First Long(ish) Trip

Very good question. I feel like this strategy might work better, since the chargers are just off the highway and I literally only stopped for 20-30 minutes (unless there is issues). So it feels like a bathroom break, a drink and you're back on the road. But it would certainly be an interesting comparison to actually prove.

 

I think it depends on how you would drive in a gas car. If you would normally be making multiple stops for restroom breaks, food breaks, etc., More charging breaks may make more sense, otherwise longer breaks, but fewer may make more sense.

 

We will be doing our first long drive about (170 miles) from San Jose to Hanford, CA in a couple of weeks. I think we can probably make it the whole way without any charging, but may stop to do a little DC fast charge somewhere in between if we can find a good fast charger.

What apps do you guys use for doing long road trips? Right now I just have the Chargepoint app.

 

Essential apps are: PlugShare and A Better Trip Planner

The second one can tell you how far you can make it. If you start with at least a 90% charge, you should make it with no need to charge.

 

I haven't done enough long distance driving to feel a need for A Better Trip Planner, but when I drove from San Francisco to Monterey to spend a few days in August (117 miles each way, plus maybe 125 miles of driving while there), PlugShare guided me to enough free charging that I never had to pay.

 

It is really good for "What if" type of planning that you might do just as a fun thought exercise. "What if I drove to ZZZ to visit YYYY".

When I first got the Kona, I stopped at numerous chargers, not so much because I needed a charge, but just to get a feel for how the thing worked, see whether it worked, etc, etc.

One time last winter I stopped at a charger, not so much because I needed a charge, but because I could only make it to the destination if the heat was off, and I was hoping to pick up some juice so I could ride in comfort. Unfortunately the charger had a single plug and it was busy, so I just continued on my way. I subsequently bought a blanket that I could put in my lap as that's going to be a way more reliable source of warmth. I don't quite get why it is the case, but I frequently found that one charger to be busy very early in the morning, so as far as I am concerned that charger isn't something I can ever depend on.

 

Despite having all the notification turned off bluelink insists religiously telling me my doors are unlocked. Its quite annoying as sometime I am fine with them being unlocked. Currently my car is still at the dealers and its been completely excommunicado for the past 7 days. I am hoping they just unplugged the battery and not just let the new 12V battery go flat. With my luck its the latter.

 

What do you mean your car is at the dealer for 7 days? You scare me! I never had a car at the dealer overnight for 20 years (Nissan Sentra).
Should I have just stayed with a Toyota? Five Toyotas and the Mitsubishi iMiEV later this scares me.

Yes, the BluLink "doors are unlocked" messages are very annoying. Sometimes I would swear the doors are closed - but so fat I was too lazy to check. My wife and I always close the doors - religiously.

 

Sadly its been sitting in my dealer's car lot for the past 21 days, waiting for a new motor wiring harness. They messed up a connector during my motor swap in August which consequentially lead to a persistent no start condition.

 

And mine has been at the dealer 5 weeks. Apparently needs a new HV battery, which is on backorder.

 

Here are some thoughts and experience after our first 'long' trip with our Kona.

We are experienced EV owners, my wife owned Mitsubishi iMiEV for six years we and loved it. We 'down traded' the Mits and my Prius for the Kona. It is quite a change from the 100 km range of the Mits. Range anxiety only kicks in when you are far from home.
We made our first "far from our home charger" trip this week, over 500km. This gave me the opportunity to test the world of L3 chargers.

This is what I learned:
1. It is an absolutely crazy requirement from the charge networks to make you a "member" - or you will pay a surcharge. The flo network charges $15 for plastic 'membership' (debit) card which needs to be loaded with funds. This is outright crazy! Imagine buying gas at Esso/Exxon/Shell only by their own credit cards? It is so 1960.

There supposed to be an "interworking" agreement between flo and ChargePoint, so each would accept the other membership card. I have a ChargePoint card from the iMiEV days and tried it at a flo charger yesterday, it did not work.

2. The chargers often do not work. In our case both the GreenLots and the IVY networks failed. The operators of both were very nice, professional and polite but "I am sorry" will not get you too far with an empty battery. They tried every procedure in their books, even rebooting the stations did not work.

- Worst of all Greenlots hit my Visa instantly with a $60 'credit hold' and $27.08 (I think both are in US$) even though I did not get a single kWh of juice. After I complained the operator promised instant correction. Three days later the $60 was gone. The $27.08 also disappeared yesterday. It was sorted out but who needs this hassle?

3. Petro Canada's L3 DC chargers came to the rescue. They work and you can use any credit card just like buying stinky gas or diesel. One issue I found that the HV cables were quite short. The heavy duty CCS cables are hanging on the left side (facing the charger). The Kona's charge access door is also left from the center of the car. So it was a tight fit but it worked. Perhaps I could have moved the car 5 to 10 cm - a "couple of inches" - closer to the forbidding yellow cement bollards, but I did not wan to take the chance with a new car.
Petro Canada also encourages you to "down load the app" but it is not needed unless you want a recipt sent to your email. Note that for now there is no way to collect Petro Points by buying electric power.
The Petro Can charger had a 175kWh output - lot's of juice. (Rem. Kona's max DC charge rate is 75kWh.) "Sparky" started taking 73kWh but quickly dropped and stayed around 54-55kWh till the SOC reached 80%. The weather was absolutely ideal for the trip 18 - 22C.

4. We should lobby our governments to force all charge networks to read and accept credit/debit cards by law. This "membership" nonsense has to stop. Also, charge networks should be forced by law to charge by kWh sold, not by connected time.

Newbies take note: never let your HV battery's SOC go too low to reach an other L3 station. Being on a long trip charging at L2 for hours is not really convenient, unless it is planned into your trip - i.e. overnight stay.

Last but not least, I must say that both 'Lady Lead-foot' and I found the Kona fun to drive and the seats very comfy, even on a long drive. Nice job Hyundai. As for efficiency; at 14,500km on the ODO the computer tells me the average power consumption is at 14.2 kWh/100km. Canadian Government says 16.8 kWh/100km for the Kona E - so I am not complaining. But "winter is coming".

My only beefs with the car are the lack of proper trip meters and a cargo net-packet behind the rear door to keep (light) stuff from moving back and forth. Most cars have A and B trips, individually resettable at your leisure. Hyundai's auto reset of the trip meter after 4 hours idle is nuts.

Cheers

 

I think I saw in the paper that they Hyundai sold 100,000 of them. I hope I did not buy a very pricey 'Pinto'.

 

We just did a long trip where we had to stop over night at a camp ground because of missing charging infrastructure:

 

I just got an email from Petro Can. The message is "stay tuned", you will get your coffee. New service, needs time to integrate. This makes sense. Also the their app, like all chargenet apps, needs data connection. This irks me. Firts, data is very pricey and sometimes you just don't have any!

 

Huh? Data is cheap and unlimited these days, at least here in the US.

 

Well, we you travel in the desert that is what you get - lol. Hope you had water! I am looming at a trip, visiting relatives in Ontario about 145km, 300 round. Should do it OK, but add some local travel it gets dicey. Add that cooler weather is coming, so I started some route planning. Guess what I found a L3 dessert in Ontario! Found a way to do it, but I had to put my thinking hat on. Have to convince my brother in law to put an L2 outlet in his garage. I guess if I tell him that it wilk increase the value of his house he will consider it.

 

Yes, and in most of the free world. But not in Canada. At least we are free.

 

You can always use the granny charger on a 220V dryer outlet. At least mine works with it. I don't know if all do, so proceed with caution. I'm not taking any responsibility if you break something.

 

This is why I got a MUSTART cable with a dryer adapter, means I can essentially have a Level 2 (or close to it) anywhere there is a dryer hookup.

But really, if you are staying overnight, you should be fine charging with the trickle charger overnight with that distance.

Not to mention depending o where you are there are likely multiple Quick Charging stations along your route. There are a lot of stations around the Ontario area according to PlugShare. Heck, there are even ten quick charging stations in Baker, CA which has nothing but a few places to trap tourists into overspending for gas and food.