EV adventures

Saturday was an opportunity to explore a bit with the new RAV4 EV. My brothers were up for a bit of adventure so we headed for the mountains. As an SUV the RAV4 did pretty well until the snow got too deep. The battery does cut into ground clearance. It was interesting to discover the alert that sounds when the available range drops below the distance to home, especially since it chimed several times since we were coming downhill.
The adventure really got interesting as we neared home. The range dropped to 12 miles but the distance to home was showing as 20. Hmm, better stop in Issaquah for "fuel". We are still going downhill so it isn’t as bad as it sounds. No worries, I just got the Safety Connect working on Friday so Entunes should show me the closest charging station. Except a touch of the Apps button results in "App update unsuccessful, Try Again". The rest of the Entunes story is for another thread.
No worries, go to plan B, but we did just hit "Lo, find a charge". A quick call to the Ground Support Team GST (wife). She googles EV charging Issaquah. The only things that show up are the Chargepoint charging stations in the Highlands. Great but we just passed the exit and I have not yet received my Chargepoint card. Nothing on Front street? Nope none showing. Ok go for the ace in the hole plan C, Issaquah Park and ride.
Range has dropped to Turtle mode. Sure enough there is a Nissan and Leaf, and a charging station at the park and ride. But they are both behind a locked gate. Ok a couple of turns around the ground floor of the garage, no charging stations. A call from the GST, no data on the park and ride but there is one over at 385 Front Street. I would have taken some cell phone pictures here except my cell phone is also showing no power.
Hmm,it is almost a mile but if it is the best shot.... Off we go. Suddenly, "No drive power" and we are parked on the side of the road. Fortunately there is an available parking space.
Hmm, now what. After a few fruitless minutes looking for a nearby power outlet at the fish hatchery my brain circles back to Entunes which gets me to Safety Connect. The web site says they provide "Emergency roadside assistance".
This is where the adventure gets more than interesting. Press the SoS button. Wait ... after a bit a very helpful voice comes on and asks if there is an accident. No, just ran out of charge. Hmm, let me check.
To make a long story short, after many 10s of minutes and a couple of handoffs, first to "roadside assistance and then to RAV4 EV charging stations, I finally had the thought that perhaps, being batteries, they may have "rebalanced". So I send the passengers on a quick reconnoiter to make sure the charging station really has power. Yep 3 blocks and wide open.
Start button, power on and we are off. Very gentle on the accelerator and we are safely parked and connected to the charger. Bonus, it is a Blink station for which I do have a card.

Now to the most important lesson learned. What to do for an hour while the EV charges? Hmm, remember I said I was with my brothers, on a Saturday, after a day in the mountains, on an adventure. And for those unfamiliar with the area,there are many bars along Front Street. "Honey, we have to stop at the bar, err I mean charge the car".
An hour later, the car is charged, the passengers are charged and all is good.
The moral of the story should not be lost on either Charger salesmen or EV salesmen, Honey - we have to wait for the car to charge, we'll be along in awhile. Assuming bars figure out the need for charging stations.
For those concerned, one of my brothers is a tea-totaller.

Heh, good story Seattle!

This touches on the concept of "range anxiety" that many prospective EV buyers might have. Heck, even with the 100+ mile range on the RAV4 EV, I still had it for a while after my purchase. But, no more. Here's why:

The RAV4 EV gives you a very good indication of when it will be out of juice. The GOM (distance to empty) gauge is quite accurate. With a smartphone, Google Maps, and the relatively flat Bay Area, I don't have any concerns if I am, for example, 16 miles away from my house (charger) and I only have 18 miles on the gauge. I KNOW I will make it, and with some miles to spare.

Additionally, on my iPhone, I have the following four applications: PlugShare, Recargo, ChargePoint, and Blink, all of which show local charging stations. I also have the associated swipe cards (in the glove compartment) for ChargePoint and Blink, although you can always just call these services from your phone to activate a charging station (you don't NEED the cards, but they are convenient).

Finally, I agree about business owners having incentive to put in charging stations. My wife and I really like Donato Enoteca, an Italian restaurant in Redwood City, and the movie theater is nearby, too. There is a free charge ChargePoint station (provided by the city, I believe) at the library parking lot, and it's fun to swing by, grab a nice meal and a movie, and have the car charged upon our return! We were laughing that we spent $50 on dinner, another $25 at the movies, but we saved $2 in electricity to charge up the RAV for free. Still, it feels like we are getting away with something, and it's weirdly satisfying.

Woody/RavTesla

SeattleRav4, nice story, and thanks for the tip on the "Too Far from home", out of range alert feature. I did not know such a feature existed. Do you have to set up anything to enable this alert? Is it documented somewhere in the owner's manual?

Ravtesla, where exactly are the free charging stations in RWC? I know about the freebies at the underground parking garage for the downtown RWC theater, and I go to the movie matinees there occasionally. But, a lot of other people go to the movies - some in EVs - so the (2 or 3?) charging stations there cannot be relied upon to always be available. Where is this other charging station you mentioned that is near a library?

As far as I know, there is no setup, although it might be possible to turn off.
It just popped up. And because of where we were, it popped up a couple of times, apparently becaue we moved in and out of range.

Dsinned,

The EVSE is behind the library - 1044 Middlefield Road, Redwood City, CA. Plugshare shows it nicely, though it's currently listed as unavailable. I've used it for my LEAF in the past...

Jay (new member pondering purchase)

Dsinned said:

SeattleRav4, nice story, and thanks for the tip on the "Too Far from home", out of range alert feature. I did not know such a feature existed. Do you have to set up anything to enable this alert? Is it documented somewhere in the owner's manual?

Ravtesla, where exactly are the free charging stations in RWC? I know about the freebies at the underground parking garage for the downtown RWC theater, and I go to the movie matinees there occasionally. But, a lot of other people go to the movies - some in EVs - so the (2 or 3?) charging stations there cannot be relied upon to always be available. Where is this other charging station you mentioned that is near a library?

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Dsinned said:

SeattleRav4, nice story, and thanks for the tip on the "Too Far from home", out of range alert feature. I did not know such a feature existed. Do you have to set up anything to enable this alert? Is it documented somewhere in the owner's manual?
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I got that message once or twice and seem to remember it was was when I had set Home as my destination and the distance to Home was greater than the remaining miles on the fuel guage.

I just received my RAV4EV from the dealer. He had it shipped from CA to TX for $600.
Used it to take the family to a movie last night.
Tested out both L1 and L2 EVSE units at home. All good.
L1 current/voltage/power draw from wall (according to Kill-A-Watt meter): 12.7 Amps, 118.6 VAC, 1506 Watts.
L2 current draw from wall ~30.6 Amps.
Going to get it inspected and registered at lunch.
White fabric on seats and especially doors seem to get dirty fast (reminiscent of Nissan Leaf). Will have to look into options.
Trying to view local charging stations doesn't work for me. EnTunes only shows chargers in California, while the car only searches for chargers in Arizona, even when I tell it to use another location. Very strange. Any other "out-of-staters" having similar issues?

Kids and wife are almost exited as I am.
Life is good.

Kohler Controller said:

I just received my RAV4EV from the dealer. He had it shipped from CA to TX for $600.

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Congrats and welcome to the out-of-state club!!

Welcome to the tiny Rav4 EV club and the even tinier Out of Staters club!

My luck with Entunes has not been great however I am attempting to use an unsupported BB 9900. My wife's Android works fine with it.
My guess is that by now you have tried it again and it is working. Probably the GPS receiver in the phone and in the car had not yet synced up to the satellites, thereby not reporting your position correctly.

Congrats! $600 to ship the car to TX seem quite reasonable! Have you tried the "sports' mode yet? :mrgreen:

Adventure Number 2
Time to see if this SUV can really deliver. The trip, Newcastle to Leavenworth WA. Mapquest shows 116 miles over Stevens pass or 127 miles over Snoqualmie and Bluwett passes. Range on the Rav4 is 120 miles, no problem. Do remember that part about passes.
Given that we would be right at advertised range and chargers in this area are far between according to plugshare (http://www.plugshare.com/), a planned intermediate stop was prudent. While the Stevens route shows 10 miles closer, I wanted to stop in Rosslyn / Suncadia. They have an Aerovironmnet charger there so it made sense.
The trip over went great. Charged for 1hr 45 min in Rosslyn and stopped in Leavenworth with 34 miles showing on the GOM with the avg efficiency at 2.7 mi/kwh.
The trip back got interesting. We decided we wanted to eat dinner in Rosslyn and figured we had to charge there anyway. In hindsight we should have come back on Hwy 2 over Stevens pass because we would have been over the Cascades before the weather closed in.
We left Leavenworth, in sunshine with only 100 miles range showing. Plenty to get to Rosslyn but . . .
We found it snowing up on Blewett pass. The Rav4 handled it like an SUV, no problem.
Dinner in Rosslyn was good but after 2 hours the charger seemed to be taking a lot longer than it had before. Without a way to actually measure we had to go by perception. The temp had dropped to 37 degrees F with a strong wind. We had plenty of charge to make it up Snoqualmie pass so we confirmed the charger there with a call to the Chevron station and checked weather. It was bad and getting worse.
The climb up the pass was a climb into winter. The snow increased, the wind increased, the visibility decreased. Speed limit 45 mph, Traction Tires Advised read the Info sign. We reached the top with 15 mi showing on the GoM in a blinding snowstorm. But the power was on at the Aerovironment charger.
Now the adventure part begins. The charger power light was on but not the Ready to Charge light. I used my key fob and plugged it in anyway. No luck! And the next closest charger is 25 mi way, but downhill, in a snowstorm! So I called the number on the charger. A nice guy with an accent answers, asks my name and how to help. I tell him I am in a snowstorm with a malfunctioning charger. He has me use my key fob so he can identify the charger and then tries a reset. 50 very cold minutes later the GoM is down to 9 mi, I am frozen standing in the wind to get cell phone signal, many resets with no response, and he says “We will have to send out a technician”. Did I mention it is now 11 pm?
I said “wait, can you at least look up the next nearest charger for me?” He says sure. After a couple of more frigid minutes he gives me an address . . . in OR. Remember the phone connection isn’t great so I say “Can you repeat that? I am in WA.” “Umm, can you tell me the number on the charging station?” So I read it to him. “Let’s try that reset again.” He had been resetting a station somewhere in OR for last 50 minutes!
Yes, it actually reset this time and is now functioning. I plug it in, check that it is charging, thank him and hang up. 2 hours later we have just enough charge to get home. As I pass Issaquah the GoM shows 18 mi and the Nav shows 12 mi to Home. But I have been basically coasting for the last 45 mi so I want some margin. 4 mi seems like enough so we pass up the Issaquah stations and continue home. The turtle mode comes on at 10 mi, the GoM switches from distance to go to LO power, Plug in Immediately at 4 mi. But we made it home just fine.
Observations
When planning a long trip, check what slow food restaurants are near charging stations and plan to stop at those stations. It is too bad most of the stations being put in tend to be more Gas or fast food oriented than slow food oriented. You are not going anywhere for a couple of hours.
It would really help if either the car, Entunes or the charging station showed current flow or rate of charge.
I have not yet confirmed it but it appeared the Nav system was showing straight line distance rather route distance while following a route. The distance appeared to calculate correctly when choosing the route but the distance to go seemed to reflect straight line as we followed along. This would not normally be a big deal since in most places the route is pretty direct but in the mountains that is not the case.
Last, it would really make sense for the Charging stations, especially the Super chargers to have a 14-50 receptacle to use in case the charger was malfunctioning.

SeattleRav4 said:

... The turtle mode comes on at 10 mi, the GoM switches from distance to go to LO power, Plug in Immediately at 4 mi. But we made it home just fine.

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You likely didn't hit turtle. Probably:

Low Battery Warning (LBW) with two fuel bar segments illuminated
Very Low Battery (VLB) with one fuel bar segment illuminated
Somewhere in here, the GOM went to "LO"

Next would have been Climate Control Limited (CCL) with zero fuel bars, however Turtle mode has popped up occasionally without losing the final fuel bar segment, hence no CCL

I'm shivering thinking about how badly this could have ended, but glad you persisted!!!

By "Turtle" I meant that the little yellow turtle appeared above the GoM.

Hopefully I didn't make this sound scary. While it was cold and nasty, Plan C included a night at the Summit Inn right next door. If I really did have to wait until morning, I would have sucked it up and paid the $119 for a room and convinced them to let me plug in my 110v EVSE to keep the battery warm.

Just thought I should clarify for those who don't know the area, which I realize is most of you.

Funny follow-on to the story. The next morning I decided to see how much Electriciy I had used on the trip. When I could not find any way to log into any Aerovironment website, I called. I wound up talking to the same guy. After some discussion I realized that they (Aerovironment) do not have a webite that tracks usage by customer.

SeattleRav4 said:

By "Turtle" I meant that the little yellow turtle appeared above the GoM.

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You should not have gotten that until the very last thing the car does before it physically shuts down. It would NOT come on with 10 miles showing on the GOM. All the other things I listed would happen first:

*Low Battery Warning (LBW) with two fuel bar segments illuminated
*Very Low Battery (VLB) with one fuel bar segment illuminated
*The GOM went to "LO"
*Climate Control Limited (CCL) with zero fuel bars, however Turtle mode has popped up occasionally without losing the final fuel bar segment, hence no CCL
*Turtle Mode

Very exciting trips SeattleRav4... Thanks
For those who live down south in the sunshine, up here in the N.W., the simple phrase "head over the pass" is not a trivial thing. Check out these pictures

This is Snoqualimie Pass AV level 3 charge tower, next to the level 2, which is buried under 4 feet of snow.
http://www.pbase.com/doug401/image/149314188

This is Stevens Pass at 4000 feet. At least it gets plowed by the ski area.
http://www.pbase.com/doug401/image/149314189

Trip planning taken to a next level

doug401 said:

Very exciting trips SeattleRav4... Thanks
For those who live down south in the sunshine, up here in the N.W., the simple phrase "head over the pass" is not a trivial thing. Check out these pictures

This is Snoqualimie Pass AV level 3 charge tower, next to the level 2, which is buried under 4 feet of snow.
http://www.pbase.com/doug401/image/149314188

This is Stevens Pass at 4000 feet. At least it gets plowed by the ski area.
http://www.pbase.com/doug401/image/149314189

Trip planning taken to a next level

Click to expand...

WOW! :shock: