You plug in vehicle and get into car or walk somewhere. No one watches the charger, he just did for video content….
Roman from TFLEV has a meltdown trying to road trip their new VW I.D. Buzz
- Thread starter AZjeff
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You plug in vehicle and get into car or walk somewhere. No one watches the charger, he just did for video content….
As a driver that grew up with air-cooled VWs (1st car at 16 was a ‘64 Beetle, later on a ‘73 Type III Squareback), the Transporter/Microbus was one of the slowest, most dangerous vehicles on the road-literally ZERO front end crash protection, possibly the most underpowered vehicle of that size made in recent history! They have been super romanticized in recent history, but those of us that had them back in the day know better!
Tesla Superchargers have nothing to look at, so there's that. Oh yeah the 250 kW cables are HEAVY!
Plugshare is great. ABRP is better for trip planning.
Plugshare has a great search flexibility for ferreting out and finding cheap or even free 50 amp connectors close to final destinations.
All good. Each to their own, right?
That's the thing though, the hotel technically didn't have chargers. They probably said they had charging available in the parking lot. They had Tesla Superchargers in their parking lot. That's quite different. As far as standard J1772 chargers that all CCS cars can use at Level 2, Tesla is aware this is the norm and includes a J1772 adapter. Anyone with an EV, especially a YouTube channel that's owned many EVs would have likely thought to ask this.
That's the problem though, it's still somewhat in its infancy when it comes to normalized charging so a little due diligence is needed.
Yep, Plugshare shows everything. I've had it on my phone for years because I thought it would come in handy when we were buying the ID.4 we never took delivery of. What's funny is with CarPlay I could view Plugshare in the GTI which didn't make a whole lot of sense, but it's definitely designed to be useful on multiple platforms.
The only times I've stuck with the vehicle is because the charge times were so fast that I didn't have time to go into the nearby restaurant. I like when they're at gas stations since I can just grab my coffee and whatever else I need while it's charging as opposed to pumping fuel and having to go in after I'm done.
edyvw
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I will say that VW should use energy in bringing Tiguan and Atlas with hybrid drivetrain, like 6 years ago.
They're definitely leaving a huge gap in the market there.
edyvw
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They have a hybrid Tiguan in Europe. So, go figure.
Yup.
The initial setup was contrived and the performance after that was what it was. Because they picked the worst time to travel in any van, much less and EV van, it was predictably awful, and the charging network was at least half of the story.
Between Roman and his kid, sometimes known as " the cameraman" they know exactly how to look up and tell what is where and know enough to not assume anything when a hotel doesn't give specifics.
It takes no more than 30 seconds per app.
Traveling in an unknown area with a CCS car practically requires 3rd party app or you end up a broken down chargers whereas the tesla onboard app tells you how many charger are open and and which ones are down at a multi charger stop. It's not perfect, but you dont need a 3rd party app to travel.
They occasionally resort to manufactured drama, not all the time they are pretty good about being balanced.
A good friend of mine in high school loved the Transporters and had a few early 70’s examples over the years. One of them had no 2nd gear and another no reverse. As you can imagine, this caused challenges!
5 of us drove from Victoria to Banff in one of the vans in the late 90’s. Luckily it was one of the ones that had 2nd gear, as it was needed to get up some of the mountain passes.
I actually owned one for a while but never had it on the road. I opened the sliding door and it fell right off. I fired it up once and drove it in a circle around the driveway…it left a giant ring of smoke all the way around.
Lots of character and we had lots of fun with them but they were terrible vehicles by most any standard. They were everywhere in Victoria well into the 2000s but it’s now rare to see them on the road.
The big problem with that is back in that time people were all in on a better, faster means of transport, the EV is not bringing anything better to the table than what we have now and IMO anyone who thinks or claims it does is either lying to themselves or lying to us IMO.
Look at this POS VW van, 70K, it gets cold and the fiasco begins, fat chance of anyone with more than 2 brain cells ever hooking up to something like that.
Even if you were right.
It happened and could have happened to anyone with an EV.
His videos are actual experiences, not fake.
Even EV proponents in here mention that people should know what use they are buying them for when something like this happens.
I read that all the time in here.
In this case a traveler with a VW EV would have had a miserable trip and would have been better if off with a large all around gasoline vehicle. Yes or no?
His videos point out EV limitations and they do exist. This helps the public make educated buying decisions.
It is rare (IF EVER) that when you pull into a gas station that you cant fill your vehicle with gas. Much the public would expect the same experience with an EV charger. Clearly this highlights this is not true for charge stations yet. Yes or No?
Was pulling up to a charger going as reliable as pulling up to a gas pump? Yes or no?
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Today I pulled up to two gas pumps 30 miles to empty(daughter car), no power and no pumps…..happens.
Seems like he made it fine after neglecting starting with full charge in AM and one down charger. Made a drama video for the worst scenario.
gasoline in much of Europe is mostly starting at $6 to over $7 dollars a gallon.
It’s always been more expensive there and why they drive around in small cars.
I know this is an EV thread, but much of the public doesn’t care about the cost of gasoline or maybe better said it’s overstated how much the public cares. we drive around in some of the most largest vehicles in the world loaded with options.
https://www.mappr.co/thematic-maps/fuel-prices-europe/
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Yes, or no, would an everyday American possibly make the same mistake? Yes, or No, did it happen?
He is not the only person who has done these road trip stories and uncovered the same issues. This is what I don’t get.
Why not just admit we have a long way to go where electric charging stations are reliable (and accessible) as all the gas pumps are across this country?
It’s just factual information nothing more but for some reason people take it personally, how can Joe public make an intelligent decision without information on a vehicle he’s about to spend as much as $70,000 on?
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