Superchargers in Australia

[GregHudson]

I wonder if Supercharger option revenue would cover all the costs of rollout & power supply globally? It's possible I guess but with ongoing & ever increasing power costs with increasing sales volumes into the future, I'm not so sure unless the Supercharger option price will rise significantly.

I guess that's why there's SolarCity, at least in the US, and economies of scale when considered as an integral masterplan. It'll be interesting to see if the first Superchargers here will be solar installations which presumably will only supplement available power from either traditional dirty or renewable sources.

Elon was quoted as saying that all power sourced for Oz SC's would be from renewable sources. This includes building solar roofs at SC stations.

GH

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No, on this forum there are only 3, all are waiting still.



Given Tesla's track record in the USA, they do start with the more populous routes but then quickly fill in all the gaps. Just in the USA they went from 50 to 152 last year, and from a quick look at their plans they will double this in 2015! (Worldwide: 64 to 335 last year!) I agree they would do Adelaide (and the Melbourne-Adelaide corridor) as well as the Perth and southwest WA area first. But those areas could easily be done by end of 2017. Then it's time for the regional areas.

Speaking of the Melbourne-Adelaide corridor...

View attachment 68422

Blue dots - existing (or currently in development)
Greens dots - first route enabled
Purple dots - additional tourist route

I've actually driven both of these routes (a long time ago!) via the Spirit of Tasmania but sadly they were in a gas guzzling Impreza. Maybe one day in a Tesla!

The SEYMOUR location is a big detour off the freeway. A few Km NE of Seymour is a truck stop at AVENEL with direct access to both directions, to Sydney, and to Melbourne.

Cheers, Greg.

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No software update appeared as yet....

Whilst I am on does anyone else have issues with their drivers door not closing properly each time you shut it from outside the car (is never an issue when pulling closed from inside) I am trying to decide if it needs adjusting slightly or if I am just being too gentle with my new baby?!

Interesting comment re the door. On my test drive last friday night it took me 4 goes to get the drivers door closed (and I'm used to closing heavy Mercedes doors). The passenger door did not have the same problem.

GH

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Hi Chuq fantastic work! However given the price of superchargers and the amount of power they consume, I'm not sure if we will ever see even a fraction of those superchargers. Though we can live in hope!

Solar powered SC's generate more power than they use (according to Elon).

GH

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Wonder how many more will be planned for Melbourne in the next 3 years? More than Chadstone & Richmond would be nice.

I agree. A destination charger at Westfield Doncaster (close to Audi, BMW, Mercedes, Porsche, Range Rover, Lexus, Jag & Volvo - all on Doncaster Rd)
A STORE iside the shopping center would be nice too ;-)

GH

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Yay! Has anyone snapped photos of the site under construction?

I was there on 8th May, and the site looks 100% complete. Spoke to someone standing next to a MS, who told me the official opening was this thursday night (15 May 2015) at 7pm.

GH

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With regards to the Supercharger in Richmond.
I wonder if they would allow me to charge up while I was at the football? Probably not convenient for others as I would be away for probably 3-4 hrs I guess and it would block another user.
I would have traveled about 360 km from Portland, then juiced up ready for journey home. (That's how we do it now, up and back after the footy in the ICE.)
I guess I'll have to go up earlier and charge up, or after the footy. I assume about 45 minute wait. We usually get home about 3-4 AM after a night game.
Thoughts anyone ...

The Cremorne/Richmond location is a decent walk from the MCG, but do-able. Re the issue of leving you car plugged in, you could always leave a FOB with the Richmond Tesla crew maybe ? (who could then move it when it is charged)

GH

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Maybe, except the Albury-Goulburn hop involves gaining over 500m altitude. Add a bit of a head-wind in and you might start getting nervous. The other hops should be fine though.

Map requires intermediary stop at Gundagai, between Albury and Goulburn.

GH

 

[WhiteStar]

From Supercharger | Tesla Motors Australia

Our Supercharger team is constantly at work around the globe constructing new sites. The exact timing of each Supercharger station opening is difficult to predict due to the nature of construction projects. Permits, inspections, weather delays and other circumstances beyond our control all influence the actual opening date. Consequently, stations will occasionally open before or after the date projected in our maps.

I’ve been a long term follower of Tesla and a short term investor. Certainly brings into focus any news and share price movements up and down. Now obviously good news makes the share price go up in any company but with Tesla, the market just needs to get a whiff of home batteries, Supercharger construction positivity, increased sales etc. and the share price goes rocketing up.


Obviously there are priorities and maybe China is a bigger priority than Australia in terms of Supercharger rollout…well no doubt about that but connecting population centres like Melbourne and Brisbane is big news even outside Australia. A win-win, firstly sales accelerate over achieving the most confident predictions - equating to that very desirable share price trajectory and capitalisation surge.


So it seems counter-intuitive not to work simultaneously on rolling out Superchargers from Sydney to Brisbane as well as the Sydney to Melbourne route. I wonder if work is simultaneously proceeding on both routes like it would be proceeding simultaneously on many routes in China? Or is work on the 2 routes sequential, first Sydney to Melbourne and only once that is complete, then Sydney to Brisbane? I hope it is simultaneous with separate teams working both routes. That would make most sense and I can’t think of a reason not to over achieve the projections. Or is there some logic in a slow sequential rollout?

 

[Dborn]

From Supercharger | Tesla Motors Australia



I’ve been a long term follower of Tesla and a short term investor. Certainly brings into focus any news and share price movements up and down. Now obviously good news makes the share price go up in any company but with Tesla, the market just needs to get a whiff of home batteries, Supercharger construction positivity, increased sales etc. and the share price goes rocketing up.


Obviously there are priorities and maybe China is a bigger priority than Australia in terms of Supercharger rollout…well no doubt about that but connecting population centres like Melbourne and Brisbane is big news even outside Australia. A win-win, firstly sales accelerate over achieving the most confident predictions - equating to that very desirable share price trajectory and capitalisation surge.


So it seems counter-intuitive not to work simultaneously on rolling out Superchargers from Sydney to Brisbane as well as the Sydney to Melbourne route. I wonder if work is simultaneously proceeding on both routes like it would be proceeding simultaneously on many routes in China? Or is work on the 2 routes sequential, first Sydney to Melbourne and only once that is complete, then Sydney to Brisbane? I hope it is simultaneous with separate teams working both routes. That would make most sense and I can’t think of a reason not to over achieve the projections. Or is there some logic in a slow sequential rollout?

Regrettably, probably budget constraints. That is probably why there was a halt in construction of the service centre in Sydney for around 4 months after Christmas last year.

 

[doctorwho]

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The SEYMOUR location is a big detour off the freeway. A few Km NE of Seymour is a truck stop at AVENEL with direct access to both directions, to Sydney, and to Melbourne.

Cheers, Greg.

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I was there on 8th May, and the site looks 100% complete. Spoke to someone standing next to a MS, who told me the official opening was this thursday night (15 May 2015) at 7pm.

GH

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Map requires intermediary stop at Gundagai, between Albury and Goulburn.

GH[/QUOTE]

Richmond chargers are physically complete but not operational as they are waiting on the sub station upgrades.

Avenel has a fantastic pizza restaurant (open Friday, Saturday & Sunday only) - worth the detour

 

[baillies]

Hopefully they start building service centres in Brisbane and Adelaide ready for the D deliveries or at least Q1 next year when the sig services need to start.

I would like to see Tesla get a deal with Westfields (and other shopping malls) to add destination chargers in all malls. The Chatswood one on the roof with the solar panels is good marketing but I would prefer for EV parking spots to be underground near the mall entrance to reduce pollution at the entrances as uptake increases we can move to all underground spaces being for electric vehicles. Superchargers should be 180km apart on highways but this leaves large gaps for destination chargers in malls in places like Port Macquarie, Batemans Bay and similar around the east coast.

Would also be excellent if the Tesla AC and DC charging through the Mennekes connector is adopted for all EV's given the patents are open source. Much better than all other standards I have seen. Would still have an issue in US/Japan although I guess even Telsa would be happy to change if they can have 1 standard, was disappointed with Japan not match other outside US but I guess it is easy to copy US when there is no global standard.

 

[Dborn]

Japan has voltage at 100 similar to North America. Therein lies the problem. To get higher wattage you need more voltage. Amps x volts = watts. To double voltage, they work with two phase. Unique compared to rest of world. I suppose they could use the Mennekes form factor but wire it to suit their unique requirements. They chose to go with a proprietary form factor. So, I suppose Japan chose to follow the USA given the voltage issue.

 

[baillies]

Japan has voltage at 100 similar to North America. Therein lies the problem. To get higher wattage you need more voltage. Amps x volts = watts. To double voltage, they work with two phase. Unique compared to rest of world. I suppose they could use the Mennekes form factor but wire it to suit their unique requirements. They chose to go with a proprietary form factor. So, I suppose Japan chose to follow the USA given the voltage issue.

Yes, Using US connector in Japan required no new engineering, but possibly also indicates either a technical issue like Mennekes does not cope with higher amps for the lower voltage system or lack of industry wide consensus on a connector or Maybe just the cost of the connector. Obviously the U.S. Cars will have different inverters etc even if they converted to Mennekes. The U.S. Connector is not capable of 3phase as you know. If Mennekes becomes the standard connector maybe Tesla will just provide adapters for US/Japan.

Edit: cannot be a current issuers supercharger has much higher DC current and voltages

 

[Zoltrix77]

The SEYMOUR location is a big detour off the freeway. A few Km NE of Seymour is a truck stop at AVENEL with direct access to both directions, to Sydney, and to Melbourne.

Cheers, Greg.


GH

I disagree that Seymour is big detour off the Freeway, take a look at this Google maps capture. Its no further than driving the freeway itself, and a fair chunk of the B340 is a 80 or 100kph zone. That main section of road through Seymour (Emily St) is dual carriageway, has a few parks, a McDonald's, a Subway a KFC, petrol stations, the Tourist Information Centre and the new Vietnam Veterans Commemorative Walk is right there too on High St. Remember you are there for 30 minutes at least, so its better than being stuck in a petrol station stop. If you want to walk for 5 minutes, you can get to the main town shopping area of Station Street and some proper food.

I drive through Seymour once a week, but haven't seen any activity for the Supercharger location. Near the Tourist Office makes sense to me.

Adam.

 

[ixat]

Seymour is also the intersection of the N-S and E-W routes, while Avenel is right on the highway for the N-S route you have to make a detour and backtrack if you are headed to Shepparton or perhaps heading east towards Lake Eildon or Mt Bulla and want to go via Seymour to top up.

 

[brewstermac]

Anyone got an update on Goulburn?

 

[Daemon]

Anyone got an update on Goulburn?

I should be able to take a look next weekend if nobody else does before then.

 

[DavidRM]

It is great to see some superchargers being built in places that were advocated on this site.

Like most of us, I have an 85 kWh Model S. With this car and the knowledge of the positions of the first few SCs, we might ask what should be the next high value steps for Tesla after Brisbane-Sydney?

The EV trip planner says that from Gundagai, one could get to Hay in one hop, Mildura in a second hop, and then Adelaide in a third. This means that with two more superchargers (Hay and Mildura) we could connect Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra to Adelaide through Gundagai.

If these two SCs were built, another supercharger at Forbes would connect Sydney to Hay more directly and simultaneously open up western NSW nicely, while a second at Horsham would connect Melburnians to Mildura and similarly open up western Victoria.

Should we be talking to Tesla about this or does someone know if this is similar to their existing plan?

 

[paulp]

It is great to see some superchargers being built in places that were advocated on this site.

Like most of us, I have an 85 kWh Model S. With this car and the knowledge of the positions of the first few SCs, we might ask what should be the next high value steps for Tesla after Brisbane-Sydney?

The EV trip planner says that from Gundagai, one could get to Hay in one hop, Mildura in a second hop, and then Adelaide in a third. This means that with two more superchargers (Hay and Mildura) we could connect Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra to Adelaide through Gundagai.

If these two SCs were built, another supercharger at Forbes would connect Sydney to Hay more directly and simultaneously open up western NSW nicely, while a second at Horsham would connect Melburnians to Mildura and similarly open up western Victoria.

Should we be talking to Tesla about this or does someone know if this is similar to their existing plan?

I don't think there are any publicised plans to link melbourne to adelaide yet. Horsham would certainly open up a lot of country Victoria though. Getting to Adelaide via Horsham and Mildura is a lot of extra distance (and adelaide to mildura in one hop is unlikely) so a better option would be another between horsham and adelaide, say at tailem bend. This would open up opportunities for overnight destination stays along the entire victorian and south australian coast west of melbourne, the grampians, along with mildura, and the sa wine and river murray regions. Those regional centres could all then evolve a network of destination hpwc's.
getting back to melbourne will be punishin through the adelaide hills, which is why tailem bend is a good option.

 

[Chuq]

It's a beautiful sight!

 

[brewster]

Will they start the Sydney - Brisbane link this year?
They seem to have all but completed the Melbourne - Sydney link in quick time.

 

[Chuq]

Will they start the Sydney - Brisbane link this year?
They seem to have all but completed the Melbourne - Sydney link in quick time.

The other sites listed for 2015 which we have heard nothing about include Canberra, NSW south coast (near Ulladulla) and Newcastle. You would expect that if they had the resources and site availability, they would be working on these ones first - but I guess it's a matter of first in, best dressed, and there is no harm in picking the low hanging fruit (eg. I'm sure Macadamia Castle would be very amiable to hosting a SC, and would open up a fair bit of northern NSW to Brisbane owners)

 

[MisterT]

It would be a big help to both the Sydney and Brisbane owners if the first supercharger in the Sydney/Brisbane link was about 2.5 to 3 hours driving south of Brisbane and filled the gap between the destination charger in Port Macquarie and Brisbane. It would make a the trip possible with an overnight stop in Port Macquarie.

 

[raynewman]

It would be a big help to both the Sydney and Brisbane owners if the first supercharger in the Sydney/Brisbane link was about 2.5 to 3 hours driving south of Brisbane and filled the gap between the destination charger in Port Macquarie and Brisbane. It would make a the trip possible with an overnight stop in Port Macquarie.

Agree - Macadamia Castle would be the obvious choice.

 

[WhiteStar]

Agree - Macadamia Castle would be the obvious choice.

Yes...and Tesla could leverage green kudos from the existing massive solar installation or go to maximum green cred by matching it with another solar carport right next to the existing one Never tried the food or coffee there though...probably not bad at all considering the quality available at Harvest & The Farm a few kilometres up the road.

 

[TesAus]

Yes...and Tesla could leverage green kudos from the existing massive solar installation or go to maximum green cred by matching it with another solar carport right next to the existing one Never tried the food or coffee there though...probably not bad at all considering the quality available at Harvest & The Farm a few kilometres up the road.

The cafe was pretty good last time we stopped there about a year ago. There is also plenty for kids to look at and do (assuming you have kids with you!).