EVs on Long Road Trips

[Patman]

Most of the long road trips I have ever taken involve stopping every 3-4 hours and spending 20-30 minutes using the restroom, eating, stretching my legs, etc. So I could easily travel with an EV and nothing would really change in terms of the actual travel time that it takes.

 

[Brons2]

With the 2022 Mach e, we dont go far. I limit the excursions to under 300km round trip. I've seen the range drop at a geometric rate, leaving me with range anxiety. As well, the rural areas do not have the infrastructure to support ev travel. I'm not waiting an hour or more to fill the battery, my time is worth something.

The big deal breaker for me is the many apps, cards or accounts needed. I want to roll up, pay cash or debit to get a charge. I am tired of the complexity in life. I want to roll up, give a 20$ and say top it up.

A coworker has an ev, thinking Hyundai. He has, close to 7 different apps and accounts for it.

Ford has plug and charge that works on multiple charging networks. One can take that approach if they want to.

I personally prefer to use the apps, because when we go to South Padre, I will sign up for the Tesla membership and I don't want it trying to charge itself through Ford, which will invalidate my discount.

But if you want super easy, it's there, no cell service or even a wallet required, you just sign up before leaving home and you don't have to even carry any payment method with you.

 

[buster]

Most of the long road trips I have ever taken involve stopping every 3-4 hours and spending 20-30 minutes using the restroom, eating, stretching my legs, etc. So I could easily travel with an EV and nothing would really change in terms of the actual travel time that it takes.

Same. I can't drive more than 2-3 hours before having to stretch. It's not healthy to sit for long periods of time anyway.

 

[melk]

New Mexico regularly has lower low temperatures than Maine.

Disclaimer: “For entertainment purposes only”

Not to be THAT GUY - because it’s not a contest, but I’m a stickler for details and the beauty of data is that it is impartial.

In any case both places get friggen cold bub!

 

[AuthorEditor]

And it matters a lot where you live in each state. Coastal southern Maine tends to be warmer than inland northern Maine. But, the point remains that extreme cold in any state is bad for EV range and must be taken into consideration. Plus you've gotta heat the car or you freeze, use more headlights with the lack of daylight, and keep the battery warmed at night. All use power.

 

[Astro_Guy]

The Tesla adapter "saved us"?? what kind of nonsense is that?

It's actually a valid point although it was made in an overly dramatic way. I drive a PHEV that accepts the common J-1772 input. The summer before last we took a trip to Virginia with a planned lunch stop in Shepherdstown, WV. We knew in advance that there were both J-1772 and Tesla destination chargers at that location. When we arrived one J-1772 port was in use, a second was non-operational and four Tesla stations were sitting idle. A few hours later we arrived at a B&B in Afton, VA and what did we find? A charging station. I pulled up, reached for the plug and what did I find? It was a Tesla destination charger format. So immediately after that I dropped the hint that Father's Day was coming up and what Dad really needed was a Tesla to J-1772 adapter. That adapter is in the glove box and goes wherever we go. It gets used frequently.

So now one can find Level 2 charging stations with either the J-1772 or Tesla desitation format and Level 3 fast DC chargers with the CCS1 or NACS format. Adapters are an unfortunate necessity for long EV road trips.

 

[TdiBoy]

At the end of the day what you don't know you don't know, and with never doing it yourself, you just don't know.

I don't mean that as an insult, it's just more of a mental block than reality. If it was that big of an issue I would have been stranded multiple times traveling multiple states. There's no hassles. If you're using GPS which most people use when they don't know where they're going it does the math and tells you where to charge. With FSD you don't even have to touch the wheel for any of it. It'll perfectly park it at the charger when you need to stop.

I'm still amazed at the amount of EV haters that post here to tell of their non experience of why they won't ever own an EV. Thanks for the laugh.

I bought a 2015 VW e-Golf SEL, fully loaded, during dieselgate in Oct of 2015. Kept it 8.5 years, put 34k miles on it, almost all city miles. Did a very, very long day going to and from San Diego back to L.A. in it. Spent way too much time recharging that battery and being tethered, and going nowhere. Sold it for $9500 in Spring of 2024.

I will not buy another EV. Too big a waste of time, and too much loss of range, even doing level 2 charging 99.5% of the time. Not worth it even at 6.3 miles per kW and paying 18 cents per kW. The depreciation is astronomical. New batteries aren't available.

I will hold on to my 2 VW TDi's, both good for 700-800 miles on a fill up with D2, and my BMW motorcycles, instead. The GS model is good for about 220 miles on 4.8 gallons and the RT is good for 300- 350 on 6 to 6.5 gallons. 7 minute fillups, with removing gloves, credit card out, use the pump, gloves on and go. I won't be looking at an electric until the fill up times, battery or gas tank, become close to equal again. Currently, nothing else matches the amount of energy stored per weight of the energy and what it's stored in, compared to petroleum products. The older I get, it feels like the less time I have to wait around.

 

[Brons2]

I bought a 2015 VW e-Golf SEL, fully loaded, during dieselgate in Oct of 2015. Kept it 8.5 years, put 34k miles on it, almost all city miles. Did a very, very long day going to and from San Diego back to L.A. in it. Spent way too much time recharging that battery and being tethered, and going nowhere. Sold it for $9500 in Spring of 2024.

I will not buy another EV. Too big a waste of time, and too much loss of range, even doing level 2 charging 99.5% of the time. Not worth it even at 6.3 miles per kW and paying 18 cents per kW. The depreciation is astronomical. New batteries aren't available.

I will hold on to my 2 VW TDi's, both good for 700-800 miles on a fill up with D2, and my BMW motorcycles, instead. The GS model is good for about 220 miles on 4.8 gallons and the RT is good for 300- 350 on 6 to 6.5 gallons. 7 minute fillups, with removing gloves, credit card out, use the pump, gloves on and go. I won't be looking at an electric until the fill up times, battery or gas tank, become close to equal again. Currently, nothing else matches the amount of energy stored per weight of the energy and what it's stored in, compared to petroleum products. The older I get, it feels like the less time I have to wait around.

The e-Golf is not much of a comparison to modern EVs. Did it even have 100 miles of range? I don't doubt you had issues.

The soundtrack of a diesel would never be acceptable to my wife, and after owning 2 EVs, I'm pretty much over all the ICE maintenance. Not to mention, my arse does not have 700-800 miles of range.

To each his own, I guess.

 

[Torrid]

I bought a 2015 VW e-Golf SEL, fully loaded, during dieselgate in Oct of 2015. Kept it 8.5 years, put 34k miles on it, almost all city miles. Did a very, very long day going to and from San Diego back to L.A. in it. Spent way too much time recharging that battery and being tethered, and going nowhere. Sold it for $9500 in Spring of 2024.

I will not buy another EV. Too big a waste of time, and too much loss of range, even doing level 2 charging 99.5% of the time. Not worth it even at 6.3 miles per kW and paying 18 cents per kW. The depreciation is astronomical. New batteries aren't available.

I will hold on to my 2 VW TDi's, both good for 700-800 miles on a fill up with D2, and my BMW motorcycles, instead. The GS model is good for about 220 miles on 4.8 gallons and the RT is good for 300- 350 on 6 to 6.5 gallons. 7 minute fillups, with removing gloves, credit card out, use the pump, gloves on and go. I won't be looking at an electric until the fill up times, battery or gas tank, become close to equal again. Currently, nothing else matches the amount of energy stored per weight of the energy and what it's stored in, compared to petroleum products. The older I get, it feels like the less time I have to wait around.

The e-Golf is the definition of a city car and is wildly different than a long range vehicle with DC charging.

I get that the e-Golf wasn't best for you, but I literally only own EVs and multi state travel regularly with both of them.

 

[TdiBoy]

The e-Golf is not much of a comparison to modern EVs. Did it even have 100 miles of range? I don't doubt you had issues.

The soundtrack of a diesel would never be acceptable to my wife, and after owning 2 EVs, I'm pretty much over all the ICE maintenance. Not to mention, my arse does not have 700-800 miles of range.

To each his own, I guess.

131 miles range around town, when new. 91 miles when I sold it in Spring of 2023 with 34k miles on it. I buy German cars and bikes because at 6'5" I still fit in them comfortably, when seat is back at the limit. Not so with American or Japanese vehicles. It was a very efficient car, seeing 6.1 to 6.6 miles per kW on surface streets in stop and go. Maybe 4.5 miles / kW doing 55 on the freeway and pissing everyone else off doing so and trying not to drain the battery to the next recharging location. Recharging locations on the road were always sh*tty compared to gas station locations to fill up with diesel. Then there were incidents of being ICE'ed out of charging parking spots, or idiots that had fully charged cars and were nowhere to be found while not charging and still trying up a charging EVSE location. Another frustration was thieves that cut the EVSE cables just for the copper content for scrap, in the handle and wiring, disabling the EVSE charger for weeks or months.

 

[Legs4Arms]

To the OP, EV for the 95% of the driving you do that's well suited to it.

Rental car for road trips?