Learnings/Feedback from completed Car Camping Roadrip

[PNWLeccy]

I just completed a 1300 mile roadtrip from Seattle to the Olympics, Washington Coast, Oregon Coast and up through central Oregon and it was a great experience. My wife and I car-camped almost every night and while the experience was generally painless we learned some interesting things from our extended time in the car that weren't as obvious from a past car camping trip in Cannon Beach for a night. I wanted to share the pros, cons, feedback and questions we discovered throughout our weeklong trip.

Details:

• 1300 miles
• 8 Supercharger stops
• Total SC cost for trip: $95.59

Tips:

• Remove the rear seat bench for true lie-flat sleeping. We didn't on our first trip and it was fine but i woke up with my feet scrunched against the back trunk multiple times and this was way more comfortable.
• Order some sort of twin sized mattress for sleeping, we used the exped megamat duo which is super comfy (made up of foam mattress and inflatable). It is 3.9" thick which is enough for side sleeping and gives you enough clearance between rear deck so you don't feel too constrained. We used backpacking sleep mats our first time and they were not as nice as having a uniform mattress.
• I ordered roof sun shades for sleeping but did not use them. I find the factory roof tint to be plenty dark enough.
• I did use the Windshield sun shade for sleeping as that blocked out lots of the ambient light. I ordered this one and while not great quality or anything, it's cheap and did its job: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07WGSDZF1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
• I looked for a side window shades made for the model 3 but couldn't find anything good except for some reflectex ones which I didn't love. We actually just hung our jackets from the rear side hooks and stretched the arms out to wrap around the rear seat belt and the front seat belts so they stretched across the rear side windows- that did the trick.
• Store rarely used items in trunk sub-trunk. We stored our camp cooking items here- didn't use them as often as we thought we might.
• Store frequently accessed items in frunk. Also good for items you want to keep seperate from car interior. We stored our black hole duffel with our clothes and hiking boots here.
• Use RV Parky app to find places to sleep. We did not plan this trip out and just decided along the way where to stop and sleep and this app allowed us to find places near us easily
• Shut off exterior lights after dark when arriving at camp sites (which i believe keeps only your fog lights on(?)) so that you aren't shining bright lights on sleeping campers

Questions:

• I bought a 14-50 adapter before leaving to use at rv sites and charge overnight but was disappointed to find that only 1 site had the plug and it wasn't working while everywhere had TT-30 plugs- Is the EVSE TT-30 adapter the only one you can buy that actually takes advantage of the 30A from these plugs?
  • I had planned to leave these RV sites each night with a full charge and minimize my SC stops but sadly that did not work out
• How is Camp Mode different from Keep Climate On?
  • From the on screen description it seems like the difference is that climate keeper shuts everything off while camp mode keeps everything on but shuts off security alarm and sentry mode. I don't get it- i tried both and they do the same thing- screen stays on at full brightness, who would want this?!?
  • The only thing I could do is turn screen brightness all the way down and go to screen clean mode so the screen is mostly black

Thoughts:

• Gas is historically cheap right now so the supercharging cost is currently very similar to gas expenses (Avg. 30mpg car @ $2.60/gl is about $113) but this only really applies for road trips where you are utilizing superchargers, you could charge while camping and reduce these costs.
• I know that V1 and V2 superchargers share power and only V3 have dedicated chargers but I didn't realize until this trip that not every SC is sequential (for example 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B, 3A...) but rather sometimes (1A, 2A, 3A, 1B, 2B, 3B...) which I realized my very slow charge at 1 stop before i realized what was going on and moved to a non-shared spot.
• From watching an ungodly amount of Tesla YT vids I knew about SC charging curves even though I almost never supercharge but I am convinced that 90% of Tesla owners do not. I always arrived at or below 10% and was able to take advantage of peak charging speed until the taper around 50% and only really charged enough to get to the next SC that made sense. I almost always arrived with a few Tesla's sitting there and left before them which told me everyone is pretty much just sitting there and charging to 100% - I get that you need that sometimes but most times you do not- the Tesla trip planner does encourage this behavior though (less stops, longer charges vs. more frequent stops, quicker charges)
• I wish we could remove the rear seat back head rests. We had them lied flat the whole trip but the head rests made it more difficult to utilize the floor space between the front seats and rear seats.
• I really wish we could control more through the app so that when you are in your "sleeping space" in the rear you wouldn't have to keep crawling towards the screen/seats to make adjustments. Actions I wish could be done through the app:
  • Adjust driver seat/passenger seat forward/back and tilt
  • Adjust screen brightness
• Improve Camp Mode so that the screen is off but climate is on. Simple. Maybe even trigger app controls specified above when changing to camp mode
• While I wish this car was a hatchback, the rear deck shelf is useful for placing items, including an ipad if desired while sleeping in the back.
• Even though I had climate control on overnight, I woke up a few times because my feet got very warm/sweaty. I suspect this is because airflow to the trunk is limited. I also blocked off my rear deck cutout (this no longer even exists) to block road noise from trunk but i bet that would've helped with ventilation in this scenario.
• Bugs....man that bumper just obliterates bugs on the highway. I brought some ONR in a spay bottle and wiped some of them off at the first couple of supercharger stops before eventually giving up
• I was looking forward to see some Model Y's on the road... In 8 supercharger stops I saw a total of 0 which made me sad.
• Autopilot: Everyone says how much easier it makes things but roadtrips are where it shines. 90% of the driving can be handles on highways and the leg fatigue is minimized greatly by being able to stretch and move your legs while in the car

This trip was a ton of fun and while the car is more versatile and spacious then most people believe, it also convinced me that I want to get a Model Y soon. It would solve most of the slight issues I have with space and versatility that the Model 3 currently has. While I knew the car could get through a roadtrip like this, it was good example to point to for our skeptical families to prove that it can be done - lots of phone calls with fam going something like this:

• Fam: "So how's that Tesla doing on this roadtrip, get stuck anywhere yet?"
• Us: "Nope, doing fine, hardly driving because of Autopilot and we sleep with the AC on"
• Fam: "...Oh, wow. That sounds pretty cool, I didn't know it could do that"

 

[smatthew]

Camp mode disables walk-away lock so when you go to the bathroom in the middle of the night the car doesn't beep and lock.
Elon has stated that in a future version we'll be able to shut off the campfire scene. Until then, carry something to throw over the screen.
Make a driver profile "Camping". Turn off easy entry for that profile. And set that profile to the drivers seat all the way forward, leaned forward.
It may seem like the screen is on full brightness, but in camp mode my screen is usually only at 10%. Still too bright.
Don't forget to turn on rear vents after enabling camp mode. Don't know why it doesn't do that automagically.

 

[RayK]

Is the EVSE TT-30 adapter the only one you can buy that actually takes advantage of the 30A from these plugs?

If you are referring to the one from EVSEadapters.com for the Tesla Gen2, then yes it looks like the only one which seamlessly will work. It says that the Gen2 mobile charger will automatically set the proper maximum charge current (24A) when using the TT-30 outlet. Other adapters, as far as I can tell, will convert the TT-30 outlet into a 50A receptacle, which you then plug in the mobile charger typically using a 14-50 plug AND have to manually set the maximum charge current.

edit: Now that I think about it, if you use a properly wired TT-30P to 14-30R adapter, and then use a Tesla 14-30 NEMA adapter with the mobile charger, that could also work seamlessly.

https://www.amazon.com/ONETAK-Charger-Compatible-Connector-Connecter/dp/B07XNPHXV2/

 

[PNWLeccy]

Camp mode disables walk-away lock so when you go to the bathroom in the middle of the night the car doesn't beep and lock.

This explains why I never noticed any difference, I've never had to get up in the middle of the night so never noticed this.

Elon has stated that in a future version we'll be able to shut off the campfire scene.

I feel like if they literally tested this for one night they would realize this design choice makes no sense. haha. Who would want the screen on while camping in their car?!?

Make a driver profile "Camping". Turn off easy entry for that profile. And set that profile to the drivers seat all the way forward, leaned forward.

Ah good call, I had created a camping profile but forgot to turn off easy entry and got frustrated with it. I still think it would be great to change these profiles from the app if you were to hop in the back and forget to change it.

Don't forget to turn on rear vents after enabling camp mode. Don't know why it doesn't do that automagically.

So I tried turning on the rear vents but had 2 issues: (1) This was my mistake but the mattress I bought was actually the Long/Wide version of the exped megamat that is 5" longer than the one I intended to get and was tight against the rear vents, covering them (2) Wouldn't those vents be blowing directly on your head if you are sleeping with your feet in the trunk?

 

[PNWLeccy]

Other adapters, as far as I can tell, will convert the TT-30 outlet into a 50A receptacle, which you then plug in the mobile charger typically using a 14-50 plug AND have to manually set the maximum charge current.

This is what I wasn't sure about as I don't quite understand all of electric terms thrown around here. I just bought the 14-50 because I thought it would more common and foolproof but it turns out TT-30 actually was at every site I went to. I had read that an adapter would still only give you the 4/5 mi/hr like a 5-15 or 5/20 except for the EVSE adapter which allowed it to get ~24 mi/hr at least

 

[PNWLeccy]

edit: Now that I think about it, if you use a properly wired TT-30P to 14-30R adapter, and then use a Tesla 14-30 NEMA adapter with the mobile charger, that could also work seamlessly.

https://www.amazon.com/ONETAK-Charger-Compatible-Connector-Connecter/dp/B07XNPHXV2/

So I could plug in the mobile charger w/ the 5-15 adapter that comes with it into the linked adapter and take advantage of increased charging speed on TT-30 w/o buying the $70 EVSE one?

 

[smatthew]

So I could plug in the mobile charger w/ the 5-15 adapter that comes with it into the linked adapter and take advantage of increased charging speed on TT-30 w/o buying the $70 EVSE one?

No. You'd still need to buy the Tesla 14-30 adapter. So you're looking at 27 + 35 = 62. So you save 8 bucks, but the $70 EVSE TT-30 provides temperature monitoring in the plug head. The EVSE TT-30 will be technically safer.

 

[PNWLeccy]

No. You'd still need to buy the Tesla 14-30 adapter. So you're looking at 27 + 35 = 62. So you save 8 bucks, but the $70 EVSE TT-30 provides temperature monitoring in the plug head. The EVSE TT-30 will be technically safer.

Thanks, super helpful. Would that give you the 22 mi/hr that the 14-30 is rated at or is there a way to take advantage of the 14-50 somehow to achieve the 30 mi/hr rate?

 

[PNWLeccy]

Forgot to add above that I had some interesting behavior using climate control overnight and wasn't sure what exactly caused the discrepancies seeing as I had about the same 55 degree weather each night.

• Unplugged, Using Keep Climate On: Used ~70mi. of range overnight (~7hrs)
• Plugged: 5-15, Keep Climate On: Used 0mi. of range overnight (~6 hrs)
• Plugged: 5-15, Keep Climate On: Used ~30mi. of range overnight (~7hrs)

Is 70mi drain overnight, for these conditions, normal ?
Would Camp Mode have used less energy?

 

[RayK]

Thanks, super helpful. Would that give you the 22 mi/hr that the 14-30 is rated at or is there a way to take advantage of the 14-50 somehow to achieve the 30 mi/hr rate?

The only way you will get a 30mph charge rate is if you plug into a 50 amp outlet. The TT-30 is rated at 30 amps and given that you are supposed to only pull a maximum of 80% of the rated amperage of the outlet (and presumably the circuit breaker), that means effectively only 24 amps is going to the mobile charger. Thus, the 22mph rate.

 

[mrau]

The 30 amp plugs at campgrounds are only 120 volts. To get Level 2 charging speeds you need 240 volts. Most campgrounds do offer 50 amp sites that use the 14-50 plug and are 240 volts. The bigger motor homes will use the 50 amp sites, but are usually available To anyone on first come basis.

So if you want to use a 14-50 adapter and have a full charge in the morning, ask for a 50 amp site.

 

[PNWLeccy]

The 30 amp plugs at campgrounds are only 120 volts. To get Level 2 charging speeds you need 240 volts. Most campgrounds do offer 50 amp sites that use the 14-50 plug and are 240 volts. The bigger motor homes will use the 50 amp sites, but are usually available To anyone on first come basis.

So if you want to use a 14-50 adapter and have a full charge in the morning, ask for a 50 amp site.

Yea I asked for 50 amp sites but the 2 times I got one, the 14-50 plug didn't work. The other times the campsite owners/managers told me they did but the site only had TT-30 plugs. Some didn't even have 5-15 which was really annoying. Based on my experience, I'm pretty sure they just kind of say whatever to get you there...

 

[allelectrified]

Thanks for posting.

Can you point to instructions for removing the rear bench?
I'm 6'1" and I've slept a number of times in my M3, including because the AC system at home is broken and it's working well for me, but 100% flat would be a great improvement.

Ha-ha. "Car-camping" now means to sleep in your car? Everywhere I've been in N. America, car camping has meant you bring your stuff with you to the camp site, and put up your tent there, as opposed to backpacking. I propose "sleeping in my car" or maybe a neologism "tesla-camping".

 

[bpjod]

Can you point to instructions for removing the rear bench?“

 

[PNWLeccy]

Thanks for posting.

Can you point to instructions for removing the rear bench?
I'm 6'1" and I've slept a number of times in my M3, including because the AC system at home is broken and it's working well for me, but 100% flat would be a great improvement.

Ha-ha. "Car-camping" now means to sleep in your car? Everywhere I've been in N. America, car camping has meant you bring your stuff with you to the camp site, and put up your tent there, as opposed to backpacking. I propose "sleeping in my car" or maybe a neologism "tesla-camping".

It looks like @bpjod beat me to it w/ vid of removing the rear bench seat. I just put a blanket over the battery so that the rear seat backs don't get scratched up.

I've car-camped w/ a tent and backpacked my whole life so I know how the term is usually used but it still feels appropriate here, perhaps car glamping is more appropriate in this scenario

 

[austinY]

Thanks for the great writeup. I picked this up - AC WORKS EVSE Charging Adapter RV TT-30P 30 Amp Plug to 50 Amp Electric Vehicle Adapter for Tesla Model S-EVTT30MS - The Home Depot for use at my in-laws. If I ever get my Y (yesterday was the scheduled delivery), I'll check it out and let you know how it works. The adapter does have a sticker on it that says 'manually change charge rate to 30A'

 

[2Fun]

I just completed a 1300 mile roadtrip from Seattle to the Olympics, Washington Coast, Oregon Coast and up through central Oregon and it was a great experience. My wife and I car-camped almost every night and while the experience was generally painless we learned some interesting things from our extended time in the car that weren't as obvious from a past car camping trip in Cannon Beach for a night. I wanted to share the pros, cons, feedback and questions we discovered throughout our weeklong trip.

Details:

• 1300 miles
• 8 Supercharger stops
• Total SC cost for trip: $95.59

Tips:

• Remove the rear seat bench for true lie-flat sleeping. We didn't on our first trip and it was fine but i woke up with my feet scrunched against the back trunk multiple times and this was way more comfortable.
• Order some sort of twin sized mattress for sleeping, we used the exped megamat duo which is super comfy (made up of foam mattress and inflatable). It is 3.9" thick which is enough for side sleeping and gives you enough clearance between rear deck so you don't feel too constrained. We used backpacking sleep mats our first time and they were not as nice as having a uniform mattress.
• I ordered roof sun shades for sleeping but did not use them. I find the factory roof tint to be plenty dark enough.
• I did use the Windshield sun shade for sleeping as that blocked out lots of the ambient light. I ordered this one and while not great quality or anything, it's cheap and did its job: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07WGSDZF1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
• I looked for a side window shades made for the model 3 but couldn't find anything good except for some reflectex ones which I didn't love. We actually just hung our jackets from the rear side hooks and stretched the arms out to wrap around the rear seat belt and the front seat belts so they stretched across the rear side windows- that did the trick.
• Store rarely used items in trunk sub-trunk. We stored our camp cooking items here- didn't use them as often as we thought we might.
• Store frequently accessed items in frunk. Also good for items you want to keep seperate from car interior. We stored our black hole duffel with our clothes and hiking boots here.
• Use RV Parky app to find places to sleep. We did not plan this trip out and just decided along the way where to stop and sleep and this app allowed us to find places near us easily
• Shut off exterior lights after dark when arriving at camp sites (which i believe keeps only your fog lights on(?)) so that you aren't shining bright lights on sleeping campers

Questions:

• I bought a 14-50 adapter before leaving to use at rv sites and charge overnight but was disappointed to find that only 1 site had the plug and it wasn't working while everywhere had TT-30 plugs- Is the EVSE TT-30 adapter the only one you can buy that actually takes advantage of the 30A from these plugs?
  • I had planned to leave these RV sites each night with a full charge and minimize my SC stops but sadly that did not work out
• How is Camp Mode different from Keep Climate On?
  • From the on screen description it seems like the difference is that climate keeper shuts everything off while camp mode keeps everything on but shuts off security alarm and sentry mode. I don't get it- i tried both and they do the same thing- screen stays on at full brightness, who would want this?!?
  • The only thing I could do is turn screen brightness all the way down and go to screen clean mode so the screen is mostly black

Thoughts:

• Gas is historically cheap right now so the supercharging cost is currently very similar to gas expenses (Avg. 30mpg car @ $2.60/gl is about $113) but this only really applies for road trips where you are utilizing superchargers, you could charge while camping and reduce these costs.
• I know that V1 and V2 superchargers share power and only V3 have dedicated chargers but I didn't realize until this trip that not every SC is sequential (for example 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B, 3A...) but rather sometimes (1A, 2A, 3A, 1B, 2B, 3B...) which I realized my very slow charge at 1 stop before i realized what was going on and moved to a non-shared spot.
• From watching an ungodly amount of Tesla YT vids I knew about SC charging curves even though I almost never supercharge but I am convinced that 90% of Tesla owners do not. I always arrived at or below 10% and was able to take advantage of peak charging speed until the taper around 50% and only really charged enough to get to the next SC that made sense. I almost always arrived with a few Tesla's sitting there and left before them which told me everyone is pretty much just sitting there and charging to 100% - I get that you need that sometimes but most times you do not- the Tesla trip planner does encourage this behavior though (less stops, longer charges vs. more frequent stops, quicker charges)
• I wish we could remove the rear seat back head rests. We had them lied flat the whole trip but the head rests made it more difficult to utilize the floor space between the front seats and rear seats.
• I really wish we could control more through the app so that when you are in your "sleeping space" in the rear you wouldn't have to keep crawling towards the screen/seats to make adjustments. Actions I wish could be done through the app:
  • Adjust driver seat/passenger seat forward/back and tilt
  • Adjust screen brightness
• Improve Camp Mode so that the screen is off but climate is on. Simple. Maybe even trigger app controls specified above when changing to camp mode
• While I wish this car was a hatchback, the rear deck shelf is useful for placing items, including an ipad if desired while sleeping in the back.
• Even though I had climate control on overnight, I woke up a few times because my feet got very warm/sweaty. I suspect this is because airflow to the trunk is limited. I also blocked off my rear deck cutout (this no longer even exists) to block road noise from trunk but i bet that would've helped with ventilation in this scenario.
• Bugs....man that bumper just obliterates bugs on the highway. I brought some ONR in a spay bottle and wiped some of them off at the first couple of supercharger stops before eventually giving up
• I was looking forward to see some Model Y's on the road... In 8 supercharger stops I saw a total of 0 which made me sad.
• Autopilot: Everyone says how much easier it makes things but roadtrips are where it shines. 90% of the driving can be handles on highways and the leg fatigue is minimized greatly by being able to stretch and move your legs while in the car

This trip was a ton of fun and while the car is more versatile and spacious then most people believe, it also convinced me that I want to get a Model Y soon. It would solve most of the slight issues I have with space and versatility that the Model 3 currently has. While I knew the car could get through a roadtrip like this, it was good example to point to for our skeptical families to prove that it can be done - lots of phone calls with fam going something like this:

• Fam: "So how's that Tesla doing on this roadtrip, get stuck anywhere yet?"
• Us: "Nope, doing fine, hardly driving because of Autopilot and we sleep with the AC on"
• Fam: "...Oh, wow. That sounds pretty cool, I didn't know it could do that"

 

[antdun]

Yea I asked for 50 amp sites but the 2 times I got one, the 14-50 plug didn't work. The other times the campsite owners/managers told me they did but the site only had TT-30 plugs. Some didn't even have 5-15 which was really annoying. Based on my experience, I'm pretty sure they just kind of say whatever to get you there...

When I've planned trips where I'm charging at an RV park I've generally asked them to give me the actual NEMA specification of the outlet so I know for sure what they have and sometimes they've just sent me a picture of the power box so that's been nice. Over time I've simply acquired adapters to be able to charge from them all so I can adapt to whatever is available. I also bring a 30 foot extension cord so I can potentially get power from a hard to reach outlet such as inside someone's home, or perhaps around an RV parked in front of an outlet that they're not using. The TT-30 adapter I got is https://amzn.to/2S1ED3p which works in conjunction with the NEMA 14-50 adapter you already have, although you do have to lower the amperage manually down to 24 amps. I created a video about my adapters which you can watch here if you're interested.

 

[run-the-joules]

I've car-camped w/ a tent and backpacked my whole life so I know how the term is usually used but it still feels appropriate here, perhaps car glamping is more appropriate in this scenario

Camping is where room service stops at midnight. Sleeping in a car or tent is temporary volunteer homelessness.

 

[MacOnWheels]

A USB mouse will allow you to control the screen to do whatever you want from the back of the car.