First roadtrip! MA>DC>NH>MA ~1500mi

[Regular150]

I used to be a gas and go traveler. My wife would go along with that 12+ years ago. It all changed with kids and gone were the days of 750 miles with 27 minutes of stoppage time. Now we stop to eat. Stop for extended bathroom/entertainment breaks. So it takes one and a half days instead of one 1ong day.

Oh don't get me started about taking our Boats self contained toilet in the back of the Sienna ! I think our daughter is still getting counseling from the trauma!

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[LightningShow]

Charging at Walmart in E Brunswick, NJ now. Plugged into a 350kW at 9%. Started ar 155kw and crept up to just over 160kw over a few minutes. After the “boost” period it dropped to 130kw, which was lower than i expected since it was only in the mid 20s SOC. Then it started bouncing continuously between 110kw and 130kw. Probably averaging 120kw. Just weird behavior. At that point i moved to a 150kw charger and it immediately went to 145kw and held until 50%. It dropped back to 130kw sometime after 50%. Now i’m at 73% and it’s at 120kw.

 

[LightningShow]

Charging has been a little rough today. Not sure if it’s the truck or the stations, 3 of the 4 i’ve plugged into thermal limited after a few minutes of good charging. The 350kw chargers seem to be more finicky. I’ve used 4 now and 3 have had issues and i ultimately got better charge rates after switching to a 150kw even though the 350kw stations jumped to 155-175kw right out of the gate they could hold the rate. I’m at 56% soc and the 350kw station is barely pulling over 100kw (and it has the same yo-yo) charge rate behavior as the last 350kw i plugged into.

Even so, as the last station(s) i got from 9% to 80% in 42 minutes, and that includes the time to swap chargers. So, well ahead of Ford’s 44 minutes 15-80% claim.

The guy in the IONIQ 5 next to me just played musical chargers, too. He was on the other 350kw charger.

Ah, EV life.

 

[LightningShow]

I’ve officially crossed 2,000 miles in 15 days of ownership.

 

[LightningShow]

Final tally was 1,596 miles and 720kWh used for an average efficiency of 2.22 mpk. Average range per charge of 291 miles. Considering the trip was >90% highway driving and I was generally travelling at the fastest possible speed for the flow of traffic, up to 85mph on NJ Tpk and the great majority over 70mph, I'd say that the Lightning did better than expected on efficiency. I might've lost a har on efficiency because we were using the HVAC but still not bad. I probably wouldn't have used it just for myself but with family in tow you can't do that, obviously. We just had the two kids and myself, plus luggage and bikes. I doubt anything we were carrying was having any major impact on efficiency.

For the major North-South roadtrip miles I drove ~1100 miles. Southbound time was 8:15, Northbound time was 9:00 (back home) and the final loop to the north (from home to campsite last night and back) was about 4:15. 21:30 of total travel time. DCFC charging time to make the journey was 168 minutes, about 2:45. I would say that on an ICE trip that would have been 1-1:30 of stop time considering that one charge stop was paired with a 30 minute shopping trip to get stuff for the camping trip, then probably about another 0:30-1:00 for breaks, gas-ups, bathroom, etc. So, an adder of a bit over an hour on a 20 hour journey. Not really a big deal IMHO.

This experience definitely makes me feel better about having the Lightning as my only vehicle. It's definitely a bit more planning for longer trips but not very difficult to do with a few minutes of forethought. My biggest issue is still that NH is a DCFC wasteland and almost all of my regional trips (mostly hiking and skiing) are to the dead center of the DCFC dead zone. I did a search for DCFC from where I was camping last night and the closest was 53 miles, one way, for a 50kW charger (just some guy who installed it at his campground, also in the complete opposite direction that I would return home so the first 106 miles of charge would just be for getting to the charger). The closest 150kW station is 83 miles away on my way home (my house is only 108 miles, so it's almost home for me). There are Superchargers 13, 24, and 34 miles from where I was camped (that's just the first three, there are more within a 50 miles radius, I'm fairly sure).

I really hope Tesla opens their SC network soon or one of these public DCFC companies gets off their butt. I assume they aren't there because NH isn't giving any handouts to the companies (which is part of why I love NH ) but also a burden in this case. Oh well, I'll live with it but also hope someone gets something done.

 

[Rob G]

EV roadtrip rule of thumb: drive fast, charge more.

I agree. I’m in FL after driving down from NJ, which I will detail in a thread, but I didn’t want to be speed constrained. I also used blue cruise significantly with good results. There were areas, mostly S Carolina where it ping ponged a bit more but over all did 100s of miles this way.

 

[LightningShow]

I agree. I’m in FL after driving down from NJ, which I will detail in a thread, but I didn’t want to be speed constrained. I also used blue cruise significantly with good results. There were areas, mostly S Carolina where it ping ponged a bit more but over all did 100s of miles this way.

Yes, for me as well, a very large portion was using BlueCruise. Overall, I'm happy with it but it can definitely be improved. Fortunately, it's just software tweaks. Hopefully Ford will listen to customer feedback and make changes quickly.

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