Anybody gone Bay Area to Tahoe yet?

[napabill]

After reading the excellent post on road trips by ChadS, I am starting to think I've been too optimistic about my charging plans. I still need to work through the math a bit more, but originally I thought
1. Belmont to Folsom, 130 miles, relatively little elevation change. Start with a range mode charge (208 miles on 60kWh battery) and no worries about speed (keep it around 70) or heat. Use the supercharger for an hour while eating lunch (and hope there's no line for the SC).
2. Folsom to Incline village, 110 miles but ~2600 meters total elevation gain and temps drop to around freezing. Start with a range charge and drive conservatively (60-65) but keep heat on (wife and kids in car).

Perhaps that's too optimistic?

If I play it safe I would stop in Auburn at Clipper Creek for their 80A charger, but unfortunately it's only 25 miles away from Folsom and not really that much higher elevation-wise, maybe 400 meters. I'd also have to convince the wife and kids that we need a 1 hour bathroom break only half an hour after lunch in Folsom. Maybe I won't need a full hour at Auburn? I'll have to work on the math but maybe someone with more experience will know off the bat:
1. Should I do a range charge or standard charge at the supercharger in Folsom?
2. How long should I charge (if at all) in Auburn? Back to full standard, full range, or just a set amount of time or miles?
There's not much in the way of high speed charging between Auburn and Incline Village, and I'm not really interested in hanging out at an RV park in the cold.

thanks

My 2 cents would be to always do a range charge prior to leaving home. You never know what congestion there might be at Folsom, so having less to charge would be an advantage. Assuming you have the Folsom SC to yourself, I'd again do a range charge. Not that I think a standard charge wouldn't be sufficient to safely get to Incline. No need to stop in Auburn. I just believe that, unlike the NYT moron, you should always charge to the max practical. When you used to drive an ICE I'm betting you didn't figure how much gas you needed to your destination and fill up only what was needed. You filled it up, correct?

Coming home, I'd stop at Folsom and do a standard charge. It's free, remember? And you could drive at any speed you wanted.

I just reread your OP and realize you are of the new 60KW crowd. Consequently, I'm not so sure about what range you can expect. Perhaps someone could shed some light on that.

 

[bonnie]

My 2 cents would be to always do a range charge prior to leaving home. You never know what congestion there might be at Folsom, so having less to charge would be an advantage. Assuming you have the Folsom SC to yourself, I'd again do a range charge. Not that I think a standard charge wouldn't be sufficient to safely get to Incline. No need to stop in Auburn. I just believe that, unlike the NYT moron, you should always charge to the max practical. When you used to drive an ICE I'm betting you didn't figure how much gas you needed to your destination and fill up only what was needed. You filled it up, correct?

Coming home, I'd stop at Folsom and do a standard charge. It's free, remember? And you could drive at any speed you wanted.

+1 on everything you said.

 

[brianman]

Let's see... 265 * 10% = 26.5 miles

Assuming you're not making someone else wait or in a rush, etc., doesn't it always make sense to do a Range charge when you plan on driving at least 26.5 miles immediately after disconnecting your power source?

 

[Cj orinda]

bay area to tahoe

Thank you for this report.

Do you happen to know what the temperature was when you did this drive? Were you running your heater or just the seat heaters?

I'm assuming that since you were driving fast that the road conditions were good.

Cheers.

My wife and i drove up last weekend. left orinda with 260 range, stopped in Folsom supercharger for about 45min till at about 265 range (drove he 100 miles there around 75-80mph) it was only about 35 degrees outside and nighttime. the top end above 240 range goes much slower even on the supercharger. I drove only about 65 on the road up and low heater (but not in range mode). go to the top of the I80 pass at 90 range (you lose 10 Miles range per 1000 ft according to Telsa) so this came out about right. Going down hill we got beyond truckee before the range changed at all since were regenerating down the east side of the pass. Then drove on to the Grand Sierra Casino RV parking in Reno. Got there with 40 miles range going around 65mph. They have 50 amp 240V service for the RV parking and it costs $10 to park there. even in the cold (like 20 degrees) I got to 260 range in 7.5 hrs. Drove back to Truckee, then to west lake (Homewood) then to South Lake Tahoe (being more careful of range since I didn't get to charge in Homewood like I thought i would. left Homewood with 142 heading to Folsom via south lake Tahoe. Shorter distance and less mountain to go over that way. I had 60 m range when arrived at supercharger Folsom. From (with 190 miles range ) took about 25 minutes, Folsom on i drove 75 on cruise control to Orinda (100 miles) it uses almost exactly 140% of "normal" at 75 v 55 and the heater was on. got home with 50 mi range. We had a great time and could have easliy made it home if we had charged fully in Tahoe and gone a little more slowly on the way home.

- - - Updated - - -

Thank you for this report.

Do you happen to know what the temperature was when you did this drive? Were you running your heater or just the seat heaters?

I'm assuming that since you were driving fast that the road conditions were good.

Cheers.

My wife and i drove up last weekend. left orinda with 260 range, stopped in Folsom supercharger for about 45min till at about 265 range (drove he 100 miles there around 75-80mph) it was only about 35 degrees outside and nighttime. the top end above 240 range goes much slower even on the supercharger. I drove only about 65 on the road up and low heater (but not in range mode). go to the top of the I80 pass at 90 range (you lose 10 Miles range per 1000 ft according to Telsa) so this came out about right. Going down hill we got beyond truckee before the range changed at all since were regenerating down the east side of the pass. Then drove on to the Grand Sierra Casino RV parking in Reno. Got there with 40 miles range going around 65mph. They have 50 amp 240V service for the RV parking and it costs $10 to park there. even in the cold (like 20 degrees) I got to 260 range in 7.5 hrs. Drove back to Truckee, then to west lake (Homewood) then to South Lake Tahoe (being more careful of range since I didn't get to charge in Homewood like I thought i would. left Homewood with 142 heading to Folsom via south lake Tahoe. Shorter distance and less mountain to go over that way. I had 60 m range when arrived at supercharger Folsom. From (with 190 miles range ) took about 25 minutes, Folsom on i drove 75 on cruise control to Orinda (100 miles) it uses almost exactly 140% of "normal" at 75 v 55 and the heater was on. got home with 50 mi range. We had a great time and could have easliy made it home if we had charged fully in Tahoe and gone a little more slowly on the way home.

 

[Kipernicus]

Great info CJ, thanks for sharing

 

[gg_got_a_tesla]

Great info CJ, thanks for sharing

Good luck, Kip! Enjoy the slopes.

We are heading the other way to the beach along with another TMC-er, twisti (Chris), near Aptos/Capitola! Chris's 85 and my 60 at the beach!

 

[Kipernicus]

I made it! More details and pics later, but basically the car was great. Swallowed up so much luggage and gear. Very comfortable driving up and didn't need to hypermile. Did need to kill time waiting to charge however because the kids got hungry before we could make it to Folsom, so we stopped at Davis and plugged in to the 70a charger there. By the time we were done eating and going to a local ski shop I had 171 miles range and headed off to Auburn. Had a brief mid-road chat with a grey model S on the way out!

Arrived at clipper creek with 110 remaining and had to charge for two hours. Went to jamba juice and Bel air for a while. Just as we were pulling out saw another white model S pulling in! Good timing. Would have been bad if they arrived while we were out (we didn't leave our phone number) and had no idea how long they would have to wait for a charge.


Anyways, left auburn with 194 range for an 88 mile climb, and ended up arriving with 60 remaining. 37.2kWh. And now it is happlily plugged into the 14-50 at the Hyatt. No anxiety, but my wife was a little miffed about having to kill time waiting for charge. At least we didn't have to wait for any chargers to free up, as that was her big worry.

In retrospect, I think after Davis we should have gone to Folsom and done a Max range charge and gone directly up to Tahoe, as napabill suggested. Just didnt know if the 60 could do it but I am pretty sure now that it can. I had 60 range left over and its 26 miles from folsom to auburn, leaving about a 30 mile buffer. Do you think that's cutting it too close?

Well it was nice meeting the two other S's and hope the rest of your trip went well.

 

[gg_got_a_tesla]

Sweet, Kip!! You are a pioneer for us 60s!!

 

[blc1017]

Kip, we saw you! It was right around Davis. We were in our hybrid and I was trying very hard to enjoy the view (of your car) without being too obvious. There was a very ugly car that was sticking very close behind you at times and I'm thinking they were ogling you too.
First time my husband has seen a Model S on the road so it was a real treat for us. Can't wait to take our own road trip, with the car coming sometime in March...

 

[Kipernicus]

Kip, we saw you! It was right around Davis. We were in our hybrid and I was trying very hard to enjoy the view (of your car) without being too obvious. There was a very ugly car that was sticking very close behind you at times and I'm thinking they were ogling you too.
First time my husband has seen a Model S on the road so it was a real treat for us. Can't wait to take our own road trip, with the car coming sometime in March...

That is too funny!
Sometime I notice when people are checking us out but usually I'm too busy looking at the instrumentation.


I did a cold soak last night, just to see how much I would lose. Parked for 14 hours and the low was around 17f, but surprisingly only went from 170 to 158. When I leave it unplugged at home I lose about 6 to 10 miles. Not nearly the loss that Broder wrote about!

 

[gg_got_a_tesla]

Nice shots of your car from your Recargo checkin, Kip!

 

[Kipernicus]

Yep, and I found out today that there's two 14-50 outlets in that spaghetti down there, and they were installed years ago when Tesla had some kind of show or event at the hotel. Anyone remember that?

 

[Banahogg]

Just finished by San Jose->Incline Village in my 60kWh.

Range charge at home got me to Folsom with about 77 miles remaining. After feeding the baby, we went to McDonalds for a quick lunch. Once we finished, the car was basically ready, but my wife wanted to look at a few stores, so we spent maybe ~20 minutes wandering around. All told, it was about an hour, but we weren't really waiting for the car.

After a second stop to feed the baby, we made it up to the Hyatt with 58 miles remaining - no problem.

The mileage was almost an exact match with the numbers that http://www.jurassictest.ch/GR/ gave me. The only difference were the sections where I wasn't going freeway speed (they only give you one speed number). I spent most of the trip with the cruise control set to more or less the speed limit, but with no real attention to driving gently.

The charger works fine, but has really low voltage with two cars charging. After a few texts back and forth was finally able to meet Kipernicus in the lobby and we had a good nerd to nerd chat abut the cars for a while

If anyone wants way too much data about the trip, I've put up a trimmed file from my REST->CSV logger here: http://banahogg.com/log20130222.csv

 

[Kipernicus]

It was great meeting you, Banahogg! Here's a pic of our cars in the morning with a light dusting of snow (I took the liberty of obscuring your plates)

This has gotta be the first pic of two 60's, 240 miles and 7000 feet away from home, charging up at a hotel!

 

[Kermit]

I'm considering driving to Echo Lake this weekend from Santa Clara County in my 85kwh S. I'm sure the drive to Folsom Supercharger will not be a problem, but from there, it is 75 miles up to Elev. 7200 to Echo Lake, where the car will sit for 2 or 3 days, unplugged. There are no charging facilities anywhere nearby except a Level 2 down at Harrahs 20 miles east (wrong direction, more climbing).
1) Can I get a full range charge at the Folsom SC or is that impractical/really slow? I know the first half-tank is 30 minutes, but charge rate tapers off....
2) Given the long climb and vampire drain in cool mountain air, will I have enough juice to make it back to Folsom?

 

[Kipernicus]

I think you should be fine, Kermit. The range charge won't feel slow if you're having a meal or something, and I think even at the very end it's about as fast as a regular 240v outlet.
Although you'll use a lot getting to the lake and lose some to dracula, my guess is you'll end up back at Folsom with 50 miles remaining (105 to go up, 40 sitting around, 65 to come back)

 

[MikeK]

Do you have even a standard 110 outlet available where you'll be staying? That would at least stave off the vampires.

 

[Kermit]

Trip report:
I made my first road trip from Santa Clara County to Echo Lake, el. 7400' in the Sierras over Memorial Day weekend. It's about 220 miles from home. My companion has been involved in EVs for decades; he built a electric/gas hybrid as a college project, and formerly leased the original GM EV1. He has worked on EV vehicle interfaces and solar power. So to get behind the wheel of a modern Tesla was a real treat for him. He was really impressed.

The drive from Santa Clara Co to Folsom was uneventful; we stopped in Davis to meet friends and charged $0/17 miles at a downtown parking lot J1772. Our main charge was at Folsom Supercharger where we topped off to a full range charge; this added 128 miles of range in 45 minutes. The 75 mile, 7000' climb to Echo Lake consumed an indicated 128 miles of range, arriving with 135 miles of indicated range. There was no where to plug in at Echo Lake, but I wasn't worried about the 75 mile downhill return to Folsom.

The weather over Memorial day was surprisingly cold and breezy, reaching freezing overnight. Backpackers were bailing out of Desolation Wilderness. The Tesla lost 24 miles of range in the 2 days parked. We drove back to Folsom, 75 miles downhill consuming only 42 miles of indicated range.

In total, the 150 mile round trip from Folsom to Echo, 7000' gain, burned an indicated 170 miles of range, and parking for two nights consumed an additional 24 miles.

Returning to Folsom, I recharged, adding 134 mi of range in 30 minutes. This was enough to get home comfortably.

 

[dwhite]

System works just fine. I've been to Reno 3 times, San Jose 4, and Sacramento 5; and I live in Southern California. Folsom may be the best for places to eat and things to do while charging. Looking forward to SuperChargers in Mojave and Bishop. (Yes I have 21,800 miles on the S, with an X coming.)

 

[jeff_adams]

System works just fine. I've been to Reno 3 times, San Jose 4, and Sacramento 5; and I live in Southern California. Folsom may be the best for places to eat and things to do while charging. Looking forward to SuperChargers in Mojave and Bishop. (Yes I have 21,800 miles on the S, with an X coming.)

Ski trips to Mammoth Mountain will be great with an AWD Model X. Free power to get up there is even better!