scoopman
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On December 29th, the fam and I piled into Mach N Cheese and drove from Northern California down to Los Angeles. We’re planning to video our trip back up, but I thought I’d write up a quick trip report focusing on some of the efficiencies and infrastructure we encountered on our rainy, chilly trip to spend New Years with family.
FIRST LEG: SUNNYVALE TO FIREBAUGH, CA
We left our home at 8:30am and drove 115mi in rain (temperatures in the 50s F) down CA-85, CA-101, and CA-152 to make it South and East over to I-5, which you follow for the bulk of the trip down South. CA-152 has terrain that includes the Pacheco Pass. I decided on this trip to not be hobbled by reduced speed, and drove Mach-N-Cheese between 75-80mph keeping up with traffic in Whiisper mode.
One complaint I always have on road trips with the MME is the lack of a “custom” mode. It’s pretty lame that after all of this time, there’s no way for me to pick soft(er) ride in the suspension, but tight steering, throttle response, and high regen. Happy wife, happy life, so I optimize for the suspension setting at the expense of the other parameters being not to my liking.
Once merging onto I-5 South, it was another 36 miles to our first planned stop at Electrify America in Firebaugh, CA. We did so at 10:26am after driving 114.9 miles after using 53.2khw for an efficiency of 2.2mi/kwh.
EA FIREBAUGH: 3 FORD EVs, 3 OF 6 CHARGERS BROKEN
We arrived to this scene at the Firebaugh station: a MME extended-battery premium, and a 3-day-old Lightning were juicing up. We pulled into the only remaining working stall, and charged from 37% to 76% in 26 minutes. Charging performance was not terrific, and our peak kw delivered never broke 100 kw.
This was not a problem, as Bluey was available for pitstop entertainment (via my latest Android Chinese gadget), paired with a morning snack and bathroom breaks.
This was NOT a particularly heavy travel day over the holidays, yet EA had only 3 of 6 stalls working at this critical infrastructure point. Each one of the 3 broken stalls showed different symptoms:
The short conversation I had with the owner of the Rapid Red Lightning is probably most telling. He just took delivery of the truck three days before his road trip, and he is already soured from taking it on any trips again, and on it as being as useful to him as a result. He told me he is only getting 1.4mi/kwh, and that he feels he has to try stopping at every EA station along I-5, because he never knows when they will be working, or dead when he arrives, and he does not think he can rely on EA enough to arrive at a station with a low SOC. It’s a real problem if a new car owner isn’t completely happy with their car only 3 days after taking delivery – due to the inept charging infrastructure from EA.
SECOND LEG: ONWARDS TO IN-N-OUT
Traditionally, we always stop at In-N-Out for lunch in Kettleman City, CA, which is basically halfway on the journey. Usually, our downtime is 30-45 min of ordering and eating, without any ability to charge.
This time, we drove the 60 miles from our last stop with the anticipation of trying the newest EA hardware in a station conveniently located next to In-N-Out. We drove 63.1 miles (including sitting in the drive-thru line) to this brand-new charging stop with an efficiency of 2.5mi/kwh.
EA KETTLEMAN CITY: GREAT CARS, NEW CHARGERS, SAME POOR EXPERIENCE
We rolled up to this scene, burgers in hand, at 12:21pm with a 45% SOC, and charged for 39 minutes until 91%. We stayed this long because little kids eat slowly, and Bluey was playing, and we were in no hurry.
The Great: look at this lineup of cars, with owners optimistic about their future with them. Front left to right: a Bolt (well, ok, this was the only really meh car), then an Ioniq 5, then a Cyber Orange Premium (only there for a little bit – read on below!), then Mr. Cheesester, then another Ioniq 5 in Shooting Star Matte Grey (with all light grey trim blacked out 🤌), followed by a Rivian R1T in Rivian Blue. Next was a CA Rt 1 in Rapid Red, followed by a Rivian R1S with manufacturer plates in Rescue Red. Finally, at the end you can see an EV6 in Yacht Blue, followed by a black-with-gold teeth trim special rapper edition of the BMW iX M60.
The New: These chargers were EA’s newest units, and the UI responsiveness on them was noticeably much faster. The chargers were all under an overhang, so you are more protected from the elements. They’re also all positioned logically at the end of each of the parking spots, instead of on the side, making it easier to position your car.
The Same and Poor: This new EA installation – with capacity for 10 cars charging at 350kw – still had 20% of the stalls not working. Both of the stalls had no indications they malfunctioned, yet neither stall delivered electricity to anyone who tried them. This includes the Cyber Orange MME next to me in the photo. They pulled in, tried the only-available stall, then tried calling EA to help them. They then drove off, frustrated.
Moreover, this is a new installation, yet it does not appear that EA has learned too much. The site itself is wedged in between a gas station and a 24-hour Mexican restaurant in a separate parking area with only one driveway to get in and out. Yet there is no signage guiding EV customers on which driveway to enter. Almost every EV turned into the gas station then had to exit the station to then find the EA entrance. (What does the Kettleman Tesla Supercharger installation have? a HUGE Tesla sign at the height of the gas station signs so you can find where it is...)
Aside from the overhang, the facility itself has no amenities. By amenities, I mean there still is no garbage pail, towels, window washer, or bathroom facilities. Both the gas station and the Mexican restaurant have signs saying that bathrooms are for customers only. The gas station did not enforce this policy, but the Mexican restaurant did, turning us away when we went in to use the restroom and then maybe patronize them. After that attitude from them, we didn't.
LEG THREE: CENTRAL VALLEY TO BAKERSFIELD
We then ran the car for a little over an hour and 56 miles to the Electrify America station in Bakersfield, CA, with an efficiency of 2.5mi/kwh. We decided to stop at Bakersfield, as we wanted a buffer of charge for the mountainous terrain ahead of us, and to forego needing a charge to get to our hotel in LA East of the downtown area.
EA BAKERSFIELD: A QUICK SPLASH
Bakersfield is the last EA stop when traveling Southward before hitting the Tehachapi Mountains. I’ve not had the best of histories when conquering the Tejon Pass, and we did not want to have to charge in Los Angeles before making it to our hotel, so we decided to do a quick 15% splash at this station.
Bakersfield has only four charging stalls, and, true to form, 50% of them were out of service. Luckily for us, a new EQB just finished charging as we pulled up, so we had one of the two working stalls for our quick charge. We charged from 64% to 79% in 12 minutes.
While Bakersfield does not have a large number of chargers, it does have a Taco Bell and Pizza Hut Express and some other food options.
SUMMITING TEJON WITH BLIPPI
From Bakersfield, we plowed on through driving rains over the mountain ranges to get into LA. What better sound track to this trek than the childrens’ favorite orange-bespeckled entertainer Blippi. With Apple Music playing a seemingly endless stream of his greatest hits, Mach-N-Cheese forged on and conquered the summit and kept regenerating electricity downhill past its nemesis of Castic, CA.
We had a huge amount of traffic in the unusual rains in LA, and, in the end, made it to our hotel with 19% SOC left after traveling 142.5 miles with 2.7mi/khw efficiency.
EPILOGUE
Our hotel was only 5 minutes away from a newly-upgraded EVgo station, so I decided to try that out for the first time. Before leaving for my trip, I set up plug-n-charge in EVgo’s app (and plugged in to authenticate my car). Plug-n-charge worked on my first try, and was reasonably fast to connect to my vehicle and account. I found that their new 350kw charger (which I believe delivers 500amps) delivered great performance (I peaked at 165kw), had a really nice and useful UI, which was mimicked on their app as I charged. The only bummer was the cost, extremely high at $0.53/kwh. The price was listed as “unknown” while charging, so this seemed a bit unfair. EVgo seems to have pricing based on time-of-day, and for the rest of our stay, I am only charging there from 9pm to 12 midnight, when their rates are lowest.
FIRST LEG: SUNNYVALE TO FIREBAUGH, CA
We left our home at 8:30am and drove 115mi in rain (temperatures in the 50s F) down CA-85, CA-101, and CA-152 to make it South and East over to I-5, which you follow for the bulk of the trip down South. CA-152 has terrain that includes the Pacheco Pass. I decided on this trip to not be hobbled by reduced speed, and drove Mach-N-Cheese between 75-80mph keeping up with traffic in Whiisper mode.
One complaint I always have on road trips with the MME is the lack of a “custom” mode. It’s pretty lame that after all of this time, there’s no way for me to pick soft(er) ride in the suspension, but tight steering, throttle response, and high regen. Happy wife, happy life, so I optimize for the suspension setting at the expense of the other parameters being not to my liking.
Once merging onto I-5 South, it was another 36 miles to our first planned stop at Electrify America in Firebaugh, CA. We did so at 10:26am after driving 114.9 miles after using 53.2khw for an efficiency of 2.2mi/kwh.
EA FIREBAUGH: 3 FORD EVs, 3 OF 6 CHARGERS BROKEN
We arrived to this scene at the Firebaugh station: a MME extended-battery premium, and a 3-day-old Lightning were juicing up. We pulled into the only remaining working stall, and charged from 37% to 76% in 26 minutes. Charging performance was not terrific, and our peak kw delivered never broke 100 kw.
This was not a problem, as Bluey was available for pitstop entertainment (via my latest Android Chinese gadget), paired with a morning snack and bathroom breaks.
This was NOT a particularly heavy travel day over the holidays, yet EA had only 3 of 6 stalls working at this critical infrastructure point. Each one of the 3 broken stalls showed different symptoms:
- One stall showed “!” with “Charger unavailable,” but of course you only can see this on the screen when you’re up-close, already parked, and you tap the screen to get past the latest EA marketing promotion screen.
- The second stall had the screen completely off, but it still had the “green” lighting of EA which, if you ask most consumers, signifies to them that the charging stall is available and operational. I saw two cars during my charging session pull into the blank-screened one, and spend time trying to get it to work, despite the screen being off. I tried to help by telling both that I think it was out of order.
- The third stall was perhaps the worst. It had it’s screen on and appeared to be completely normal, until you plugged in and found that the charger was sending no juice to the car. Several cars had this experience as well.
The short conversation I had with the owner of the Rapid Red Lightning is probably most telling. He just took delivery of the truck three days before his road trip, and he is already soured from taking it on any trips again, and on it as being as useful to him as a result. He told me he is only getting 1.4mi/kwh, and that he feels he has to try stopping at every EA station along I-5, because he never knows when they will be working, or dead when he arrives, and he does not think he can rely on EA enough to arrive at a station with a low SOC. It’s a real problem if a new car owner isn’t completely happy with their car only 3 days after taking delivery – due to the inept charging infrastructure from EA.
SECOND LEG: ONWARDS TO IN-N-OUT
Traditionally, we always stop at In-N-Out for lunch in Kettleman City, CA, which is basically halfway on the journey. Usually, our downtime is 30-45 min of ordering and eating, without any ability to charge.
This time, we drove the 60 miles from our last stop with the anticipation of trying the newest EA hardware in a station conveniently located next to In-N-Out. We drove 63.1 miles (including sitting in the drive-thru line) to this brand-new charging stop with an efficiency of 2.5mi/kwh.
EA KETTLEMAN CITY: GREAT CARS, NEW CHARGERS, SAME POOR EXPERIENCE
We rolled up to this scene, burgers in hand, at 12:21pm with a 45% SOC, and charged for 39 minutes until 91%. We stayed this long because little kids eat slowly, and Bluey was playing, and we were in no hurry.
The Great: look at this lineup of cars, with owners optimistic about their future with them. Front left to right: a Bolt (well, ok, this was the only really meh car), then an Ioniq 5, then a Cyber Orange Premium (only there for a little bit – read on below!), then Mr. Cheesester, then another Ioniq 5 in Shooting Star Matte Grey (with all light grey trim blacked out 🤌), followed by a Rivian R1T in Rivian Blue. Next was a CA Rt 1 in Rapid Red, followed by a Rivian R1S with manufacturer plates in Rescue Red. Finally, at the end you can see an EV6 in Yacht Blue, followed by a black-with-gold teeth trim special rapper edition of the BMW iX M60.
The New: These chargers were EA’s newest units, and the UI responsiveness on them was noticeably much faster. The chargers were all under an overhang, so you are more protected from the elements. They’re also all positioned logically at the end of each of the parking spots, instead of on the side, making it easier to position your car.
The Same and Poor: This new EA installation – with capacity for 10 cars charging at 350kw – still had 20% of the stalls not working. Both of the stalls had no indications they malfunctioned, yet neither stall delivered electricity to anyone who tried them. This includes the Cyber Orange MME next to me in the photo. They pulled in, tried the only-available stall, then tried calling EA to help them. They then drove off, frustrated.
Moreover, this is a new installation, yet it does not appear that EA has learned too much. The site itself is wedged in between a gas station and a 24-hour Mexican restaurant in a separate parking area with only one driveway to get in and out. Yet there is no signage guiding EV customers on which driveway to enter. Almost every EV turned into the gas station then had to exit the station to then find the EA entrance. (What does the Kettleman Tesla Supercharger installation have? a HUGE Tesla sign at the height of the gas station signs so you can find where it is...)
Aside from the overhang, the facility itself has no amenities. By amenities, I mean there still is no garbage pail, towels, window washer, or bathroom facilities. Both the gas station and the Mexican restaurant have signs saying that bathrooms are for customers only. The gas station did not enforce this policy, but the Mexican restaurant did, turning us away when we went in to use the restroom and then maybe patronize them. After that attitude from them, we didn't.
LEG THREE: CENTRAL VALLEY TO BAKERSFIELD
We then ran the car for a little over an hour and 56 miles to the Electrify America station in Bakersfield, CA, with an efficiency of 2.5mi/kwh. We decided to stop at Bakersfield, as we wanted a buffer of charge for the mountainous terrain ahead of us, and to forego needing a charge to get to our hotel in LA East of the downtown area.
EA BAKERSFIELD: A QUICK SPLASH
Bakersfield is the last EA stop when traveling Southward before hitting the Tehachapi Mountains. I’ve not had the best of histories when conquering the Tejon Pass, and we did not want to have to charge in Los Angeles before making it to our hotel, so we decided to do a quick 15% splash at this station.
Bakersfield has only four charging stalls, and, true to form, 50% of them were out of service. Luckily for us, a new EQB just finished charging as we pulled up, so we had one of the two working stalls for our quick charge. We charged from 64% to 79% in 12 minutes.
While Bakersfield does not have a large number of chargers, it does have a Taco Bell and Pizza Hut Express and some other food options.
SUMMITING TEJON WITH BLIPPI
From Bakersfield, we plowed on through driving rains over the mountain ranges to get into LA. What better sound track to this trek than the childrens’ favorite orange-bespeckled entertainer Blippi. With Apple Music playing a seemingly endless stream of his greatest hits, Mach-N-Cheese forged on and conquered the summit and kept regenerating electricity downhill past its nemesis of Castic, CA.
We had a huge amount of traffic in the unusual rains in LA, and, in the end, made it to our hotel with 19% SOC left after traveling 142.5 miles with 2.7mi/khw efficiency.
EPILOGUE
Our hotel was only 5 minutes away from a newly-upgraded EVgo station, so I decided to try that out for the first time. Before leaving for my trip, I set up plug-n-charge in EVgo’s app (and plugged in to authenticate my car). Plug-n-charge worked on my first try, and was reasonably fast to connect to my vehicle and account. I found that their new 350kw charger (which I believe delivers 500amps) delivered great performance (I peaked at 165kw), had a really nice and useful UI, which was mimicked on their app as I charged. The only bummer was the cost, extremely high at $0.53/kwh. The price was listed as “unknown” while charging, so this seemed a bit unfair. EVgo seems to have pricing based on time-of-day, and for the rest of our stay, I am only charging there from 9pm to 12 midnight, when their rates are lowest.
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