3323 mile round trip Northern AZ to LA to Vancouver, WA -- Fantastic vehicle.

[GDN]

I don't begrudge a DCFC provider making some money--we live in a world where it's expensive to provide commodities like electricity for EVs. The installation investment isn't nothing. In CA the average cost of a kWh of electricity is about $0.199/kWh. If the DCFC provider charges $0.48/kWh, their immediate margin on the kWh is $0.281/kWh. Let's say it was $4.2M to install, operate, and maintain a 6-vehicle, 350kW station over 5 years*. If they want to make back 10% ROI, they have to get a return of $4.6M.

They need to sell 16.4 million kWh of electricity at that $0.281/kWh margin.

If their average provided power is 100 kW and they're providing that to 6 vehicles at a time, that's 27,333 hours of 6-vehicle charging they need to provide to cover the costs of installation, operation, and maintenance. That's 1139 days, or about 3.1 years before they can recover their installation costs. And unlike fossil fuel convenience stores, those capital costs aren't subsidized at the same rate as c-stores (which receive 100% depreciation in the year the capital costs are incurred).


*The capital costs as evaluated in 2017:
https://www.itskrs.its.dot.gov/2017-sc00381

Thanks for working through that math. I've laughed for a few years when people complain about the prices. I don't like the prices, but truly don't use them often, I'm more commuter than traveler.

Either way - they are not cheap to install and run.

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[SpaceEVDriver]

We have a bit over 11,300 miles (18,000 km) on the truck with more than 75% highway driving. This trip brought our average down from about 2.4 miles/kWh (25.9 kWh/100 km) to a solid 2.3 (26.9 kWh/100 km). And I may have to drive back to Los Angeles in a couple of weeks, so it'll likely go down again as temperatures drop some more.

This is a common efficiency on the longest leg I drive to LA. There's a total of about 20 minutes of slow or stopped traffic from home to the freeway and from the freeway to the charging station, so the average of 65 mph (105 kph) doesn't represent the cruise control speed I set (72 mph, 116 kph). The average for this round trip in summer is about 2.2 miles/kWh (28.2 kWh/100 km) and about 2.0 miles/kWh (31.1 kWh/100 km) in the winter. Note that we drop 7,000 feet (2134 meters) on the outbound trip but then have to climb it all back on the return trip.

 

[user-name-required]

Speeds:
My tips for better efficiency when on a road trip:

1. Excess speed is a waste of time and energy. 130 kph is a waste of energy and it doesn't save you time. You will arrive at about the same time if you drive at 110 kph (80 mph vs 70 mph). And you save money. It's easy enough to do the math to show this.
2. Heating the cabin is energy-expensive. Start the vehicle when it's still attached to the mains and get the cabin a bit too warm. Then rely on seat heaters and use the cabin heater only when necessary. That said, your comfort is important because if you're distracted by being uncomfortable, you won't be paying attention to the road. But do you really need 25 ºC? Can you handle 20 ºC? 18 ºC?
3. Tire pressure is important. The OEM recommended pressure is for both safety and comfort. If you can handle a little rougher ride, you can safely increase the tire pressure. Check the details of your specific tires and don't over-inflate. Low pressure can cause a loss of a few % to 10% in your efficiency numbers. Under- or over-inflation can cause safety hazards.

That's awesome, thanks!

We've had another EV for about 35,00kms now so we know the speed kills thing. And the cabin temps...I usually have the temps set to 19-20*C as well. But, I will be upping my tire pressure, as the truck came stock with 36psi on all 4 tires.


That said...I have only had the truck for about 700kms now - picked it up Nov 8th - and my all time avg efficiency is still a paltry 34kw/100kms. Which seems so, so poor compared to what I keep seeing here. I am on the factory AT tires, but otherwise, it is bone stock.

• About 300kms were freeway driving as soon as I picked it up, not caring about efficiency as I was just trying to get home, so was doing 5-10kmh over, or about 110-120 depending on the section.
• Since then, its all local driving, dropping the kids off, misc projects, etc.
• I am also not a lead foot either. I try to drive as gently and efficiently as I can, sort of gamifying it trying to get my efficiency better over time, but seem to be unable to do so.
• most days, I am not having it plugged in overnight for preconditioning, as a) its not that cold here yet (barely hitting 0*C), and b) for the small daily drives, the efficiency doesn't matter that much.

BUT....as I am planning some winter road trips from Vancouver BC to Vernon, BC soon, and then another one from Vancouver to Revelstoke or maybe even Calgary in January, I am looking at my avg efficiency, and then planning on it being even worse and maybe going as bad as +40kw/100kms for these drives.


But then, I hear stories like yours, where you are hitting snow, using higher PSI, and driving slower because of conditions, and getting even better efficiency than I can achieve with my local running around, and I am not sure if there is something wrong with me, the truck, or the efficiency calculator?


Serious question about the efficiency meter, lest you think I am crazy...

Case in point:

• Driving down from our local ski hill, we lose about 1000m of elevation over 20 kms.
  • In our ID4, at the bottom of the hill, the efficiency reading shows "-24kw/100km" or whatever, reflecting that we gained juice....gaining about 3-4% state of charge...hence the negative usage.
  • In the truck.....despite the battery SOC also showing a 3% gain, the efficiency meter was still showing a positive usage of energy, as in, we were still using energy. But...how could that be? We travelled 20kms, gained 3% state of charge, and the meter shows a positive ~8kw/100km still?

Do you guys have any experience with this? Does the truck's efficiency meters not ever go into the negatives? Even the whole way down the hill, huge sections of descents, it never once went to 0kw/100km or below, always stayed in the ~7+ range.


Anyways, glad to hear the truck actually can get to the efficiency it was rated for. So far, according to the dash anyways, my truck has terrible efficiency.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

That's awesome, thanks!

We've had another EV for about 35,00kms now so we know the speed kills thing. And the cabin temps...I usually have the temps set to 19-20*C as well. But, I will be upping my tire pressure, as the truck came stock with 36psi on all 4 tires.


That said...I have only had the truck for about 700kms now - picked it up Nov 8th - and my all time avg efficiency is still a paltry 34kw/100kms. Which seems so, so poor compared to what I keep seeing here. I am on the factory AT tires, but otherwise, it is bone stock.

• About 300kms were freeway driving as soon as I picked it up, not caring about efficiency as I was just trying to get home, so was doing 5-10kmh over, or about 110-120 depending on the section.
• Since then, its all local driving, dropping the kids off, misc projects, etc.
• I am also not a lead foot either. I try to drive as gently and efficiently as I can, sort of gamifying it trying to get my efficiency better over time, but seem to be unable to do so.
• most days, I am not having it plugged in overnight for preconditioning, as a) its not that cold here yet (barely hitting 0*C), and b) for the small daily drives, the efficiency doesn't matter that much.

BUT....as I am planning some winter road trips from Vancouver BC to Vernon, BC soon, and then another one from Vancouver to Revelstoke or maybe even Calgary in January, I am looking at my avg efficiency, and then planning on it being even worse and maybe going as bad as +40kw/100kms for these drives.


But then, I hear stories like yours, where you are hitting snow, using higher PSI, and driving slower because of conditions, and getting even better efficiency than I can achieve with my local running around, and I am not sure if there is something wrong with me, the truck, or the efficiency calculator?


Serious question about the efficiency meter, lest you think I am crazy...

Case in point:

• Driving down from our local ski hill, we lose about 1000m of elevation over 20 kms.
  • In our ID4, at the bottom of the hill, the efficiency reading shows "-24kw/100km" or whatever, reflecting that we gained juice....gaining about 3-4% state of charge...hence the negative usage.
  • In the truck.....despite the battery SOC also showing a 3% gain, the efficiency meter was still showing a positive usage of energy, as in, we were still using energy. But...how could that be? We travelled 20kms, gained 3% state of charge, and the meter shows a positive ~8kw/100km still?

Do you guys have any experience with this? Does the truck's efficiency meters not ever go into the negatives? Even the whole way down the hill, huge sections of descents, it never once went to 0kw/100km or below, always stayed in the ~7+ range.


Anyways, glad to hear the truck actually can get to the efficiency it was rated for. So far, according to the dash anyways, my truck has terrible efficiency.

Note that I live in the mountains of Arizona, so I get pleasantly warm temperatures for 6-9 months of the year and only dip below 0 ºC for 3 or so months of the year. We get a lot of snow (on average, more snow than many Canadian cities), and that does reduce our efficiency.


The Ford way of measuring energy use has often confused me (they quantize things in a way that makes me think they have some really small memory registers for energy use or distance or both). That said, I've verified the resulting values on various trip legs. For example, on the trip referenced above we used 63% of the battery for the leg in the photo. We started the leg at 100%. The energy use was 0.63 * 131 kWh = 82.5 kWh. The 217.3 miles / 82.5 kWh = 2.63 miles/kWh = 23.6 kWh/100 km. Allowing for various roundoff error, this tracks with the reported 2.5 miles/kWh.

I've never see either of our Ford EVs report a negative energy use. Which never surprised me. When regenerating on a long, moderate-speed drive down a mountain, the battery warms up, increasing the potential across the anode/cathode of the cells, which convinces the BMS that the stored energy is higher. That's not wrong: physics-wise there is more stored energy because temperature is one factor that determines available energy in the battery. But the energy use tracker is based on coulomb counting, and it'll see more power leaving the battery than returning, even when the BMS-reported state of charge is higher than when the drive started. There's more to it than this simple explanation...

I think you'll get lower efficiency until you learn the truck's behaviors and performance.

For the shorter trips, if there's a lot of stop-and-go, you'll want to have a warm battery when possible and not be charged to 100%. This is so that regeneration is as efficient as possible. If you start at 100%, the truck can't feed the battery, so it shunts the recovered energy off, wasting it as heat (or perhaps warming the battery if it needs it--I'm not 100% sure).

Just some thoughts...

 

[Magendi]

My tips for better efficiency when on a road trip:

1. Excess speed is a waste of time and energy. 130 kph is a waste of energy and it doesn't save you time. You will arrive at about the same time if you drive at 110 kph (80 mph vs 70 mph). And you save money. It's easy enough to do the math to show this.

I’m 100% with you on everything except uncertain on your first point. From all I’ve read and playing with trip plans on ABRP, it seems like usually driving faster and charging more often saves time in theory, though it does in fact waste money. However, if arriving faster is the main priority I’d love to see more of your MC simulations to better understand this. My natural inclination is to drive faster and still do that with fast accelerations on daily commute. For the occasional road trip I am wrapping my head around the idea of setting BC at the speed limit if I could do it without losing time, so would love some supportive data.

As an aside, while tools like ABRP include an overhead to stopping to charge, I find that even when I hustle their overhead duration is probably optimistic and it only takes pulling into one crowded charger and waiting for 20 min (has only happened to me once but it did happen) or getting to a charger and finding it broken and having to find and drive to an alternative to really change the overall time calculation.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

I’m 100% with you on everything except uncertain on your first point. From all I’ve read and playing with trip plans on ABRP, it seems like usually driving faster and charging more often saves time in theory, though it does in fact waste money. However, if arriving faster is the main priority I’d love to see more of your MC simulations to better understand this. My natural inclination is to drive faster and still do that with fast accelerations on daily commute. For the occasional road trip I am wrapping my head around the idea of setting BC at the speed limit if I could do it without losing time, so would love some supportive data.

As an aside, while tools like ABRP include an overhead to stopping to charge, I find that even when I hustle their overhead duration is probably optimistic and it only takes pulling into one crowded charger and waiting for 20 min (has only happened to me once but it did happen) or getting to a charger and finding it broken and having to find and drive to an alternative to really change the overall time calculation.

Assumptions based on my experiences (you'll want to adjust this based on either your experiences or whatever other sources you trust):
72 mph gives me 2.5 miles/kWh (see above photo--the average was 65 mph, but the highway speed was cruise control set at 72 mph).
80 mph gives me about 1.8 miles/kWh.

If I have to drive 217 miles:
@ 72 mph = 181 minutes.
@ 80 mph = 163 minutes.

Difference is 18 minutes in favor of 80 mph.

Energy use:
@72 mph: 217 miles / 2.5 miles/kWh = 87 kWh
@80 mph: 217 miles / 2.0 miles/kWh = 121 kWh

Assuming an average charge rate of 150 kW:
@72 mph, 87 kWh / 150 kW = 35 minutes.
@80 mph, 121 kWh / 150 kW = 48 minutes.

Difference is 13 minutes in favor of 72 mph.

Total difference is 5 minutes in favor of 80 mph, assuming everything else is the same. However, if I have 700 miles of driving to do in a day, I will have at least one more stop at 80 mph than at 72 mph, which means that not just the time of charging at that stop, but also the overhead of that stop needs to be included in the time cost. And for a shorter total charge time (72 mph), the initial high power charge rate means the average will be higher and you'll see that 5 minute difference shrink even more.

The charging stop overhead for me is typically 5 to 10 minutes when stopping at charging stations near the freeway.

Also, note, I'm being generous to the 80 mph with the 150 kW average charge rate. My experience is a bit closer to 130 kW in the truck and 100 kW in the Mustang. That lower average rate is harder on the 80 mph average speed than on the 72 mph average speed.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

As an aside, while tools like ABRP include an overhead to stopping to charge, I find that even when I hustle their overhead duration is probably optimistic and it only takes pulling into one crowded charger and waiting for 20 min (has only happened to me once but it did happen) or getting to a charger and finding it broken and having to find and drive to an alternative to really change the overall time calculation.

Another reason to go slower: if you're concerned about the reliability of chargers, you will have fewer chargers to be concerned about on long trips and if you are able to move on more quickly, you'll open up that working charger spot for the next driver.

When there are two of us road tripping, the passenger can open up the relevant app and check availability of the planned charger with enough time to change our mind before stopping at the charger. We did this a couple of times on our most recent trip. About 10-15 minutes out we'd check the status. I mentioned the T chargers that were 4/8 full, which was likely to mean they were full given our charge port location mismatch. Knowing that before we pulled off the freeway allowed us to move on to the next charger without stopping.

 

[Scorpio3d]

brand-T chargers

I like this I guess you could use that or brand X chargers with the same meaning!

 

[21st Century Truck]

I didn't think I've ever had an EA or T DCFC cost me $0.50/kWh. I have seen the non-subscription prices for EA and T be as high as $0.64/kWh, but I've never paid that much. The maximum I've paid was $0.48/kWh. I included the $8 for EA and $15 for T subscriptions.

We got slow charging of 120 kWh for no additional cost to us. I included our at home 109 kWh at our local utility rate of $0.14/kWh (including fees and taxes). We got a free charge of 82 kWh worth $45 at an EA charger for some reason. We had L2 at a rental house that was covered by the rental fee.

Subtracting the 202 kWh of no-cost charging from 1429 kWh leaves me with 1227 kWh that we paid for directly. Subtracting the at-home charging of 109 kWh and $15.26 gives me 1118 kWh for $444.19, or $0.397/kWh average for the charging we paid for during traveling.

We paid $0.35/kWh at the hotels we stayed at--neither was free. Charging at a SC off peak can be as low as $0.22/kWh, and you can find those in the app.

Great electricity harvesting. I found it's a new learned habit for us EV drivers on long distance trips. It's akin to the ol' cheapest gas station hunt of yore.

On long distance trips I've grown fond of stopping for the night at state parks which always have nice RV pads. For the price of an RV pad, we get to cook steaks at a fire pit, a hot shower in the morning and evening + morning walks in beautiful restful areas, and the 240V NEMA 14-50 charging overnight comes free.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

Great electricity harvesting. I found it's a new learned habit for us EV drivers on long distance trips. It's akin to the ol' cheapest gas station hunt of yore.

On long distance trips I've grown fond of stopping for the night at state parks which always have nice RV pads. For the price of an RV pad, we get to cook steaks at a fire pit, a hot shower in the morning and evening + morning walks in beautiful restful areas, and the 240V NEMA 14-50 charging overnight comes free.

We do a lot of camping and often stop at RV campsites. This particular trip wasn't that kind--we both work remotely and we worked on this trip. We needed desk space for both of us. Which meant we needed to have a hotel suite or house rental. The options of those that also include free charging are a bit more difficult to find.

 

[21st Century Truck]

In the general vein of this really informative thread, I'll mention another angle of long distance road-tripping in an EV (both of mine are / were Fords) compared to long distance road-tripping in a gasoline / diesel car.

The subtle yet very present factor of better restfulness / less tiredness after a full long day in an EV compared to a gasoline car.

I've done my share and then some in my 1990 BMW 318i, which died of a mechanical heart attack at 199,700+ miles after crossing Europe and the USA multiple times. Had multiple hybrids and plug-in hybrids as well, and the usual early life used clunkers.

The MachE and now the Lightning don't tire the humans in the car out, unlike all of the above gasoline cars. My 14-year old nephew noticed it before I did on our Summer 2023 cross-country six week jaunt. He was right. It's a subtle thing and I now attribute the lack of tiredness to a lack of noise over a long day... no low frequency thrumming in the cabin from the engine and the transmission, no cool-yet-wearying continuous exhaust background.

When we fly for 6+ hours in a commercial airliner we (most of us) emerge tried and grumpy and just a bit worn out... yet all we do during the flight is sit in a seat. I attribute that to the same thing... constant surrounding noise, most of it at low frequencies. We aren't attuned to notice it over time but our bodies and our brains certainly absorb it.

So in this vein, a hidden advantage of more overall restfulness is also a hard-to-price yet present factor in our Lightning long distance trips, which should be weighted against the slightly longer refueling stops and the overall somewhat comparable cost of DC Fast / gasoline replenishment.

I have yet to see this driver (+ passenger) restfulness factor used in EV advertising... I think EV manufacturers are missing a good marketing angle here.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

In the general vein of this really informative thread, I'll mention another angle of long distance road-tripping in an EV (both of mine are / were Fords) compared to long distance road-tripping in a gasoline / diesel car.

The subtle yet very present factor of better restfulness / less tiredness after a full long day in an EV compared to a gasoline car.

I've done my share and then some in my 1990 BMW 318i, which died of a mechanical heart attack at 199,700+ miles after crossing Europe and the USA multiple times. Had multiple hybrids and plug-in hybrids as well, and the usual early life used clunkers.

The MachE and now the Lightning don't tire the humans in the car out, unlike all of the above gasoline cars. My 14-year old nephew noticed it before I did on our Summer 2023 cross-country six week jaunt. He was right. It's a subtle thing and I now attribute the lack of tiredness to a lack of noise over a long day... no low frequency thrumming in the cabin from the engine and the transmission, no cool-yet-wearying continuous exhaust background.

When we fly for 6+ hours in a commercial airliner we (most of us) emerge tried and grumpy and just a bit worn out... yet all we do during the flight is sit in a seat. I attribute that to the same thing... constant surrounding noise, most of it at low frequencies. We aren't attuned to notice it over time but our bodies and our brains certainly absorb it.

So in this vein, a hidden advantage of more overall restfulness is also a hard-to-price yet present factor in our Lightning long distance trips, which should be weighted against the slightly longer refueling stops and the overall somewhat comparable cost of DC Fast / gasoline replenishment.

I have yet to see this driver (+ passenger) restfulness factor used in EV advertising... I think EV manufacturers are missing a good marketing angle here.

This is a huge factor for us. We're significantly less tired after a road trip in either the Mustang or the Lightning compared with the Tacoma or other ICEs. Part of it is less noise, for sure. Part of it is the longer stops and common walks with those stops.

 

[user-name-required]

This is a huge factor for us. We're significantly less tired after a road trip in either the Mustang or the Lightning compared with the Tacoma or other ICEs. Part of it is less noise, for sure. Part of it is the longer stops and common walks with those stops.

Agreed. Same with us, even towing our tent trailer with our ID4 the last 2 summers on our 2000km round trip mtn bike trips.... it is fine that we have to stop to charge after ~200kms of driving. The kids get to play at a playground, eat a decent meal, etc., while we fuel up. Much better than iron-butting it

 

[1Jetpilot]

OH-Fl .......1200 miles $150 all Tesla Superchargers and 2 EA. Almost all the T failed on the first attempt and had to move to the stall next to it. Had to rely on the Tesla app to

 

[Maxx]

ADDED: Approximate map and elevation profile for the trip.

Could you share where the elevation graph comes from? Is that something you can get before starting your trip?

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