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The State of Charging on a Gravity Road Trip

DeaneG said:
Because it is "fast" in the USA. Our charging infrastructure isn't great - one side effect of our fractured, divisive politics.
Yellowstone is one of the largest, oldest, and most scenic national parks in the USA, with nearly 5 million visitors last year, and there isn't a DC fast charger within 160km of it.
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and why unfortunately I am renting a gas car for when I do Yellowstone in September (flying to Jackson Hole from Philly so not driving the Gravity)
 
Lycra said:
Oh ok, I thought you guys have the EA chargers and Ionna which have 400kw ?! or are those not much around?

Alright, but 150kw should almost every EV nowadays be able to charge, correct?

Thanks for the update though, I am considering the GGT because of the charging speed over my audi etron which has max 150kw ;)
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EA has been unreliable in the past but improving.
Ionna is just getting started in the USA with few locations, but they are very welcome.

There aren't many DC fast chargers in some parts of the USA. We have many large, low-population-density areas to cover, themselves the size of many Germanys. EVs aren't a good fit for some of these areas due to the long distances and weather, so residents mostly have internal combustion cars and many are skeptical of EVs. The economics of installing and maintaining DC fast charging in these areas doesn't always work out.
 
DeaneG said:
EA has been unreliable in the past but improving.
Ionna is just getting started in the USA with few locations, but they are very welcome.

There aren't many DC fast chargers in some parts of the USA. We have many large, low-population-density areas to cover, themselves the size of many Germanys. EVs aren't a good fit for some of these areas due to the distances and weather, so residents mostly have internal combustion cars and many are skeptical of EVs. The economics of installing and maintaining DC fast charging in these areas doesn't always work out.
Click to expand...

The HUGE thing people aren't talking about is that Walmart is installing their own charging network at their locations at a decent price ($0.45 kwh on average) and 400w speeds
They seem to be rolling it out fairly fast too

New Walmart DC Fast Charging Stations | DCFC Tracker

110 Walmart EV fast charging stations with 918 stalls across 21 states. Updated daily from AFDC data.
dcfctracker.com dcfctracker.com
 
BTW- if you have certain credit cards (AMEX Platinum eg) you get the monthly Walmart+ fee reimbursed so you get the free shipping from their site AND now a discount at the charging network (think it brings it down 10%)
 
BrianBigNFun said:
and why unfortunately I am renting a gas car for when I do Yellowstone in September (flying to Jackson Hole from Philly so not driving the Gravity)
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1783435381717.webp


www.nps.gov

Electric Vehicles in Yellowstone (U.S. National Park Service)

Electric Vehicles and charging stations are in use in Yellowstone and the surrounding ecosystem.
www.nps.gov www.nps.gov
 
The 2 inside the park do NOT work (someone on here even confirmed that)
Plus I am staying inside the park so having to drive outside the park constantly is not a good option- especially since itll be a rental
 
Adnillien said:
Yellowstone

Don’t count on any charging within Yellowstone Park. There are level 2 chargers at the Old Faithful cabins, Plugshare correctly showed them as broken. The desk staff knew about them but were clueless about their condition. Plugshare suggests this is true for Yellowstone Lake lodge also. Hence, the warning about not counting on any chargers within the park. Some hotels in West Yellowstone have level 2 or level 1 charging and could be a good option but we wanted to stay within the park to avoid driving in and out of the park.

We arrived Sunday at Old Faithful Snow Lodge with 81% SOC, 30 degrees and snowing. On Monday we visited the lower and midway geyser basins. On Tuesday, we drove to Canyon Village. The east roads in the park were still closed. On Wednesday, we visited Norris Geyser basin Mammoth Hot Springs and part of the Lamar valley. Bison, elk, black bears and grizzly bears were all out making it a great day. We stoped to turn around in the Lamar valley and decided to grab some beverages from the frunk. A ranger stoped within a minute asking if we needed help since our hood was up. I explained that our Gravity was electric and the frunk was a great place to store water and pop when it is 35 degrees outside. She was very nice and I do appreciate that she stoped in case we did need help.

We then drove to Gardiner to use the Rivian chargers. We arrived with about 25% SOC with an expectation of getting 300kW. We also planned to have an early dinner at the Cowboy Grille while charging. We got a whopping 49kW with the dreaded “charging limited by station” message. I tried a second charger and got the same 49kW. This reminded me of EA three years ago. I thought RAN was supposed to be better than this. We spent a lot more time at dinner than initially planned and still had time to shop for some adult beverages to enjoy back to the lodge. We charged to 90% and arrived back at the Old Faithful Snow lodge with 82%. More than enough charge to get to Idaho falls or Pocatello on the way to Saint George UT.

Gravity is one of the few EV’s that can get around Yellowstone enjoying all of the activities without worrying about charging. This is the primary reason for purchasing a Gravity. All days were in the mid 30’s with light snow. Better weather would make getting around even easier. I emailed the lodge manager about EV charing and received a nice personal response. I hope everyone that visits Yellowstone does the same. There are Tesla chargers in West Yellowstone that are not available to non-Tesla cars. I hope that Tesla upgrades this site or someone else puts in chargers for all EVs.

Total charging cost at Rivian was $57.46.

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Lycra said:
View attachment 39825

www.nps.gov

Electric Vehicles in Yellowstone (U.S. National Park Service)

Electric Vehicles and charging stations are in use in Yellowstone and the surrounding ecosystem.
www.nps.gov www.nps.gov
Click to expand...


found the post about the 2 destination chargers

Adnillien

Post in thread 'Phoenix to Yellowstone'

Yellowstone

Don’t count on any charging within Yellowstone Park. There are level 2 chargers at the Old Faithful cabins, Plugshare correctly showed them as broken. The desk staff knew about them but were clueless about their condition. Plugshare suggests this is true for Yellowstone Lake lodge also. Hence, the warning about not counting on any chargers within the park. Some hotels in West Yellowstone have level 2 or level 1 charging and could be a good option but we wanted to stay within the park to avoid driving in and out of the park.

We arrived Sunday at Old Faithful Snow Lodge...
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clearly it can be done with certain parameters and a decent range
but you can't just rent a car with a good range from Hertz or such (and I cant do Turo because I am flying into Jackson Hole and out of MIssoula)
 
DeaneG said:
EA has been unreliable in the past but improving.
Ionna is just getting started in the USA with few locations, but they are very welcome.

There aren't many DC fast chargers in some parts of the USA. We have many large, low-population-density areas to cover, themselves the size of many Germanys. EVs aren't a good fit for some of these areas due to the long distances and weather, so residents mostly have internal combustion cars and many are skeptical of EVs. The economics of installing and maintaining DC fast charging in these areas doesn't always work out.
Click to expand...
I totally understand. Then I also understand that the US does not need any "chinese" cars which can do 1 megawatt charging like the Denza for example.
In Germany BYD is creating 300 1,5megawatt chargers with CCS standard and roughly 2000 around Europe.

Hwoever, the denza for example goes to an 400kw or even we do have 600kw chargers (ionity for example) and the denza does not have a curve, just flat line 400kw or 600kw from 0-97 %..
 
BrianBigNFun said:
The HUGE thing people aren't talking about is that Walmart is installing their own charging network at their locations at a decent price ($0.45 kwh on average) and 400w speeds
They seem to be rolling it out fairly fast too

New Walmart DC Fast Charging Stations | DCFC Tracker

110 Walmart EV fast charging stations with 918 stalls across 21 states. Updated daily from AFDC data.
dcfctracker.com dcfctracker.com
Click to expand...
That is good news!
 
BrianBigNFun said:
The 2 inside the park do NOT work (someone on here even confirmed that)
Plus I am staying inside the park so having to drive outside the park constantly is not a good option- especially since itll be a rental
Click to expand...
I understand. and the level 2 chargers for charging over night while sleeping arent an option? even with that high range of an lucid air or lucid gravity gt?
 
BrianBigNFun said:
clearly it can be done with certain parameters and a decent range
but you can't just rent a car with a good range from Hertz or such (and I cant do Turo because I am flying into Jackson Hole and out of MIssoula)
Click to expand...
Drive there with your Gravity GT from home :D
 
Lycra said:
I understand. and the level 2 chargers for charging over night while sleeping arent an option? even with that high range of an lucid air or lucid gravity gt?
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if they worked (I should note that they are broken and cannot charge at all) then yes it would be a viable option for even renting a base model Tesla- but they are broken (I have been coming across so many broken level 2 destination chargers on my travels and its very annoying)
and since the parks system budget has been gutted by the current administration and considering their view on EV's and oil (drill baby drill) I doubt it will get fixed any time soon
 
yeah i understand. really annoying though, woudl be for yellowstone also better to have EVs driving around than gas/oil...
 
Lycra said:
Drive there with your Gravity GT from home :D
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My wife would kill me and it would add at least 6-7 days to my trip which is already 20 days long as it is
 
Lycra said:
View attachment 39825

www.nps.gov

Electric Vehicles in Yellowstone (U.S. National Park Service)

Electric Vehicles and charging stations are in use in Yellowstone and the surrounding ecosystem.
www.nps.gov www.nps.gov
Click to expand...
The Gardiner location is a 100km, 2 hour drive from the outskirts of Yellowstone.
The West Yellowstone site may be a figment of AI's imagination - no data there from Chargepoint, Google, Plugshare
Island Park has only 2 CCS plugs, noted as unreliable online, 100km / 1.5 hours from the center of the park
Jackson has 2 CCS plugs, and is 160km/2.5 hours from the park.

Yellowstone is a huge park. It is easy to spend 2 full days driving around within it.
 
The Gravity GT has plenty of range to get round the park for a couple of days. Speed limits are low in the park so the elevation changes are the only thing that can decrease your efficiency. There are two DC fast chargers in Gardiner. My experience with the Rivian network in Gardiner was not good with power limited to 49kW. Outside of West Yellowstone the chargers at Island park were not great either. Only one of two worked and it was very difficult to get the charge started but once started the speeds were good. I think the GGT is one of the few EVs that have enough range to enjoy Yellowstone.
 
BrianBigNFun said:
BTW- if you have certain credit cards (AMEX Platinum eg) you get the monthly Walmart+ fee reimbursed so you get the free shipping from their site AND now a discount at the charging network (think it brings it down 10%)
Click to expand...
Thanks for sharing this. I have an Amex Platinum with the free Walmart+ subscription and had no idea this was one of the perks. The only thing I've actually used Walmart+ for is a Peacock streaming account to watch the World Cup 🤣
 
Solomente said:
Thanks for sharing this. I have an Amex Platinum with the free Walmart+ subscription and had no idea this was one of the perks. The only thing I've actually used Walmart+ for is a Peacock streaming account to watch the World Cup 🤣
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Go Argentina 🇦🇷 🙂
 
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