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The grandparents aren't going to have an EVSE for you, there is no larger battery that can do the trip^, and Christmas is not getting moved to a restaurant to a

The grandparents aren't going to have an EVSE for you, there is no larger battery that can do the trip^, and Christmas is not getting moved to a restaurant to accommodate your car. Nobody, not even Tesla, has a good answer to the EV range issue if you don't happen to have a quick charger on your route, and you often won't. That just means Supercharger network versus no Supercharger network probably won't be the thing that keeps people from buying a Bolt, just like it's not keeping them from buying a Tesla. That's the discussion I jumped in on. ^ There's a range calculator on the Model S webpage. If you drop the temperature and turn on the heater, even the 90 kWh battery doesn't have 240 miles range.

mikeash 11y ago
Even a 120V outlet will do the job. A 240V outlet (for example, if grandma has an electric dryer) will be even better. If your response to that suggestion is "The grandparents aren't going to have an EVSE for you" then I don't think you understand this stuff.
- dangrossman 11y ago
  A 120V outlet trickle charging 3-4 miles per hour in the winter isn't going to get you home. The 240V outlet isn't going to help either, because people aren't going to jump through hoops to justify a car that doesn't make the drives they need to make. If there's no charger network where they live, and they need that range, then they're not going to replace their car with the EV. If it's there, then Tesla's stations probably aren't the only ones available, because Tesla's network is relatively small, so it's not a huge problem for Chevy.
  - mikeash 11y ago
    Yes, you can come up with a trip where this doesn't work. If you're going 120 miles and there isn't a Supercharger on the way and it's cold as hell outside and there's no easily accessible 240V outlet and you're not staying long enough for 120V to get the job done and you're not going out during your visit then, yes, you're going to have trouble. But we were talking about "most people," not "a tiny tiny proportion of the population that just happens to have the worst case scenario."
    - lotharbot 11y ago
      If I purchase a vehicle, I'm likely to want it to work for every trip I want to take. It needs to work when I visit my brother in Oklahoma in the winter, and my friend's LAN party in Louisiana in the summer, and my in-laws in Oregon in the fall, and when I pick friends up from the airport (a 45-mile round trip) a few times a year, and on days when I have a bunch of scattered errands all across town. If a car sucks for even one of those trips, I'm going to be hesitant to buy it, and if there are two or three circumstances where it would suck, I'm crossing it off of my list. If I can come up with one trip where I'm going to need to sit there for two hours waiting for my car to charge, then the supercharger network, while not being actually useless on the whole, is not particularly convenient for me and therefore not really a strong selling point.
      - bryanlarsen 11y ago
        You sound like some of my neighbors who drive great big huge pickup trucks because they need something that can carry a full sheet of plywood, which they do once or twice a year. They spend thousands in extra gasoline and depreciation to save $50 in delivery charges.
        lotharbot 11y ago
        If I have to put up with slow charging (and therefore perhaps take an extra vacation day), or have to rent a car or fly, for 2-3 trips, that's thousands of dollars every year, not a $50 delivery charge. If I have to seriously inconvenience my grandparents every time I go to visit them, that generates a lot of stress and potentially puts them at risk (grandpa is turning 95 this year; he doesn't travel well.) But I can buy a plug-in hybrid like the Chevy Volt for a couple grand less than the cheap Tesla (counting the same tax incentives), and it works for every trip. With the gas generator, it has a range of over 300 miles, and can refill about 280-290 miles of range at an ordinary gas station in 5 minutes. So I can spend a similar amount of money for a much more convenient experience by going with a hybrid and ignoring the superchargers entirely. Point being, the argument that the supercharger network covers "almost everyone" is flawed. There are a lot of people for whom it still misses at least some of their trips, where other types of EVs perform better, and missing some trips is far more relevant than you seem to give it credit for. Again, it's not like spending $thousands to avoid the occasional $50 delivery charge for plywood. It's spending basically the same amount on a different type of technology to avoid the occasional flight, car rental, or extra stress on the grandparents. The supercharger network will need to be much more dense before it gets to the point of being a major factor in Tesla's favor.
  - vvanders 11y ago
    I do almsot this exact route(296mi roundtrip) about once a week. Only reason at all I bought a Tesla is there's a Supercharger about 60mi from my house on that route. I can do the trip in good weather without the Supercharger. However with cold it becomes necessary. Other fast charging? Forget about it. All the CHAdeMO along the route(there is only two) are 40kw which would take me 3x longer to charge. Also the tend to be non-functional regualrly and only have 1-2 slots vs 8 for the Supercharger. The reason I started the parent thread is exactly this, once you own an EV with 120kw charging it changes everything for long trips.
- nommm-nommm 11y ago
  What if grandma lives in an apartment?
nommm-nommm 11y ago
>There's a range calculator on the Model S webpage. If you drop the temperature and turn on the heater, even the 90 kWh battery doesn't have 240 miles range. Yeah, it seemed at least three years ago driving from DC to Boston in the winter was pretty much impossible... and that's one of the most traveled routes in the country. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the-ev-highway.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the... There's a lot of people I talk to who the only driving they do is from home to work to the grocery store. These are the ones insisting very loudly that range isn't an issue with EVs and there's no convincing them otherwise, its only a theoretical problem for them.
- mikeash 11y ago
  If you drive like an idiot, fail to think for yourself, and perhaps deliberately try to run down the battery, then it was pretty much impossible. And three years is a long time. Here's what the Supercharger situation looked like then: http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_AFED015E-139C-420B-A040-FE99CDC67DAC.png http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_AFED015E-139C-420B-A040-FE... Here's what it looks like today: http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_A922B393-0F4B-4E07-9CEA-507D93F7A874.png http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_A922B393-0F4B-4E07-9CEA-50... You'll notice a slight increase in the availability of chargers along that corridor. In my experience, the people insisting very loudly than range isn't an issue with EVs are all Tesla owners who have taken their cars on 1,000 mile road trips, while the people who insist that Superchargers are worthless and long trips in EVs are terrible are all working from partial information, speculation, and imagination.

mikeash 11y ago

Even a 120V outlet will do the job. A 240V outlet (for example, if grandma has an electric dryer) will be even better. If your response to that suggestion is "The grandparents aren't going to have an EVSE for you" then I don't think you understand this stuff.

dangrossman 11y ago
A 120V outlet trickle charging 3-4 miles per hour in the winter isn't going to get you home. The 240V outlet isn't going to help either, because people aren't going to jump through hoops to justify a car that doesn't make the drives they need to make. If there's no charger network where they live, and they need that range, then they're not going to replace their car with the EV. If it's there, then Tesla's stations probably aren't the only ones available, because Tesla's network is relatively small, so it's not a huge problem for Chevy.
- mikeash 11y ago
  Yes, you can come up with a trip where this doesn't work. If you're going 120 miles and there isn't a Supercharger on the way and it's cold as hell outside and there's no easily accessible 240V outlet and you're not staying long enough for 120V to get the job done and you're not going out during your visit then, yes, you're going to have trouble. But we were talking about "most people," not "a tiny tiny proportion of the population that just happens to have the worst case scenario."
  - lotharbot 11y ago
    If I purchase a vehicle, I'm likely to want it to work for every trip I want to take. It needs to work when I visit my brother in Oklahoma in the winter, and my friend's LAN party in Louisiana in the summer, and my in-laws in Oregon in the fall, and when I pick friends up from the airport (a 45-mile round trip) a few times a year, and on days when I have a bunch of scattered errands all across town. If a car sucks for even one of those trips, I'm going to be hesitant to buy it, and if there are two or three circumstances where it would suck, I'm crossing it off of my list. If I can come up with one trip where I'm going to need to sit there for two hours waiting for my car to charge, then the supercharger network, while not being actually useless on the whole, is not particularly convenient for me and therefore not really a strong selling point.
    - bryanlarsen 11y ago
      You sound like some of my neighbors who drive great big huge pickup trucks because they need something that can carry a full sheet of plywood, which they do once or twice a year. They spend thousands in extra gasoline and depreciation to save $50 in delivery charges.
      - lotharbot 11y ago
        If I have to put up with slow charging (and therefore perhaps take an extra vacation day), or have to rent a car or fly, for 2-3 trips, that's thousands of dollars every year, not a $50 delivery charge. If I have to seriously inconvenience my grandparents every time I go to visit them, that generates a lot of stress and potentially puts them at risk (grandpa is turning 95 this year; he doesn't travel well.) But I can buy a plug-in hybrid like the Chevy Volt for a couple grand less than the cheap Tesla (counting the same tax incentives), and it works for every trip. With the gas generator, it has a range of over 300 miles, and can refill about 280-290 miles of range at an ordinary gas station in 5 minutes. So I can spend a similar amount of money for a much more convenient experience by going with a hybrid and ignoring the superchargers entirely. Point being, the argument that the supercharger network covers "almost everyone" is flawed. There are a lot of people for whom it still misses at least some of their trips, where other types of EVs perform better, and missing some trips is far more relevant than you seem to give it credit for. Again, it's not like spending $thousands to avoid the occasional $50 delivery charge for plywood. It's spending basically the same amount on a different type of technology to avoid the occasional flight, car rental, or extra stress on the grandparents. The supercharger network will need to be much more dense before it gets to the point of being a major factor in Tesla's favor.
- vvanders 11y ago
  I do almsot this exact route(296mi roundtrip) about once a week. Only reason at all I bought a Tesla is there's a Supercharger about 60mi from my house on that route. I can do the trip in good weather without the Supercharger. However with cold it becomes necessary. Other fast charging? Forget about it. All the CHAdeMO along the route(there is only two) are 40kw which would take me 3x longer to charge. Also the tend to be non-functional regualrly and only have 1-2 slots vs 8 for the Supercharger. The reason I started the parent thread is exactly this, once you own an EV with 120kw charging it changes everything for long trips.
nommm-nommm 11y ago
What if grandma lives in an apartment?

nommm-nommm 11y ago

>There's a range calculator on the Model S webpage. If you drop the temperature and turn on the heater, even the 90 kWh battery doesn't have 240 miles range. Yeah, it seemed at least three years ago driving from DC to Boston in the winter was pretty much impossible... and that's one of the most traveled routes in the country. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the-ev-highway.html http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the... There's a lot of people I talk to who the only driving they do is from home to work to the grocery store. These are the ones insisting very loudly that range isn't an issue with EVs and there's no convincing them otherwise, its only a theoretical problem for them.

mikeash 11y ago
If you drive like an idiot, fail to think for yourself, and perhaps deliberately try to run down the battery, then it was pretty much impossible. And three years is a long time. Here's what the Supercharger situation looked like then: http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_AFED015E-139C-420B-A040-FE99CDC67DAC.png http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_AFED015E-139C-420B-A040-FE... Here's what it looks like today: http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_A922B393-0F4B-4E07-9CEA-507D93F7A874.png http://mikeash.com/tmp/screenshot_A922B393-0F4B-4E07-9CEA-50... You'll notice a slight increase in the availability of chargers along that corridor. In my experience, the people insisting very loudly than range isn't an issue with EVs are all Tesla owners who have taken their cars on 1,000 mile road trips, while the people who insist that Superchargers are worthless and long trips in EVs are terrible are all working from partial information, speculation, and imagination.