[breytex]

Did the exact same trip with a Model 3 2021, 1200km ski trip from Germany to Austria. Came back yesterday. I experienced it way differently.

- We were able to make 300km with 90% to 10% battery (to not hurt the battery longevity too much)

- Outside temp was -4 to +2 °C

- Inside temp set to 20°C, seat heating 2/3 for two passengers

- So a we made a charging break every 300km, so approx every 2-3 hours

- Recharging those 80% at a supercharger takes about 30-50min depending on the Supercharger-version.

- We had 0 traffic/wait times at the super chargers (we drove both directions on a sunday)

- We would do a 10-15min break anyway every 2-3 hours to grab a coffee or do magic pee, so the extension of the charging breaks over our normal breaks aren't event that long

- All superchargers had a <5min detour from the Autobahn

Overall we spent approx. 2hrs more on breaks as we would have with a conventional car. I think thats a fair trade-off for 2-3 vacation trips a year, figuring in the time saved for normal refilling stops with a non-EV cars during commutes (when you are able to charge your EV at home).

To me, the future of "driving into holiday fully electric" is already possible with a Tesla LR model. With other EVs without Supercharger-Access/smaller battery/slower charging speeds probably not so much.

You can even save more time by using tools like ABRP[0]. This even gives you better charge-planning with shorter, time-optimized stops also figuring in detour times.

[0]: https://abetterrouteplanner.com/

[hughrr]

The thing that gets me with the success stories is the issue with risks and planning for success only.

When you’re driving in the colder parts of Europe it’s generally advisable to keep your tank at least 50% full all the time. If the shit hits the fan, like it did for me in Switzerland once, and you’re stranded for 4 hours due to a crash out of your control, your car becomes a fairly important life support system until the road is cleared. There is no recovery option when there are a few hundred cars in the same shit.

So you’re 3 miles from a supercharger with 15% battery left and your car is a frozen brick in under an hour. You can’t deliver more fuel to it and your efficient route plan is a liability and there’s a queue of bricked EVs waiting for flatbed recovery.

I’m not criticising the concept but the current execution and the perception of it.

[cogman10]

> So you’re 3 miles from a supercharger with 15% battery left and your car is a frozen brick in under an hour. You can’t deliver more fuel to it and your efficient route plan is a liability and there’s a queue of bricked EVs waiting for flatbed recovery.

There are a few things to consider.

First up, if you want to optimize for energy efficiency then the best option in an EV is to carry a blanket and rely on the seat heaters as much as possible.

Consider this scenario with a long range model 3. 80kwh, 15% means you have 12kWh available (Let's drop that to 8 due to cold weather). The seat heater consumes 500W at low power. That gives you 16/people hours of heat.

But let's say you just run the HVAC straight. You've still got 1 hour of heat (assuming it's using the 6kw restive heater. More if you are using the heat pump).

In any event, the approach to "I'm in an EV and stuck in traffic" is exactly the same as if you were in an ICE with low fuel. Shut things off. Wait until you are freezing, turn it on again. Ration your fuel/energy until you are unstuck.

To get to your charging destination in this scenario, you need roughly .9kwh of energy (300wh / mile, which is on the high end) or about 2% of your battery.

[tcas]

Car and Driver did a test using an older Model 3 with a resistive heater (the newer models use a much more efficient heat pump), and found that it used around 2.2% an hour to keep the cabin warm.

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a38807463/tesla-model-3-cl...

In your example with 15% left, you'll use ~9% battery while in traffic for 4 hours keeping the heat and car on, leaving 6% to get to the next charger. At ~300wh/mile you'll arrive with ~4-5% left. There's also buffer under 0%, but it's not guaranteed.

4-5% is not a comfortable number to be at, but I think it's acceptable in a worst case scenario like this. That being said I would definitely turn down the heat, and drive slower for the next few miles (and check for alternate chargers) to minimize power usage.

[Yaggo]

I do ~900 km trips with 2019 Model 3 SR+ multiple times per year in Scandinavia. -20°C winter temperatures are not unusual. Travelling with my family, including young kids. No problems. 2-3 hours driving, then 30-50 min charging. I actually like how EV forces you to have more breaks.

[kraftman]

What's a magic pee?

[breytex]

Go to pee even if you don't feel the urge to not feel it 20 min later when you are back in the road.

Heard it the first time when an American from California said it to their kids

[maxwell86]

A 50 minute per session.

[Gareth321]

Thanks for sharing your experience. If I may ask, how long was each leg of the trip in total?

[pulse7]

Not parent, but calculation from given data: 1200km, charging every 300km for about 30-50min -> 4x 30-50min -> 120-200min -> 2h-3.3h in one direction -> 4h-6.6h in both directions

[maxwell86]

I did a similar trip earlier in January. 1100 km from Germany to the alps (550km per way).

I had to stop once for the full 1100km trip to refuel (before leaving Austria on the way back cause it’s cheap to tank there, not because we actually needed to refuel).

It was ~4:30 per way. Nobody in the car had to pee, etc.

I think doing 15 min break per way would have been ok. But doing 1h per way or more if breaks is really not great. Particularly with kids in the car (we leave really early put them as sleep, they woke up for the last 2:30 h or so and that was borderline).

[jhoechtl]

> - So a we made a charging break every 300km, so approx every 2-3 hours

> - Recharging those 80% at a supercharger takes about 30-50min depending on the Supercharger-version.

How is this so totally different to the above commenter? I also need brakes during my rides and after a three hour ride a break sounds totally reasonable. But nowhere between 30 to 50 minutes?