So I had my first experience away from home on the public charging network with my Model 3 this weekend. Here is how it went...
My RWD Model 3 was at the detailers this week getting a ceramic coating put on, when I got it back after work on Friday night (25 mins each way to the detailer) we 'only' had 82% when we left and the battery was stone cold. I think we had a realistic 160 miles left (it was 2C on Friday night) and we were heading to the Oxford area. The plan was to juice up to 85% at the Wyboston supercharger which should have given me enough to get back to the same supercharger on Sunday afternoon. The backup plan was to bail out on the way back at MK and find a BP charger or go to the super charger on the M40 before heading home if needed.
Got down to Wyboston with about 45%, I think the pre-heat sucked up a lot of batter power. It was pulling 140kw initially and was still pulling 48kw at 91% by the time I finished the KFC (20-25 mins). I think I got to my destination at around 64%.
We went up to Blenheim Palace and then went into the centre of Oxford for something to eat on Saturday evening. I snagged a free 7kw charger in the Westgate shopping centre. It's quite a good set up there, 45 7kw chargers but they were very 'busy', lots of EV's and PHEV's actually charging but 1/3 of the bays were ICED. I think I got pretty lucky getting space as there were not any others free. I charged from about 50% to about 75% in the time we were there.
On the way back on Sunday my wife wanted to stop at Bicester Village and we managed to snag the last free charge post there too. They've got 14 22kw chargers according to zap map, we were only there for about 2.5 hours and we were brimmed back up to 100% about 5 mins before we got back to the car. On the way back we stopped off at a couple of places in Milton Keynes and the in laws near Cambridge and got back with 47%.
To sum up, the super charger network is good but really the hero of the trip was destination the chargers. Not because they were free, but because in reality, for most of the time the car was parked and actually I wouldn't have needed the superchargers at all if there was a plentiful supply of 7kw chargers that could be relied upon. The issue is that they can't, hence plan A was basically to ignore them.
I think I have said a few times on here that the key to this whole EV thing is cheap AC chargers and lots of them. DC chargers get all the sexy headlines and do enable those really long trips but when you are doing medium length trips, a wide deployment of 7kw chargers is far more beneficial. I only did about 300 miles over the weekend and no stint was particularly long either, certainly not long enough for me to stop normally.
This might be controversial but I think they need to charge for AC units, those that need them would stand a far better chance of getting on one if you had to pay the going rate. I doubt many of those topping up in the centre of oxford actually needed to use them but as its free, it basically offsets the cost of parking. Some enforcement of ICEing, and a sensible approach to cars not charging/idle fees wouldn't go a miss either.
Our hotel actually had the hardware for 10 7kw chargers in the car park (public) but they were not actually yet commissioned and were out of use. They also looked like fairly dumb units that were not capable of taking payment which seems slightly short sighted. Perhaps a different kind of sensible policy would perhaps need to be applied to overnight parking. In time probably most hotel car parking spaces are going to need some kind of charging facility.
TLDR
I didn't have any problems, the car performed well, super chargers are good (could be better IMO, particularly east-west routes) but the wider public network needs some serious work IMO.
My RWD Model 3 was at the detailers this week getting a ceramic coating put on, when I got it back after work on Friday night (25 mins each way to the detailer) we 'only' had 82% when we left and the battery was stone cold. I think we had a realistic 160 miles left (it was 2C on Friday night) and we were heading to the Oxford area. The plan was to juice up to 85% at the Wyboston supercharger which should have given me enough to get back to the same supercharger on Sunday afternoon. The backup plan was to bail out on the way back at MK and find a BP charger or go to the super charger on the M40 before heading home if needed.
Got down to Wyboston with about 45%, I think the pre-heat sucked up a lot of batter power. It was pulling 140kw initially and was still pulling 48kw at 91% by the time I finished the KFC (20-25 mins). I think I got to my destination at around 64%.
We went up to Blenheim Palace and then went into the centre of Oxford for something to eat on Saturday evening. I snagged a free 7kw charger in the Westgate shopping centre. It's quite a good set up there, 45 7kw chargers but they were very 'busy', lots of EV's and PHEV's actually charging but 1/3 of the bays were ICED. I think I got pretty lucky getting space as there were not any others free. I charged from about 50% to about 75% in the time we were there.
On the way back on Sunday my wife wanted to stop at Bicester Village and we managed to snag the last free charge post there too. They've got 14 22kw chargers according to zap map, we were only there for about 2.5 hours and we were brimmed back up to 100% about 5 mins before we got back to the car. On the way back we stopped off at a couple of places in Milton Keynes and the in laws near Cambridge and got back with 47%.
To sum up, the super charger network is good but really the hero of the trip was destination the chargers. Not because they were free, but because in reality, for most of the time the car was parked and actually I wouldn't have needed the superchargers at all if there was a plentiful supply of 7kw chargers that could be relied upon. The issue is that they can't, hence plan A was basically to ignore them.
I think I have said a few times on here that the key to this whole EV thing is cheap AC chargers and lots of them. DC chargers get all the sexy headlines and do enable those really long trips but when you are doing medium length trips, a wide deployment of 7kw chargers is far more beneficial. I only did about 300 miles over the weekend and no stint was particularly long either, certainly not long enough for me to stop normally.
This might be controversial but I think they need to charge for AC units, those that need them would stand a far better chance of getting on one if you had to pay the going rate. I doubt many of those topping up in the centre of oxford actually needed to use them but as its free, it basically offsets the cost of parking. Some enforcement of ICEing, and a sensible approach to cars not charging/idle fees wouldn't go a miss either.
Our hotel actually had the hardware for 10 7kw chargers in the car park (public) but they were not actually yet commissioned and were out of use. They also looked like fairly dumb units that were not capable of taking payment which seems slightly short sighted. Perhaps a different kind of sensible policy would perhaps need to be applied to overnight parking. In time probably most hotel car parking spaces are going to need some kind of charging facility.
TLDR
I didn't have any problems, the car performed well, super chargers are good (could be better IMO, particularly east-west routes) but the wider public network needs some serious work IMO.
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