I've posted over three dozen times on lucidowners.com, but I always expected I'd finally post in the New Members Intro after taking delivery.
I didn't buy the car. Awesome car, awesome deal, but....
The tl;dr is that I really liked the car, and I tried pretty hard to rationalize overlooking the problem, but the AGT I drove so under-performed from a range perspective that I couldn't do it.
So now the long version:
With the assistance of the awesome folks in the Plano studio, I was provided with an AGT to take an extended Plano-Wichita Falls-Lubbock-Abilene-Plano test drive. My intention was to evaluate charging infrastructure in addition to the car itself.
I left Plano at 100% SOC with the first destination the EA facility at I-35 and US 380 in Denton. I arrived at the Walmart parking lot at 89 percent. Had I really been thinking about it I might have been concerned with losing 11% in 34 miles, but for the first little bit I was more concerned with figuring out how everything worked.
Since I was already at 89% the car started charging at 60 kW, which seems reasonable. I disconnected at 96% and 32 kW. No complaints whatsoever here.
The distance between charges in Denton and Wichita Falls was 98.5 miles with an elevation change of right at 250 feet. I arrived with a 60% SOC and a usage rate of 2.8 kW/mile. Not good.
The only public level 3 charger in the city, managed by EV Connect, did not cooperate. Fortunately there was free (!) 20 kW charging nearby. The good news is that I didn't have to turn around and go back to DFW. The bad news is that I sat for two hours to recover again to 96 percent.
The Wichita Falls-Lubbock segment involved an elevation change of about 2300 feet. I arrived home at 19%. My best guess is that if I hadn't stopped in Wichita Falls I would have gone dead about 40 miles from home.
This post is already long, and I have more details (including specific numbers) if anybody cares, but the remaining highlights are that the 60 kW EV Connect charger in Lubbock worked fine, the segment from Lubbock to Sweetwater got me 3.1 kW/mile, the EA charger in Sweetwater worked flawlessly, and the segment from Sweetwater to Lubbock was at 3.4 kW/mile. Had I gotten 3.4 on the outbound trip, I'd own an AGT now.
I drove with the cruise almost the entire way from Denton to Lubbock with it set at 3 or 4 mph over the speed limit. The posted speed was 75 for the majority of the trip. It was a 75-degree day, so there shouldn't have been significant energy expended heating or cooling the cabin. The driving mode was set to smooth. Regen was set to normal, but there was very little braking so that was not a big factor.
One significant concern is that, if you believe the car's trip and SOC info, this test car with ~10K miles only had about 103 kW of capacity, which means it had already lost about 8 percent. Again, I have details on how I derived these numbers if anyone cares.
The test car had 21-inch wheels, which meant about a 10 percent range penalty compared to the 19-inch tires on the car I had reserved, but even with smaller tires I would have not quite made the 315-mile trip from Denton to Lubbock without stopping.
I didn't expect anything close to the EPA range rating, but I certainly expected more than 300 miles.
If you're considering telling me I'd have gotten better range at 65 MPH, drive from Lubbock to Wichita Falls at 65 and then get back to me.
, as others have said, if the AGT won’t get it done, no EV will. Good luck!!
if I had a gravity we could easily fit another body and set of clubs!
But also a few days ago I noticed my car had consumed 4kwh 'since last charge' before I even took it out! I sometimes forget to turn off my phone's bluetooth so I'm guessing the car turns on here and there.
Today I'll go on slow lane and do 70. I also recently figured out that I don't need my hands on the wheel all the time during Highway Assist. I just need to wiggle the steering wheel occasionally.
