ARTICLE: You Need Way Less Range Than You Think

[KevinRS]

That 20% rule, is not something you even want to make a 100% of the time thing. You need to occasionally go down lower, and charge to 100%, to calibrate the range. Don't worry about never getting below that 20% even in an emergency. You can consider it your reserve for those emergencies, that's fine. EV chargers are also being installed at an accelerating rate.

 

[bumblebeetuna13]

Even as consumers demand electric cars that can go 250, 300 or even 400 miles between charging sessions, research shows that they can usually make do with far less.

Full article here: INSIDE EVs - How Much Range do you Actually Need

Dang my bad y’all. I posted an article that I found personally interesting and posted it here because, well, I thought you might find it interesting, too.

Didn’t mean for things to get so spicy. My take is if you want a no frills, small EV truck with sub 200 mi range, then a Slate might be a good option for you. If this is not what you want, perhaps your time and energy would be better spent in a different forum.

 

[GaRailroader]

That 20% rule, is not something you even want to make a 100% of the time thing. You need to occasionally go down lower, and charge to 100%, to calibrate the range. Don't worry about never getting below that 20% even in an emergency. You can consider it your reserve for those emergencies, that's fine. EV chargers are also being installed at an accelerating rate.

Tesla doesn't enforce the 20% rule and they are the ones warrantying the battery. The only thing Tesla cautions is when you set your charge limit to higher than 80% a Charge Tip appears in the app which reads '80% recommended for daily driving'. I didn't hear of the 20% rule of thumb until joining this forum. I think it is human nature to not leave your EV below a quarter tank.

For the non-EV owners, to illustrate how easy a road trip in an EV can be, I looked up the Salty Dog Cafe on Hilton Head Island in Google maps on my phone and shared it with my Tesla. It is 316 miles away from my home in the north Atlanta suburbs. I haven't charged the Tesla in several days and so the range indicator is showing 169 miles remaining. The Tesla nav calculates the route complete with charging stops. With a partial charge on the car at the start it is recommending 2 stops at 10 minutes each. The first one in Macon, GA for 10 minutes. Battery is at 24% at arrival. The 2nd stop is in Metter, GA where battery is at 11% at arrival. Battery is also at 11% at destination. You can set a minimum charge level that you would like to be at destination and it will incorporate that in to the plan. (I have not set up this option) If I was really planning on going to Hilton Head today I would have charged last night and it would have only recommended 1 charging stop about halfway at Dublin, GA. It is in a Wendy's parking lot so we make it a lunch stop and charge longer than 20 minutes.

 

[Dorbiman]

I'll have to completely disagree with the statement "adding a larger gas tank is trivial" in a modern-day ICEV.

My statement was for the automaker, not the end user. My bad if that wasn’t clear. It’s not a problem for Chevy to mount a 28 gallon tank under a Silverado. Shit, my GTO fuel tank is just in the trunk and that’s from the factory.

 

[Dorbiman]

My Pontiac is a 2005, not a 60’s.
My point is that there is typically lots of room. Especially with modern saddle style split tanks.

 

[GaRailroader]

He usually stops 3 times at 10 to 15 minutes each to recharge as that is the optimal speed the battery can charge in the meat of the charging curve, from about 45% to 80%.

45% to 80% is not the meat of the charging curve. When you plug in at 10% SOC, you will see charging rates where you are adding range to your battery at a rate of over 1000 miles per hour. This charging rate tapers off as you fill up. Starting at 45% you are barely breaking 100 kWh. Once I drop below 100 kWh, I am watching the app to see when I have enough to get to the next planned charging stop. Taking your battery up to 80% at each charging stop you are going to spend a lot more time charging then running it down to 10 and charging up to 50 or 60. I know this is counter intuitive to ICE people to stop on a trip and get half a tank of gas but in an EV that is the way to minimize charging time. Below is the charging curve for a Model Y Long Range. In a Slate, the larger battery pack will have faster charging experience even if on a road trip you only take it up 150 miles and never use the extended capacity.

 

[SichuanHot]

I was too. The automaker has to comply with very stringent fuel system safety regs for modern cars (i.e. model year 2025) not like a 1960's Pontiac prior to significant rewrite of safety regs in 1970.

If you have a truck with a bed, you can easily put an aftermarket fuel tank in the bed with a fuel hose attachment. Other body styles not so easy, but trucks - super easy.

 

[AZFox]

This charging rate tapers off as you fill up.

This happens with my phone(s).
When SOC is low, charging is rapid.
When SOC is high, charging slows, eventually to a trickle near 100%.

Might be for different reasons, possibly temperature?

 

[GaRailroader]

This happens with my phone(s).
When SOC is low, charging is rapid.
When SOC is high, charging slows, eventually to a trickle near 100%.

Might be for different reasons, possibly temperature?

Heat is definitely the case for the charging curve taper on EVs. The closer you get to 100% the higher the voltage and consequently the heat.

 

[Luxrage]

In case anyone doesn't realize this, if you have the feature turned on (knowing Google it's on by deafult) your phone has probably been logging every trip you make every day. Google's Timeline even gives you driving miles.
I pulled up my Google maps timeline for the last four years and looked at my monthly mileage averages, and all of the towns I went to. I averaged 40 miles per day and on the longest trips I did, about 78 miles each way, every town I went to at that time had a charger station.

Even the really long, on a whim, trips, the longest was 159 miles each way. And it looks like there's charging stations every 50 miles. I spent about 4 hours in that town before leaving so I'd have to know how the Slate's charge times are to really do the math. The point is that I think 150 really is enough for something that's gonna be a second car anyways.

The major road trips I did, I always ended up renting a car. One was to BUY a car 6 hours away, and the others were trips I wouldn't take the Slate on in the first place (LTD Road Trip from TX to WI).

Funnily enough I was tempted on the extended range battery, but I really don't need it, looking at the data.

 

[RedJoker]

Due to this thread, I started playing around with abetterrouteplanner and realized that I could actually stay with the standard battery. Visiting my elderly parents every weekend is within the round-trip range of the standard battery and visiting my brother requires a charging stop no matter which battery I have.

Good exercise that might save me a lot of money!

 

[OldGoat]

Heat is definitely the case for the charging curve taper on EVs. The closer you get to 100% the higher the voltage and consequently the heat.

Tis true. After you get to around 80% most chargers slow down the juice (some almosgt to a crawly) to avoid heat issues. So most of us only charge to @ 80% tops when going long. Even at home, I rarely charge to 100% and that is to "re-caibrate" the cars computer that guesses how much range I have.
Big battery or stock? Of course it depends on how much you drive! My advice is based on how you go about life. If you are seriously Type A and always looking for the shortest line wherever you go, get the bigger battery. If you are able to sit and read without getting grumpy at a doctors office while things run late for your appointment, you also won't mind a few extra minutes at a public charger and likely do OK with the stock battery.

 

[OldGoat]

I failed to also note in my post that cold winter temps WILL cut your range by up to 30%. So that is why I went for the extended range in my Mach E. I can really see the range dip when the temps slide below freezing at night. Factor that in if/when the time comes to pony up for your Slate. Even if you live in cold temps, if you can charge at home at night, you might be just fine with the stock battery if you are only going about 100 miles per day. Which is way past what some will drive.

 

[ScooterAsheville]

Cold weather will cut your range by various amounts with CURRENT battery technology. The amount varies by chemistry, by the inclusion or not of a heat pump, and by the cleverness or lack thereof in the battery conditioning system.

 

[AKrietzer]

Cold weather will cut your range by various amounts with CURRENT battery technology. The amount varies by chemistry, by the inclusion or not of a heat pump, and by the cleverness or lack thereof in the battery conditioning system.

What would be the best temperatures to keep an EV overnight when you aren't driving? I keep vehicles in my garage, Summer can get to about 90, Winter down to about 50. What temperature range do the batteries like best? I'm retired and don't drive as much anymore, so the vehicles spend most of the time in the garage. If the temperatures are at their extreme, 50 or 90, do I need to precondition the batteries ( or heat or cool the batteries, whatever you call it ) before I drive? Sorry for all the EV newby questions.