WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
IMHO that journey is tight. However, with a Plan-B it will be fine. On 90% of the days you do it there will be no problem ...
With EV the only figure you need to consider is Max Range. Statutory Tests are for mixed-mode journeys. you don't drive those on a Max Range day, you tootle along the motorway at 75+MPH and that uses the most fuel, so Test Figures are useless. In an EV you typically are not slowing down much on Motorway so very little benefit from Regen, unlike in-town / country roads journeys (except where you have a good downhill section in the mountains, but that is offset by having to climb up the other side ...)
(Actually the Statutory Test is useful in terms of cost-of-ownership, just not in terms of Range)
For Max Range journey the situation to consider is Cold and Wet. Both of those sap range, but Wet (or Snow) far more than Cold. Cold is bad, but once the battery is warm its not a huge difference (maybe 10% compared to Summer), so on a long journey battery will be warm, more so if you pre-condition before you set off. (But Cold is a HUGE problem for travelling-salesman in winter ... stop for an hour and battery will be cold, so you get the full set-off-energy-penalty each time you stop)
Torrential Rain is a nightmare, slowing down doesn't help - that fixes the Aero aspect, but you still have to push all that water out of the way mile after mile.
As others have said, have a go with A Better Route Planner. Choose make/model of EV, and experiment with e.g. 5C and Wet
For the 3LR I suggest going with 240 mile range, at motorway speed. If you are going to own your car for 3+ years and sticking 30K miles p.a. on it then you will be looking at, say, 7% battery-degradation range loss by the time you flog it, so you need to factor that in too.
I work on the basis of having 40 miles of contingency, so that leaves you 200 miles ... which is exactly your journey length.
OK, so Plan-B. Unfortunately its a bit pants. Both Leeds and Barnsley are your mid point Superchargers, but they both only have 2 stalls so high chance of being occupied (and you really need a pair of stalls to yourself; if you are second-to-arrive, in a stall-pair, you get lower charging rate until the first car leaves). So Supercharger sites with lots of stalls would be better ...
I reckon your best bet would be to charge at destination. Not sure what that is - your place of work? if so i would hassle the Employer to put some charging in. We got a 50% government hand-out when we put EV chargers in our work car park. But even 13AMP socket would be enough - you only need "enough" to change your journey from "tight" to "comfortable". You'll need to change your Fossil thinking from "Fill up once a week / when getting low" to "Leave home every day with full tank, and top up only just enough to get to destination". If you can find a 13 AMP socket in the car park that is used for Pressure Washer
or somesuch I'd plug into that until someone told me not to!! ... or I would find a householder nearby who would be happy to sell me electricity ... even paying at twice their meter rate would be worthwhile, so something in it for them too.13AMP is about
EDIT: Fixed my duff maths, sorry about that
You won't be able to use the ultra low Electricity rate (such as Octopus Go), as they are only 4 hours per night and that won't be enough time to get you a 200-mile charge. A Home Charger at 7 KW is a bit less than 30 MPH, so you'll need the Economy-7 or similar rates ... however, what time are you leaving in the morning? If you have to leave at sparrow that will be before the end of E7 so you might have to start scheduled charging before E7 starts to get enough. That's fine of course, you just need to build that into your costings.
Also, if you are going to arrive home below 20% I would suggest "some" charging immediately. Not good for the battery to leave it sat low (or above 90%) for hours and hours, and worthwhile having some contingency in case you have to go back out unexpectedly.
You should give consideration as to whether you will charge to 100% every night. Tesla recommendation is to charge to 90%, and charge to 100% when "going on a trip". So doing 100% every night is likely to stress the battery a bit ... if you need to do that I wouldn't worry about it too much, there is plenty of data from Airport Taxi Tesla users who abused the cars - Supercharging frequently and leaving them at 100% for long periods and still not getting any significant battery degradation, so my advice would be "Do your best to avoid leaving car at 100% for long periods" and not stress beyond that. In Summer if you can do the journey with 90% starting charge then so much the better.
There are third party schedulers which can do reasonably funky stuff like "Charge a bit if come home below 40%". Also, it would be good if you charge for an hour just before you leave ... that would warm the battery (in Winter). My scheduler changes the Charge Limit to 80% at the start of overnight charging, and then ups that to 90% and restart the charge an hour before normal departure for work (and heats the cabin 15 minutes before departure ... which also defrosts the screen etc.
)You could schedule setting the 100% charge an hour before departure (on the nights before your long-commute)
But you stop for Fossil Fuel right?
I know Fossil Fuel is only a 5 - 10 minute stop, so not as annoying as a 20-30 minute EV charging stop, but when fossil-fuelling you spend the time standing-and-pumping and then queuing-to-pay. You probably send 8 hours a year doing that (I'll leave you to do the sums ) my first Model-S was around 240 mile real-world range, and I spent exactly the same total time Supercharging as I had done fossil-fuelling (I've got a Raven now, 20% more range, and my once/twice a month Supercharge is now only a couple of times a year only )Charging an EV is plug in and do something else. So if you normally do Work Emails as soon as you get home then if you do those whist sat charging it becomes time neutral (and breaks your journey). If you don't have to do work emails then factor in the extra cost of Starbucks on your budget and Cookies on your waistline!
THIS! ^^^ Absolutely this ^^^
The only time Range matters is on the days it is tight.
Consider a new Model-S perhaps? That would give you 300 miles at motorway speed instead of 240. Higher sticker price of course ... but also a bit more on the residual
Company car? 100% first year writeoff (so that's worth about 20% to the employer, although have to pay back on sale, so assuming 50% depreciation that is a 20% discount at purchase and then 10% charge at sale)
No Benefit-in-Kind tax on Electricity as a fuel - so if you can charge at work that's "free"
No Benefit-in-Kind on Company Car ownership either (from April, its higher until then, but even at present BiK on EV is less than Fossil Fuel car)
Flip side, if this is personal purchase but mileage is chargeable as business then that will cover Electricity and also some increased Finance
Wall Charger at home might cost £200-£500-ish (after grant), particularly if wiring distance is long / route is "difficult"
Beware that most Tesla Service is diabolical. Huge delays for pretty much anything, impossible to speak to anyone, and so on. So basically "don't bend it"
. Regular Service (if you bother to have any done at all) is fine, you just need to book it a couple of months before you reckon you will need it.Service much cheaper than ICE. No brake pads (until 140K-ish miles). I get much better tyre wear than I expected (I've read that is due to no gear change causing slight "jerk" on the tyres each time). No fluids, Spark Plugs etc. of course.
If you can get a good price on Electricity (Economy-7 and charge-before-midnight permitting) you should get down to around 2p per mile. I reckon your Fossil is 10p a mile, assuming your current car is Frugal. For a rule-of-thumb figure you should save £100 per month for each 10,000 miles you drive a year.
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