Trip to the Alps - range

[EllyMac]

Hi Everyone!

Wondering if anyone has any experience of driving to the Alps specifically Aussois?

I've mapped the route which looks well served by superchargers. The last one looks to be Chamberry (73000) which is about a 140 mile round trip. If I do a full trip charge there (240 miles?) and drive sensibly I should have 100 miles to spare but I'm conscious that the car will lose more miles than usual parked in the cold?

I'm there for 7 nights, won't be driving while there and I'll resist the temptation to check the app so the car stays in sleep.

I've had no experience of the car being in cold temperatures, the forecast shows a worst overnight min of -14c with average being -7 to-12c and daytime between -4 & +4c.

Should I have any worries? Any thoughts or advice greatly appreciated.

Thanks

 

[EllyMac]

sorry, forgot to add I have an S -75. 67 plate

 

[f205v]

There is a public charging station in Modane (few Km away from Assois) with type2 connector at 22KW.
It's in "Place du Marché" on the parking space along the river.
In case your 7 nights stop will reduce range too much you can have a quick fill up there.

 

[AustinP]

Just returned from Val Thorens. Second year there, and third ski vacation with the Tesla.
My advise: do indeed a full charge at the last SuC.
This, not to have enough for the return, but to be sure to arrive in any case: Last year, we had a severe snow storm and the short trip between Chambery and Val Thorens took 11h instead of 1.5h, half of it not moving, just keeping the car warm. This does drain the battery!
Do plan to charge at your destination : ask your hotel or destination resort for a plain electricial plug (220v) to charge with your UMC. Often local parking do also provide this service. It might take a day or two to charge, but as you will not be moving, you’ll be able to recharge fully while enjoying your vacation.
So also do take your UMC (or borrow one from a friend): this year, a fellow tesla driver also in our ski station was told there would be a type 2 charger at his hotel, and it turned out there was only a plain plug. He did not have a UMC. Long story short, he managed to contact me (thanks to the local parking management) and so we shared my UMC.
If you charge later, meaning after your battery had time to get cold, don’t be alarmed if after plugging in, all is green except there seems to be 0 charging speed: very cold battery needs some hours to warm up before they start really charging.
Last advise: if the local reception tells you there is no electric plug in their garage: ask to talk to the technical team. There is probably one or more they are not aware about. I believed them, so booked a parking further away with electric charge facility, and it turned out they had 3 plugs... ...
Anyway: Enjoy your vacation!

 

[EllyMac]

Just returned from Val Thorens. Second year there, and third ski vacation with the Tesla.
My advise: do indeed a full charge at the last SuC.
This, not to have enough for the return, but to be sure to arrive in any case: Last year, we had a severe snow storm and the short trip between Chambery and Val Thorens took 11h instead of 1.5h, half of it not moving, just keeping the car warm. This does drain the battery!
Do plan to charge at your destination : ask your hotel or destination resort for a plain electricial plug (220v) to charge with your UMC. Often local parking do also provide this service. It might take a day or two to charge, but as you will not be moving, you’ll be able to recharge fully while enjoying your vacation.
So also do take your UMC (or borrow one from a friend): this year, a fellow tesla driver also in our ski station was told there would be a type 2 charger at his hotel, and it turned out there was only a plain plug. He did not have a UMC. Long story short, he managed to contact me (thanks to the local parking management) and so we shared my UMC.
If you charge later, meaning after your battery had time to get cold, don’t be alarmed if after plugging in, all is green except there seems to be 0 charging speed: very cold battery needs some hours to warm up before they start really charging.
Last advise: if the local reception tells you there is no electric plug in their garage: ask to talk to the technical team. There is probably one or more they are not aware about. I believed them, so booked a parking further away with electric charge facility, and it turned out they had 3 plugs... ...
Anyway: Enjoy your vacation!

Thanks so much for all the really helpful advice, feeling much more comfortable now

 

[EllyMac]

Just returned from Val Thorens. Second year there, and third ski vacation with the Tesla.
My advise: do indeed a full charge at the last SuC.
This, not to have enough for the return, but to be sure to arrive in any case: Last year, we had a severe snow storm and the short trip between Chambery and Val Thorens took 11h instead of 1.5h, half of it not moving, just keeping the car warm. This does drain the battery!
Do plan to charge at your destination : ask your hotel or destination resort for a plain electricial plug (220v) to charge with your UMC. Often local parking do also provide this service. It might take a day or two to charge, but as you will not be moving, you’ll be able to recharge fully while enjoying your vacation.
So also do take your UMC (or borrow one from a friend): this year, a fellow tesla driver also in our ski station was told there would be a type 2 charger at his hotel, and it turned out there was only a plain plug. He did not have a UMC. Long story short, he managed to contact me (thanks to the local parking management) and so we shared my UMC.
If you charge later, meaning after your battery had time to get cold, don’t be alarmed if after plugging in, all is green except there seems to be 0 charging speed: very cold battery needs some hours to warm up before they start really charging.
Last advise: if the local reception tells you there is no electric plug in their garage: ask to talk to the technical team. There is probably one or more they are not aware about. I believed them, so booked a parking further away with electric charge facility, and it turned out they had 3 plugs... ...
Anyway: Enjoy your vacation!

There is a public charging station in Modane (few Km away from Assois) with type2 connector at 22KW.
It's in "Place du Marché" on the parking space along the river.
In case your 7 nights stop will reduce range too much you can have a quick fill up there.

There is a public charging station in Modane (few Km away from Assois) with type2 connector at 22KW.
It's in "Place du Marché" on the parking space along the river.
In case your 7 nights stop will reduce range too much you can have a quick fill up there.

There is a public charging station in Modane (few Km away from Assois) with type2 connector at 22KW.
It's in "Place du Marché" on the parking space along the river.
In case your 7 nights stop will reduce range too much you can have a quick fill up there.

Thanks very much for the info

 

[AustinP]

Thanks so much for all the really helpful advice, feeling much more comfortable now

You’re welcome.
It looks like you are from UK, so another tip: bring an extension cord with you in case the plug is further away or someone else parked on the spot for EV. And of course an adaptor, as French plugs are different from UK ones.
I guess the Tesla UMC will accept the adapter but do ask Tesla just to be sure.

 

[EllyMac]

There is a public charging station in Modane (few Km away from Assois) with type2 connector at 22KW.
It's in "Place du Marché" on the parking space along the river.
In case your 7 nights stop will reduce range too much you can have a quick fill up there.

We've arrived and are struggling to find a plug socket in the resort so we plan to take a trip to the charger you mentioned, the resort pointed us to this as well. Do you happen to know how we access the charger though? On-line it looks like it's free but accessed via an app but we can't seem to find out what app we need? Have you actually charged there? Could you shed any light? Thanks

 

[f205v]

No, I've never charged there myself. If a phone APP is needed to charge, usually the instructions for downloading the APP are on the charging station itself.
a picture of the charging station is here attached.

 

[AustinP]

We've arrived and are struggling to find a plug socket in the resort so we plan to take a trip to the charger you mentioned, the resort pointed us to this as well. Do you happen to know how we access the charger though? On-line it looks like it's free but accessed via an app but we can't seem to find out what app we need? Have you actually charged there? Could you shed any light? Thanks

Did you try to reach to the technical guys of your resort? My recent experience demonstrated that between the "management"/"reception" team and the technical team, there was not much info sharing, resulting in the reception telling me there were no plug sockets available. When on site, I crossed a tech guy in the parking, gently asked him if they would put some plugs some day... and he told me "but of course we do already have parking spots with plugs"...

 

[EllyMac]

Thanks everyone for the info. Thought I'd post some of the things I've found out for anyone planning a trip this way. So it seems that we are in a very small ski resort (Aussois) and there really doesn't seem to be any ability to charge. I snooped around the car-parks myself, no plug sockets. There also didn't seem to be any outside or accessible plug points anywhere to stretch a lead.

Very difficult to figure out public chargers on-line, info seems very limited. The charger in Modane mentioned here and recommended by my apartment says on-line it's free for all to access but says verification 'is via phone app' (but helpfully doesn't state which one). So to save further range anxiety we decided to take a trip down to Modane by taxi to check it out before bringing the car and wasting miles (plus we were snowed in anyway) On arriving we actually discovered 2 'Maurienne' chargers, one at the train station and one at the river. However they machine asks for a 'badge' after much googling (no info at all on the machine) we eventually found that this is an RFID card which you need to order and have posted to you in 3 days! Have no idea why things like this are made so difficult.....why can't I just pay for some juice on my card?

So we then went to plan B (which in hindsight should have been plan A) Tesla destination chargers! We found St Charles hotel and spa was 18 kilometres away (basically the next ski resort along - Val-Cenis) I phoned the hotel beforehand (they spoke perfect English) to put my mind at rest and they advised as we are non-resident they charge 15euros to use the underground garage (which is where the charger is located) they have 2 Tesla destination chargers and 1 universal charger (I didn't check if this meant type 2)

We have arrived, paid for the garage parking and the car is filling up while we're having lunch and later a trip to the spa! It's advertised as 11kw so pretty slow (because it's underground it has no signal so I can't check current speed on the app) but we're having a nice relaxing afternoon anyway.

So next time I am just going to book into a resort with a destination charger. Much easier. I really feel for non-Tesla EV drivers as the public charging network seems such a minefield, perhaps also more difficult being a tourist.

So range anxiety over, I can now enjoy the last 4 days of my trip. One pleasant surprise was how well the battery held up parked in the cold. I had lost 24 kilometres 138km to 114km so 15miles in 3 days (about 66 hours to be precise) in temperatures as low as -8c overnight. I had read a couple of posts mentioning 12-15 miles in a 24 period so I was fearing the worst. I resisted the urge to check the app over those 3 days to keep the car in sleep mode and it got covered in snow the first 2 nights which might have kept it a little warmer in a little igloo .

Morale of the story for me, always stay in Tesla destination charger resorts.

 

[SNO man]

Hi EllyMac,
We're on our second Tesla (S100D and M3P) and made a guide to help driving in the alps.
Driving to the Alps by Electric Vehicle | Tesla & EV ski holidays | SNO ®

At the bottom of the page you can see a list of ski hotels with destination chargers - picking one if these really takes the anxiety out of it all.
There's also lots of the more commonly know tips on how to maximise range in the cold (e.g. dress appropriately and use the heated seats rather than heating the whole car, etc).

Our last trip south was all the way to Cannes and I can honestly say we never stopped to charge, only to eat, but that was a summer trip...
...range is much less in the cold, so it's worth topping off before leaving the motorway for the mountain roads, just to give you peace of mind.

Best of luck - it's a really fun drive and Tesla 4WD is awesome in winter driving conditions.