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Charging at Calabogie Motorsports Park

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Doug_G

Lead Moderator
Global Moderator
Apr 2, 2010
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Ottawa, Canada
It's up and running! We now have both Roadster and Model S charging stations at Calabogie Motorsports Park. Big thanks to Tesla Motors for donating the charging stations.

Tonight I charged my Roadster at the track for the first time. Gobs of power - 248V! This means 17 kW for Roadsters and nearly 20 kW for Model S. Sweet! This makes it really easy to drive the Calabogie track.

The circuit is 100A, so it's set up so you can switch on one station or the other as needed.

Charging.jpg


The stations are right beside the gas pumps, as it happens. They will be charging a modest fee for using the station. They are talking about $20 per track day. Seems reasonable! Still a lot cheaper than gas.

The event I was at has a 15 minute warm-up session at the beginning, with full course caution so no passing. They were nice enough to let me run with the top down during that time, so I could grab some decent video. Here's a couple of laps, taking the straights easy but having a little fun in the corners, also showing the track to a beginner (I'm now an instructor).


Afterwards one of the organizers was saying that if we could get enough Teslas, we could have an evening session 7 pm to 10 pm. Normally the track is closed because of sound regulations, but our cars don't make any. At first I thought they were joking, but it sounds like maybe not!

Huge thanks to Tesla Motors and Calabogie Motorsports for making this happen!
 
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Awesome, I'll plan to be there with the P85D for the Chump weekend in 4 weeks knowing that i can charge up.

Dunno about Watkins but I imagine they'll charge the same at Calabogie regardless. The price is only a little above the cost of electricity for a full charge.

I will also be at Calabogie for the Chump weekend with the 1morelap neon. Will be using my Model S to get to/from the track, of course. But I don't need to recharge to get home.
 
And just where is this place? Would be nice to know.

WGI = Watkins Glen International - a race track at the southern end of Seneca Lake in NY. They don't have an HPWC but they do have lots of 14-50 outlets (normally for camping). Unfortunately since the Buffalo SC wasn't operational I didn't bring my MS to the track this weekend.

Dunno about Watkins but I imagine they'll charge the same at Calabogie regardless. The price is only a little above the cost of electricity for a full charge.

I will also be at Calabogie for the Chump weekend with the 1morelap neon. Will be using my Model S to get to/from the track, of course. But I don't need to recharge to get home.

My statement was probably confusing, the Hill's work for Calabogie, but they were also down at the Chump race at Watkins Glen this past weekend so I asked if they knew about the pricing for destination charging vs. lapping. They said they'd find out at the Bogie staff meeting today.
 
Just did a morning CMP Lapping session at Calabogie with my Model S P85+ on Friday. Things went pretty well and I will definitely take my car to the track again.

I called in advance to make sure that mine would be the only Tesla there since I wanted to maximize my laps and see how many could be done. The morning session has three 30 minute run sessions each for beginners (no experience & with an instructor or experienced but wanting slower laps) and for experienced drivers.

I started at home with a full charge and a rated range of 419 km. I live in Kanata so I'm at the right end of Ottawa for getting to Calabogie. The distance was 93 km and I used 111 km of range to get there (driving somewhat above the speed limit). The park opens at 7:30 am but I got there about 15 minutes later. At registration, I said that I had a Tesla and they charged me $25 for charging for the day and quickly got me connected up. Unfortunately, the HPWC was internally set for 40A charging but they were able to get one of the staff to adjust the HPWC to deliver 80A. After that I was able to get 94 km/hr charging. In the end, I wound up only gaining 47 km of range before the experienced drivers started at 9:00 am (I had experience driving the track in my Audi S6 in the past).

I started the first run about 5 minutes late and managed 8 laps (each lap is almost exactly 5 km) before we were flagged off the track. The first lap is great because you have full power. I could get the car up to about 190 km/hr on Rocky Road - the longest straight section of the track. An interesting fact is that the P85+ didn't really get to a significantly higher speed on Rocky Road than my S6 even though the Tesla is way faster off the line than the S6 was. I think that the Tesla doesn't have as much advantage in accelerating once the speeds are higher. I found the driving experience to be comparable. After the first lap, the maximum was about 155 km/hr. I still found it quite fun with the lower power available. I used up 148 km of range for 18.5 km of range per lap.

I charged just under 30 minutes and gained 46 km of range. Again I started a few minutes late and this time got in 9 laps using up 180 km of range for 20.0 km of range/lap. Not sure why the km of range/lap was higher since my Wh/km was almost the same (646 for this run vs. 640 for the first run).

Again I charged just under 30 minutes and gained 46 km of range. This time, I was starting with just 119 km of range so I new I had to keep track of the range. I did 5 laps and left the track with 22 km of range left. I used up 97 km of range for 19.5 km of range/lap. My Wh/km was 630 for this run. I finished at about 11:25 am.

I stayed for the lunch which was served at 12:30 pm. I wouldn't say it was great value - $15 for a plate of food (2 salads and a pasta) without drinks (water is provided throughout the day). I left at about 1:15 pm with 190 km of range and used 120 km of range getting home while driving somewhat faster (around 15-20 km/hr over the speed limit).

I figure that I could probably get in about 10 laps per run if I started right at the beginning of the run and stayed on until the end. With ideal charging: maybe 1 1/4 hrs charging at the beginning and 25 minutes charging between each run, I still couldn't do 30 laps before running out of power. I figure that I could get in about 25. That's still pretty good. So I figure that I would plan on runs of 9, 9 & 7 laps or so.

There was a lot of interest in the Model S and it was enjoyable to chat with the other drivers.

This was my second time going to Calabogie with my Tesla. The first time, there was no charging available and I managed 11 laps vs. 22 laps this time and maybe 25 laps ideally.

It would be great to run the track with some other Teslas but we would have to be careful about charging.
 
I heard that there was a Model S on the track Friday... great to hear about your experience. I had my Roadster out again on Saturday evening. (We were there to test our Chumpcar, but it died so I ran the Roadster for a bit.)

I've had my Model S out on Calabogie, but only for a few laps at a time. It handles surprisingly well on the track. (I've also had it out for a full day at Shannonville - in that case I stopped a bit early so I wouldn't have to wait so long to drive home.)

If there were two Teslas running in opposite run groups, they wouldn't overlap except at lunch. Otherwise, yes, sharing would be required. You could charge a Model S and Roadster simultaneously at 40A (100A circuit), or with two Models S you could take turns plugging in.

Model S is a heavy car and will draw rather more power than a Roadster, so it will require more charging. On the other hand, its big advantage is that it cools down faster than the Roadster. You might find it more enjoyable to run a few laps, then pull into the pits for 5-10 minutes to cool down, and then return to the track. Yes that's easier in an open lapping event, but even with 1/2 hour sessions you should be able to get a breather in the middle.