Month: January 2025

Summing Things Up: A Whole Bunch of Ideas, Experiences, and Lessons Learned

~ Ken Mirvis ~ 1 Comment

For everyday driving, I cannot really imagine a better mode of travel. On the road, the cost of charging was about 3/4 the cost of gasoline ($450 versus ~$575) … and Mo does not need any oil changes. At home, the cost is about ½ the cost of gasoline. As long as the travel day is less than 200 miles, one charge is good for the day. The at-home charger works all night and is done by morning. The deal with my electric company is that as long as I don’t charge during peak demand hours – 5:00 PM to 10 PM – I get $100 a year knocked off my bill, bringing the price down a little more. On those rare days when driving distance might exceed 200 miles, like Boston to Vermont, finding a charger is pretty easy, and 30 minutes is ample for a charge of 85% capacity or more.

The at-home charging apps are totally intuitive and easy. If you pay a time-of-day rate, you just program the app to charge only when rates are at their lowest. Easy Peasy.

Here are a few things I would like to know, have available, or understand better … and few ideas I have for making the experience easier…

Charging Speed and Battery Capacity

The Ariya has a battery capacity of 87 kilowatt-hours. It is rated to get over 3 miles per kilowatt-hour. In winter, it got about 2.5. High speed chargers are generally rated at either 150 kilowatts or 350 kilowatts. That is where my practical understanding stops.

I do not understand why some vehicles seem to charge faster than others at otherwise identical chargers, and I did not experience a big difference in actual charging speeds, though I always tried to charge at 350-kW chargers. At a Walmart in Erie, PA, I watched 3 different vehicles plugged into identical chargers get charged at dramatically different rates. I don’t get it.

Also, I have been told … and many of the chargers state … that charging slows down at 85% capacity, so the charge rate from 20% to 85% is faster than the charge rate from 85% to 100%. I did not experience the slow down, though I did try to space-out charging stations so I never worried about getting that last 10%, from 90% to 100%. I was usually antsy to re-hit the road, so I quit when I knew we had ample capacity.

Finding Charging Stations and Motels

On the one hand, there is an amazing amount of information about EV charging on the web. On the other hand, it is a pain to use. Plus, the number of charging stations is changing at warp speed. Keeping up with the changes would be nearly impossible.

All of the motel chain websites plus Hotels.com, Expedia, AAA, etc. have “EV Charging Station” filters as part of their search. Too bad the lists are not always up-to-date or complete; they often have no information or incorrect information about the plug (Tesla versus other … and lazy/cheapskate me never bought the adapter), and they certainly never have information about either the working condition of the charger or the number of cars needing a charge. From my experience, all of the public chargers everywhere are on a first-come, first-serve basis, and the only control to keep things moving is idle fees. “StayN’Charge” is an app that supposedly shows motels with chargers, but it is grossly lacking in data. We learned of a fantastic motel in Omaha through it, but other than that it never lived up to its potential.

There’s a mess of resources for finding chargers. “Plug Share” is an app that consolidates information from other charging sites. It’s pretty good, but nowhere near 100%. Google Maps is also pretty good and nowhere near 100%. With Google Maps, you can ask it to find EV Chargers near a specific locale, or you plot a route and then (on the computer but not a cell phone) hit the EV Charger filter. With a little more digging, you can learn the charging speed (Level 2 or High Speed), the charging capacity (150 kW or 350 kW), and the connector (CCS vs CHAdeMO vs Tesla). No doubt, these resources will improve over time.

Each of the chargers is operated by an independent business. (Think “Shell,” “Exxon,” “Mobil,” etc.). So, on my phone, I have apps for “EVGo,” “Chargepoint,” “Vialynk,” “ChargeHubEV,” “Flo,” “ChargeFinder,” “EVConnect,” “Envirospark,” “CircleKCharge,” “ShellRecharge,” and “BlinkCharging.” They are terrible for locating chargers, but once at a charger, they either make the charging easier or possible, and after-the-fact, they provide a great paper trail of where you charged, how much electricity you used, and the cost. For some, you need a credit card only and no account; for others, you need an account and payment method, so you charge with the swipe of a QR code. They are all different, so once again, patience!

In Ohio, we ran into a weird problem finding chargers. The chargers we found on the map were at dedicated service plazas on the Interstate, but the map did not tell us that, and we stay off of Interstates. We arrived at the back side of a Service Plaza; we could see it, but we couldn’t get into it. We had to drive 20+ miles out of the way to get onto the Interstate and then to the Plaza. Fortunately, we had learned our lesson about letting the capacity get too low, so we had plenty of battery for the wild goose chase. It was a non-event.

A Vision of the Future: Battery Swapping

I expect we will have a pretty robust infrastructure of charging stations in the coming years. But I also expect that battery capacity and vehicle range will increase dramatically too. With increased capacity and range, charging times will take longer and longer, and with more widespread adoption of EVs, lines will become longer and more frustrating. 

My hope is that a new industry will successfully emerge. Think propane tanks! Back in the day, everyone with a gas grill had to find a re-filling station for the propane tank. Then miraculously, a decade or two ago, tank exchanges popped up everywhere. The tanks are all uniform and meet a strict standard of safety. Users drop off an old tank and pick up a new one. Tank ownership becomes blurry. (Users own a tank, but not necessarily the tank they are using.) The whole process is as easy as buying a quart of milk. 

The same deal is happening with EV batteries … successfully in China, and as a start-up in the Bay Area. When it’s time for a re-juicing, you pull into a robotic battery center, the robot slides the battery pack from your car and installs a fresh, fully charged one. The provider recharges your old battery so it’s ready for re-use. You drive out fully charged in less time than it takes to fill a tank with gas. Get to work you entrepreneurs. Time is of the essence!!

Ease of Handling the Cables

EV chargers look like gas pumps, and the electrical cable looks a lot like the hose on a gas pump. But don’t be fooled. Those cables are filled with conductive wire. They are heavy and stiff, especially in the cold. And the plugs themselves are not forgiving. They must be lined up perfectly to attach to the car. In the blowing cold, hooking up the charger is really hard work. Over time, I expect to see increasingly lighter weight and more flexible materials, so the act of getting a charge does not require as much brawn.

Location of Charging Ports

Mo’s charging port is on the right side, just in front of the passenger door. If I don’t pull up to a charger perfectly, the cable will not reach, and I cannot plug in. If there are multiple cars using chargers, I may not be able to maneuver the car so the cable fits. Charging ports on other cars are everywhere: left, right, front, and back. If manufacturers put them in similar places, it’d be a lot easier to design chargers that will work on all cars.

It’s time to bury the Westinghouse / Edison hatchet. Make this stuff uniform so we can all enjoy the benefits of going EV without fighting the hubris of infantile design engineers!

Starting to Fall in Love After a Rough Start

~ Ken Mirvis ~ 2 Comments

Lipton introduced canned iced tea to the world in 1972. I was in grad school in Georgia (a place where we know a thing or two about iced tea). It was a foul swill that bore no resemblance to actual iced tea. Then, a friend offered a new perspective. “Stop thinking of it as iced tea,” he said. “If you just think of it as a canned drink, it’s not bad. It’s only bad if you think it should taste like iced tea.”

The experience of driving 4,200 rural, back-road miles in an EV followed a similar trajectory. 

At first, I leaned into an early life of road tripping experience: Get in the car in the morning; drive til you need gas; fill up; keep driving; make pit stops only when necessary; buy easy-to-eat-in-the-car road grub; drive til you’re tired; sleep a few hours; repeat. You could cover a lot of miles that way, and if the few hours of sleep included camping, you could even have some really good fun.

Then aging set in. Children in the car required more stops and less marathon driving. Retirement brought a new freedom: The journey became the priority instead of the destination.

Then we dared to change machines, from internal combustion to electric, at a time when we knew the infrastructure for on-the-road charging was still nascent.

The first week or so was overwhelming. Would we find the chargers we needed? Would we wait for hours while a Level 2 charger juiced us up? Would we have to spend days waiting for a charge on a 110-volt circuit? (I brought a 100-foot extension cord along just in case.)

Very quickly, we learned that the mileage capacity that showed on the dash at 100% had little or nothing to do with reality. We also learned that the 272-mile range the Ariya was supposed to have was fiction … and that the stories we had read of high speed, mountains, and cold weather affecting performance were totally true. (According to the car’s computer, our lowest range at 100% capacity was 191 miles; our highest was 246. Actual experience might have been even more variable. I expect to see well over 300 in summer.)

Two experiences taught us the importance of being conservative and careful. The first was our very first road trip when we left Albany, NY with what appeared to be 100 miles of extra capacity (a seemingly comfortable cushion) and drove north through the Adirondack Mountains at Interstate speeds of 80-ish on a very cold evening. By the time we reached our Grand Isle, Vermont destination, that 100 miles of extra capacity had miraculously become 20 miles. We made it, but I was neither happy nor chill.

The second was on our journey west in Lafayette, Indiana late on a Saturday afternoon. Wisely or not, I had made the assumption that college towns would be more likely have chargers than other places. I still have no idea if that assumption is totally true. The best bet for finding a high-speed charger is a place with a bunch of car dealerships … but dealer-provided juice might cost an arm and a leg.

In Lafayette, we had reserved a room at a motel with a charger, so we didn’t worry when our capacity started to get low. By the time we arrived, we had 50 miles of range remaining. When I made the reservation at The Best Western, I had asked the clerk every question I could think of, but silly me had neglected to ask one more essential question: Did their charger work! The clerk was utterly non-plussed when we asked. “Yes,” he said, “we have a charger. But it is not working right now.” Lesson learned. Take nothing for granted. 

So I called the local Nissan dealer. The nice guy on the phone assured me they had a high-speed charger we could use. It not only worked fine, he said, but the guys at the dealership would provide the charge for free. But the guy on the phone was not the guy at the dealership … and the guys at the dealership were jerks. Their high-speed charger, we were told, was for their cars only. We could use their Level 2 charger for the 2 hours they were still open, which might get us 20 miles, but then we were on our own until Monday. Like I said, take nothing for granted.

Fortunately, we found a Doubletree with a free Level-2 working charger. We paid more than we wanted for the room, but left in the morning well rested and with a full charge.

Lesson: Plan to charge with at least 100 miles of range remaining. Misinformation, broken chargers, and long waiting lines (especially at Walmart chargers) are commonplace.

By this point in the trip, I had reached a nadir: Road tripping in an EV sucks, and I never want to do it again. I told my family back east that the experience had earned an “F,” and it would be a while before we tried a stunt like this again.

From the Depths

That is when the attitude shift started to set in … when, like with the Lipton canned iced tea, I stopped thinking of this experience as just another road trip, but rather as a road trip in an EV, with its own pace of travel and its own opportunity for really fun, cool experiences. I have come to embrace EV travel. I never did learn to like bottled iced tea.

The trip home in Mo was slower than I had anticipated, and it required a lot more planning and flexibility, but the experience was well worth it. Plus, we gave ourselves some time to just have fun. We dawdled before leaving Omaha, enjoyed an afternoon along the Mississippi, spent a full day at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and hung with really good friends in Syracuse.

Wintertime is assuredly the wrong time of year to learn the EV ropes. The days are short, and the battery life stinks. Plus, we are slow-moving old folk who had a hard time hitting the road before 9:00, who wanted to stop before dark (just because), and who wanted to avoid Interstates (because we love the quiet, beautiful, truck-less solitude of back-road driving). Speed was not a priority.

In summer, with warm temps and lots of daylight, I expect to be able to cover 600 miles a day. On this trip, with our traveling days limited to 7-ish hours (9-4), average speeds of about 50, and 2 charging stops, we aimed for about 250 slow, leisurely miles, and we succeeded. The rhythm of the day became a fun part of the trip. Planning the route around reliable chargers … which required a lot of apps and phone calls (to be sure they were available and working) … and motels with chargers (usually free Level 2 that take all night to charge) became a daily ritual.

Is it like driving a gas-powered car? Yes and no. You still climb into a car, start it, put it in drive, punch the accelerator, and cuss at the horrible, rude drivers or cut you off, speed and weave, tailgate, or don’t let you change lanes. But it is also the smoothest, quietest ride I have ever imagined. The acceleration is from a different planet. The internal climate control (because it does not depend on heat from the engine) is totally comfortable all the time … and it is easy to heat the seats, steering wheel, and back seats. Most importantly, in 4,200 miles, we did not burn a single drop of gasoline!

My jury is still out on long, destination-focused road trips.  But for everyday driving, there is no choice: The EV wins hands down.

Near the Halfway Point

~ Ken Mirvis ~ 1 Comment

By the time we made it to Kearney, Nebraska and Granddaughter Ella’s senior art show, we had driven about 2,000 miles.

Planning the trip west was exciting. We had no idea if it could be done or how much hassle it would be. We had no clue how the cost would compare to gasoline. 

By Kearney, we knew some of the answers: Yes, it could be done. Driving an EV through the rural Midwest and high plains is a hassle. We won’t know the cost until the trip is complete.

Unlike past trips, we could not just take whatever route we wanted. We had to study maps and apps and find day-time routes with high-speed chargers spaced at roughly 100-mile intervals. We had to work to find motels with Level 2 chargers, so we could charge overnight, hopefully – but not always – for free.

We could not haul ass. In past trips, we had to stop for two things: peeing and getting gas, both of which take 5 or 10 minutes. Peeing happens in roughly 2-hour intervals; gassing up in roughly 4-hour intervals. With the EV, peeing and needing to charge happen at roughly the same 2-hour interval. Peeing still requires just a few minutes, but charging takes 30 minutes or more … unless you have to wait for a charger, which fortunately happened rarely. We had to spend roughly 25% of our time charging. That down time provided a perfect opportunity to confirm or pinpoint our next charging destination, and if we were lucky, get in a half game of cribbage. We could make a beeline between chargers, but not between points, and stopping at motels with a charger might take us 10 or 20 miles out of the way, so we could not possibly minimize the miles we had to drive.

That is exactly the work and hassle we had anticipated. It changed the fabric of road tripping. It was hard and somewhat frustrating, but we learned that EV travel can be done.

In Kearney, I wondered why we had ever embarked on such a whacko adventure. By the time we re-crossed the Mississippi, I had a much better idea of the answers and had become a convert. Except for the rare I-gotta-get-there car trips, EVs it will be!