The New Gas

This blog post may be boring/too technical unless you are an EV geek.

Towing with a Tesla sometimes has it challenges. While Tesla has lots of Superchargers in most of the US  (they just installed their 50,000th charger), Tesla  does not have much charging infrastructure ("Superchargers") in the Maritimes. A few days ago was my first "must charge" adventure without a Tesla SC.

Tesla Superchargers are great. They always work. Plug in the car and walk away - no credit card or app failures, no buttons to push, they just work. The charger knows the VIN and therefore the owner, and I have a credit card with Tesla. In 80,000 miles, 25 states and five provinces, I have never had to wait for a charge. Certainly in some areas, such as California, people complain about waiting to charge, but I haven't hit one yet.

A few years ago I bought a CHAdeMo dongle (charge adapter). Weirdest camel-case name for a consumer product ever, usually spelled now as Chademo. It supposedly means something in Japanese, but legend says somebody had gooey fingers with the caps lock key. I bought it thinking it might be useful if there was no Supercharger around. I tested it about five times, all failed for diverse reasons, some of which were probably operator error or impatience.

In reality there are so many Superchargers in the USA I never tried again. There never was a place that had CHAdeMo and did not have a Supercharger nearby. Superchargers are much faster (3 to 5 times faster), too. I stopped trying to use it.

Last summer I used it the first time while in Quebec province. We were going to Boma's birthplace (the Safari Condo factory) for some repairs. The information about available electricity there was vague. I researched which EV apps I needed, and prefilled the credit card and vehicle info. Turned out there was a slow charger right across from the factory, and the nearest campground had good power, so no problems. I tried using Chad at two different chargers and it worked both times. 

With that experience, I planned our trip from PEI to Nova Scotia requiring a Chad charging stop at New Glasgow, with no other practical alternatives. 

The charger was a solo. One car was charging and another car was waiting. Two social hours later (everybody in Canada is friendly) we got charged and got back on the road. 

We have since Chad charged in Nova Scotia with no problems or wait, albeit a bit slower. 

Some campgrounds are misinformed about EV charging; I think there must be some misinformation in a campground owners group. 

In East Bethel a week ago, I was hooked up in a nearly empty campground, needing an overnight charge. After an hour or two, the 50 amp breaker tripped. Fortunately the adjacent site (and many more) was empty so I plugged into that pedestal. No problems, and off in the morning. 

As a courtesy, I emailed the campground owner that the circuit breaker was failing  Circuit breakers typically have a useful life of only a half dozen trips before they start tripping at lower and lower loads. Two camp electricians have said this and cheerfully replaced the weak breaker when I asked.  

The Bethel owner responded testily (and wildly incorrectly) about EV charging  A 50 amp outlet is rated for something like 60 amps for a few minutes, 50 amps for a few hours, and 40 amps for continuous (over three hours, such as EV charging). All EVs can only charge at 30-32 amps from a travel charger cord.  Charging at 32 amp should not stress a 50 amp breaker.

The owner complained he was probably losing money on my stay, saying that the electricity cost over $65. My 50 A site (before sales tax) cost $56. If I wasn’t going to charge I would have rented a 30 A (120 V) site, which cost $48, a difference of $8. The car used 30 kWh, which at  Maine’s 19 cents is $7.70, not $65.

I offered to pay the $7.70 if he was still upset. No reply. 

Similarly I had a friendly conversation with the campground owners in Linwood NS.  As everywhere, I had paid extra for a 50 amp site. They were astounded that a full charge is less than $10. (Electricity in Nova Scotia is only about 12 cents) “Wow, it costs me $150 to fill my truck every week!”. They realized that EVs weren’t really a problem for them. 

Here we are back at charging station discussed above, on the way to Halifax.  Nobody waiting, so I could block the site. Pretty ugly, though.  There is only one DC charger here, anyway.

By the way, if you as a homeowner have a breaker that trips too easily, it is safe and easy DIY to change your breaker. Lots of info online, or drop me a note. If you have any outlets on that circuit that are in a kitchen, bathroom, garage, basement, or outside, you probably should install a breaker with ground fault protection. It is now code for all those locations, but most older houses still have the cheaper regular breakers. The code does not require to upgrade, but might as well if you are changing it anyway. 

Happy Trails,

Krem and Barbara