daveo4EV

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and to illustrate my earlier point - here is the plugshare screen for Reno to SLC via I-80 - you 4 fast charging stops - for the entire segment - not the time to "drive my Porsche fast" and not care about range…

there are _NO_ options if you blow your range - not even slow 30 amp plug options along the way…

so this is the segment where you practice your pro-ev Driving skills and maximize range - and trust the speed saves range lessons you've learned…

charging options are excellent in Reno (lots and lots of charging) and SLC (again lots and lots of choices) but for the 519 miles between the two locations you have 5 (22 stalls total) possible stops - one of which is known to be out of order as of June 15th, 2020…so now you have 4 possible stops.

Porsche Taycan Distance & Range Anxiety - How Far Have You Gone Screen Shot 2020-06-20 at 4.15.09 PM
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daveo4EV

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1550 E Newlands Dr - Fernley Nevada is the western end of the Segment
6527 SR-36 S - Toole, UT - is the eastern end of the segment

Fernley is a Wallmart EA 350 kW charger with a 10 rating and a successful check in on June 19th
Toole, UT is a Chargepoint 50 kW with a 10 rating but last checkin Feb. 9th…

between there the _ONLY_ options for charging are:
  • 3010 Potato Rd, Winnemucca, Nevada, 89445, US - EA 4 stalls - 150-350 kW - 9 rating, last checkin Jun 5th
  • 654 W. Front Street, Battle Mountain, Nevada, 89820, US - EA 4 stalls - 150-350 kW - 8 rating - last checkin Jun 11th
  • 2944 Mountian City Highway, Elko, Nevada, 89801, US - EA 4 stalls - 150-350 kW - 10 rating - last checkin Jun 9
  • 735 Wendover Blvd, West Wendover, NV 89883, USA - Greenlots - 1 stall - confirmed NOT WORKING ON JUNE 15th - probably 50 kW
so you have to drive from 2944 Mountian City Highway, Elko, Nevada, 89801 - Toole - 211 miles and skip Wendover - cause there ain't no fast charging joy in Wendover right now - it's broke.

so the planning would be

Fernly to Battle Mountain - 183 miles
Battle Mountain to Toole - 211 miles

85% charge of 250 mile Taycan range = 212 miles - I'd do at least half the segment at less than 65 mph to avoid having too charge to 100% in Fernley and Battle Mountain

85% charge stop = 25 minutes
95% charge stop = 48 minutes

and plug share proved it's worth by letting me know you really really can not count on Wendover as charging stop due to recent confirmed dysfunctional charging station - which is really the ONLY possible stop between Battle Mountain and Toole…

that also means a run from 3010 Potato Rd, Winnemucca, Nevada, 89445, US to Toole @ 344 miles probably is _NOT_ in the cards since the most likely charging stop of Wendover is out of commission - the Battle Mountain Charging stop is a MUST work charging stop!! to make this trip.
 
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daveo4EV

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summary plan - Reno to Salt Lake City - as a planing example - and a limited number of charging choices along route.
  1. stay in Reno hotel w/L2 charging
  2. top Taycan off to 100% at hotel overnight
  3. drive to Battle Mountain 219 miles - should be easy for Taycan
    1. Fernley and Winmucca are along route to handle screwup - but should be un-necessary
  4. normal drive to Battle Mountain -219 miles should be good for Taycan at 100% charge with reasonable speed - drive at limit, but not much over to maximize range - faster speeds possible as you get closer to Battle Mountain and you are doing better than required.
  5. skip Fernley - you shouldn't need it
  6. skip Winnemucca - you shouldn't need it
  7. charge to 85% at battle mountain - maybe 90% depending on how it's going charge rate wise
  8. drive 211 miles to Toole - right at the limit of Taycan range for 90% battery - so drive conservatively
  9. Elko is a back up - but probably un-necessary
  10. Charge in Toole to 30-60% - not a great plan since Toole chargers are only 50 kW…longer stop - which is why we're only charging to 30-60%
    1. spend less time at slow charger, get enough range to drive to a faster charger of which there are plenty in SLC.
  11. finish drive into SLC staying at hotel with L2 overnight or near by Fast charging.
2 charging stops - 60-65 mph - low range anxiety…start each segment slower - add speed every 30 minutes as you get closer to charging stop and are well with in range limits.

alternate plan
  1. stay in Reno hotel w/L2 charging
  2. top Taycan off to 100% at hotel overnight
  3. drive to Battle Mountain 219 miles
  4. normal drive to Battle Mountain -219 miles should be good for Taycan at 100% charge with reasonable speed - drive at limit, but not much over to maximize range - faster speeds possible as you get closer to Battle Mountain and you are doing better than required.
  5. skip Winnemucca - you shouldn't need it
  6. charge to 40% at battle mountain - maybe 50% depending on how it's going charge rate wise - you only need 70 miles range to get to Elko - 50% charge is 130 miles range - should be a 10 minute charging stop
  7. drive to Elko top off to 85-90% at fast charger in Elko (150-350 kW) because "fast chargers" in Toole are only 50 kW
  8. you should now be able to "finish" the trip and arrive at near your destination in SLC 229 miles…
    1. skipping the "slow" 50 kW chargers in Toole
  9. conservative driving from Elko to SLC to hit your 229 mile range target - but you can always stop in Toole @ 50 kW charger for 10 minutes if you're falling a bit short...
  10. finish drive into SLC staying at hotel with L2 overnight or near by Fast charging.
either way this trip requires two fast charging stops from my point of view.
  • plan A stops at one 350 kW charging stop and then a 50 kW charging stop, Battle Mountain and Then Toole - one medium stop and one really medium stop in Toole (cause we don't top off at the slow charger).
  • plan B stops at two 350 kW charging stops - one short stop, and one long stop, Battle Mountain & Elko - but both stops are high reliability EA 350 kW stations
plan this around some meal breaks and the charging stops should actually not be that much longer that what you'd do for a driving break anyways.
 
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wemct

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The second leg of my trip from Connecticut to Georgia took me from Durham, North Carolina to Alpharetta, Georgia. Because the first leg from Connecticut to Durham was uneventful and the Porsche Charging Planner chose 2 Electrify America stops just off the interstate that worked fine, I assumed that day 2 would be the same -- wrong. The Porsche Charging Planner populated some lengthy charging stops (44 minutes to over an hour). When I followed the Nav system to the charging stops, it took me several miles off the Interstate (that should have been my first clue that things were not going to be good). It took me to a Harley Davidson dealership. It was Sunday and the dealership was closed. - no charger in sight. I plotted another charging stop on the Nav system. It plotted a stop 8 miles further away from the Interstate to the parking lot of a small Post Office. The charger was not a DC charger and it was broken. Now the panic started that I was off the beaten path, and only had 40 miles of range left.

As others have mentioned, you must have the other EV mapping apps. As I sat in the parking lot of the Post Office, I fired up the Electrify America app and located an EA charger 25 miles away. I double checked the distance on Wazes because this was do or die. I made it to the EA station.

Many lessons learned. The Porsche Charging Planner is not up to date with all of the new EA charging locations that are continuously opening. If you are traveling on the Interstate on the East Coast, the EA stations are generally located within 2 miles of the Interstate near a Walmart, Home Depot, or other shopping center. If the PCP plots something further away from the Interstate, or says the stop will be longer than 20 or 30 minutes the warning lights in your head should be firing that it won't be a 150kw or 350 kw charger. Use the other charging apps as back ups and plan ahead. You can definitely make it 230 miles between charges even at highway speeds of 70/75 with Range mode and cruise control on. However, try to space out the stops no further than 180 miles apart to give yourself some cushion in case the charger is out of order and you need to make it to the next charger location.

One thing about driving an EV is that 10% or 15% state of charge is fine to continue driving locally and does not cause me battery anxiety unlike before owning the Taycan when I used to throw my cellphone on the charger every time it was below 60%.
 


feye

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If you like risk, then by all means, drive to a station 220 miles away that sits in the middle of a desert, 75 miles from anywhere else. I’ve done it. Fingers were crossed, anxiety was high.
You still loved it and would do it again! Admit it!
 

feye

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...The charger was not a DC charger and it was broken. Now the panic started that I was off the beaten path, and only had 40 miles of range left.
Americans are very friendly people, so shouldn't you always just find a house where you can charge on a regular socket by asking the owner? Isn't that part of the fun going on a trip?
 


daveo4EV

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american outlet are not 220 volt like Europe - about 1.4 kW if you're lucky to plug into a normal household socket…some people have 220 volt outlets but those are normally inside the home for electrical appliances so not easily accessible to a stranger's car - and you'd need the proper NEMA plug adapter....

so while we are a friendly people - the practical answer is it wouldn't do much good, I doubt the average EV owner has the proper equipment with them to take advantage of what ever plug they might find...

and the Porsche EV charger doesn't even support the normal household outlet in North America for charging…

so not really a practical solution with out my road warrior "kit"…but then you are clearly a nut - and while we're a friendly people we are also very cautious when presented with an EV nut with a "kit" asking to use your electricity.
 

HK111

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My impression from local driving-around, including on the Autobahn, is that the car is so efficient even at 80-100mph that you can essentially drive around very quickly without looking much at the battery charge.

But I have accustomed myself to add a quick charge at Ionity superchargers when around, so there is some range anxiety left :).

the one problem I have with that is learning to love to drive a Porsche at 50-60mph. Don’t tell me you bought a Porsche to drive it slowly...
 

daveo4EV

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also it should be noted that if range is what you're going for speed is only a major contributing factor after 40 or 50 mph - at or below those speeds, speed reduction will only have marginal or no effect on overall range…

so basically if you've dropped your speed, and you're driving 40 or 50 mph - dropping your speed any further is unlikely to achieve your goals (modulo head wind affect)

so if you're driving 45 mph, and the range calculations still say you aren't going to make it - well then I'd humbly suggest you are not going to make it - and it's time to stop, consult plug-share and start looking for alternate charging solutions - even those that include back tracking…

at a certain point the car can only drive so far on so much available energy and there are no more savings to be had - HVAC is the last item you have control over and it will buy you some more range - but speed will no longer be the controlling factor to increase range.

however the good news is these cars are amazingly efficient at at 40 or 50 mph their range is truly impressive - so there are only few places in the world I could think of where 45 mph + some juice in the battery would be insufficient to get somewhere where you'd be able to charge (with an appropriate road warrior kit)…

all else fails optimize to get some place where you're likely to have good cell coverage and call the "flat bed of 0% Battery SOC shame" and they will come get you and haul you somewhere where you can charge - in our modern world you are fortunately very rarely truly out of options…some are just more inconvenient than one would like.
 

kwrudy123

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Dave,
Really great information. That should be extracted into a “Welcome to EV Driving FAQ” which we should write/assemble sometime... soon.

I just wanted to expand on a subject you touched on: “the reliability of the EV charging network”.

Our charging network is different that Tesla’s. We don’t have a Single Supplier, Single Provider network. We have a mishmash of networks, and even within the single most important network for Taycans, the ElectrifyAmerica network, they have four different suppliers of DC Fast chargers.

And we use a Porsche-written App to start charging sessions. And Porsche lags behind in features that the EA App has had for months. The EA app is a good backup, though.

But my main point is this: You cannot rely on that charger 200 miles away to be working. Yes, you can easily make it there, but what if it fails? Where is the next one? If you have 230 miles of range (in your particular driving style, weather, terrain, etc) but the next Charging Station is 50 miles further on, you are in trouble if your first choice (200 mile) station is out of order.

You’ll learn to charge more often on long road trips, to reduce risk.

If you like risk, then by all means, drive to a station 220 miles away that sits in the middle of a desert, 75 miles from anywhere else. I’ve done it. Fingers were crossed, anxiety was high.

Know where your backup stations are. Arm yourself with lots of Apps: (EA, ChargePoint, PlugShare, ChargeHub, EV Hotels, ABRP, Flo, EVgo, etc.)

Teach your navigator (spouse, child, cat, whatever) to use those Apps, and to use the car’s Nav to find other backup stations.
Ron,

Thanks for this reply on this thread. I just returned from a 2,500 mile round trip from San Diego to Bend, Oregon, driving almost its entirety on I-5 in my Taycan Turbo. I'll leave all my review about the supreme pleasure of this car on the road to another thread, but as for the range anxiety, here are my comments:

1. I had plenty of anxiety after I encountered 3 different Electrify America 350 KwH stations along my planned route that were not operating properly or not at all. That's horrible!

2. I did plan out all of my EA stops along the route ahead of time, using a combination of EA's charger map and then saving these destinations in my Connect Navigation Plus app to make them easily accessible.

3. Given the intermittent bugs and outages of the Connect over the air service "OTA", these destinations weren't often showing up when I turned my car on each morning. Argh! This forced me to use my iPhone apps to find the next charger, then manually enter it as a stopover destination in my route.

4. I discovered that even when the car's Connect/Navigation app recommends charging stopovers along your route or you ask the system to look up where charging stations are, they are rarely if ever the EA stations. They are all mostly only 50-60KwH stations from some other service, which would take much longer to charge. Why isn't the entire EA network part of the Porsche Connect database? VW Group has invested heavily in that network as part of their Tdi settlement. This makes no sense to me.

5. Even when I arrived at an EA 350 KwH station that was working, at least half of the time it would only charge at 60-100 Kwh rates, regardless of my state of charge at arrival. This always caused the charging sessions to last longer than I had planned. The EA network has quite some ways to go to get their quality up to snuff!

6. Finally, like you and others have suggested in this thread, I found that the optimal pacing/intervals of charging stops seemed to me to be around 175 to 180 miles, as it takes much longer to get even a 350 KwH station to "top off" the battery to the last 10-20% of charge. So departing the station at 85% charged gives you only about 200 miles of range at 70-80 MPH speeds and you want to leave yourself at least 20-25 miles of buffer in case you have a problem with the charger you planned next.
 

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Taking first distance trip with wife and trying to reduce charging stops. If I start at 100% on the turbo with 21" wheels can i make it 216 miles doing 78 -80 mph? What is a reasonable range to expect freeway cruising? Will be heading south on i81 from NVA.
Lots of good info here.

You should have no problems getting 216 miles off a full charge. In my 4S, range mode with spirited driving, most of it at 80-90 mph, I was able to get 300+ miles on a full charge.
 

RobboWWFC

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long distance travel with an EV is different that an ICE - with the main characteristics being;

speed is the enemy

as speed increases
aerodynamic drag increases - dramatically

until about 40-50 mph all the energy expended on moving the car is over coming mechanic friction and weight - with the amount of energy required to over come aerodynamics being “insignficant” at lower speeds…

however as one gets above 50 mph the portion of power being expended to overcome aerodynmic drag becomes signficant and dominant and overwhelms the basic cost of moving the car

as speed increases the power required to offset the aerodynamic drag has a velocity^2 (squared) component and it gets really expensive really really quickly…

if it costs 10 mythical units of power to to from 50-60 mph, it might cost:

20 incremental units to go from 60-70
40 incremental units to go from 70-80

the chart below is 100% fabricated and does not represent any factual values for _ANY_ vehicle I'm aware of - but it is conceptually accurate as a mental model of how as speed increases the contribution of aero-dynamic loads becomes greater than the linear cost to "just move the car" from a pure mechanical physics point of view (rolling resistance/friction/weight which are constant and linear) - again this is a "conceptual" model to illustrate how when one increases speed the aero component becomes greater than the technical component in a non-linear increasing fashion…

Screen Shot 2020-06-20 at 2.24.51 PM.png

please don't quibble with the actual numbers - they are meaning less - but conceptually accurate in terms of aero dominating cost in a non-linear/increasing fashion…it's a demonstration as an example - and not entirely inaccurate for the theory and illustrative that aero does dominate costs as speed increases - I'll leave it to mechanical/aero engineers to provide a real world model, but will assert the basic change may differ in scale/ratio but not in concept.

you'll note on the chart that aerodynamic drag in this model does not play a significant role until around 50 mph - but from that point forward it starts to dominate incremental cost as speed increases…the chart/model I fabricated was "hand tuned" to achieve this inflection point - but that is representative of real world - where in fact between 40 & 50 mph is where aero starts to appear in cost equations as a meaningingful factor, and by 60-65 mph is a majority factor in cost to move the vehicle…

even though each change in speed only 10 mph (linear) the cost is non-linear - each mph-unit added costs more than the previous mph in incremental costs…

while the units of power above are "made" up the scale/change is not - each mph costs more than the previous mph after 50 mph - and you stack all these on top of one another and pretty soon your Taycan can only drive like 70 miles at say 100 mph…

this gets really really expensive power wise very very quickly - and is also why reducing speed is so effective - you're gaining more range which each mph slower you are going, than losing in terms of speed…

an EV that say can go 300 miles on a full charge at 50 mph, can only go 180 miles at say 70 mph, or maybe only 140 miles at 80 mph…

also there is this strange trade off between faster travel from point a to point b - but because you used more power you’ll have a longer charging stop

for example there is a stretch of I-5 south in California - between two fast charging stops - I-5 is posted speed limit 70 mph, so average speeds are slightly higher - now it is 116 miles between these two superchargers (harris ranch to tejon ranch)

@70 mph that is 99 minutes travel time
@75 mph that is 93 minutes travel time
@80 mph 87 minutes
@85 mph 82 minutes

now the car can easily do a 116 mile run at 85 mph - but if you leave harrish ranch with 85% battery you arrive at Tejon ranch with 12% battery (plenty of buffer) and you’re therefore in for a nice solid 25 min charger stop to get back to 85%

making the total travel time 82 minutes + 25 minutes = 107 minutes

however if you shave 10 mph off your speed and take 93 minutes - you’ll arrive at Tejon ranch with just over 34% battery and require only an 15 minute stop to get back to 85% battery

making the total travel time 93 minutes + 15 = 108 minutes

so for both speeds the total travel time is about the same because while to travel between fast chargers is faster the increased energy consumption causes you to spend longer at a fast charger to recover the increased energy consumption…

but more importantly - the reduced consumption lets you go sooooooo much further - at the slower speeds you can skip the stop altogether at Tejon ranch and push the car further south to stop at the Castaic fast charger - where at 75 & 80 mph you simply can’t push the car that far and that fast.

if you want to reduce charging stops - reduce the speed and you’ll be amazed, amazed I tell you, how far the car can go on a single charge - and because of the relationship between speed, consumption, and charge rate you’ll be very very hard pressed to reduce overall travel time given the longer stops at the fast chargers.

having driven over 300,000 miles with EV’s the actual travel time differences by driving 5-7 mph slower are inconsequentical, but the time saved due to reducing time at fast chargers more than makes up for the slower speeds - and in some cases changes a 3 fast charger segment into a 2 fast charger segement by cutting out a full charging stop you can save 20-30 minutes…

at speeds of 65 mph or less the Taycan is easily a 270 mile vehicle, at speeds of less than 58 mph I wouldn’t be surprised at easy 330 miles of range - once you start pushing 70 or greater in _ANY_ EV the range starts to drop quite quickly due to the dramatic increase aero-dynamic drag…

how do I maximize range at 75 mph? easy don’t drive 75 mph - drive 65 mph and you’ll get more than 20% better range…

note this all also true for ICE cars - but given that they are only 20% efficient with fuel (you’re wasting most of it on waste heat anyways) and “fixed” refueling time of 7 minutes or less - the increased consumption is not offset by increased fueling time - there by allowing you to reduce overall travel time by driving faster at the consequence of increased fuel consumption.

at 65 mph I’d say the Taycan is easily 216 miles, however I”m not so sure at 75 mph or greater - also you have to plan your charging stops - as the distance you think you’re driving may be difference that where the fast charging stops are…EV road tripping requires a little planning up front, and I highly recomend using plug-share to evaluate the reliability of fast charging options along your route.

now in ideal circumstances the Taycan can go from 5% to 80% battery in a 22 minute fast charging stop (EA 350 kW charger)

but it can go from 30%-80% in about 12 minutes at the same charging stop - saving 10 minutes

that charge savings will be magnified at the more common 150 kW chargers and dramatically magnified if you’re stuck using a 50 kW fast charger…

in racing weight is the enemy - I understood this, but until I actually raced, I didn’t really understand it - shaving weight has sooooo many benefits that magnify one another it’s just hard to comprehend until you experience it for yourself - it’s just plain simple that weight shaving is the best way to improve performance of any car, but in racing more so.

for road trips with an EV - there is a virtuous cycle with speed shaving - the dramatic range increase for even a 2-5 mph adjustment in speed is just simply huge due to the reduced aerodynamic loads…

at 68 mph on innodrive cruise control you will have _ZERO_ range anxiety and when it does come time to stop at a fast charger the charging time savings will be impressive, even more impressive is driving 64 mph might allow you to skip the fast charging stop all together and simply charge overnight at your destination…at a minimum it will change a 2 fast charging stop trip into a 1 fast charging stop trip…

range and speed are not each other’s friend when you’re traveling with a budget of less than 3 gallons worth of kWh’s (about 90 kWh).
Thanks Stephen Hawking
 
 




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