Driving Home from Pickup—Enough Chargers?

[PianoAl]

I'll be picking up our Model 3 (with the long range option) in Rocklin, CA and driving it home to Trinidad, CA.

I know the car will tell me, but I want to plan ahead.

It's 188 miles from the supercharger in Red Bluff to home. That should be no problem, right?

Thanks,

Al

 

[PianoAl]

PS Sorry this should have gone in the Charging subforum.

 

[Sherlo]

I'll be picking up our Model 3 (with the long range option) in Rocklin, CA and driving it home to Trinidad, CA.

View attachment 493911
I know the car will tell me, but I want to plan ahead.

It's 188 miles from the supercharger in Red Bluff to home. That should be no problem, right?

Thanks,

Al

You might be cutting it a bit close this time of year (with colder weather).

Try this planner

A Better Routeplanner

 

[PianoAl]

Thanks, Sherlo!

That shows me arriving with 10%. I'm willing to drive more slowly than usual.

In this map, it shows me charging to 74% in Red Bluff. But I could charge to 100%, right?

 

[drtimhill]

Yes, you can charge to 100% .. the tesla route planner doesn’t really care about your SoC (state of charge) at destination. Better Route Planner can be setup (look in options) so you can specify what SoC you want when you arrive at destination.

 

[Watts_Up]

.... But I could charge to 100%, right?
View attachment 493936

You can charge up to 100% put it takes more time as it will charge slower and slower as soon you pass 70%.

If you need to use your brakes, like when on a curving road or going down the hill, I would not got more than 95%
because there will be no regenerating braking.

 

[PianoAl]

Thanks. I modified that, and it looks good.

I think I have free charging based on the referral code from a friend. If I don't, do I have to set up a credit card or something?

From Youtube videos, it looks like all I have to do it plug it in, and it will know who I am.

 

[Watts_Up]

I would recommend to install some EV charging App to your phone like EVgo , Blink, or ChargePoint... and create an account.

You might find a restaurant or a shopping center where you could charge.

It would be a L2 (7 kWh) charger but you can get an extra 20 to 30 miles for an hour.

Also the Tesla/Findus give you a list of L2 Destination chargers.

 

[PianoAl]

You can charge up to 100% put it takes more time as it will charge slower and slower as soon you pass 70%.

If you need to use your brakes, like when on a curving road or going down the hill, I would not got more than 95%
because there will be no regenerating braking.

Okay, good to know. I will be extra cautious, since I'm new to the car. I don't mind waiting—I'm used to charging up our Leaf.

So, if I'm above 95%, I'll end up using the brake pads more, and wearing them out, is that right?

 

[PianoAl]

Good. Yeah, I have ChargePoint and Greenlots cards.

BTW, any reason to get a ChaDeMo adapter?

 

[drtimhill]

Thanks. I modified that, and it looks good.

I think I have free charging based on the referral code from a friend. If I don't, do I have to set up a credit card or something?

From Youtube videos, it looks like all I have to do it plug it in, and it will know who I am.

You will already have an account setup with Tesla .. they use that info to bill your credit card (make sure you have the car setup in your app before you start your journey).

 

[Sherlo]

Okay, good to know. I will be extra cautious, since I'm new to the car. I don't mind waiting—I'm used to charging up our Leaf.

So, if I'm above 95%, I'll end up using the brake pads more, and wearing them out, is that right?

You are gonna really love it coming from the Leaf, that’s what we had too. Enjoy

 

[Zcd1]

FWIW - a good rule of thumb when traveling and supercharging is to charge to about 10% more than the car says is necessary.

By contrast it’s rarely worth the substantial extra time required to charge beyond about 90%.

 

[Watts_Up]

So, if I'm above 95%, I'll end up using the brake pads more, and wearing them out, is that right?

Yes a litle bit of wear, the car is quite heavy, but the problem is mostly that when you get used to the one foot pedal,
you could be surprised because the car will not really slow down when releasing the accelerator and you will have to press on the brake pedal.
In case of heavy traffic, you just need to be warned about.

In my case, I always charge at 90% every night. Recently because of wildfires, PG&E was going to shutdown the power.
So I charged a 100% but for urban driving, the first 15 miles where not very pleasant until I went back to about 93 or 94%.
So the following days I charged at 95%.

 

[jkoya]

Is the route from Red Bluff to Trinidad in a general downhill direction ?

 

[Watts_Up]

Is the route from Red Bluff to Trinidad in a general downhill direction ?

Here is the road elevation from Red Bluff (left) to Trinidad (right), using Google map and the Cycling option.

The blue line is the north road (299) passing by Reeding.

The grey line is the south road (36).

 

[jkoya]

Here is the road elevation, using Goole map and the Cycling option.

Thanks - it's been a while for me since I've been up that way and couldn't remember..

 

[animorph]

Welcome PianoAl!

I use ABetterRoutePlanner to plan Supercharger stops. I use the car's nav to estimate my charge level when I reach my destination. Then I keep an eye on the charge remaining at destination (at the bottom of the nav's turns list) to make sure I'm on track. Slowing down or following trucks (or both) is nearly always sufficient to maintain your desired safety margin. We haven't run out yet, nor have we had to use anything but Superchargers on road trips. Headwinds and rain/snow are two things that can catch us out once in a while.

I find waiting for anything close to 100% charge while traveling is intolerably slow unless you need extra time to eat or something. We used a 20% charge remaining at destination initially, down to 15% now. As long as there are no range decreasing conditions suddenly popping up that's usually a comfortable safety margin.

 

[Watts_Up]

BTW, any reason to get a ChaDeMo adapter?

The CHAdeMO adapter costs $450 and provides only 50 kWh.

If you cannot charge at home or at work, your only current option are the L2 public chargers or the Blink CHAdeMO.

It would be better to wait to get the CCS Superchargers adapters, but also Tesla vehicles can soon be charged at EVgo charging stations in the US

BTW, will you be able to charge at home? If so, do you have aleady a plug installed?
What kind of typical daily commute, or weekend trip will you have?

Note: About your range estimate, if the weather is bad, like a lot of wind, rain,
and if you need to use a lot the heater, plan to add 20 to 50 % of possible loss range.

 

[QS01]

The easy answer - just plug in your destination when you get in the car. The M3 does a really good job at estimates the range (especially after about 30 miles into the drive). The car won’t let you run out of power unless you completely ignore it and what it’s telling you do it. It will automatically route you to the necessary chargers to get you there.