ALL POSTS - GOM - Range Meter - Distance To Empty meter

[mark_rivers19]

Congratulations on your new RAV4 EV.

First thing to do, ignore...yup. IGNORE The number posted on the range.
Stick with the fuel bars.
In time, doing the same commute again and again, you'll figure out your range based on your driving style.

I have 9,000 plus miles on my odometer, and regardless of what the range says, i still get 90 plus miles on trip With 15-20 miles left ( on the range estimate) OR 2 fuel bars. This is on a Standard charge.

Depending on how i drove, the GOM ( guess o meter) my lowest posted range is 83. And the highest is 108. Both these estimates were done on full charge.

Again it all depends on how you drive.. My most conservative is 3.7kw and with a lead foot when i'm on Tesla mode, it's 2.1kw

 

[raramuri]

Thanks a ton!

 

[Khaihon]

I've been 110 charging for 8 months and just installed a Leviton 40A EVSE. My top range display (not actual range) went from 123 miles on standard to 106 miles. At first, I thought the Leviton didn't charge correctly... but then I also realized that I've started to be a bit more of a leadfoot, knowing that I will always have a full charge whereas on 110, I was driving as conservative as possible. After a few days of conservative driving, the indicator crept back up to 123 miles.

 

[n3ckf]

yup. have this problem as well. I take my car to the foothills every couple of weeks. Its gotten to the point where i know exactly how much i need to have on the GOM when passing the last charging station (which is fortunately right before i go up the hill in Jackson, CA).

If you use the battery segments (next to the GOM) to estimate your battery you wont ever run out, its very accurate.

I now for instance, that it takes 28 miles of "range" go go from Jackson to my house at 3300' (which is 19 miles away). If i dont have 28, i stop and charge.

You'll find that the GOM stabilizes when you have a big hill drive, it just stabilizes at a much lower value than you're used to. (and will be wrong in terms of actual range of course).

When i drive *down* i use 3 miles of "range" to go the 19. So its 24-25 up (i never want to get the turtule) vs. 3 down, very consistently.

 

[michael]

I'm a committed EV owner (Focus and Volt) and have spread the word to my friends. One couple have a very long commute which can be handled only by a Volt or RAV EV. They don't like the Volt but think the idea of the RAV EV is very attractive. They are very enthused by the prospect.

So yesterday I got them to agree to check one out in person...ideally for a test drive but as a minimum to look it over. They weren't quite ready to buy (needing to line up charging) but they were committed to the plan...solid buyers.

I called three local Toyota dealers...none had a single one available either in stock or as a demonstrator. Finally...a fourth dealer had none in stock but had a demo unit. "Come over any time up to 9" they told me. Note that this was Saturday, a big car selling day.

So I rounded up my friends and we arrived at the dealer around 5:30. Salesmen were circling like sharks at the entrance. One grabbed us, we told him why we were there, and he started enthusing about the car. Said it was so great employees liked to take it.

Well...guess what? Some employee had taken it away for the weekend.

My friends were aghast. So was I.

As a final effort, I called a dealer who shows on his web site that a RAV 4 EV is available as a rental. It had been our plan to rent it at some point before buying just to make sure the RAV could handle their commute with plenty of reserve. We figured we could rent it for a day, or at least look it over. They told me they no longer rent the RAV EV.

When I bought my Focus, the Ford dealer had a car charged up and ready to demo. He offered to lend me the car for a day if necessary to verify that it worked for me. I closed the deal that day and they had a car in the exact color and trim I wanted two days later.

When I bought my Volt, they had a line of cars in various colors, and the saleswoman knew her stuff. They had a car in the exact color and trim I wanted already in stock. I drove my Volt home in two hours. That dealer sells 50-60 Volts a month.

Is Toyota trying to prove that nobody wants EV's by making them nearly impossible to buy even when a customer is hot to go? They have sure soured my friends.

 

[TonyWilliams]

Well, dealers and Toyota USA are separate.

Yes, Toyota does want to sell exactly 2600 Rav4 EV's:

http://www.myrav4ev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=379

 

[michael]

Well, dealers and Toyota USA are separate.

Yes, Toyota does want to sell exactly 2600 Rav4 EV's:

http://www.myrav4ev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=379

Then Toyota USA, please tell your dealers to act like they want to sell one.

 

[StanfordEV]

How good is the GOM? I left the car with friend for the three days and my GOM on regular charge went from 120 miles to 105. She only gets about 3.0 m/kWhr compared to 3.4 for me. Is the GOM so smart (smarter than most people on this forum to assert) to figure out after three days that she gets 88% as good milage as me and to adjust the range to EXACTLY the range she would expect to get? If so, what exactly is the point of paying $40/year for RavCharge when the car adjusts the GOM so precisely while RavCharge expects me to do the guessing? Thanks for all your input.

Michael

 

[fooljoe]

what exactly is the point of paying $40/year for RavCharge when the car adjusts the GOM so precisely while RavCharge expects me to do the guessing?

I suppose the GOM does a decent enough job of guessing your range based on your recent driving, but what good is that? The drive you take tomorrow may be nothing at all like what you drove today.

Here's an example: I do most of my driving in the Rav commuting back and forth to work in rush hour on the 405. Because the average speed on this commute is something like 30 mph, I average a pretty decent 3.7 miles / kwh. Most mornings the GOM will reflect this and show 125-130 miles on a normal charge.

But just today I had to drive the whole family out to Chino for a birthday party. That means about 75 miles of driving 70-75 mph on the freeway with a fully-loaded car and my wife blasting the A/C. You'd be hard-pressed to get 3.0 miles / kwh for a drive like this. If I believed the GOM I'd think I could drive out to Chino on a normal charge no problem, and still have 50 miles of range to spare, but of course that'd be ridiculous.

Instead I put a conservative estimate of 2.8 miles/kwh into RavCharge and saw that I'd comfortably get 98 miles of range on a normal charge. Of course that'd be enough to make the trip, but I wanted more than a 23 mile buffer in case of a needed detour or if I wanted to go anywhere else during the day, so I knew to go ahead and do an extended charge.

So hopefully you get the point: the GOM is backward-looking, but when you are going to plan a trip you need something forward-looking. That's how RavCharge can help you. And these out-of-the-ordinary trips like my foray into Chino are precisely when you actually need a reliable estimate of your range. Who cares what the GOM says when you're making the same drive you make every day?

 

[RAVEN]

I understand that the charger has an effect on charging time. However, I have been using the factory charger and cannot get my GOM past 130 miles even if I let it charge for days. If the charger does make a difference, what charger will yield the largest range?

 

[eschatfische]

The EVSE you use to charge the RAV4 does not influence the range of the vehicle, assuming there is time for that EVSE to provide a full charge.

The RAV4 EV has an EPA-rated range of just 103 miles new, and the GOM is just an estimate of the number of miles you can drive. While many/most of us can easily get more than 130 miles out of a full charge with a RAV in various driving conditions, there is no guarantee either that the GOM will be accurate (ie, the GOM can read 110 after an extended charge based on previous trips, yet you can still drive 130+ miles on that full charge), or that you will even get that sort of range given driving conditions, your driving style, or the prior use of the battery.

 

[TonyWilliams]

There is no connection between charging speed and vehicle range with a full charge. None.

You are confusing the GOM readout with range of the Rav4 EV, and formthat, there is no connection between what the GOM calculates based on previous driving and what i will actually be able to drive in the future.

The GOM can read any number; please understand this, absolutely ANY NUMBER, but if the Rav4 EV is fully charged, and the vehicle is in new condition (no battery degradtion), and ambient temperature is about 70F, then on a level, no wind, dry roadway, without climate control, then the Rav4 EV will travel 142 miles at 65mph.

Again, GOM can read ANY number, and the car will go 142 miles at 65mph.

 

[cossie1600]

Just a heads up, cars with a bad inverter/heater will have some funky readings on the gom. You can tell as the spread between ac on and off are huge

 

[Davidb9608]

I reported that I got 165 miles on a single charge the other day. Tony said he had only managed 151.8 so I decided to double check. I drove all over Amherst mass dumpster diving with a homeless friend. Loaded the back with detritious from an evicted gamer then drove to Northampton to catch the end of the gay pride march. I then said go for it and drove to Putney Vermont and back. Bottom line just before the end but before the turtle showed I quit at 175.1
I traveled numbered state highways at normal speeds 30- 55 . The temperature was 65 degrees. One of these days I will work on squeezing out 200. Having fun in my old age.

 

[Davidb9608]

The next morning after a full extended charge the GOM showed 160

 

[n3ckf]

The next morning after a full extended charge the GOM showed 160

this implies that you were achieving close to 4.0 miles/kwh. (the GOM at full extended charge is reading whatever 41.8KWH converts into.
160/41.8 = 3.82 mi/kwh.

Which is definately achievable at the speeds you mention on mostly level terrain on a battery with no degredation.

I've gotten 3.9 mi/kwh on a 110 mile trip but i cheated and was going net downhill (about 3000' over the 110 miles).

One of the barriers to getting really long ranges is driving on Freeways. The Rav4EV just isnt that aerodynamic, so if you drive at 60+ you're going to get a lot less miles really quickly. (I actually got down around 2.1 mi/kwh on one 20 mile trip once, by driving 85mph the whole way. This was not in evil-red-car mode either, just regular blue-car mode, but really fast. Milpitas Motor Speedway for the win.)

 

[Davidb9608]

Yes for the whole trip that was 175.1 the reading was 4.4. Miles per kWh . A warm day 65 and reasonable speeds

 

[kttvpab]

Just brought my new RAV EV home last night.
Couple of issues. Left Dealer fully charged... Showed 123 miles. the gauge showed full. at around 98 miles - the number dropped down to 60?
Did a full charge last night and once again - 10 miles of conservative driving today and the meter dropped from 90 to 58, but the gauge still remained near 3/4 or above? Any ideas?

Also, driving today with the window down, my wife noticed a click e clack sound coming from the two right tires. Almost sounded like horseshoes?
Thougts?

 

[tailgate1234]

The mileage drop may be the computer adjusting to your driving style.

The tire sound is not normal. I would take outback to your dealer ASAP.

 

[Surfitall]

That kind of mileage drop while driving doesn't sound typical to me. What you will see is your total range starting out lower after a full charge, especially when you top off the battery. It worried me until I went on some heavy use days and finished the day with about 10 miles range left and whaddya know, the range popped back up the next morning after a full charge. They don't call it the GOM for no reason.