Hybrid charging woes - need help / suggestions

Schizophonic

Schizophonic

Schizophonic

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Joined
27 Dec 2006
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Northampton
Recently I went to a trip to Poole in my C300e. It was a 110 mile trip each way and my car managed to survive half way down there using EV mode only. I know this was gonna happen but on my day going home I thought I would want to get some charge from a public charger somewhere.

I found a 22kw charger in an ASDA parking station and that failed to work correctly, I then began to search for chargers near by and struggled and failed badly. What do people do with electric cars do to charge effectively? Do they just find the nearest charger (whatever output range) and get their car charged up? I was trying to search for 22kw as it was the fastest my car accepts on the type2. Also when going to service stations they don't have type 2 chargers. Are their suitable adapters or am I not going to find one at a service station?
 
Also what apps do you find which you can use to have a route planned and tell you EV chargers along the way? I know Google Maps / Wazes can do something but it wasn't as straight forward in my opinion I used it.
 
Surely the whole point of running a hybrid is that you don't have to trouble yourself with public charging?

I mean, fair play for wanting to reduce fuel use but it's a headache you don't need. Plus at some point you're likely to upset an EV driver who "needs" that charger.
 
I used to charge my 330e regularly when electricity was cheap, it basically allowed me to get 63mpg that. without charging, I still get a respectable 48mpg, not bad for a ~280bhp car thats a tax fiddle in reality:p
 
Schizophonic said:
I found a 22kw charger in an ASDA parking station and that failed to work correctly, I then began to search for chargers near by and struggled and failed badly. What do people do with electric cars do to charge effectively? Do they just find the nearest charger (whatever output range) and get their car charged up? I was trying to search for 22kw as it was the fastest my car accepts on the type2. Also when going to service stations they don't have type 2 chargers. Are their suitable adapters or am I not going to find one at a service station?
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You are not on your own with that experience. By all accounts, it's a problem for everybody who uses public charging, which is why many recommend you only get a pure EV if you have a home charger and don't have to rely on public charging infrastructure that often. Finding outlets that are out of use - say they're free when they're not, or not delivering the speeds they say they do are all par for the course.

That's why you get a hybrid - so on long journeys you can just drive your car like a ICE car and not worry. Yes that long journey used a tank of fuel (or whatever) but how many tanks of fuel are you not burning across your total ownership period when driving around doing day to day stuff on the average < 10 mile journey.

Save yourself the hassle and just drive on the ICE engine. By faffing around with public electric charging you're giving yourself the worst of both worlds of ICE and BEV car ownership.
 
Tinders said:
What year c300e is it? didnt think they could do 22kw?
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Its a 72plate, S206. I'm getting conflicting info on the web. Looking on the Spec list of MB it says 7.4kw. When I first got my car, I bought it to my local tesco POD points which can charge up to 7kw. It was SLOW.
Then at my work they have 22kw which was charging my car much faster than the POD points. Whats going on?

Sirrel Squirrel said:
Just drive it in whatever normal mode is over that sort of distance and let the car charge itself, that's the point of a hybrid.
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It doesn't self charge when driving normally to my understanding, and when I say it - its not like when I'm just accelerating it charges, its only when I perform regenerative braking thats when I see it charging it up. Its not like other popular EVs like the Prius. Thats my understanding - I could be wrong.

Fr0dders said:
You are not on your own with that experience. By all accounts, it's a problem for everybody who uses public charging, which is why many recommend you only get a pure EV if you have a home charger and don't have to rely on public charging infrastructure that often. Finding outlets that are out of use - say they're free when they're not, or not delivering the speeds they say they do are all par for the course.

That's why you get a hybrid - so on long journeys you can just drive your car like a ICE car and not worry. Yes that long journey used a tank of fuel (or whatever) but how many tanks of fuel are you not burning across your total ownership period when driving around doing day to day stuff on the average < 10 mile journey.

Save yourself the hassle and just drive on the ICE engine. By faffing around with public electric charging you're giving yourself the worst of both worlds of ICE and BEV car ownership.
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Granted I dont go visit places and locations every week, I use the car mainly for town driving and doing errands and am able to survive on electric only. I had half a tank of fuel and not really used it for over 6 weeks. It was on a recent long trip I found myself in that situation you described above where public chargers are a flaff at times.
 
I thought yours was a w206, remember photo, outside maisonette ? where they started the bigger 15Kwh battery, for eu tax breaks, to give ~60mile range you reported,
... along with 22kw
 
jpaul said:
I thought yours was a w206, remember photo, outside maisonette ? where they started the bigger 15Kwh battery, for eu tax breaks, to give ~60mile range you reported,
... along with 22kw
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Its the estate version (S206), the W206 C300e only has about 2-5 extra miles on EV range.
EDIT.
This one?
P-20230603-154049.jpg
 
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jpaul said:
I thought yours was a w206, remember photo, outside maisonette ? where they started the bigger 15Kwh battery, for eu tax breaks, to give ~60mile range you reported,
... along with 22kw
Click to expand...

The UK model is 11kw max, on launch Merc did say it could be 22kw, but all UK cars are 11kw max, which is still pretty ok for a PHEV.
 
RockLobster said:
Speaking of charging apps needed what apps do you guys have downloaded?
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With most networks requiring their own apps you will end up with a ton of different charging apps, honestly its a mess.
A few apps like shell recharge or electroverse are partnered with a few networks and allow one app/card for multiple networks but rarely at the best price.
I typically use plugshare to find/compare the charger I want then use the info on there to find cheapest method to charge at that charger.
 
Schizophonic said:
It doesn't self charge when driving normally to my understanding, and when I say it - its not like when I'm just accelerating it charges, its only when I perform regenerative braking thats when I see it charging it up. Its not like other popular EVs like the Prius. Thats my understanding - I could be wrong.
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Many have a button where you can charge from the engine, does the Merc not have that, clearly uses more fuel than normal driving but you are storing charge for later use, it's quite handy and charges surprisingly quick.

With respect to charging, sounds like you must have a 2/3 phase charger for 11/22Kw on AC so when you install the apps set them up to find type 2 mennekes AC upto 50Kw, zap map works well for this filtering.

Unfortunately unless you have a Combo AC/DC compatible CCS connector (sounds like some new Merc PHEVs will ) you can't use DC chargers at service stations, there is no adaptor for this as AC and DC are different ways of delivering power.

lordrobs said:
Plus at some point you're likely to upset an EV driver who "needs" that charger.
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Nothing could be further from my mind, if I want to top up at a public slow AC charger, I'm going to, the proper EV has loads of fast/rapids they can use, threads in this forum says they are everywhere ;) just because I have petrol, I don't have to use it :p I don't like it when my mpg goes below 150 :D
 
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