Mountain and Winter Supercharging Issues (CA SR108 SC desert)

[ThePirate]

There is a post about the longest gaps in miles between superchargers on interstates. This is a bit different - this is about getting over mountain passes with enough juice to make it to the other side. There are two things against the driver here: First, gravity - not so many miles, but lots of energy needed to get over big mountains. Second, the inherent issue of population centers, and therefore supercharger placements (or any other kind of charging infrastructure) avoiding mountains and the remote areas around them. Actually, there's really a third thing - in Winter you have lower efficiency and need them to be more frequent.

In CA, we have big mountains, and big distances between chargers. In the winter, there are only a few ways over the Northern Sierra Nevada mountains. If you go North, way way way up through the Carson valley, there are superchargers on the way, and it works OK, but it's far. In early summer, Sonora pass opens, state route 108, and this is a *serious* supercharger desert. Going East from San Francisco in a Y, we stopped at a supercharger in Manteca, and barely made it to the one at Mammoth mountain on the other side of the Sierras - that was a lot of anxiety. It turns out that there is indeed one a bit closer to the pass, in Copperopolis, but it is significantly out of the way from the SF bay area. So, this is really inconvenient setup, and results in very big distances without any Superchargers. I really really wish there was an SC in Sonora, or perhaps farther up the mountain.

In the summer, 120 through Yosemite opens. However, on the east side of the mountains, there is again, no superchargers south until Mammoth, missing Lee Vining, and June Lake. Yuk. The lack of SCs on the East side of the Sierras between Bridgeport and June Lake is really a pain.

What about your mountain areas?

-TPC

 

[KJD]

Do you have the Tesla CCS adapter? There might be other charging DCFC options on that route besides Tesla.

 

[EVSince2011]

I don't see any CCS stations on that route in Plugshare. We have a CCS adapter. I used it once to test that it worked. It worked, but at 22 KW because the battery wasn't pre-conditioned. There should be a navigation option to designate a location to pre-condition the battery. The suggested kludge on selecting a nearby Supercharger as your destination won't work if there's no Supercharger nearby

 

[ThePirate]

I don't see any CCS stations on that route in Plugshare. We have a CCS adapter. I used it once to test that it worked. It worked, but at 22 KW because the battery wasn't pre-conditioned. There should be a navigation option to designate a location to pre-condition the battery. The suggested kludge on selecting a nearby Supercharger as your destination won't work if there's no Supercharger nearby

The in-Tesla menu allowing listing of L2 NACS chargers had one at "Twain Harte", at a B&B. On arrival it had a hand-written "out of order" sign on it, a sure sign that no one gives a poop. I have no idea how to report this to Tesla as dead, but it's listed as non-working with a wrench ("under maintenance") on plugshare.

Yes, I do have a CCS adapter. Plugshare lists lots of little L2s here and there, but in an hour you barely get a few % from these things, so they are pretty useless, and whatever business they are at would be perfectly reasonable to require you to buy something. So, pretty much useless and a pain as well.

There are a gaggle of public chargers in Bridgeport, completely on the other side of the mountains. However, I have yet to get a public charger to work after two serious attempts. I note that the comments in plugshare say pretty much the same thing for these particular chargers, and I think these comments were likely made by people without Teslas who should know how to use them. (Obviously the ruler of the universe needs to somehow force charger makers to make them ALL just plug-and-go like Teslas. We heard the IRA was supposed to do mandate plug 'N swipe your cc, but...)

I just wish Tesla would realize how tricky it is to get over these mountains in anything but perfect conditions, and put a midway-ish few chargers please.

-TPC

 

[cpa]

First off, a Supercharger is under construction in Sonora. There is also a new Supercharger in Arnold on SR4 before Ebbets Pass.

I guess your destination is Mammoth Lakes. A nonce work around until Sonora is up and running is to head to Jackson on 88, then over on Monitor Pass to the Topaz Lake Supercharger. It's only about 4 miles from the junction with 395 to Topaz Lake.

I have a dinosaur 2014 S85. I've charged at Groveland and driven across Tioga Road to Hawthorne, Nevada. I've charged at Jackson and made it to Reno. My car charges at chronically slow rates (it takes about 35 minutes to go from ~15% to 70%, or an effective 200 mile range in perfect conditions.)

Ya just gotta be patient. These times are 50 times better than when I first bought the S in May 2014. One hour and twenty minute charging to reach 97% in order to drive 55 MPH to reach the next Supercharger 200+ miles away. Kingman to Barstow. Blanding, Utah to Flagstaff. Las Vegas to Cedar City, Utah and a 14-50 plug because Beaver (the next Supercharger on Interstate 15) was another hour's drive away.

 

[ucmndd]

Sonora should make 108 a non-issue and is under construction. Looks like it should be open any day now.

Arnold addressed SR-4.
88 is covered with Jackson.
120 has Groveland.
140 to 120 has Mariposa and El Portal.
41 to 120 has Oakhurst and Fish Camp.

Bridgeport or Lee Vining would be nice-to-haves on the East side and then this is essentially a solved problem.

The problem with “midway-ish” is once you’re out of the western foothills or Owens valley you’re more or less in completely undeveloped national forest or national park. Not like there are a few megawatts of power laying around at the top of Sonora pass… nor should there be.

 

[greendave]

There are a gaggle of public chargers in Bridgeport, completely on the other side of the mountains. However, I have yet to get a public charger to work after two serious attempts. I note that the comments in plugshare say pretty much the same thing for these particular chargers, and I think these comments were likely made by people without Teslas who should know how to use them. (Obviously the ruler of the universe needs to somehow force charger makers to make them ALL just plug-and-go like Teslas. We heard the IRA was supposed to do mandate plug 'N swipe your cc, but...)

FWIW, I've stopped in Bridgeport at least a dozen times to charge my non-Tesla. It's a good location and works well.

Rivian has a location going in at Lee Vining. They will supposedly be opened up to non-Rivians by the end of the year.

Sonora will be a good location too.

 

[ThePirate]

FWIW, I've stopped in Bridgeport at least a dozen times to charge my non-Tesla. It's a good location and works well.

Rivian has a location going in at Lee Vining. They will supposedly be opened up to non-Rivians by the end of the year.

Sonora will be a good location too.

Thank you so very much for that info.

You said the bridgeport non-Tesla works well. I looked it up on plugshare, and it was an EA. Then I went to the EA site and the FAQ had about 36 questions that were relevant, and they were incapable of saying, "HERE'S THE SIMPLEST WAY TO CHARGE: DO THIS...". So, me and the other Tesla folks here are just rolling their eyes. The earth has no hope if we have to rely on this.

I'm more interested in the Rivian location "going in" at Lee Vining. Do you know if that will be NACS or CCS, if there will be some attempt at a functioning credit card swipe, and otherwise how it will work for Tesla folks?

Thanks,

-TPC

 

[ThePirate]

Sonora should make 108 a non-issue and is under construction. Looks like it should be open any day now.

Arnold addressed SR-4.
88 is covered with Jackson.
120 has Groveland.
140 to 120 has Mariposa and El Portal.
41 to 120 has Oakhurst and Fish Camp.

Bridgeport or Lee Vining would be nice-to-haves on the East side and then this is essentially a solved problem.

The problem with “midway-ish” is once you’re out of the western foothills or Owens valley you’re more or less in completely undeveloped national forest or national park. Not like there are a few megawatts of power laying around at the top of Sonora pass… nor should there be.

Thank you so much for letting us know about Sonora. That will be super-helpful.

I definitely see your point about power "midway-ish", but
-There are definitely loads of gas stations "midway-ish". (look on google; if you zoom in enough they appear.), and EVs need more locations than gas stations due to shorter range
- There are definitely off-the-grid solar powered chargers. These are basically solar-charged batteries that you can get some EV juice from. It would be super-helpful if they had these midway-ish, but perhaps restricted them to tiny amounts of power (just enough to get you over the summit). (e.g. 5 min @250kW limit, placed where that would get a truck over the summit at 45 mph).

It wouldn't hurt in saving the planet to help folks out with a little convenience, in comparison to that enjoyed by ICEVs.

-TPC

 

[ucmndd]

- There are definitely off-the-grid solar powered chargers. These are basically solar-charged batteries that you can get some EV juice from. It would be super-helpful if they had these midway-ish, but perhaps restricted them to tiny amounts of power (just enough to get you over the summit). (e.g. 5 min @250kW limit, placed where that would get a truck over the summit at 45 mph).

The problem is even those “tiny amounts of power” require massive resources to generate.

Using your example, 250kw for 5 minutes is about 21 kWh.

Factoring in efficiency, conversion losses, etc, 21kwh delivered to the car is about 25kwh that would need to be generated. A 25kw solar farm - about 70 typical solar panels - would take an entire hour in perfectly ideal sunny conditions to deliver charge to ONE car.

This just isn’t a real solution with the current limitations of photovoltaics and battery storage.

 

[Rocky_H]

I looked it up on plugshare, and it was an EA. Then I went to the EA site and the FAQ had about 36 questions that were relevant, and they were incapable of saying, "HERE'S THE SIMPLEST WAY TO CHARGE: DO THIS...". So, me and the other Tesla folks here are just rolling their eyes. The earth has no hope if we have to rely on this.

You're not the only one rolling their eyes. I am too, at this over the top negativity. Just because a site has some Q & A doesn't mean that people "have to" rely on it, or that it is necessary at all and completely baffling without reading all of that.

I went and used an Electrify America station near me with my Tesla and my CCS adapter, and it was dead simple to figure out without reading any website. They had a credit card reader on the front of the machine. I hooked up the cord and adapter to my car, and it was waiting for payment, so I put my credit card next to the reader, and it automatically activated and started. It was easy and barely a step more than what Superchargers already do. All this whining is generally not necessary.

 

[Seattle]

..I'm more interested in the Rivian location "going in" at Lee Vining. Do you know if that will be NACS or CCS, if there will be some attempt at a functioning credit card swipe, and otherwise how it will work for Tesla folks?...

Rivian will eventually transition to NACS on their chargers but as they are only shipping CCS cars this year, every expectation is they'll stay on CCS. They are stuck behind Tesla seemingly not providing more NACS adapters, it would just piss off customers if they built a new NACS dcfc right now.

 

[greendave]

Thank you so very much for that info.

You said the bridgeport non-Tesla works well. I looked it up on plugshare, and it was an EA. Then I went to the EA site and the FAQ had about 36 questions that were relevant, and they were incapable of saying, "HERE'S THE SIMPLEST WAY TO CHARGE: DO THIS...". So, me and the other Tesla folks here are just rolling their eyes. The earth has no hope if we have to rely on this.

My point was simply that it's an option (and unlike a number of locations, the units have been reliable for me). As for the mechanics of charging, EA isn't notably different from ChargePoint or EVgo. Whether or not that's good enough for most, I can't say, but it's made traveling to the eastern Sierra possible for me.

I'm more interested in the Rivian location "going in" at Lee Vining. Do you know if that will be NACS or CCS, if there will be some attempt at a functioning credit card swipe, and otherwise how it will work for Tesla folks?

They'll be CCS for now. It's not clear exactly what Rivian's plan is at this point, but their existing units don't have card readers, so my bet would be that charging has to be done through the app. You can in fact load their app today (even if you don't have a Rivian) but right now they block non-Rivians from activating (I tried at a couple of locations, just in case...).

 

[ucmndd]

FYI Sonora is open now.