Idaho to Montana and back in the Winterish, YLR - First Road Trip 1,100 miles in three days

[CalypsoCowboy]

This was my first long road trip in our 2023 MYLR since we purchased her in December. We started in Boise, ID and drove to Helena, MT and back over three days, about 1100 total miles. A few things to preface this trip. We took the freeway the entire way as we have always done that in the past and we find it easier than the normal two-lane road. The speed on most of the freeway is 80 and we tend to do a few miles over. Roads were pretty good except for a few spots where we slowed down due to snow on the roads. Idaho and Montana in general do not have the greatest charging infrastructure. On this trip there were 6 SC locations not counting our destination with some gaps of 100+ miles between chargers. Only two of those are V3, the others are older V2. Being our first road trip and not knowing what to expect we planned for an arrival SOC of 20 because we knew speeds and temperature would decrease that. Temps were 34 to 7 F in general. We can usually make this trip in about 8 hours with one stop for gas and a few restroom breaks.

Trip Summary
Boise to Helena - 559 miles - Drive time 7:49 - Used 201.81 kWh - Avg 361 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 95% Ending SOC 39%
Charge in Helena - 0:38 to 80%
Helena to Boise - 565 miles - Drive time 7:58 - Used 197.74 kWh - Avg 350 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 72% Ending SOC 19%
Charge in Boise - to 80%

Some things I learned:

• Range anxiety is an understandable thing and it got better with each drive segment. I'm sure once I figure out how much roughly I need for the segments, I will feel better. Looking at the energy graph was a big help in determining if I could speed up some or if I needed to keep it closer to 80.
• Planning is kind of a pain in Tesla or ABRP, I used a combination of both to figure out what I needed to start with when we left. In general, I just used Telsa's in car guidance to determine when to stop charging. Most of the time the app was pretty good but a few times it was off by a bit. ABRP seemed farther off, but it may be I just didn't have the setting correct.
• When travelling in the winter, bring a snow shovel. Our stop in Lima, it had recently snowed and they plowed in the direction of the super chargers. There was a big berm in front of them. Luckily on the way up there was one spot that was packed down and we used it. On the way home the same spot was available, but as we were getting ready to leave three other Tesla's showed up. They all had shovels but had to dig out places for two to charge.
• We used FSD for 95% of the trip it did pretty well. There were a few things it did have issues with. 1. We had a couple of times where when passing and the vehicle behind us, it tried to move back over into the slow lane too quickly, I intervened when this happened. 2. The car doesn't want to slow down in clearly marked curved, there are places in the freeway where yellow signs indicate to slow down to 55 or 65 for a curve, FSD didn't slow down, I hope this gets fixed. 3. My car thinks it's a truck. We have speed limit signs that say Speed Limit 80 and below that Trucks 70. FSD seems to see these at two speed limits and numerous times the car slowed down to 70 in an 80 zone, no fun.
• If I'm being honest, I was surprised by the total time, like I said earlier we usually make the trip in 8 hours. I was hoping around 9, but it turned out to be 10. We tried to time bathroom/food stops as best we could with charging but it wasn't always possible. In the future, I am going to try to get into the charger closer to 10 or 15% and I think that will help some. In most cases I was in 16-20% range when I arrived, I could have shaved off a few minutes adjusting things. 10 hours in the car is a lot, we had a few stops where we stayed in the car while charging, in the future we will get out and walk around, stretch our legs.
• Speed and temperature kill range. I'll make this same trip in May and I'm curious to see how or if things change. I don't anticipate fewer stops, but maybe less time at the stops.
• TeslaFi is awesome and tells me way more data that I need, I won't need it normally, but for these road trips it's great to see all the data.

All in all, it was a good trip, I felt like I learned a ton, the car handled great and FSD made it easy to drive.

-Josh

"Tesla Model Y Front View" by Monotoan is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Admin note: Images added for Blog Feed thumbnail

 

[charlesoris]

Thanks for sharing with us.
Like you said, speed and temperature impact efficiency and range. The same holds true for ICE vehicles. Arriving at around 10% SOC and hitting v3 SuC, and charging enough to get to the next SuC helps cut down on total time.
Finally, I walk around every time I am at a SuC. That helps with fatigue and allows me to rest my eyes.

 

[IronCoffee_Max]

Doing 20k of road trips in my M3 - a few tips:

1. I do a full trip plan using Tesla Nav, but in reality I manually pick the SC I want to go to.
2. I try to hit 1-5%.
3. Depending on where I am, sometimes there are dozens of options, sometimes just 1 or 2. But usually I can find a lot of CCS and SC in an area that makes 1-5% less risky
4. I do have a CCS adapter.
5. I find Tesla Nav has recently been taking me to 150Kw chargers…but I'll manually pick the 250Kw or 350 CCS
6. I use Plugshare often to see how things are before I get there. Just a nice perk of crowdsourcing.
7. I only use ABRP for a swag of how things will go depending on seasonal climate, construction, etc…
8. I never sit in the car during charging. Unless its 2am and I sleep.

 

[danpass]

Interesting about the snow plow.

Imagine ICE drivers having to dig out an access to fuel pumps .....

 

[phxazcraig]

Interesting about the snow plow.

Imagine ICE drivers having to dig out an access to fuel pumps .....

This ICE driver remembers a day long ago driving over Donner Pass in January in an Opel GT with a locking gas cap. Cap lock was frozen and wouldn't work as needed, and it took a while to end up dribbling hot coffee water into the lock to unfreeze it enough to open.

 

[Rally]

Thanks for sharing. It sounds like you were using navigation to SCs so the battery preconditioned prior to arrival. This will help with charging speed especially when it's cold.
Took a short trip from Boise to Vegas in early December last year with no issues in our MYLR. Generally the car will charge enough to allow for about 10% remaining upon arrival at the next SC. This works fine if you don't have any issues or make stupid mistakes. I made a stupid mistake and made a stop in St. George for food, but forgot to charge. I realized this mistake a couple minutes later after getting back onto the freeway. There were no exits for miles, and the freeway was all downhill for miles. I think the car said we would be at 1% upon arriving at the next SC. I didn't want to turn around and chance going uphill, so we continued south. By slowing down to 55MPH and turning off the radio, AC, and even the front marker lights, we were able to arrive with 6% charge.
If I had done the minimum charge the car recommends and had left St. George with 10% remaining, I don't think we would of made it.
Of course if I didn't make the stupid mistake of not charging, it wouldn't have been an issue.
Also, before we arrived to Vegas, the freeway came to a standstill several miles north. This was the day of the UNLV shooting and many roads were shut down. We were delayed 2-3 hours. Since we charge more than the car wants, I wasn't worried. I had about 38% charge left and would only use maybe 8% to get to our hotel. The car uses almost zero charge just sitting in traffic. Weather was nice so we were just sitting on the freeway with the windows down listening to music. Just food for thought.

 

[DrGriz]

A couple of years of driving intermittent longish trips in a model Y in and around Idaho. The trip calculator can be close or seriously wrong. We made a trip to SoCal last June. Coolish weather. Started out 100% in Boise and planned to drive to Winnemucka SC. Trip planner said arrival 9%. As we drove, mostly speed limit, it quickly recalculated and said up to 18% at arrival. As we got into no cell signal land it gradually dropped until it went negative. When the estimated arrival charge got to -5 %, the car began flashing alarms, beeping and started disabling features to the point that all I had was steering brakes and accelerator! I had to pull over and stop. I couldn't really do anything else so I did a two button reset. When things came back up the car trip planned back and over to Bend, Oregon.

It was a little disturbing to say the least! But I then trip planned to end in McDermitt, NV, which is on the way and has a Shell Recharge. (It also now has a Tesla Supercharger, but it wasn't open at the time). Of course we have a CCS1 adapter.

The point of my long story to you is that the trip planner estimator swung 23% in that drive. It's pretty unreliable. I find it usually overestimates by about 10% of charge per 100 miles of driving the speed limit in Idaho and surrounding in winter, even with it knowing the weather, elevation changes, temperature, wind and the fact we have snow tires.

You are right to plan extra buffer and keep that CCS1 adapter handy.

Your extra trip time is about what we see for a similar trip.

All that said, if you are smart, relax, plan ahead and think of it as an adventure, it can be quite fun!

 

[Rally]

Interesting. I have found the trip planner to be fairly accurate. A 23% swing would be concerning.

Having a CCS adapter isn't a bad idea. I think they were $250 last time I looked. I generally plan out all our stops before the trip. I look at each SC option and look to see which ones have more to offer in the area. All SCs are definitely NOT created equal in terms of food in the immediate area.

Do you mind if I ask what CCS adapter you have?

 

[DrGriz]

I was able to get this Tesla OEM adapter. It is pretty simple, and there are others out there that are reliable and cost less. You can find at least one thread in here discussing alternatives.

If, for instance, you want to drive from the Treasure Valley to Coeur d'Alene on US 95 or Idaho 55 and stay in Idaho (minimum 379 miles with many passes and valleys) you will not encounter a single Supercharger. There are a handful of working CCS1 chargers however, McCall now and one in Clarkston (a small side trip). Grangeville as soon as they get the last few parts. For that it's worth it.

 

[sgMT]

Our first road trip was double driving back from the Tesla store with our new MY, earlier in the month. I drove the ice car back, arrived 10 minutes ahead of the MY. Perhaps more a statement of how I drive. Stopped for fuel once, another time for the dog. 550 mi trip.

 

[father_of_6]

In the future, I am going to try to get into the charger closer to 10 or 15% and I think that will help some.

If there are enough chargers for it, ideal would be to arrive at the charging station in the lower single digits.

I suspect you'll be able to shave an hour off the trip with more experience and aligning your bathroom breaks with charging stops.

 

[Solar Windman]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts

 

[DrIlyich]

This was my first long road trip in our 2023 MYLR since we purchased her in December. We started in Boise, ID and drove to Helena, MT and back over three days, about 1100 total miles. A few things to preface this trip. We took the freeway the entire way as we have always done that in the past and we find it easier than the normal two-lane road. The speed on most of the freeway is 80 and we tend to do a few miles over. Roads were pretty good except for a few spots where we slowed down due to snow on the roads. Idaho and Montana in general do not have the greatest charging infrastructure. On this trip there were 6 SC locations not counting our destination with some gaps of 100+ miles between chargers. Only two of those are V3, the others are older V2. Being our first road trip and not knowing what to expect we planned for an arrival SOC of 20 because we knew speeds and temperature would decrease that. Temps were 34 to 7 F in general. We can usually make this trip in about 8 hours with one stop for gas and a few restroom breaks.

Trip Summary
Boise to Helena - 559 miles - Drive time 7:49 - Used 201.81 kWh - Avg 361 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 95% Ending SOC 39%
Charge in Helena - 0:38 to 80%
Helena to Boise - 565 miles - Drive time 7:58 - Used 197.74 kWh - Avg 350 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 72% Ending SOC 19%
Charge in Boise - to 80%

Some things I learned:

• Range anxiety is an understandable thing and it got better with each drive segment. I'm sure once I figure out how much roughly I need for the segments, I will feel better. Looking at the energy graph was a big help in determining if I could speed up some or if I needed to keep it closer to 80.
• Planning is kind of a pain in Tesla or ABRP, I used a combination of both to figure out what I needed to start with when we left. In general, I just used Telsa's in car guidance to determine when to stop charging. Most of the time the app was pretty good but a few times it was off by a bit. ABRP seemed farther off, but it may be I just didn't have the setting correct.
• When travelling in the winter, bring a snow shovel. Our stop in Lima, it had recently snowed and they plowed in the direction of the super chargers. There was a big berm in front of them. Luckily on the way up there was one spot that was packed down and we used it. On the way home the same spot was available, but as we were getting ready to leave three other Tesla's showed up. They all had shovels but had to dig out places for two to charge.
• We used FSD for 95% of the trip it did pretty well. There were a few things it did have issues with. 1. We had a couple of times where when passing and the vehicle behind us, it tried to move back over into the slow lane too quickly, I intervened when this happened. 2. The car doesn't want to slow down in clearly marked curved, there are places in the freeway where yellow signs indicate to slow down to 55 or 65 for a curve, FSD didn't slow down, I hope this gets fixed. 3. My car thinks it's a truck. We have speed limit signs that say Speed Limit 80 and below that Trucks 70. FSD seems to see these at two speed limits and numerous times the car slowed down to 70 in an 80 zone, no fun.
• If I'm being honest, I was surprised by the total time, like I said earlier we usually make the trip in 8 hours. I was hoping around 9, but it turned out to be 10. We tried to time bathroom/food stops as best we could with charging but it wasn't always possible. In the future, I am going to try to get into the charger closer to 10 or 15% and I think that will help some. In most cases I was in 16-20% range when I arrived, I could have shaved off a few minutes adjusting things. 10 hours in the car is a lot, we had a few stops where we stayed in the car while charging, in the future we will get out and walk around, stretch our legs.
• Speed and temperature kill range. I'll make this same trip in May and I'm curious to see how or if things change. I don't anticipate fewer stops, but maybe less time at the stops.
• TeslaFi is awesome and tells me way more data that I need, I won't need it normally, but for these road trips it's great to see all the data.

All in all, it was a good trip, I felt like I learned a ton, the car handled great and FSD made it easy to drive.

-Josh

View attachment 1021162
"Tesla Model Y Front View" by Monotoan is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Admin note: Images added for Blog Feed thumbnail

Thanks for documenting the trip. As a fellow Montanan, the range of an EV coupled with the wind, cold weather, and the highway speed limits that we have, makes long trips brutal. Yes, 300 miles of range or so works fine for others parts of the country. But it’s definitely not sufficient for places like Montana given the charge times.

Like you said, speed and temperature impact efficiency and range. The same holds true for ICE vehicles.

I can make the same trip as the OP on one tank of gas in my ICE vehicle in the worst winter conditions. Max fill up would be 10 mins and even that is being generous. So 20 mins total for fill up time round trip vs 220 mins charge time. Yes, efficiency is affected regardless of what you drive in bad weather conditions. But that delta in efficiency is nowhere near the results of an EV.

 

[rzn89]

View attachment 1021400
I was able to get this Tesla OEM adapter. It is pretty simple, and there are others out there that are reliable and cost less. You can find at least one thread in here discussing alternatives.

If, for instance, you want to drive from the Treasure Valley to Coeur d'Alene on US 95 or Idaho 55 and stay in Idaho (minimum 379 miles with many passes and valleys) you will not encounter a single Supercharger. There are a handful of working CCS1 chargers however, McCall now and one in Clarkston (a small side trip). Grangeville as soon as they get the last few parts. For that it's worth it.

I have some cheap $45 one from Amazon, bene using it for 3 months and works fine. I only use it because im cheap and want to bank all my solar credits so when I get another EV or plug in Hybrid I can drive it for free. There is a 60 kw/h ccs charger that is free 4 miles from my home. I go every 2 weeks and sit there when on a meeting at work. If I travel it's on Tesla SC.

 

[cxone]

Thanks for posting this. I’m considering getting a Model Y soon and reading up as much as I can.

 

[DuncanM]

• 
  
• If I'm being honest, I was surprised by the total time, like I said earlier we usually make the trip in 8 hours. I was hoping around 9, but it turned out to be 10. We tried to time bathroom/food stops as best we could with charging but it wasn't always possible. In the future, I am going to try to get into the charger closer to 10 or 15% and I think that will help some. In most cases I was in 16-20% range when I arrived, I could have shaved off a few minutes adjusting things. 10 hours in the car is a lot, we had a few stops where we stayed in the car while charging, in the future we will get out and walk around, stretch our legs.

-Josh

View attachment 1021162
"Tesla Model Y Front View" by Monotoan is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Admin note: Images added for Blog Feed thumbnail

5-10% SOC arrival and departure at ~50% makes for best travel times. In this video Bjorn Nyland was able to drive 1000km (620 miles) in 9:45 (including charging stops) in a Norwegian Winter.:

If you're doing ~85mph and you think you might run it down below ~5% SOC, just slow down and watch the estimated arrival SOC climb. You have about a ~5% buffer below zero as well.

Having a CCS1 adapter gives more charging options, but remember that every gas station will have a 120v exterior plug and RV campgrounds will have 240V plugs, so always carry a TMC and at least the NEMA 5-15 and NEMA 14-50 adapter cables ( I've never had to use these options when road tripping, but it eases range anxiety) - check out Plugshare and set it to see CCS1, J1772, Tesla destination chargers, and NEMA 14-50 outlets, to see your options on route. You can also set Plugshare and ABRP as favourites in your car's web browser, so your 'copilot' can scout ahead for available chargers (you'll need the wifi data subscription).

I've driven my M3 into central BC in the winter, across Canada in the summer, and to (late Nov) and from SE Arizona (several times ~1900 miles one way, in 3 days or ~2200miles in 4 days if we visit Morro bay on route) and I've been able to match Bjorn's 1000km challenge times and I generally have no range anxiety.

 

[DrGriz]

5-10% SOC arrival and departure at ~50% makes for best travel times. In this video Bjorn Nyland was able to drive 1000km (620 miles) in 9:45 (including charging stops) in a Norwegian Winter.:

If you're doing ~85mph and you think you might run it down below ~5% SOC, just slow down and watch the estimated arrival SOC climb. You have about a ~5% buffer below zero as well.

Having a CCS1 adapter gives more charging options, but remember that every gas station will have a 120v exterior plug and RV campgrounds will have 240V plugs, so always carry a TMC and at least the NEMA 5-15 and NEMA 14-50 adapter cables ( I've never had to use these options when road tripping, but it eases range anxiety) - check out Plugshare and set it to see CCS1, J1772, Tesla destination chargers, and NEMA 14-50 outlets, to see your options on route. You can also set Plugshare and ABRP as favourites in your car's web browser, so your 'copilot' can scout ahead for available chargers (you'll need the wifi data subscription).

I've driven my M3 into central BC in the winter, across Canada in the summer, and to (late Nov) and from SE Arizona (several times ~1900 miles one way, in 3 days or ~2200miles in 4 days if we visit Morro bay on route) and I've been able to match Bjorn's 1000km challenge times and I generally have no range anxiety.

Good advice. However, looking at the Plugshare map, I would say Canada, at least near the southern border where most people live, is much better covered than Idaho. Plugshare is your friend, but unless you don't mind spending an extra day charging to make your trip, your level III charging options are extraordinarily limited. There are literally more broken chargers than working between the interstates. And you can count them all on one hand. Sometimes in a snowstorm, the trip is no go.

 

[DuncanM]

Good advice. However, looking at the Plugshare map, I would say Canada, at least near the southern border where most people live, is much better covered than Idaho. Plugshare is your friend, but unless you don't mind spending an extra day charging to make your trip, your level III charging options are extraordinarily limited. There are literally more broken chargers than working between the interstates. And you can count them all on one hand. Sometimes in a snowstorm, the trip is no go.

The Trans-Canada Hwy DCFC network gets pretty sparse in northern Ontario and rural SE AZ and SW NM is no bowl of cherries either and on my recent trip to Roswell I had to use Chargepoint DCFCs to cover the gap from Las Cruzes NM to Roswell NM, and back, via Cloudcroft NM.

Anyways the trip from Boise ID to Helena MT can be shortened by about 80 miles by driving through Arco ID and charging at the Idaho Science Centre's EV Connect DCFC.:

Idaho Science Center | Arco, ID | EV Station (if that happened to be down, a MY LR should still be able to make it to the Snake River Landing SC)

I'd top off at the Walmart based EA station in Mountain Home ID:

Walmart Supercenter | Mountain Home, ID | EV Station

https://www.electrifyamerica.com/faqs Only one plug per unit can be used at a time

www.plugshare.com

prior to heading to Arco ID.

 

[DrGriz]

The Trans-Canada Hwy DCFC network gets pretty sparse in northern Ontario and rural SE AZ and SW NM is no bowl of cherries either and on my recent trip to Roswell I had to use Chargepoint DCFCs to cover the gap from Las Cruzes NM to Roswell NM, and back, via Cloudcroft NM.

Anyways the trip from Boise ID to Helena MT can be shortened by about 80 miles by driving through Arco ID and charging at the Idaho Science Centre's EV Connect DCFC.:

Idaho Science Center | Arco, ID | EV Station (if that happened to be down, a MY LR should still be able to make it to the Snake River Landing SC)

I'd top off at the Walmart based EA station in Mountain Home ID:

Walmart Supercenter | Mountain Home, ID | EV Station

https://www.electrifyamerica.com/faqs Only one plug per unit can be used at a time

www.plugshare.com

prior to heading to Arco ID.View attachment 1022279

Yes. But I am talking about visiting within Idaho. Which is basically US95/I55. Going from north to south, you pretty much have to go through other states.

 

[father_of_6]