A Really Big Trip

thank you.

 

I'm happy to hear that EA worked well for you. I had good luck last week when I tried an EA station last week as well. Hopefully, all of the issues we've experienced previously have just been teething pains and they're getting their act together. It will be great to have another charging network in the USA.

Also good to hear you're actually getting fast charging on your Kona when the charger can provide it.

 

I hadn't heard of EVConnect before either and this thread seems about the first where they've
been constructively discussed at all, but I reached their support department and "Alex" there
says it's possible to set up an account / payment record via their website and get an RFID
"keyfob" to use at their chargers. He provided https://ops.evconnect.com/driver-portal/login
as a starting point, which I haven't really pursued yet.

They work on the Chargepoint model: the property/site owner sets the rates and presumably
takes a share of revenue, unless they offer it for free, and EVconnect manages the network.

So I guess I'll add another RFID-thingie to my fistful thereof, because while said fistful is
indeed a sad statement about the state of the industry that should be so much farther along
and more integrated by now, RFIDs are actually way more comvenient than apps/websites
and should work even if I'm out of cell range. EA really screwed the pooch in that regard.

_H*

 

If I can offer a suggestion to help you increase your overall trip speed:
Just as with NASCAR, "Splash and Dash" is the mantra for EV road trips. This means that the lower state of charge you can arrive at a charging station, the faster you'll get to your destination. You then only charge until you have enough to make it to another reasonable charger or as long as you are still charging at a high rate. Once your charging slows to some point, if you can make it to another charger, you might as well get back on the road and keep moving toward your destination.
Clearly, it takes experience and I don't know that other manufacturers offer the same convenient tools that Tesla offers to make this easy and more comfortable to do. The real-time Trip Energy graph (below) is particularly helpful since it shows how you are actually doing based on actual conditions (mostly affected by speed and wind) and how that will affect your state of charge at your destination.
Doing these calculations in your head while driving, knowing only your GoM ("Guess o Meter) range estimate, distance to destination, possibly with an elevation plot, while I've done them, is probably beyond many and definitely is not "easy driving" for anyone.
When you can, however, if you only charge enough to arrive at the next charger with less than ~10% SoC, you'll get much further, faster. It takes experience to do so without inducing too much anxiety, however, so I'm not suggesting you do this. But you can.

 

Here is the aforementioned trip energy graph provided in Tesla cars that helps allay range anxiety while improving overall trip speed:

 

You're right - I misspoke earlier when I said that the per kWh stations were cheaper. It's the per-minute ones. I guess that's because we're able to charge at the higher end of their 0-90kWh bracket? It's crazy to me how inexpensive these per-minute stations are (not that I'm complaining!). $0.12/minute with Pass+.
My wife just charged from 30-70% (34kWh) for $3.90!!! That's about $2 less than it would have cost me to pay for the same charge in my own garage!

When she gets into NY state that same charge will cost about $11. Kind of a strange situation we're in at the moment with the same brand gas stations in neighboring states charging 2.5x more for the same amount of fuel. I guess it'll make more sense in the end to pay for the number of electrons, and not the amount of time, but until then the savings are remarkable.

 

I've had a couple of people try playing the who's greener game with me too. I just tell them that I don't care about the environment and that I only drive an EV (PHEV in my case) because it saves money. When I tell them what my net cost was on the car and that my average driving cost is 3 cents a mile, they usually look pretty stunned.

 

They can also look stunned when you walk them thru the chain of events required to eventuallyhave gasoline/diesel magically flow out of the pump they are using...

 

I'm in the San Francisco Bay Area and I am planning a trip in my Kona at the end of June to Crescent City then up the Oregon coast about half way, then east to I-5 and returning home. I feel safe with charging capacity going up the coast but once in Oregon things turn sketchy as far as DC fast charging goes. In Oregon there is another network of chargers - Webasto - that you have to join or use the PlugShare app. On top of that, it looks like a lot of the Webasto stations only have CHADeMO plugs for DC fast charging!! There are a few ChargePoint DC stations at Fred Meyer stores but they are very low power and user comments on PlugShare indicate frequent downtime. I don't mean this to be a rant but if anyone else has made a similar trip I would appreciate some words of wisdom. Thanks

 

I have been to Oregon a couple of times but not along the coast. I have used the EA in Grants Pass with no issues. I have used one Webasto charger and was able to pay through PlugShare with out joining Webasto. You are correct that DCFC is only Chademo or a level 2 j1772, no ccs. I usually charge at relatives house over night but if you are not visiting friend or family you can still charge overnight with Level 2 or at campgrounds. I also have a J 1772 to Tesla destination charger adaptor which works well. There are a lot of them along the cost at inns where you could charge overnight.

 

Second greatest Governor in the country!!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Hi. I am wondering which J 1772 to Tesla adaptor you have? I know there are several out there but prefer to know of one that works well.

 

Here is the link to the one I bought off of amazon.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B08HGC4618/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The only thing I would note was that with this adapter I could not use the medium or low amp setting in the car It was always at the 32 amp setting regardless of the settings on the car screen. This wasn't a problem more of a quirk. I don't know if this happens with all adapters or just this one. My guess is it would be all of them and it has more to do with communication to the Tesla EVSE than the adapter.

 

thank you for this information. I see it is not compatible with superchargers? So how long did it take you to charge on a regular Tesla charger?