Following on from my last post about towing with a Model Y, we took our caravan out at the weekend for a first test weekend away.
We picked a little site 94 miles away from home and just went for it. The tow out was a breeze, as you all know, a car with 400hp isn’t going to have a problem towing. So what about the range?
It was 1C when we left on Friday morning and we mostly chilled on motorway tucked in on the inside lane with the trucks at 56mph and averaged 567wh/mile so an effective range of 132 miles in winter. We left on 97% (battery preconditioning was working hard on a a cold soaked battery) and got to the destination with 24%.
We charged up on a mix of the granny charger on the electric hook up and an 11kw public charger in the local town.
The way home was more interesting with storm Isha, bearing down on Sunday. I thought I’d test what the consumption would be if we drove at 60mph directly into a 40mph head wind with no drafting. The answer is 700wh/mile over about 30 miles! The car/caravan was pretty stable on the easterly leg with the cross winds, I was expecting the exposed sections to be more hairy than it was.
We tucked it in with the trucks for the rest of the journey at 56mph and the final efficiency was 584wh/mile. It was about 8C when we left which made a big difference to the first leg.
In all honesty, the extra 4 mph makes almost zero difference to travel time but a big impact on efficiency (even without the wind), so in conclusion it’s just not worth it. Find a truck doing 56 and just stick with it with TACC.
I’d expect spring/summer/autumn range will be around 150 miles.
We picked a little site 94 miles away from home and just went for it. The tow out was a breeze, as you all know, a car with 400hp isn’t going to have a problem towing. So what about the range?
It was 1C when we left on Friday morning and we mostly chilled on motorway tucked in on the inside lane with the trucks at 56mph and averaged 567wh/mile so an effective range of 132 miles in winter. We left on 97% (battery preconditioning was working hard on a a cold soaked battery) and got to the destination with 24%.
We charged up on a mix of the granny charger on the electric hook up and an 11kw public charger in the local town.
The way home was more interesting with storm Isha, bearing down on Sunday. I thought I’d test what the consumption would be if we drove at 60mph directly into a 40mph head wind with no drafting. The answer is 700wh/mile over about 30 miles! The car/caravan was pretty stable on the easterly leg with the cross winds, I was expecting the exposed sections to be more hairy than it was.
We tucked it in with the trucks for the rest of the journey at 56mph and the final efficiency was 584wh/mile. It was about 8C when we left which made a big difference to the first leg.
In all honesty, the extra 4 mph makes almost zero difference to travel time but a big impact on efficiency (even without the wind), so in conclusion it’s just not worth it. Find a truck doing 56 and just stick with it with TACC.
I’d expect spring/summer/autumn range will be around 150 miles.
