Specifically we had to plan our charging for a few days ahead because, without a home charger, we couldn’t get more than a 25% charge overnight. So unless we wanted to start our journey with an expensive fast charge we would need to plan our car usage and charge strategy so that when we left for the big trip we’d have at least 80%.
With an ICE we just fill up the night before or morning of and we’re good to go with 500 miles in the tank.
I don't doubt your troubles, and it does sound like your usecase is indeed a decent fit for an ICE. Do you mind if I ask what kind of activities you do that involve several long (150+ mi), daily roadtrips in a 2 month period? I think that's fairly well outside the normal usecase for cars.
Sure:
- visiting family, 2 lots, both over 3 hours each away
- mountain biking, 2 to 5 hour each way
- friends wedding, 3 hours
- airport run, 4 hour round trip … twice
- overnight work trip 5 hours each way
That’s a pretty common 2/3 month period for us. Oh and when we had the PS2 there was a daily commute to one of two office between 30 and 60 minutes each way.
Wow, with that amount of driving you're going to be stuck with ICE cars for a while. I suspect you're a significant outlier though in terms of long trips per month.
With a 22kW (default European 3-phase) charger, it would be easy to have a full battery every morning. A large EV charges from empty to full in 5-8 hours.
In some places 3-phase power is very common (e.g. my small apartment in Copenhagen has a 3-phase supply), though in the UK it's less common. The upgrade might be £1000, or considerably more.
With 7kW (1-phase) it will be OK for a lot of trips — charging in 11-12 hours. This is more power than a normal domestic socket provides. In some countries there's a higher-power socket in the garage already, otherwise it's something the electrician needs to install.
A normal domestic socket is around 3kW.
Maybe, but I've got quite a few friends in that do similar amounts of driving so I might not be as far out there as you think. But I agree we are at the higher end.
> without a home charger, we couldn’t get more than a 25% charge overnight.
Seems like a nasty issue with that polestar or with whatever you were using to charge overnight. With an actual charger you'd get to 100% overnight.
With tesla you'd also have car adding detours for you towards fast chargers when needed, so much less to worry.
Yeh we were charging from a normal domestic socket plug in charger.
If we’d spent the £1,500 on the dedicated charger I’m sure my view would be different.
Either way I can get 500 miles out of an ICE and refill it in 2 minutes. EVs are great but for longer drives that convenience is hard to beat.
> Either way I can get 500 miles out of an ICE and refill it in 2 minutes. EVs are great but for longer drives that convenience is hard to beat.
Sure, but typically refill would be 30-40 min with a Tesla in a supercharger for long drives, which I usually need after driving 500-600km.
On the other hand, they're very fun to drive, the acceleration is insane. ICE cars that come close are twice the price and with much higher maintenance costs.
I'm not sure why you went with a polestar though.
> EVs are great but for longer drives that convenience is hard to beat.
No, for longer drives multiple times per week with no return home in between them, an ICE is hard to beat. If you're driving 250 miles a day and returning home then it's a no brainer - you don't even need to stop for petrol.
> With an actual charger
Well, yeah, that's the issue. Without an "actual charger" you only get ~25% range overnight with a standard wall outlet. It's not a problem for most driving usecases, but for people who do a lot of long trips, it still an issue.
Why don't you string an electric cable from a regular socket out of the window? It's slow but it can easily charge a car overnight.
In the US, on a 120v / 12a circuit, it'll add 3 miles of range per hour.
Which is plenty for most folks (I originally planned on installing a Level 2 charger in my garage, but found it was completely unnecessary and just charge off a standard outlet)
Sure -- I use such a setup sometimes when visiting family.
It's not ideal, however; it's 66 hours continuously to add 200 miles of range to an older S; for more efficient cars (that get 4 or 5 miles of range an hour) it's still going to be 40 hours.
Such a setup is totally untenable if you're hanging an electric cord out your window and over a sidewalk or through trees or whatever, if you can even get a parking space within extension cord range of your car...
Also, broadly -- running a random outlet at 12a continuously for 60 hours may break things in unpleasant ways.
Wouldn't taking a lunch break at a faster charger elsewhere achieve the same thing?