1st Road Trip Long Enough To Need Charging

[Freeman]

I took my first road trip that needed a mid-trip charge today. I drove from the Central Coast of California to Fresno and back. Here are my observations regarding my MME (2021 CA Route 1 Edition).

LOVE this car. The drive was customizable to meet my driving style, stereo and car play are a dream to use, and when I need it, it has more than enough power and solid handling. Was unsure before the drive if the MME would be good for longer trips. No uncertainty left, it was perfect for what I need and like.

Data

• 274 miles
• 73 mi/hr on highway / open roads
• ~54˚ day
• 100% charge on batteries to start. 32% added at DC charging station. 30% remaining on batteries at end of trip.
• To Fresno, 3.1 kWh / hour average use
• From Fresno, 3.7 kWh / hour average use
• Climate control only used on 1/2 of trip back (for heat)

Electrify America

• Easy to find
• Ford App let me know there were 3 open slots
• All I had to do was plug in and answer a prompt of two. It knew my car and payment via Ford. This was SUPER easy and convenient.
• Charging original estimate was 20 mins for 48% battery to 80% battery charging. Actual time was 22 minutes.

Co-Pilot Features

• For the adaptive cruise control, I found the experience to be significantly smoother when using Whisper mode instead of my normal Unbridled mode. The accelerations and speed modifications were more comfortable and less jarring.
• There were some signals on long roads and I left the cruise control on to see how the Mustang would stop (with traffic directly in front of me). The MME slowed down appropriately and stopped where it should.
• For most of the trip, the “Hands Free” feature was not available. However, besides nagging me to touch the wheel, the non-hands free co-pilot performed the same as the Hands Free feature.
• Co-Pilot works pretty well on straight and wide curve roads. As the angle of the curve becomes sharper, the co-pilot is more jarring. Think of it like driving with a student driver where they are always making course corrections. It isn’t the smoothest experience, but also isn’t horrible.

Misc

• My iPhone 12 got very hot charging on the charging pad. For it to consistently charge I had to remove the rubber mat and put the phone (with a case) directly on the charging pad. The phone actually suspended operations with an error notice saying all would be well in the iPhone world once it cooled down.
• Trip planning took some work. I couldn’t figure out how to do a round trip plan on FordPass. Also, it took some hunting on FordPass while I was driving to see if my charging destination was still available (it was). This is defiantly an area for improvement.

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[Rapid Ed]

I assume to get from Fresno to the central coast you had to cross the hills/mountains. Did you have to hit any of the sharper curves that feature on some of the roads, and how did the car handle those? Any oversteer or understeer at speed?

 

[RickMachE]

No free EA hours?

 

[Freeman]

I assume to get from Fresno to the central coast you had to cross the hills/mountains. Did you have to hit any of the sharper curves that feature on some of the roads, and how did the car handle those? Any oversteer or understeer at speed?

Yes, quite a bit of hills to ascend and descend.

As for handling, holy crap it did well. No oversteer or understeer at speed. It gripped the road providing a great feel of security. It just felt really solid.

 

[Freeman]

No free EA hours?

I did use my free EA hours. My comment about the credit card was just to make the point that any charges, including my credit, was all handled automatically.

 

[Matt Bagne]

I took my first road trip that needed a mid-trip charge today. I drove from the Central Coast of California to Fresno and back. Here are my observations regarding my MME (2021 CA Route 1 Edition).

LOVE this car. The drive was customizable to meet my driving style, stereo and car play are a dream to use, and when I need it, it has more than enough power and solid handling. Was unsure before the drive if the MME would be good for longer trips. No uncertainty left, it was perfect for what I need and like.

Data

• 274 miles
• 73 mi/hr on highway / open roads
• ~54˚ day
• 100% charge on batteries to start. 32% added at DC charging station. 30% remaining on batteries at end of trip.
• To Fresno, 3.1 kWh used
• From Fresno, 3.7 kWh used
• Climate control only used on 1/2 of trip back (for heat)

Electrify America

• Easy to find
• Ford App let me know there were 3 open slots
• All I had to do was plug in and answer a prompt of two. It knew my car and payment via Ford. This was SUPER easy and convenient.
• Charging original estimate was 20 mins for 48% battery to 80% battery charging. Actual time was 22 minutes.

Co-Pilot Features

• For the adaptive cruise control, I found the experience to be significantly smoother when using Whisper mode instead of my normal Unbridled mode. The accelerations and speed modifications were more comfortable and less jarring.
• There were some signals on long roads and I left the cruise control on to see how the Mustang would stop (with traffic directly in front of me). The MME slowed down appropriately and stopped where it should.
• For most of the trip, the “Hands Free” feature was not available. However, besides nagging me to touch the wheel, the non-hands free co-pilot performed the same as the Hands Free feature.
• Co-Pilot works pretty well on straight and wide curve roads. As the angle of the curve becomes sharper, the co-pilot is more jarring. Think of it like driving with a student driver where they are always making course corrections. It isn’t the smoothest experience, but also isn’t horrible.

Misc

• My iPhone 12 got very hot charging on the charging pad. For it to consistently charge I had to remove the rubber mat and put the phone (with a case) directly on the charging pad. The phone actually suspended operations with an error notice saying all would be well in the iPhone world once it cooled down.
• Trip planning took some work. I couldn’t figure out how to do a round trip plan on FordPass. Also, it took some hunting on FordPass while I was driving to see if my charging destination was still available (it was). This is defiantly an area for improvement.

Do you feel that there were ample options besides the charging location you ended up using? In other words, if there was not an open slot there, would you have been hard-pressed to find a "Plan B" location?

 

[KevinS]

• To Fresno, 3.1 kWh used
• From Fresno, 3.7 kWh used

I assume you mean kWh per mile?

 

[RickMachE]

Do you feel that there were ample options besides the charging location you ended up using? In other words, if there was not an open slot there, would you have been hard-pressed to find a "Plan B" location?

It's easy to have a Plan B, or a Plan C, if you use multiple tools to plan your trip. Many threads on this, but basically you want to use:

- Ford's navigation so that the car knows where you are headed and if you'll make it there. You can plan the trip on the phone, and have it send it to the car.

- ABRP (A Better Route Planner), to see if it disagrees with Ford. You can easily tweak settings with it.

- PlugShare to check the reviews, especially current ones, for each and every location you plan on stopping. Some Electrify America locations are a nightmare for reliability.

- Google Maps to see if either the navigation or ABRP is taking you way out of the way to charge, and if so to help figure out an alternative.

 

[Freeman]

Do you feel that there were ample options besides the charging location you ended up using? In other words, if there was not an open slot there, would you have been hard-pressed to find a "Plan B" location?

There were ample options if my original location charging location was full. I chose to charge up in Fresno instead of smaller towns on the route because of this very reason.

 

[Freeman]

I assume you mean kWh per mile?

Thanks for pointing that out. You are correct; I have corrected my original post.

 

[Freeman]

- PlugShare to check the reviews, especially current ones, for each and every location you plan on stopping. Some Electrify America locations are a nightmare for reliability.

I hadn’t thought of that. Thanks for the tip!

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