Winter Trip report

[jeffMachE]

Took my Premium AWD Ext on a trip to Las Vegas from the Denver area right after Christmas. Some good, some bad.

Range was significantly worse than I was expecting, could only average ~120-~140 miles before needing to charge. Significant factors that reduced the range:
- Was driving fairly fast, 75-80 (as anyone who has ever driven I-70 across Utah can attest, there is little to slow you down)
- Had significant headwinds, at times up to 60 MPH due to a winter storm blowing through
- Temps in the 20's for much of the trip

All told, had to stop 6 times to charge on a 780 mile trip (started with 100%) and it took 16 hours to drive there.
Good news is that all charging was free courtesy of ElectrifyAmerica. Not having a faster charge curve and having to stop at 80% rather than 90% probably added 2 extra charging stops. We also didn't take any chances and never ran below 15%. Got an average of 2.2 mi/kWh on the way out. Not great. No issues with finding chargers, just had to stop too many times.

Coming back, with similar temps but no headwind, got closer to 2.7 mi/kWh.

All in all, my impression of travelling long distances in the winter is meh. I'm sure spring/summer would be better - having 180-200 effective miles would be great. But 120-140 is pretty tedious.

Note - I'm not complaining - I've driven EV's for 6+ years. But you really need 200 miles "effective" range (e.g. 70% of the battery range - 10% to 80%") to make this a real cross-country vehicle. Also, I'm sure in the East where driving 80 MPH isn't the norm, it would be much better.

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[Caramel]

I totally agree. Since getting mine, we’ve done a couple of 150-200 trips needed to charge once each trip. (I’m also in the denver area.) I do love how coming down the mountains is basically free regen though! Lol

 

[RickMachE]

This is why we took the F-150 on our recent 2,400 mile round-trip.

 

[Nklem]

Took my Premium AWD Ext on a trip to Las Vegas from the Denver area right after Christmas. Some good, some bad.

Range was significantly worse than I was expecting, could only average ~120-~140 miles before needing to charge. Significant factors that reduced the range:
- Was driving fairly fast, 75-80 (as anyone who has ever driven I-70 across Utah can attest, there is little to slow you down)
- Had significant headwinds, at times up to 60 MPH due to a winter storm blowing through
- Temps in the 20's for much of the trip

All told, had to stop 6 times to charge on a 780 mile trip (started with 100%) and it took 16 hours to drive there.
Good news is that all charging was free courtesy of ElectrifyAmerica. Not having a faster charge curve and having to stop at 80% rather than 90% probably added 2 extra charging stops. We also didn't take any chances and never ran below 15%. Got an average of 2.2 mi/kWh on the way out. Not great. No issues with finding chargers, just had to stop too many times.

Coming back, with similar temps but no headwind, got closer to 2.7 mi/kWh.

All in all, my impression of travelling long distances in the winter is meh. I'm sure spring/summer would be better - having 180-200 effective miles would be great. But 120-140 is pretty tedious.

Note - I'm not complaining - I've driven EV's for 6+ years. But you really need 200 miles "effective" range (e.g. 70% of the battery range - 10% to 80%") to make this a real cross-country vehicle. Also, I'm sure in the East where driving 80 MPH isn't the norm, it would be much better.

Remember to multiply that mi/kWh by .9 to get the real actual number.

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