Noobie Taycan Owner ...immediate long Road Trip .... Advice sought....

[CaliPorsche]

This is why these goodwill crowdsourcing forums are so invaluable - I tip my hat @ y’all….. thanks much, it will make a huge difference to my first real experience of this car ….. and as they say …. first impressions matter ?

 

[WasserGKuehlt]

@annieland ”will continue to play around and try not to get myself worked up .”
yes, very much this ^ - especially the latter part. Throw a wrench in the works, and deviate from the plan on your trip. Stop on the way in, and charge to <however long you have the patience to wait>, then let the car/app figure out the rest.

The problem I have with planning apps (any of them) is that they’re trying to optimize for total trip time. This would be my advice to anyone contemplating a longer trip in an EV - take your time, charger coverage is not ideal but far from sparse. Worst case you’ll get home 1-3 hrs later, and that’s not worth stressing over “optimal” charging strategies.

 

[annieland]

This is why these goodwill crowdsourcing forums are so invaluable - I tip my hat @ y’all….. thanks much, it will make a huge difference to my first real experience of this car ….. and as they say …. first impressions matter ?

You definitely fall into a braver category than I do, but this car never ceases to impress, that's for sure! And I was at a PCA Picnic yesterday, and just chatting with a few of the old-timers, answering their basic questions about the car, and they were looking at my husband like, "Where did you find this woman?? She knows so much!" And I'm like, I knew nothing six months ago! My first post here had me sounding like I was ordering a Tesla or replacement minivan or something. So welcome, and you won't be a 'noobie' for long. But even if you are, as I know I am, constantly learning from everyone is so rewarding!

 

[Payton48]

If you're flexible with your stops and schedule, don't be afraid to deviate from your original plan. I used ABRP to come up with a plan, but then often refreshed it based on my current location and SoC. There're plenty of EA stations along the west coast so you have lots of options. If you hit a stretch of open road and are able to sustain high speeds, you may want to enjoy it and charge sooner/longer, as opposed to being stuck in traffic/ slow speeds and getting really good efficiency.

The problem I have with planning apps (any of them) is that they’re trying to optimize for total trip time.

I agree. I would rather charge longer if I'm getting good charging speeds and maximize my stop. There's no point ending a good charge early just to save a few minutes.

 

[Tooney]

@annieland No matter what charging stops are in your actual road trip plan, use the EA sites map to locate all the EA sites along your route. Add them all as "favorites" in your nav unit. Make sure they are added labeled as charging sites (showing KW, etc.), not just their locations.

Then should you decide to skip a planned charging stop, or stop for charge earlier than you planned, it is easy to switch to a different charging site.

 

[annieland]

@annieland No matter what charging stops are in your actual road trip plan, use the EA sites map to locate all the EA sites along your route. Add them all as "favorites" in your nav unit. Make sure they are added labeled as charging sites (showing KW, etc.), not just their locations.

Then should you decide to skip a planned charging stop, or stop for charge earlier than you planned, it is easy to switch to a different charging site.

Ooh, smart!! I haven’t even been adding favorites yet, except Home . I’m so scarred by how many crappy navigational tools I’ve dealt with on all my previous cars that I’m still in this “afraid to commit” mindset. Like, I’m gonna add all my stuff and then get something in the mail that says I need to send $250 for a DVD because all my maps are now out of date. Or the car where to update my infotainment I had to download a file from the website, load it on a thumb drive, and then sit in the RUNNING car while it took an hour to upload. These days you’d think that meant someone else pretty much just took ownership of my car ?.

Ok I’ll have some EV nerd fun today. I gotta get this first “big” trip right. Kids are counting on me!

 

[Tooney]

Ok I’ll have some EV nerd fun today. I gotta get this first “big” trip right. Kids are counting on me!

Couple of other Taycan nav unit tips:
Assume you have pre-planned your trip, with destination and two preferred charging stops prior to destination.
To enter your plan as a route in the nav unit:

First enter the destination.​

Wait for nav unit to add its recommended charging stops to the route.​

Then enter your stops in reverse order as stopovers - last stop, next-to-last stop, first stop, etc.​

If the stopovers you enter are charging sites, the nav unit will adjust its charging recommendations.​

When you are finished, check "route overview" in nav unit:​

Home....Nav.....<3 dots>....Route overview. You can edit/delete/move stops in route overview.​

This will let you see the nav unit's estimation of times and states of charge for the entire trip.

When you actually take the trip, you can either have the entire route in the nav unit, or just put your next immediate stop as the destination.

 

[annieland]

Couple of other Taycan nav unit tips:
Assume you have pre-planned your trip, with destination and two preferred charging stops prior to destination.
To enter your plan as a route in the nav unit:

First enter the destination.​

Wait for nav unit to add its recommended charging stops to the route.​

Then enter your stops in reverse order as stopovers - last stop, next-to-last stop, first stop, etc.​

If the stopovers you enter are charging sites, the nav unit will adjust its charging recommendations.​

When you are finished, check "route overview" in nav unit:​

Home....Nav.....<3 dots>....Route overview. You can edit/delete/move stops in route overview.​

This will let you see the nav unit's estimation of times and states of charge for the entire trip.

When you actually take the trip, you can either have the entire route in the nav unit, or just put your next immediate stop as the destination.

Ok, been sitting here in the car in a parking lot with your post open on my phone on my lap while knee-deep in the pcm route planner. After a half hour I’m close, but this thing just doesn’t like my plan. My situation is I will get to my destination at 31%, it’s getting home that I can’t do, but I want to charge back up on the way there, not home at night which it keeps pushing me towards. I add a charging point as the first stop and then it adds a second on the way home because it plans for me to just charge to 70% or something.

I know I’m gonna figure this out though, don’t worry. Probably 5 minutes after I send this post.

 

[Tooney]

@annieland Note that when you enter a route or destination in the nav unit, the charging planner assumes you start your trip at the car's current SoC. So if you plan to start your trip at 95% SoC but the car's current SoC is less than that, it bases charging stops on the lesser SoC.

That's why the advice is to use ABRP or such as a tool to actually plan the trip.

But you can use the info about estimated SoC the nav unit gives you to calculate the battery % consumption for each leg of the trip. If the nav unit says you start first leg of trip at 80% and when you arrive at stop #1 the car has 30%, then nav unit is telling you that leg of trip consumes 50%. The 50% consumption will be true no matter what SoC the car starts with.

Edit: Also if charging planner adds a stop you dont like, go to route overview, delete the stop by swiping it left, and see what happens.
There is also a check box you can use to deactivate the charging planner. Then you can see the results of your own plan, without the planner adding anything.
Home... Nav.... Options..... Charge Planning

 

[annieland]

@annieland Note that when you enter a route or destination in the nav unit, the charging planner assumes you start your trip at the car's current SoC. So if you plan to start your trip at 95% SoC but the car's current SoC is less than that, it bases charging stops on the lesser SoC.

That's why the advice is to use ABRP or such as a tool to actually plan the trip.

But you can use the info about estimated SoC the nav unit gives you to calculate the battery % consumption for each leg of the trip. If the nav unit says you start first leg of trip at 80% and when you arrive at stop #1 the car has 30%, then nav unit is telling you that leg of trip consumes 50%. The 50% consumption will be true no matter what SoC the car starts with.

Edit: Also if charging planner adds a stop you dont like, go to route overview, delete the stop by swiping it left, and see what happens.
There is also a check box you can use to deactivate the charging planner. Then you can see the results of your own plan, without the planner adding anything.
Home... Nav.... Options..... Charge Planning

The few times I was trying to delete the stop I didn't like it would wipe them all out at once and I'd have to start over. And when I got the pop-up that it was going to deactivate the planner I just exited the screen not to have to go back and reactivate it. I'm back home and on the computer and finally got what I want in ABRP:

If I have to just override the calculation in the PCM and just set the charge stop as my destination from home, and then add Cedar Point from there, that's fine. Life is full of tech overrides, I just like to get a grasp on the native behavior first. Thank you SO much for your help.

And since I've totally hijacked this thread, one other question... If normally I have my charging timer set to every day to 80% but want to set a second timer for a specific day at 100%, does one take precedence? What I've been doing is taking that day of the week off the regular daily timer and then hoping I remember to put it back on. Is that necessary?

 

[Jonathan S.]

[...] So I use ABRP to get a broad general overview of roughly where and how many stops I'm going to need - then ignore it's charging stop recommendations and translate the general vicinity of charging stops into workable EA charging stops (only if EA is not an option do I then consider EVGo/ChargePoint alternative) [...]

Curious why the strong preference for EA?

Our planning protocols are otherwise identical.
But I still haven't made up my mind about EA...

Given my i4 charging curve (which just eyeballing it seems to be fairly similar to the Taycan, i.e., hitting the advertised kW only when you've been running on fumes electrons), my three EA/EC 350kW sessions have been only ~1.5x faster than my three shared-power 125kW ChargePoint sessions. (Ford dealership -- perhaps the only three times in my entire life I've visited a Ford dealership?)
And just slightly over 2x faster than two 50kW EVgo sessions.

EA/EC does have the advantage of four units at each location I've visited.
But those locations also attract far more drivers, many of them with no incentive (other than wasting their time and everyone else's time) to stop charging until the freebie 30-min session is completed.
Add in the usual potential EA snafus (which, to be fair, I encountered only 1 out of 3 times), and I'm not sure whether to give priority to EA and hope all goes well, or search out the overlooked alternatives with just one or two slower units that are more reliable and less busy?

Somewhat related, if Tesla does open up its ~12k CCS-lingual Superchargers to all CCS, I think the key to predicting which are in the ~12k and which are in the remaining ~5k is to check the speed: 250kW is V3, so compatible with CCS (via adapter and Tesla permission), but 150kW is older, so inherently incompatible. (For the Supercharger near that Ford ChargePoint -- St J VT -- all eight units are 250kW, which makes sense, since it dates back to only 2022: permit application was in May, then on-line in September. For the Supercharger near the EA -- W Lebanon NH -- eight units are 250kW, but the other eight units are 150kW, which also makes sense, since that location originally started a long time ago with eight units, then in 2022 it was expanded with another eight units.)

 

[WasserGKuehlt]

[...]If normally I have my charging timer set to every day to 80% but want to set a second timer for a specific day at 100%, does one take precedence? What I've been doing is taking that day of the week off the regular daily timer and then hoping I remember to put it back on. Is that necessary?

The next timer takes precedence.

Specifically: if your daily timer fires (is scheduled for) at 8am, and the one-off is set for 8:01, the car will use the daily timer as the target. Note this does not depend on target SoC, so if you have an 80% set for 8am, and a 100% for 9 - the car will fulfill the first/next timer, and may not have time to reach the next target.

Tl;dr: if you're not sure, disable that day's regular timer (so that there is no potential conflict with the one-off timer).

Regarding the trip planning: you can always adjust the desired SoC at destination (to whatever would be needed to get back home), and that will force the (Porsche) app to include a charging stop on the way out.

 

[annieland]

The next timer takes precedence.

Specifically: if your daily timer fires (is scheduled for) at 8am, and the one-off is set for 8:01, the car will use the daily timer as the target. Note this does not depend on target SoC, so if you have an 80% set for 8am, and a 100% for 9 - the car will fulfill the first/next timer, and may not have time to reach the next target.

Tl;dr: if you're not sure, disable that day's regular timer (so that there is no potential conflict with the one-off timer).

Regarding the trip planning: you can always adjust the desired SoC at destination (to whatever would be needed to get back home), and that will force the (Porsche) app to include a charging stop on the way out.

Got it, thank you! All makes sense. And the Tl;dr is pretty much what I've been doing . I'd rather forget to throw the 85% back on than not be fully charged when I really need to be. An otherwise boring two hour drive to an amusement park has suddenly become a thrilling adventure! I love it!

 

[daveo4EV]

Curious why the strong preference for EA?

Our planning protocols are otherwise identical.
But I still haven't made up my mind about EA...

Given my i4 charging curve (which just eyeballing it seems to be fairly similar to the Taycan, i.e., hitting the advertised kW only when you've been running on fumes electrons), my three EA/EC 350kW sessions have been only ~1.5x faster than my three shared-power 125kW ChargePoint sessions. (Ford dealership -- perhaps the only three times in my entire life I've visited a Ford dealership?)
And just slightly over 2x faster than two 50kW EVgo sessions.

EA/EC does have the advantage of four units at each location I've visited.
But those locations also attract far more drivers, many of them with no incentive (other than wasting their time and everyone else's time) to stop charging until the freebie 30-min session is completed.
Add in the usual potential EA snafus (which, to be fair, I encountered only 1 out of 3 times), and I'm not sure whether to give priority to EA and hope all goes well, or search out the overlooked alternatives with just one or two slower units that are more reliable and less busy?

Somewhat related, if Tesla does open up its ~12k CCS-lingual Superchargers to all CCS, I think the key to predicting which are in the ~12k and which are in the remaining ~5k is to check the speed: 250kW is V3, so compatible with CCS (via adapter and Tesla permission), but 150kW is older, so inherently incompatible. (For the Supercharger near that Ford ChargePoint -- St J VT -- all eight units are 250kW, which makes sense, since it dates back to only 2022: permit application was in May, then on-line in September. For the Supercharger near the EA -- W Lebanon NH -- eight units are 250kW, but the other eight units are 150kW, which also makes sense, since that location originally started a long time ago with eight units, then in 2022 it was expanded with another eight units.)

in general a working EA charger is faster than the alternatives - if things go well I routinely get 175 kw from 150 kw EA chargers - the other networks have been slow on the uptake of faster charging speeds - i use other networks as back up for EA and when there is no alternatives

i’ve been getting 125-140 kw at the scott’s valley super charger (16 stalls, normally all functional) - which is 99% reliable and always faster than the non EA networks - and normally faster than that the sorry state of most EA chargers/sites - but EA _CAN_ be faster but can rarely demonstrate that with any consistency.

when EA works it's better/faster than the Supercharger network - there are however a few problems with the EA network

• it's reliability is quite low
• the CCS1 cord/connector is hard to handle
• the CCS1 cord/connector is fragile and often broken
• stall count is quite low per-site - leading to congestion - stalls out of commission due to low reliability does not help

a functional EA network could be better/faster than Tesla's superchargers - however the key word is "functional" and EA's level of functionality lacks greatness…it in fact demonstrates incompetence at every opportunity.

Aptos, CA EA Site, July 17th, 2023 @ 3 pm'ish

• stall -01 - CCS/Chademo - CCS cord/connector "unavilable" - has been since June 2nd, 2023
• stall -02 - CCS/CCS - functional - but delivers 37 kW charge rate (150 kW stall)
  • my battery SOC was 27% - temps were "in the zone" for a faster charge rate - it wasn't too cold, and it wasn't too hot - briefly saw 43 kW then settled back to 37 kW
• stall -03 - CCS/CCS - both CCS1 connectors physically broken, can not latch - stall's offline - no idea how long it's been this way
• stall -04 - CCS/CCS - station pretends to work but can only charge for 30 seconds at a time before erroring - and forcing you to unplug and restart the whole charging sequence again - effectively offline
  • bonus: after waiting on hold w/EA for 20 minutes - they have no idea -04 is "non-functional" - rebooting station fixes nothing - they will "put in a trouble ticket"
  • they know -01 is "broken" - trouble ticket unresolved according to the helpful agent
  • they had no-idea stall -03 was offline - another trouble ticket was entered.

4 stall site - 1 stall "functional" - EA only knew about one stall being offline - they were under the impression the other two were functional but they were not - and the one functional stall was in "limp mode" and could not even muster 50 kW…

EA could not provide any estimate time line for resolution of these problems and lacks basic awareness of their charger's actual level of functionality

EA demonstrates incompetence at every opportunity.

In my opinion the other networks (EVGo, Chargepoint, Blink, etc…) while slightly more "reliable" are not competitive with EA (slower charge speeds, typically even fewer stalls, reliability that is only slightly better than EA)…

ymmv

 

[Payton48]

Curious why the strong preference for EA?

Free charging for 3 years. My recent ~3000mi road trip cost me $0 in charge costs.