Today's plan: charge in Tamworth before we leave, charge again at the halfway point in Tenterfield, then push on to Brisbane. It's 620 km, which will take an estimated 8 1/2 hours including just over an hour of charging time. We'll have breakfast and lunch during our charging stops so it's not just wasted time.
Road trip underway! We're taking our BYD Seal from Sydney to Brisbane via the New England Highway, with an overnight stop in a motel in Tamworth.
One recharge at Cameron Park on the way which we probably could have skipped, but since we wanted to stop to grab a quick bite to eat for dinner anyway I did take the opportunity to top up.
That's just under 400 km driven, tomorrow we'll do the remaining 700 km.
Time to break free from the chains of motoring?
A modern electric bike will cost you far less, do much the same thing while taking up a fraction of the space and you'll get healthy in the process.
Did you know that around 70% of journeys in the UK under five miles are driven? This is where we can save fuel for when it's really required.
https://www.cyclingelectric.com/in-depth/buying-new-car-buy-an-electric-bike-instead
#transport #war #iran #costofliving #oilcrisis #oil #evs #electriccar #cycling #ebikes
So one of our two corporate JetCharge ChargeMate units, not even three years old, has failed. JetCharge doesn't sell the units now and it's looking like they don't even repair units out of warranty any more. So,
Who can recommend a type 2 EV charger, available in Australia, 3-phase 32 A ("22 kW"), that can be operated in non-smart "plug it in and it charges" mode? Not Tesla brand.
The one thing that makes this nonsense bearable is that most electric car owners rarely have to deal with this nonsense.
DC fast chargers are fundamentally different to petrol stations in that they are not the only, or even main, way that you can power your car. Most EV owners will either have a charger at home or, failing that, use cheaper, slower AC chargers close to home most of the time. DC fast chargers are only really needed for long road trips that exceed the range of your car, and most people do those fairly infrequently.
Oh, maybe don't ditch the bp pulse app just yet. Apparently Chargefox charge you extra for using a bp pulse charger through them vs using the same charger with bp pulse's app. Sneaky bastards.
@[email protected] @[email protected] From what I've seen there's a price premium for using Chargefox at BP Pulse but I'm not sure how much.
Can you imagine a petrol station pulling this bullshit? Oh, you want to fill up with E10? Absolutely, please scan this QR code, install the app, enter your name, address, email address, phone number, car make and model, favourite colour and mother's maiden name, then check your email and click the link we've just sent you to activate your account, then enter your credit card details, then scan the QR code on the fuel pump, tap start in the app, and then you're good to start pumping. What's that, you can't get mobile signal? Yeah, sorry, bit of a coverage black spot here. Nah mate, you can't just pay by credit card.
The charger network operators will keep doing it unless they are forced to stop though, because like every modern company they want to hoard as much customer data as possible.
At least with some charger networks you can get an RFID card which means you can tap to start a charge without needing the app (or mobile signal). I've got one from Evie that also works for Chargefox. Some networks go further and set it up so the charger recognises your car so all you need to do is plug in. These still require you to have previously set up an account with all the charger networks you want to use, though.
A small bit of good news for Australian electric car owners ahead of the Easter holidays: bp pulse fast chargers can now be used via a Chargefox account.
Edit: Maybe hang on to the bp pulse app, see differential pricing comments down thread.
One of the annoyances of road tripping in an EV in Australia is that you can't, generally, just pull up at a DC fast charger and tap your credit card to start charging. In most cases you need to have installed a phone app from the charger network operator, created an account, and registered a payment method. Consequently preparing for a long trip might mean installing and configuring half a dozen or so different charging apps.
bp pulse chargers being available through Chargefox means one fewer app and account is required, a small step in the right direction.
Ideally none of this nonsense would be needed, and all DC fast chargers would at least give you the option of just tapping a payment card, with no app or account required. I know from experience hiring an EV while on holiday in the UK that these apps can be a major problem for overseas visitors as they are often region locked and not available unless your phone is registered locally, and they also need mobile data to function. At least in the UK most of the chargers would just accept a credit card instead, not so here.
Do you think that electrons taste sweet to an EV? I imagine it's like sugar water and the cars circling the chargers are like hummingbirds.
Anthony Horton
CyclingElectric
Deborah Pickett
BrisWombat
Paul Rosen