We took a weekend drive from San Diego to Phoenix and I wanted to share some of my experiences.

Route: San Diego to East Mesa, Phoenix via I-10. Approximately 385 miles.

1. Began with a 90% charge at home.
2. First stop at an Electrify America station in Palm Springs - charged back to 90%. I faced some issues with the charger and had to disconnect and reconnect several times.
3. Stopped again in Indio, charging from 80% to 90% after a 20-minute wait. The navigation system suggested that charging at Buckeye would be sufficient to complete the trip (a total distance of 220 miles from Indio to Buckeye). I was nervous but knew there was another EA station in Quartzsite, AZ, about 120 miles from Indio if needed.
4. Facing a gentle incline and temperatures around 110 degrees, the battery depleted faster than expected. By Blythe, CA (110 miles from Indio) the charge was down to 35%.
5. Unfortunately, the EA station in Quartzsite was out of service. I had to opt for a slower 60 kWh charging station in Blythe, CA, which took over two hours (including waiting and charging) to reach 85%.
6. I continued driving but the battery depletion rate remained high, finally reaching Mesa with 10% remaining.

(Return Trip: East Mesa to San Diego via Mesa -> Buckeye -> Gila Bend -> El Centro -> San Diego)

I noticed EA stations every 60 to 70 miles and expected smooth travel.

1. First stopped at Buckeye Walmart where only 3 of the 4 chargers were functional. I experienced a 40-minute wait, and the parking at the charging stations was notably tight.
2. Charged back to 90% and proceeded towards Gila Bend.
3. Stopped in Dateland, CA to charge; 3 of the 4 chargers were operational with no waiting required.
4. Next stop was in Yuma, CA with the same charging availability as Dateland, and no waiting.
5. The navigation system estimated reaching home with a 25% remaining charge.
6. Chose to skip the El Centro EA. However, while ascending the Cleveland National Forest (summit over 4000 feet), the battery fell to 29% with about 75 miles left to travel. I was concerned but hoped descending would help recapture some energy.
7. Arrived home with 20% charge remaining.

Lessons Learned:

1. Route I-10 isn’t the most optimal for EVs traveling from San Diego/LA to Phoenix; I-8 may be a better choice.
2. The trip involved several hours wasted waiting and charging, which made me miss traditional ICE vehicles. Time is indeed valuable.
3. The intelligent navigation system needs improvement as it doesn’t accurately account for elevation changes and temperatures.
4. Waiting and Charging in external temperatures exceeding 100 degrees is uncomfortable, and I would avoid repeating the experience.
5. The infrastructure for EA charging stations needs significant improvement due to unavailability and frequent malfunctions.
6. For long road trips, a battery range of 280 miles is insufficient; longer range capability (400+ miles) would be more suitable.

While the EQS offered a luxurious and comfortable ride, the overall EV driving experience had its challenging moments which I hope to forget with more local usage.

 

Thanks for your experience. This is why I ultimately stayed with ICE this time although I did want an EV...

 

I've now done several long-distance road trips in my EQS 580 SUV. One thing I've found is that Electrify America charging stations are typically readily available in smaller towns (usually just off freeways). (The only major exception is Quartzite AZ; that tends to be a **** show.) On the other hand, it's Electrify America charging stations in cities that are often crowded. Fortunately, though, those cities usually have other high-speed charging stations (e.g., ChargePoint) nearby that you can use instead (though not for free).

I conclude that making road trips in (non-Tesla) EVs is still relatively uncommon. But lots of people in cities are using Electrify America chargers to charge their EVs - perhaps just for local use (because they don't have level-2 charging at home).

 

Since 1985 have traveled to San Diego and LA from NM in my ICE vehicles about twenty times. Prefer taking I-8 route...it even snows up in Elevation on the California side. The I-10 West direct route to LA thru Palm Springs is best done at night once you leave PHX. I rather get off I-10 and take the secondary roads and scenic route thru Joshua Tree via 60/72/62 Wickenburg/Parker/Twentynine Palms.

Thanks for your excellent EV write-up and lessons learned...before my Gluten Allergy Diagnosis this past February, In-N-Out Burger Pit Stops made the drive thru the Hot Desert Refreshing over the Decades.

 

Thanks for sharing. Did you happen to record your time stamps (each segment's departure & arrival, duration of each stop, total time)?

What are the causes of charger station malfunctions, and why aren't they being maintained?

I still drive an ICE, and am content with its 6 hour non-stop 400 mile uninterrupted comfort experience.

 

I do the Phoenix to the central coast run a lot. For me I prefer I-40 to avoid Quartzite, Indio and Palm Springs. Usual reasons; broken machines and long waits (waited over 3 hours in Quartzite to start charging once). The irony of Quartzite is that Tesla put in around 20 machines across the highway, why can't EA?

But it's better than it used to be before EA. Blythe and Ciriaco Pass are no fun when it's 115F, even when sitting in the car with the AC running while charging at 50kW.

I've found the routing function to be accurate to within a percent of destination range regardless of significant elevation changes.

 

This is largely what it comes down to and as the percentage of EVs increases, it's only gonna get worse. They can't build enough charging stations to keep up, and even if they could, EA and others are currently battling thieves that are cutting the cables for the copper in them. I've long said, human behavior, good or bad is ultimately gonna throw a monkey wrench into this. The problems are only starting.

EVs work fine if you don't have to charge or can charge at home all the time. Although I just read in the news about a thieve trying to steal the charging cable from an EV that was being charged in the home owner's driveway over night. They even succeeded to disconnect it, but the home owner was still awake and an alert on their phone alerted them to what's going on and they chased away the thief. It is said that only about 40% of car owners can realistically charge at home, which is starting to make the predictions like the one from the Toyota chairman about EVs topping out at around 30% market share globally very plausible. Even if you can charge at home, for many it only takes one road trip where they end up wasting hours waiting for an available charger for things to turn sour. Particularly on holidays even Tesla Superchargers have long lines here in California and remember what happened in Chicago during last winter. A few of those experiences is all it takes.

To the point above about chargers in cities being busy, that's all the ride share drivers charging their cars. Many Uber and Lyft drivers have switched to EVs due to incentives from these companies and the lower running cost, but they have to charge somewhere, so they block many of the chargers in busy areas. In some cities you can barely charge during much of the day, because of all the ride share drivers hogging the chargers. You have a much better chance to charge in the middle of nowhere.

As I've said before, in principal I'm not against EVs. They just don't work for my lifestyle and ultimately I find them boring. The only thing that's exciting is the straight line acceleration, but after a while that gets one-dimensional. I'm currently driving an EQE 350+ sedan. It's the 4th or 5th EV loaner I have had and just for driving short distances from A to B they are nice. I never had to charge any of them, because they hand them out with at least 80% SoC and you don't have to return them at the same level as opposed to the ICE loaners, so this is great as a loaner.

 

On the upside, there seems to be an absence of EV car-jackings (lol). But then I don't get the SoCal local news.

 

Between the MercedesMe stalker and Geofencing functions they wouldn't get very far.

 

I don't think this is really the case. As long as there are plenty of charging options along a route there will be places to charge. The chargers being online and communicating with the cars and drivers being guided to available stalls is huge.

 

We'll have to see and it will likely depend on where you live. California is a good indicator as it is the state with the highest percentage of EVs. We are still at less than 10% of the total fleet being electric and the problems are already starting. Existing charging stations are badly designed to begin with. One issue is that there is no clear system for how you are supposed to line up. As most of these charging stations are essentially in parking lots, people who need to charge are blocking other cars from parking or leaving if there's a line. Fights are breaking out, and eventually EA etc. will have to redesign all these charging stations. The problem has at least been recognized and they are all now starting to invest in charging hubs that resemble gas stations, complete with a roof so you don't get drenched during a rain storm and can get a coffee or something while you are waiting.

 

This time of year with seemingly half the country on vacation, lines form at petrol stations even with 5 minute fill-ups. Total conversion to EVs by 2040 seems unlikely with the charging station problem.

 

Things will improve over time, both with the number of charging stations and with charging times. When our 1935 Ford came out gas stations had to hand pump petrol into an overhead vessel before fueling the car, not exactly an expedient process.

 

There's a fundamental problem with improving charging times. The faster you want to charge, the more electricity needs to be supplied to the site. We are at 350 kW now per charger. To cut the charging time in half means 700 kW chargers. The biggest challenge is a powerful enough grid connection to deliver enough power. Already the supplied power is split between all the chargers. The busier a charging station, the longer it takes to charge, because each charger gets throttled. Some of it gets balanced out as cars that are almost full draw less power than those with an empty battery, but ultimately you have a supply constraint. Some charging stations are adding battery storage to buffer energy, so they can supply more during busy times w/ a smaller grid connection, but those batteries need space and sufficient perimeter to be safe in case of a fire etc.

You don't have this problem with gas stations. However long it takes to fill the tank of a car, it always takes that long, because each pump can suck as much fuel from the underground tank as it can supply. There's no competition between the pumps. The only constraint is the size of the underground tank to store enough fuel before the next delivery. So even if a gas station is busy, you can pretty much predict how long you gonna wait. Have three cars ahead of you, it's probably gonna be 15 minutes, so you can decide if you wanna wait or just leave and stop at the next station.

I suppose charging stations could start adding huge battery storage underground and have them fill during slow times and have enough energy stored for the throughput they need, but that takes a lot more infrastructure and safety considerations than an underground fuel tank. Don't think you wanna set up the chargers on top of the underground batteries for example.

 

The problem is that we only account for charging time and not take waiting time into consideration. Waiting time can be very painful even in California. In our previous road trip, I ended up with 15% remaining at Valencia, CA on my way from SF to San Diego. There was one EA charging place with 6 available but there were almost 15 cars waiting. We literally spent 2 hours waiting and charging. I even took the chance to look for nearby EVgo (before the 2 hour wait). Ridiculous EVgo disabled CCS charging on 2 out of 4 charging stations. And there were already 2 cars plugged in right when I went and starting charging at <10%.

I didn't want to drive down I-5 south hoping to find another working and available EA charger (and losing more battery) so ended up simply waiting in the first one I found in Valencia.

 

Yep, that's the point. I'm not waiting 2 hours for anything, especially not on a road trip that already takes 9 hours.

 

Stopping every 200 miles for 25 minutes doesn't bother me, having to worry about the location of and on line nature of chargers does

 

I decided to take my EQS 580 SUV on a vacation road trip from Austin, TX to SPI, TX, a 383 mile trip.

I used the MB Route planning and the first recharge at a EA charging station went without any issues, 8 charging stations available, no wait, all are working.
It was the second stop in Kingsville that burned me. This is Texas, and between Corpus Christi and the Valley, a 150 mile stretch, you have two car dealers in Kingsville that have two stations each. Only open during business hours. I thought no problem, between the two dealers and four stations I shouldn't have any issues. I got to the first dealer and sure enough, both stations are available and working! Great! I thought
They did work, but it cost me $150 to charge from 15% to 80%, and 80% is what I needed to make it to the Valley.

The return trip I used the other dealer, but the same story, another $150 bill to get to where I needed to be to make the next EA station.

Moral of the story...just because the EV Charging station is there and working does not mean it is not a problem, they can charge whatever they want when they are the only game around.

I won't make that trip again in my EQS, at least not for a few years when we can have a better charging infrastructure, or when we can get access to Tesla charging stations, which are all over Texas.

 

Two of the EA stations that I've been using lately both have banks of SK Signet inverters with racks of battery modules for load leveling during off-peak hours.

 

My solution

 

Let’s not forget the potential for vandalism from impatient EV owners. I had an EV loaner for about five days, and the one time I took it to a public charger at a shopping center, someone keyed it. I’m certain it was an impatient EV owner. This was my first time charging an EV at a public station, and I thought it would give me a good idea of what it’s like to own an EV. So, I let it charge to 100% and ran some errands (30 minutes max with the free charging from Mercedes). I was monitoring the app and was late returning to the vehicle by 2-3 minutes after it completed charging. The keying was right on the driver’s door. I am guessing it was the Kia that pulled in after me and had to wait since all the chargers were full. He probably waited for a while, saw my dash showing the battery percentage, got mad, and decided to key the car. The chargers were in an area where only EV customers parked because it was inconveniently located compared to other areas of the shopping center.

Luckily, the scratches weren’t deep, and my dealer buffed them out at no charge.

 

Other EV owners don't like if you hog a charger and trickle charging it all the way to 100%, especially if you are blocking a 350 kW charger and only pulling 50 kW or less. EA has announced that they are going to automatically limit charging to 80% and then charge a per minute penalty for overstaying your welcome. Similar to Tesla's penalty charges if you don't unplug as soon as the battery is full, but Tesla so far doesn't limit how much you can charge. EA's plan is like going to a fancy restaurant and then get kicked out before the last two courses, because the next guests have arrived.

 

What $150 to charge 65%? that's terrible. I am sure they 4x the price.

 

If the Tesla station is busy, the Tesla will automatically limit your charge to 80%. If you need more than that, you can go ahead and change it to 90, 100. or whatever it is you need. At EA, I'm sure you can re-start the charge if you need more range as well. Something really needs to be done about all the Bolts, Konas, etc out there that trickle charge all the way to 100% at 20kw on a 350kw charger. I have run into this far more times than I'd like to.

 

An article in today's WSJ explains to us why charging anxiety is unwarranted and how 120 VAC outlet charging at home is all that's really necessary.