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I've driven an EV on 500 mile trips. Getting out and stretching your legs for 20-25 minutes once every three hours isn't "super annoying." If all I did was dr

I've driven an EV on 500 mile trips. Getting out and stretching your legs for 20-25 minutes once every three hours isn't "super annoying." If all I did was drive around all day, every day for 500 miles at a stretch, it might be, but not nearly as annoying as routinely driving for 500 miles. For most people, the vast majority of their driving takes place well within the range of the typical BEV and range anxiety is a total non-issue. The fact is, even accounting for the occasional long trip, I spend less time at charging stations than I did at gas stations when I owned an ICE car, because the vast majority of the time, I just plug the car in at my house and let it do its thing.

nottorp 1y ago
This is tiring. Not everyone lives in the suburbs with a plug at ground level and getting out and stretching your legs is great when you choose where you do it but not when you do it in the queue for charging...
- msh 1y ago
  I have never been in a queue for charging in my 5 years of ev ownership. This includes 3 long roadtrips (Denmark to southern France so 1800 km to 2200 km each way) during summer vacations.
  - Rebelgecko 1y ago
    It's pretty common in California. Even though I was worried about charging on my first EV road trip, I've had an easier time in rural areas with lower EV ownership. Not as many Uber drivers using their freebie Electrify America charging.
  - dboreham 1y ago
    Queuing is common at non-Tesla sites in California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah in my experience.
- mbreese 1y ago
  EVs (or having a car in general) aren’t for everyone. Or aren’t for everyone yet. But you’re now talking about the lack of adequate charging infrastructure in an urban setting. That’s a different conversation. It’s a worthy conversation, but not all that related to making 500 mile road trips. This summer I made two 500 mile trips (round trip each time) to drop off (and pick up) a kid at a summer camp. It was a week long camp, so I drove up and back on two weekends. I drove an electric car up the first time and a hybrid SUV up the second time. It was fine to do in my electric car. I spent about 5 minutes making sure I had a good charging plan, which turned out to add about 10-15 extra miles to the trip. It wasn’t a problem to stop to charge, and I really wanted to stop to eat and stretch when I needed to charge, so everything worked out well timing wise. The trip in the hybrid was a little faster, but not by much. I still stopped the same number of times regardless of what car I drove. Note: I would have happily had made the trip in my EV both times, but I had another person with me for the second trip. She hated the seats in my EV, so we took the car with more comfortable interior for the second trip. The trip in the hybrid was “nicer”, but that was because it was a more comfortable car in general, not because of the difference between an EV and hybrid.
- eloisant 1y ago
  Of course if you don't have a plug at home, and have to do all your charging at a station, buying an EV now is not a great idea. If you do have a plug for charging, which you could have even if you live in an appartment (personal parking spot with a plug at your residence), then you're trading a small inconvenience for another. Yes during your occasional long trip you'll have to spend 20 minutes charging instead of 5 minutes filling your tank, but when you're around your home doing short trips (most of the time for most people), you no longer have to do the occasional visits to the gas station. You just plug your car at home and be done with it.
- vel0city 1y ago
  I've been doing EV road trips for four years now and I've never had to queue for a charger. A recent road trip I went on about a month ago, I pulled up to the place I was planning to charge (an EA station attached to a Walmart, was going to go to the deli for a snack while it charged). It was completely full and seemed like there were a few people waiting. I just drove to another charging location about 2mi away (a 7/11 station I think?) and charged there and had a snack. No big deal. That's about the closest I've had to queue in the past few years. Other than that, there have usually been multiple open chargers available. And once again that's only when I've road tripped. I've had to waste far more of my life pumping gas in my non-EV than I've spent waiting on charging despite my ICE getting far fewer miles.
- marcusb 1y ago
  Maybe its tiring for you. What’s tiring for me is that in every single one of these threads, people bring up the most extreme, outlier situations (500 mile trips) as a cudgel against EVs.
  - shrubble 1y ago
    It’s not an outlier for a lot of people in the USA or the western part of Canada.
    - marcusb 1y ago
      Citation please. It takes over seven hours to drive 500 miles non-stop at 70mph. I’d love to see a credible source that documents “a lot” of people are routinely driving this far in their personal vehicles.
      - bryanlarsen 1y ago
        Lots of people regularly drive 500 miles. The question is, how many drive 500 miles without 15 to 30 minutes of stopping? That I suspect is the small number. Doing so is illegal for commercial drivers in many jurisdictions, for darn good reasons. It's downright dangerous.
        marcusb 1y ago
        As I said before, “citation please.”
        bryanlarsen 1y ago
        You know what's a lot stronger comeback than "citation please"? Doing your own Googling, and then posting the results with a "hah, you're wrong".
        marcusb 1y ago
sillyfluke 1y ago
>Getting out and stretching your legs for 20-25 minutes once every three hours isn't "super annoying." Nothing done by choice is annoying obviously. But a lot of people are fine with stretching their legs on a five minute bathroom break. Adding an extra an hour or hour half for unwanted stops due to forced recharging is what annoys them.
- marcusb 1y ago
  > Nothing done by choice is annoying obviously. Right, so that covers approximately 100% of EV owners.

nottorp 1y ago

This is tiring. Not everyone lives in the suburbs with a plug at ground level and getting out and stretching your legs is great when you choose where you do it but not when you do it in the queue for charging...

msh 1y ago
I have never been in a queue for charging in my 5 years of ev ownership. This includes 3 long roadtrips (Denmark to southern France so 1800 km to 2200 km each way) during summer vacations.
- Rebelgecko 1y ago
  It's pretty common in California. Even though I was worried about charging on my first EV road trip, I've had an easier time in rural areas with lower EV ownership. Not as many Uber drivers using their freebie Electrify America charging.
- dboreham 1y ago
  Queuing is common at non-Tesla sites in California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah in my experience.
mbreese 1y ago
EVs (or having a car in general) aren’t for everyone. Or aren’t for everyone yet. But you’re now talking about the lack of adequate charging infrastructure in an urban setting. That’s a different conversation. It’s a worthy conversation, but not all that related to making 500 mile road trips. This summer I made two 500 mile trips (round trip each time) to drop off (and pick up) a kid at a summer camp. It was a week long camp, so I drove up and back on two weekends. I drove an electric car up the first time and a hybrid SUV up the second time. It was fine to do in my electric car. I spent about 5 minutes making sure I had a good charging plan, which turned out to add about 10-15 extra miles to the trip. It wasn’t a problem to stop to charge, and I really wanted to stop to eat and stretch when I needed to charge, so everything worked out well timing wise. The trip in the hybrid was a little faster, but not by much. I still stopped the same number of times regardless of what car I drove. Note: I would have happily had made the trip in my EV both times, but I had another person with me for the second trip. She hated the seats in my EV, so we took the car with more comfortable interior for the second trip. The trip in the hybrid was “nicer”, but that was because it was a more comfortable car in general, not because of the difference between an EV and hybrid.
eloisant 1y ago
Of course if you don't have a plug at home, and have to do all your charging at a station, buying an EV now is not a great idea. If you do have a plug for charging, which you could have even if you live in an appartment (personal parking spot with a plug at your residence), then you're trading a small inconvenience for another. Yes during your occasional long trip you'll have to spend 20 minutes charging instead of 5 minutes filling your tank, but when you're around your home doing short trips (most of the time for most people), you no longer have to do the occasional visits to the gas station. You just plug your car at home and be done with it.
vel0city 1y ago
I've been doing EV road trips for four years now and I've never had to queue for a charger. A recent road trip I went on about a month ago, I pulled up to the place I was planning to charge (an EA station attached to a Walmart, was going to go to the deli for a snack while it charged). It was completely full and seemed like there were a few people waiting. I just drove to another charging location about 2mi away (a 7/11 station I think?) and charged there and had a snack. No big deal. That's about the closest I've had to queue in the past few years. Other than that, there have usually been multiple open chargers available. And once again that's only when I've road tripped. I've had to waste far more of my life pumping gas in my non-EV than I've spent waiting on charging despite my ICE getting far fewer miles.
marcusb 1y ago
Maybe its tiring for you. What’s tiring for me is that in every single one of these threads, people bring up the most extreme, outlier situations (500 mile trips) as a cudgel against EVs.
- shrubble 1y ago
  It’s not an outlier for a lot of people in the USA or the western part of Canada.
  - marcusb 1y ago
    Citation please. It takes over seven hours to drive 500 miles non-stop at 70mph. I’d love to see a credible source that documents “a lot” of people are routinely driving this far in their personal vehicles.
    - bryanlarsen 1y ago
      Lots of people regularly drive 500 miles. The question is, how many drive 500 miles without 15 to 30 minutes of stopping? That I suspect is the small number. Doing so is illegal for commercial drivers in many jurisdictions, for darn good reasons. It's downright dangerous.
      - marcusb 1y ago
        As I said before, “citation please.”
        bryanlarsen 1y ago
        You know what's a lot stronger comeback than "citation please"? Doing your own Googling, and then posting the results with a "hah, you're wrong".
        marcusb 1y ago

sillyfluke 1y ago

>Getting out and stretching your legs for 20-25 minutes once every three hours isn't "super annoying." Nothing done by choice is annoying obviously. But a lot of people are fine with stretching their legs on a five minute bathroom break. Adding an extra an hour or hour half for unwanted stops due to forced recharging is what annoys them.

marcusb 1y ago
> Nothing done by choice is annoying obviously. Right, so that covers approximately 100% of EV owners.