20 kW Fast Charging Future

[pjam3]

Greetings from rainy Gresham Oregon.

I bought my FFE just after Thanksgiving 2014. Had to get it home from Seattle, but that's another story.

So as a new owner I'll have to admit that this has been a learning process. Understanding how range really works considering temperature, weight, terrain and using other electrical devices (heater) has taken me longer than I would have thought. Having said that, I am not sorry I made the purchase (that reminds me that I need to do my tax return).

Used the 110v unit for a bit (which in all honesty would meet my needs maybe 80% of the time) then bought the Clipper Creek 40. Big difference. Preheating the cabin and by virtue topping the battery off and I think warming it too made a noticable improvement. Haven't seen it take longer than 3.5 hours to charge yet.

So, I'm getting comfortable with my 34 mile commute and my around town driving. But for the first 6 weeks or so I was mainly watching the GOM and doing math in my head and spending too much time being cold. Now I just charge and go. Don't look much at the dash. Guess what, this is a fun car to drive and I now enjoy it. Haven't gotten caught with a dead battery and don't think it's likely. Gave my slightly nervous wife a "coupon" for a free tow home and told her to drive and charge and not worry. If you get stuck call a tow truck and call it an adventure.

So yesterday we ventured down to Salem to see my daughter. Met her at the restaurant instead of picking her up because it was closer. 110 mile round trip. There was a transit center about a block away with several chargers. As it turned out, we just spent time enjoying each other and by the time we left I was at nearly a full charge and got home warm with miles to spare.

Next week we are headed to the beach for 3 days. 106 miles one way. Time for the ICE. Would love to drive the FFE, but it just won't work. Its going to be hilly, cold and rainy. Yes, there are places to charge, but we want to get there not sit and wait for the batteries. I have another work trip to Sea-Tac that's about 175 miles one way coming up. Will drive my Taurus for that too.

To be honest, I'm a little disappointed. I would be willing to be a bit cold and charge along the way, but it's just too much time to wait. DC quick charge would be amazing. I would definately take the FFE. but if I could get a real nice bump in an hour or a little more, this car would literally work for 99% of my driving. It does make me look hard at the Volt or Bolt and certainly the fantom Tesla. If Ford could just give a little. To be honest, the 2015 was disapointing.

So, whatever the EV industry could do to get one good step forward would really help. A Super charger hyway sounds great, but I just want to get to the beach.

Marv

I think a real 150 Mile range and quick charging would make a difference. I never understand the don't go that many miles per day anyway. When I first bought my EV, I had no way to charge it at my condo, so I relied on charging stations. But they started to get expensive. 7 bucks a month for some, 5 bucks a month for others and then 75 cents per hour to charge or $1 per hour and so on. And some of the machines were always broke or worked, but would take 8 hours instead of 4. 8 hours means around 8 bucks. Great if I got 75 miles all the time, but I was averaging about 60 miles most times. 60 miles for 8 bucks and 5 bucks a month, not exactly that impressive. And the time. Even if the charger was at a mall or little plaza or near a beach, spending 4+ hours at a mall or worse is not my idea of quality time. And if you have kids, it becomes a pain. A pain where you never really fully charge it.

Fast forward to this year and I have my own garage and can charge it when i want. SDGE used to have a 2 tier or multiple tier plan, but they have changed that and a lot of people are complaining about it. I will see how much more my bill goes up. I was paying about 40 bucks a month in electric bills, so if it goes up to 50 bucks a month, my electric car added 10 bucks. Time will tell.

But the biggest thing was people used to tell me everything changes once you can charge every night. So far, i would say that is half true. I don't really go to charging stations anymore, so that saves me 4+ hours every day or multiple times a day. But it is just a horrible car when you have any kind of hills. I take my oldest kid to school and it's a 3 mile round trip drive. 1.5 miles to his school and 1.5 miles back home. But there are a couple of decent inclines so I will start with 70 miles and get back home with like 63.

I have been told that is just a guesstimate, except when I see 70 miles, I assume far less. Taking my kid back and forth to school every day and not charging it on purpose went something like 70 miles fully charged, 63 miles, 56 miles, 49 miles, 42 miles, 35 miles, 28 miles, 21 miles, 14 miles, 7 miles, and dead. We never needed to go elsewhere so it was a test to see how far or little it would get. And like I said, it is a 3 mile round trip.

So I would start on Monday with 70 miles, be down to 56 miles by the end of the day. Tuesday down to 42, Weds down to 28, Thurs down to 14, and friday it was dead. Except it was never 70 miles. It was actually only 30 miles. No climate used, etc. But it was freeway and going about 55MPH. The other options are even worse because the one route is longer, more inclines, and I wind up going from 70 down to like 54. Another route there aren't as many inclines, but it is far out of the way and doesn't give me any added benefits to mileage.

If the decline would get as much as the incline, it wouldn't matter. But I go to the school (1.5 miles away) and it'll go from 70 to below 60. Heading back home gets me some mileage back, but it's just not as good and half the time it will be worse if other drivers want to run me off the road or kill me because I am trying to get as much back as I can. But going from 70 to say 59 back up to 63 is the norm. And I have done this quite a few times. This is why I avoid freeways when i can.

So to me, it guesses 70 miles for a full charge and I wind up getting about 30 miles. Not exactly impressive or useful.

 

[Rogerschro]

I think a real 150 Mile range and quick charging would make a difference. I never understand the don't go that many miles per day anyway. When I first bought my EV, I had no way to charge it at my condo, so I relied on charging stations. But they started to get expensive. 7 bucks a month for some, 5 bucks a month for others and then 75 cents per hour to charge or $1 per hour and so on. And some of the machines were always broke or worked, but would take 8 hours instead of 4. 8 hours means around 8 bucks. Great if I got 75 miles all the time, but I was averaging about 60 miles most times. 60 miles for 8 bucks and 5 bucks a month, not exactly that impressive. And the time. Even if the charger was at a mall or little plaza or near a beach, spending 4+ hours at a mall or worse is not my idea of quality time. And if you have kids, it becomes a pain. A pain where you never really fully charge it.

Fast forward to this year and I have my own garage and can charge it when i want. SDGE used to have a 2 tier or multiple tier plan, but they have changed that and a lot of people are complaining about it. I will see how much more my bill goes up. I was paying about 40 bucks a month in electric bills, so if it goes up to 50 bucks a month, my electric car added 10 bucks. Time will tell.

But the biggest thing was people used to tell me everything changes once you can charge every night. So far, i would say that is half true. I don't really go to charging stations anymore, so that saves me 4+ hours every day or multiple times a day. But it is just a horrible car when you have any kind of hills. I take my oldest kid to school and it's a 3 mile round trip drive. 1.5 miles to his school and 1.5 miles back home. But there are a couple of decent inclines so I will start with 70 miles and get back home with like 63.

I have been told that is just a guesstimate, except when I see 70 miles, I assume far less. Taking my kid back and forth to school every day and not charging it on purpose went something like 70 miles fully charged, 63 miles, 56 miles, 49 miles, 42 miles, 35 miles, 28 miles, 21 miles, 14 miles, 7 miles, and dead. We never needed to go elsewhere so it was a test to see how far or little it would get. And like I said, it is a 3 mile round trip.

So I would start on Monday with 70 miles, be down to 56 miles by the end of the day. Tuesday down to 42, Weds down to 28, Thurs down to 14, and friday it was dead. Except it was never 70 miles. It was actually only 30 miles. No climate used, etc. But it was freeway and going about 55MPH. The other options are even worse because the one route is longer, more inclines, and I wind up going from 70 down to like 54. Another route there aren't as many inclines, but it is far out of the way and doesn't give me any added benefits to mileage.

If the decline would get as much as the incline, it wouldn't matter. But I go to the school (1.5 miles away) and it'll go from 70 to below 60. Heading back home gets me some mileage back, but it's just not as good and half the time it will be worse if other drivers want to run me off the road or kill me because I am trying to get as much back as I can. But going from 70 to say 59 back up to 63 is the norm. And I have done this quite a few times. This is why I avoid freeways when i can.

So to me, it guesses 70 miles for a full charge and I wind up getting about 30 miles. Not exactly impressive or useful.

I think one of the disadvantages to having an electric is that we get to see real time just how well we are doing energy wise compared to an ICE. We see est. 70 on the GOM and then we watch it plummet faster than that, getting a much lower range than we were shown. On an ICE, we are promised, for comparison, on the ICE Focus, est. 38 mpg, but we already know from experience that we will really get less than that depending on terrain. In the 3 mile example, that would translate to probably an actual 25 mpg +/-. pretty significant difference but somewhat hidden due to gas tank capacity. But we know this so we just accept it as normal, but on the electric, with a much more limited range, it is far more dramatic and we also Expect to get 70 miles if it says 70, not 'your miles may vary'.

On the Focus forums I often see comments of people getting only 23 -24 mpg from the car even though it claims 38 ave. Conditions and terrain have a big effect. My own Focus was rated at 38 ave, during the summer I'd get pretty close to that, usually 34-36 mpg for the trips, but in the winter it dropped pretty noticeably to 29-30 for the same trips. Same goes with the FFE, but I do notice it more with the FFE because of the limited range and instant info right there. Full to empty shows a lot more on a limited 'tank' than on a larger one, even if they go down the same relative rate.

In this case, I think your trip base is too limited. Sample size being three miles round trip with the conditions it has, nets a far smaller ave than what a longer range would show. given the route is only 1.5 miles, and using interstate, a fair portion of your drive is comprised of turns, accelerating and climbing. All of which are large drains on the battery. That is the Least efficient use of power. steady speeds is where you get the best range, so your trip has an overly large percentage of power draw to steady draw. Once you factor this in and use your car for longer drives, it will level out the range ave. and do better. But for the short 1.5 miles you drive, it is always going to show less. Whether ICE or electric, it is going to be less than the ave mpg(e) of the vehicle.

 

[WattsUp]

So to me, it guesses 70 miles for a full charge and I wind up getting about 30 miles.

So, you reset your odometer at the beginning a full charge and, by empty, it measured only 30 miles?

Unless your average Wh/mi is around 600, this seems highly unlikely.

What is your average Wh/mi?