Top 5 EV road trip tips
A little homework will go a long way when you’re doing big distances in an EV
We’re still all getting used to the brave new world of battery electric vehicles (BEVs). They’re becoming more mainstream by the month, but the same things still worry a lot of us.
Gather a vox pop and we’d bet the top three would be range, the number of charging stations available, and the time it takes to charge. All three of those things make for huge anxiety when it comes to taking a road trip in a BEV.
At DRIVEN Car Guide, we’d like to think we know a thing or two about pure-electric road-tripping. We’ve been long-hauling BEVs for a while now and we even used a BYD Atto 3 to cover 1000km in a day last year.
Our most recent BEV roadie was a bit more representative of Kiwi lifestyles, even if the car wasn’t: Auckland to Taupo¯ in a Ford Mustang Mach-E GT.
Okay, we were a bit spoilt with this one. But the GT does have a shorter range than other Mach-Es (mostly because it’s so, ahem, powerful) and the BEV-specific pros and cons with this car are really no different to any other — whether that’s a GWM Ora or Porsche Taycan.
You do have to plan a bit (sorry)
It pays to plan a route, know a ballpark range figure for your car and know where the chargers are
on the way, even if you’re not planning to use them all.
There are plenty of apps that can show you where chargers are and even if they’re available: ChargeNet is the largest private provider of public charging stations, Z Energy has a growing number of fast-chargers, as does BP, and there’s OpenLoop — an EV specialist platform that allows charge providers to offer their services through a dedicated app.
NZTA’s EVRoam website has links to an online EV travel planner and charge map (produced in partnership with energy providers), while PlugShare is a well-known public site/app that shows a huge number of potential charge points.
And so on. A little bit of homework before a trip will go a long way; you’ll need to join up as a member with those various providers to use their services, but don’t feel overwhelmed. If you want to stick with a single provider to start with, you can absolutely do that — as long as you know it’ll cover your journey.
Don’t bother with AC (aka know your charging types)
There are two types of charging you need to worry about: AC and DC.
AC covers everything from home charging to some public machines, but it’s relatively slow: around 7kW for most public stations, although some are as high as 22kW if they’re hooked up to three-phase power.
AC is ideal for day-to-day urban use or topping up overnight, but on a trip it’s really too slow to bother with. Our Mach-E has a big
90kWh battery, so even an hour on an AC 7kW charger only adds around 8 per cent of charge (about 35km).
When you’re out of town, stick to the DC machines, which will replenish at a rate anywhere from 50kW to 300kW, depending on the machine and the capability of your car.
Those apps should tell you which machine is what. As will the plug when you get there: if you have a BEV with a Combined Charging System (CCS) port, as most new ones now are, an AC station’s charge plug will simply comprise the rounded/D-shaped top section (also often called a Type 2 plug).
You’ll also notice a section of the port on your car that isn’t being used by the AC plug. If it’s DC, there will be an additional oval on the bottom of the station’s connector that plugs into that bottom part of the car’s port — which is the DC bit. Hence the “combined” plug.
The main exception to the above is the used-import Nissan Leaf (and other ex-Japan EVs), which still use a different plug called Chademo. Many Kiwi DC stations have a Chademo outlet as well, but CCS is definitely now the dominant standard worldwide.
Be happy at 80
Not 80km/h; 80 per cent battery charge. By all means start your trip at 100 per cent, but when you’re charging on the go, settle on 80 per cent or less.
Charge rates slow to a crawl as they get past 80 per cent. It’s simply not worth the wait and it’s better for long-term battery health to keep it between 20-80 per cent anyway.
Graze, don’t gorge
Charge when you can, not when you have to. For example, with a real-world open-road range of 300km-plus, our Mustang could theoretically drive from Auckland to Taupo¯ in one go. That’s probably what you’d do in a petrol car.
But leaving so little to spare is asking for trouble, and it also means you’re committed to a longer spell of charging once you get there.
Little and often is better than running a BEV near-flat all the time and stressing about whether the charge station at your destination will be free, or even operational. Yes, they do break sometimes.
DC charging isn’t free, or even that cheap
Yes, public DC stations are a lot more expensive than charging at home: getting our Mach-E from 20-80 per cent (for around 260km range) on a home Wallbox would cost about $15, but on a public DC station with a representative rate of 80c per kWh (these vary a lot depending on the supplier), it’s more like $45. But still about 25 per cent less than a petrol car.
And remember that road trips are occasional for most of us; the majority of charging is still done at home, for the majority of shorter trips.