EV news. Hybrid News. A Path Forward.

If it suits your needs then go for it. I’ve got a RAV4 Prime that barely gets me to work and back home on EV with a 15 mile drive to work. HVAC off, heated seats off, staying at 60-70 mph, etc. 52 miles displayed on the estimated range. Add in other stuff like grocery shopping? I’m using gas. If it’s cold out, forget it. Even with HVAC off I won’t make it home on EV only. On my drive to work today I got a personal best 6.2 miles/kWh by drafting a big rig.

In the end the Prime works, it just doesn’t work the way I want in an EV. I’m looking into trading my Prime for the Mini Cooper EV. It’s got a $9900 lease credit currently.

 

Toyota and Tesla sign deal! Hints at Toyota BEVs available in 2025.

https://electrek.co/2023/10/19/toyota-signs-deal-tesla-nacs-supercharger-access/

 

Not sure if this post quite fits the thread topic, but earlier this week I ran across a stranded Tesla, and gained some new insights into the challenges and benefits of electric vehicles.

I hope this doesn't come across as electric-vehicle bashing. Electric vehicles are awesome. That said, I won't be swapping out the Tacoma any time soon... but let's face it, I've driven older cars my whole life. Electric trucks could fly and bake cookies, and I'd still drive an old beater for another two decades. But one thing I really like about my old-fashioned pickup truck is how easy it is to keep it fueled over long distances in remote places--I'm never without a jerry can or few of extra gas, and I'll gleefully offer it to stranded motorists along the way.



Well, this guy flagged me down at dusk, and suddenly those jerry cans didn't seem as useful. He said he had only one mile of range remaining, and I doubt you could find an outlet to charge even a cellphone within a mile of this spot. For that matter, we were many miles from cell service in any direction!

A retrospective Google search suggests the nearest Tesla charger was only 19 miles away, as the bird flies. However, this was a car, not a bird, and to make matters worse, this was in a national park, and those draconian government tyrants won't let you drive to that charger from this side of the park! And either way, he was at least 18 miles short, stranded in a somewhat remote place, barely visible in the dim light as I approached... and seemingly unprepared for night temperatures that would dip into the 30s.



I guess I'll elaborate... The park in question was the Grand Canyon, and the charger in question was located on the opposite side of its namesake feature. A more realistic distance to reach that charger, again according to Google, would be 198 miles. I don't know where he was trying to go, but it would be hilarious if he was planning to charge on the opposite side of the Grand Canyon.

I towed him up to the lodge... a backtrack for me, but the best option based on what we could speculate there on the side of the road with no cell service. I later learned that there are no formal EV charging sites on the north rim, but I at least knew there were plenty of campsites with RV hookups for 120V charging. They were fully booked up that night -- earlier that afternoon I had landed a permit for what I believe was the last available vehicle-accessible camp site in the whole park for that night: a rim-side back-country spot an hour distant from here. But no doubt either a friendly camper would offer him an unused hookup, or park/concessioner staffer would work something out to help this stranded motorist.



We agreed that he'd hold brake pressure throughout the tow, which served my interest to avoid having my tow strap run over, and his interest to add a bit of charge to his battery. The 13-mile tow boosted his reported range by another 14 miles, which also made me feel much better about leaving him there at the lodge -- whatever charging arrangement he could work out, his car could at least get there under its own power.

I have no idea what kind of Tesla this was, but I Googled a "Model 3" and noted a nominal battery capacity of 60 kWh, range of 310 miles, and mass of 4000 pounds, which I used for run some back-of-the-envelope numbers: Adding the distance traveled to the reported range increase (totaling 27 miles), then converting that to kWh via the above figures, and finally adjusting for the difference in elevation: I calculate that the tow imparted about 5.1 kWh of effective motive energy to the stranded vehicle. Given that this took about 25 minutes, I conclude that the net effective energy delivery rate was ~12 kW, or ~16 horsepower. Compare that to the power you can draw from a 20A 120V outlet: 2.4 kW tops. Or a portable generator for that matter.

In fact, some internet searching suggests that a Tesla only charges at 1.3 kW on 120V (3 miles of range per hour), whereas the 240V "Home Charger" is 11.5 kW (44 miles of range per hour). I towed him at an average speed of ~31 MPH, during which his range also increased at a rate of ~34 miles per hour. I didn't see him the next morning when I doubled back to the visitor center for a nice indoor poop--wait I mean to gaze over the spectacular canyon just one more time. But assuming he was limited to 120V charging, he was probably still there, because I think the closest Tesla charger was 80 miles away, so adding the remaining 65 miles of range he'd need would have taken... Jesus, over 20 hours? Maybe he just got someone else to tow him back out of the park!

You could possibly tow even faster, or regeneratively brake harder, if you knew what you were doing, and were confident in the abilities of the tow vehicle and towing equipment. But this was definitely a laborious tow for a stock Tacoma engine.


With apologies to the car I held up for the final mile of the tow...

To conclude, although you can't dump a jerry can of gas into an electric car, at least not in a beneficial way... you can substantially recharge it through towing. I guess this is obvious, but I was surprised by how effective it was. In remote areas, all it takes is some bad luck or navigational errors, and anyone can wind up stranded without enough gas/charge. It's nice knowing there are options to help each other out.



Fuck the guy that took my permit site though... I wound up camping at a trailhead instead.

 

On that topic of stuck Teslas, the GF recently got a flat tire in her Tesla while in Oakland, CA. Since there isn't a spare, and the tires aren't runflats, she had to resort to calling Tesla's service.

They initially told her that they'd be able to get to it in *two* days.

Two motherfucking days, not even thirty miles from the factory. Get the fuck out of here with that bullshit, Elon.

After some back and forth, she managed to get them out that night (a four-hour wait). Rather than fix the flat there, they gave have a loaner wheel and tire, which they swapped out several days later.

Ridiculous.

 

no doubt, he learned a very valuable lesson that day.

Can't you just buy a spare? I get that it adds weight and every ounce counts in an EV, but if you're only going back and fourth to work then the ~20lbs shouldn't be a deal breaker.

 

Jeez, don't they at least give you a can of fix-a-flat to huff while you slowly starve to death?


I guess it's easy to complain, but let's not forget that electric vehicles are still in their infancy. I'm sure things will be better in the future. Hmmm...

 

It's more that adding an aftermarket donut and tools eats up a ton of trunk space, since (unlike every other passenger vehicle I've ever driven) there's no dedicated location for that stuff to go. We'll end up ordering one, regardless, but it's frustrating to have to spend $300-500 on something that should have been included to begin with.

 

luckily it has two trunks

 

Many modern cars are foregoing the spare, not just Tesla or EVs. Weight is a target for reduction in both ICE and EV in striving for efficiency. Your wait time was obviously unacceptable. The one time I called Tesla roadside it was 30 minutes.

 

I've noticed a distinct lack of charging facilities in the national parks. Road tripping in an EV does require you pay attention to the "gas" gauge. My technique is to create a route on the car's nav system to the places I want to go with the last stop being a Supercharger. That way I know I have enough charge to not end up like this guy. The nav system will gladly give you directions that leave you out of charge and no way to get one. I'm over 25K miles of road tripping so far, including a trip to the Grand Canyon. It's beautiful and well worth the trip.

Here's my flat story: In the middle of rural Nebraska I hit something in the road at 75 mph while driving on FSD. The left front tire instantly went from just fine to completely flat. I took over the driving and pulled to the side. It took a bit of force on the steering wheel because the car wanted to keep driving in a straight line. After surveying the damage I called around looking for a shop that had a replacement tire. The first shop didn't, but they said try my competitor, he might. Who does that anymore? I appreciated it though. Called the competitor and they did indeed have a tire that would work. Then using google I called the closest tow truck company and they had me loaded on the truck in 20 minutes. He dropped me off at the tire shop right into the work bay. The people at the shop were super nice and none of them had even been close to a Tesla before. $280 for a new tire, mount, balance, taxes and fees and I was back on the road. It never even crossed my mind to call Tesla. My insurance includes road side assistance so I just sent the tow bill to them.

 

Two trunks: The frunk would be a good spot to put the jack and tools, but it's unfortunately not big enough for a spare. Totally feasible to put it in the rear trunk, of course, but would probably be more ideal if the vehicle was a station wagon crossover because you could put stuff on top of it.

Efficiency: I really have my doubts that the weight of a donut, a screw jack, and the screw jack tool/lug nut wrench makes all that much of a difference on the efficiency of a two-ton vehicle that seats five.

Towing to a shop: This happened at 7PM on a Friday night, so that wasn't really an option for an immediate repair. While I suppose that she could have called a towing company to tow it to a shop somewhere less sketchy, repair it in the morning, and then bill it to the insurance, that probably didn't occur to her because roadside service was a selling point when she bought the car and calling for service is integrated with the car.

 

Yeah I don't buy the weight savings piece of it..though it is one argument of course. Remember BITD they said don't keep stuff in your vehicle you don't need in order to get better fuel mileage?

It is a cheapout thing mostly now as I see it. Heard this happen to quite a few friends of mine.

 

I just have no sympathy for someone who runs out of charge in an EV just as I do with someone that runs out of gas. If you can't calculate something as simple as how far you can go or travel without checking fuel or charging infrastructure on the way. Oh well. If you can't add or subtract please stay off the road and don't buy an EV or ICE vehicle.

 

Look at a few expensive ways manufactures try and save weight. The Tesla model 3 hood is aluminum to save a couple pounds and significantly increased cost over steel. Manufactures are paying higher costs to save a few pounds here and there on a vehicle using more expensive materials, which adds to the cost of the car. A 40lb spare tire is nearly 1% the model 3's total weight. Astronomical weight savings over an aluminum hood, and it doesn't increase cost to remove it, it actually reduces cost and as a side benefit gives greater cargo space. When you look at the weight savings ROI it is very apparent why spares are often eliminated.

 

I get it of course but yeah it just seems odd, I could see going with a donut size versus full size but that's me.

And yes, the auto stop/start being another one I can think of.

 

Get a used Leaf for like $60 for around town during the week and keep your truck for fun weekend/long haul trips

 

To add on to my interstate flat tire story, even if I had a spare I wouldn't change a tire on the side of the freeway. Have you seen those idiots out there? While waiting for the tow truck I watched multiple times where cars and semi trucks were making crazy lane changes because of one car, sitting completely off the pavement with its 4 way flashers on. Imagine if I'd been out there fussing with a jack and spare tire.

 

I saw one for $4k with like 86k miles but when I asked the guy how much range it had left he said he had no clue... didn't want to tell me anything just said he sells cars but doesn't know anything about it's range.

However I did double check and if I drop my kid off every day plus commute a few times a week even at 11mpg and 4 bucks a gallon I'm looking at $380 bucks a year. Just having to insure a leaf or any other EV would cost me more so really I'm overthinking about less than $400 bucks in gas.

 

That comes out to 1 tank of fuel per quarter. If that’s accurate then you’re so far off the edge of the Bell Curve of annual mileage that it’s not even worth discussing an EV.

I work from home and my toddler’s sitter is 3 miles away. Even still I’m averaging 18k miles per year in my Volt

 

That and in general, if one charges an EV and then rarely drives it how fast would the charge start to dissipate from sitting?