charging

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!

Dammit!!!!

~ Ken Mirvis ~ 2 Comments

I thought we were getting into the swing of this EV travel thing. Maybe; maybe not.

We did it all correctly: We had a travel distance we could manage in one charge. We had a motel lined up with a charger (the Best Western near Purdue in Lafayette, Indiana just in case you keep a file of places NOT to stay). We called the motel to be sure that the info we had was correct. (It was.) By the time we arrived in Lafayette, we had 30 miles of capacity left. No problem. We had a room with a charger all set.

The hotel guy was almost right: They did indeed have an available charger. He just neglected to tell me that it wasn’t working, and I had not asked. 

There we were: 30 miles of capacity remaining, in the middle of freaking nowhere late on Saturday afternoon. So, I called the Nissan dealer. Yes! They had a charger. The guy on the phone told me that the manager had a key so we could get a charge at no cost. Five miles later, we are down to 25 miles of capacity. My heart was pounding.

The guys at the dealership were (pardon my language) assholes. They had two high speed chargers, but we couldn’t use them. They had one Level 2 pay-for-it charger (that would require 15 hours for us to charge). Everything else was just out of their control. (They were open for two more hours then closed all day Sunday.)

They told us that the nearby Walmart with four high-speed chargers would be the right option for us. Off we went. Two of the Walmart chargers were out of commission, and the other two had long lines.

Once again, I started looking for motels with chargers. Great! There was a Residence Inn. Having learned my lesson, I called with specific questions: Yes! They had ample chargers and they worked, but they were only for Teslas. Crap! (Note to self: Spend whatever it takes to have a full array of Tesla-to-Nissan adapters!)

We had one last option: the Doubletree. I called. I asked. All was good. We went. I plugged in. It worked. We made it. We checked in: $50 more than we wanted to pay, but Mo was charged by morning.

We took a load of stuff to the room then came back out for a few more things. There was another EV, a Chevy Bolt, parked next to us … but with no available charger. I like being a nice guy, but I was not about to move for someone else. I told the desk clerk that my car will be charged at 5:00 AM. I will move it then, but not before.

All we need is more infrastructure. Please ask the incoming Trump administration for some leadership on this issue. I’d appreciate it. 

Cheap and Easy So Far … but No False Sense of Security

~ Ken Mirvis ~ 2 Comments

I hope we have not experienced a calm before the storm, but I fear we might have!

We are nearing the end of our first week on the road, and we’ve travelled about 1,000 miles. The trip has been easy, gorgeous and chill, all on back roads laced with stone walls, beautiful mountains, nifty villages, plenty of manicured farms, and, not unexpectedly, a mind-blowing number of Trump signs. 

Interestingly, the Trump signs pretty much disappeared in the 60-mile stretch between Columbus, Ohio and Dayton, Ohio. In the center of that stretch sits Springfield, Ohio, a small-ish town with a rich immigrant population that was recently made famous by both Trump and Vance for their ravings about the Haitian immigrants eating their pets. We made a point of stopping there to try to get a sense of the place; we walked around the local Kroger supermarket for a while and engaged in some friendly banter. Yes, the people are more darkly hued than in the surrounding towns, and yes, they do have accents and appear to be less well off than others, but they were all extremely nice.  Just sayin’.  Trump won the county by 30 percentage points, so the electorate was no different from other places, but the visible, in-your-face Trump-ness was absent. I have no explanation; only observations.

But this blog entry is not about politics, flags, or yard signs. It is about keeping an EV charged and running. Our first few days, I fear, provided a false sense of ease and security. Chargers were plentiful and mostly free. Our first 800 miles cost just $15 thanks to motels with free overnight charging and really nice Nissan dealers who let us plug into their high-speed chargers.  

As we move west from the comfortable “woke-ness” of the east coast, the chargers get scarcer, the distances longer, and the cost, higher.  So far, the drive has been less costly than gasoline-powered travel. Now that we are entering Indiana, though … followed by southern Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska … I expect the cost and hassle to rise, perhaps by a lot.

Up until now, we have taken the straightest possible route that follows the AAA-map dotted highways, the scenic roads. That strategy is ending. Now, our goal is just to stay charged, regardless of time, cost, and distance. Running out of juice would really suck!

And the other great uncertainty, in addition to the location of charging stations and time required to charge, is the effect of cold. The last few days have been sub-freezing. Our battery capacity has fallen from 270 miles on a charge to 240 to 210. Tomorrow, we start seeing temps in the 40s and 50s again. What will the effect be? I’ll let you know. All I know for now is that I don’t want to go more than about 120 miles without a charge.

Our totally chill, relaxing drive will either stay that way … or it won’t. Stay tuned.