C2C - Supercharging on a Distance Trip.

The only way to really understand the size of the USA is to drive. Even after a Coast to Coast and back trip I'm not really there - after all Alaska would probably double such a trip.

Still to review:

6370 Miles + 440 Mile Wilmington NC leg = 6810 miles sea to sea and back home.

Now considering the 300 miles were off the home charger, that meant 6,500 miles were Supercharged at 45 SC stops across the country. Sometimes my planning worked well - other times not so much.  April was still cold over much of the country so often I would be force to add a final SC stop knowing the battery would be cold overnight and wake up considerably lower than I stopped with.

This could be the reason 151.4 = 6810 / 45 stops.  Given I had two 120 plugins - one KOA and Texas, plus a 240 charge worth 80 miles or so I'd say we can call this 150 miles average. I think that's because I often choose to make two 15 min stops topping around 55-60% rather than a single full charge taking 55-1 Hr 10 minutes.

The final part of the charging puzzle I just couldn't find on the fly. Destination charging. This would have been a big help. When you pull out the driveway at 300miles+ in the battery it really opens up the options and cuts back on the extra SC stops. One medium 45 minute stop places you at 500 miles for the day and then another Destination Charger means you can do it all again. Planning with a Better Route Planner or staying at different places would have helped here.

I was also pushing hard on daily distance on my starting days to cut cost.  If I had a little extra cash I might not have done that - saving wear and tear on my sixty year old self.  My first return day started at 8:30am and ended at 11pm.  Admittedly part of this was because of large sections of road that were 30-40 mph for whole morning. I picked a beautiful mountain and lake route but it cost in time.

So while SC fueling is not more convenient than gas it's getting close. With Destination Charging at hotels it could be about the same.  Day to day though with a home charger it beats gas hands down as normally one never stops with 300 miles of range any morning you wake up.

Happy EV motoring!

                                                

C2C - Vacation objectives

The view from the vacation EV office - not too shabby.

So first I wanted to first hold the vacation costs to about $2,000.  Normally I'd consider more but as a Tesla Model 3 owner still paying off his car and retiree I had to go modest.  Next I wanted to do an EV Coast to Coast trip to showcase the Model 3 as practical option to tour cross country with Tesla's very good Super Charger network.

Next since I had three cheap nights reserved at the Elara in Vegas for $200 (timeshare pitch), I wanted to see a couple shows - I picked Penn & Teller because I'm a fan and there are some illusions they only do in Vegas and the 'Love' cirque show because - well I'm an old guy who likes the Beatles. The Elara gave me a really nice suite with great views so that was a luxury highlight.

On the EV (Electric Vehicle) side I wanted to go to the Tesla Fremont factory where my car was assembled. Any Tesla owner can reserve this tour once a year and bring three guests. I was traveling alone as that is my situation but this tour costs nothing at present and would be great with a group.

Next I wanted to drive the Tesla on PCH (Pacific Coast Highway 1). That objective would be accomplished and more, as you have seen in the articles photograph and more to come.

Another objective: I hoped to drop in on friends along the way - which worked in one case and made my Texas stay a lot of fun. More would have been great but Texas was awesome.

Finally - Could I actually car camp to keep expenses down? This was mixed for me so we will cover it in depth but the short version is it can work. How about the mount of driving required?

Next C2C blog entry tomorrow, first another view from the office