Tesla-S-owner

EVgo’s web page  about its “Autocharge” system (which means “plug and charge”) lists sixteen supported car makes.  They are denoted in bold face in the table below.

What I learned is that that list of sixteen supported car makes is incomplete.  A Rivian owner told me that Rivian is able to do plug and charge with EVgo.

Yesterday for the first time I managed to enroll my vehicle in EVgo’s plug and charge system.  After that, I received a customer satisfaction survey from EVgo asking how this first charging session went.  The first question is the make and model of the car that I charged.  (The second question is the model year of the car.)  The survey invited me to select the make and model from a drop-down list of 73 vehicle models.  Doing a “view source” on the drop-down list revealed database codes that presumably get used internally in the analysis of the survey responses.  The models and codes are listed in the table below.

It is interesting to speculate on why the database codes run in three distinct numerical sequences:

• • nine digits starting with “7231244” (56 codes)
  • nine digits starting with “8433858” (2 codes)
  • nine digits starting with “9456995” (1 code)
  • ten digits starting with “12650109” (10 codes)

What’s striking is how different the drop-down list is from the table on the EVgo web page.  The main thing is that the drop-down list from the satisfaction survey is much longer — the survey includes vehicle makes that are missing from the EVgo web page:

• • Audi
  • BMW
  • Fiat
  • Fisker
  • Harley-Davidson
  • Honda
  • Lordstown Endurance (Wikipedia article)
  • Lucid
  • Mazda
  • Mini
  • Mitsubishi
  • Rivian
  • Scion
  • smart fortwo (Wikipedia article)
  • Vinfast VF8 (Wikipedia article)
  • Volkswagen

I welcome comments from readers who own any of the makes listed above, as to whether you have been able to enroll such an EV in EVgo’s Autocharge+ system.

Note that “Energica” is missing from the survey, despite being listed on the EVgo web page.   What, you may ask, is “Energica”?  It is a motorcycle.

Make and model	database code
Audi e-tron	723124418
Audi e-tron GT	723124419
Audi e-tron Sportback	723124420
BMW Active E	723124421
BMW i3	723124422
BMW i4	1265010945
BMW i5	945699583
BMW i7	723124423
BMW iX	723124424
Cadillac Lyriq	1265010946
Chevrolet Blazer EV	723124425
Chevrolet Bolt EUV	723124426
Chevrolet Bolt EV	723124427
Chevrolet Spark EV	723124428
Energica Experia
Energica Eva Ribelle
Energica Ego
Energica EsseEsse9
Fiat 500e	1265010947
Fisker Ocean	723124429
Ford E-Transit-350 Cargo	723124430
Ford F-150 Lightning	723124431
Ford Focus Electric	723124432
Ford Mustang Mach-E	1265010949
Genesis Electrified G80	723124433
Genesis GV60	1265010948
Genesis GV70	723124434
GMC Hummer EV	723124435
Harley-Davison LiveWire	723124436
Honda Clarity EV	723124437
Honda Fit EV	723124438
Hyundai Ioniq 5	1265010950
Hyundai Ioniq 6	723124439
Hyundai Ioniq Electric	723124440
Hyundai Kona Electric	723124441
Jaguar I-Pace	723124442
Kia EV6	1265010951
Kia EV9	723124443
Kia Niro Electric	723124444
Kia Soul Electric	1265010952
Lexus RZ 450e	843385879
Lordstown Endurance	723124445
Lucid Air	723124446
Mazda MX-30	723124448
Mercedes-Benz B-Class Electric Drive	723124447
Mercedes-Benz B250e	1265010953
Mercedes-Benz EQB	1265010954
Mercedes-Benz EQE	723124449
Mercedes-Benz EQS	723124450
MINI Cooper SE	723124451
MINI Electric	723124452
Mitsubishi i-MiEV	723124453
Nissan Ariya	723124454
Nissan Leaf	723124455
Nissan Leaf Plus	723124456
Polestar 2	723124457
Porsche Taycan	723124458
Rivian R1S	723124459
Rivian R1T	723124460
Scion iQ EV	723124461
smart fortwo	723124462
Subaru Solterra	723124463
Tesla Model 3	723124464
Tesla Model S	723124465
Tesla Model X	723124466
Tesla Model Y	723124467
Toyota bZ4x	723124468
Toyota RAV4 EV	843385880
VinFast VF8	723124469
Volkswagen e-Golf	723124470
Volkswagen ID.4	723124471
Volvo C40 Recharge	723124472
Volvo XC40 Recharge	723124473

 

Let’s suppose you are going to fly to Dulles, rent an EV, and drive to Charlottesville, VA.  How do three major EV-charging service providers compare for geographic coverage along this route?  Continue reading “Comparing coverage of Electrify America and EVgo and Tesla”

(Update:  what “plug and charge” charging experiences are available in the US?  I have set up a table that I hope will show progress with setting up “plug and charge” in the US.)

From the moment that became an owner of a Tesla vehicle, I was able to do an easy “plug and charge”.  I would park my car at a Tesla charging kiosk, plug the charging plug of the kiosk into the charging port of the car, and charging would commence.

Note what is missing from the previous sentence.  Never in all of my years of charging my Tesla car at a Tesla charging station have I needed to do anything else to get the charging to commence.  No tapping a proximity card in front of a “tap to pay” reader on the kiosk.  No tapping a credit card in front of a “tap to pay” reader on the kiosk.  No waving my phone in front of a “tap to pay” reader on the kiosk.  No inserting a credit card into a credit card reader on the kiosk.  No fumbling with a smart phone app, and no cursing because the stupid smart phone app had logged me out and of course I do not have the password memorized for logging back in.  No going on a treasure hunt on the kiosk to try to work out what the “kiosk number” is so that I can key in the kiosk number at the smart phone app.  No calling up tech support to talk to somebody about why the “tap to pay” did not work.

Tesla owners are, as you may appreciate, rather spoiled by this absolutely seamless charging experience.  We read news stories about owners of non-Tesla vehicles who end up very disappointed or angry because when they finally did locate a non-broken charging kiosk, they found that it was difficult or impossible to get the actual charging to begin.  Or if it was not that bad, at least the owner of the non-Tesla vehicle had to tap a phone or tap a prox card or key in a kiosk number into a smart phone app, to get charging to commence.  Yes, we read those news stories, but having never had those problems, we do not fully appreciate how bad it might be to try to get charging to commence.

Across the US are tens of thousands of free-of-charge Level 2 chargers.  Most of them provide a seamless charging experience, but of course it is slow.   You might have to leave your vehicle at the charger overnight to get a full charge.  No, what I am talking about in this blog article is fast DC charging or “supercharging”, typically at speeds of 50 kW or 150 kW or more.

Which brings me to two general questions.  First, to what extent is there any way for a Tesla owner to have “plug and charge” fast DC charging experience on any non-Tesla-branded kiosk?  And second, to what extent does the owner of a non-Tesla EV ever get to have a “plug and charge” fast DC charging experience?  Continue reading “Who gets to do an easy “plug and charge”?”

The subject line of this blog article makes things sound better than they are.  The real situation is that starting now, the owner of a Ford CCS1 EV can try to place an order for an adapter to be able to charge at Tesla supercharging stations.  If and when the owner successfully places the order for the adapter, the owner gets to wait for the adapter to arrive.  If and when the adapter arrives, the owner can try to find a Tesla supercharging station at which the charging can be carried out. When the time comes to plug in the Ford CCS1 EV at the Tesla supercharging station, it is likely this will greatly inconvenience other users of the supercharging station. Continue reading “Owners of Ford EVs can now charge at Tesla supercharging stations”

On February 12, 2024, Stellantis announced that Real Soon Now, all of its newly manufactured electric vehicles for the US will have a Tesla-style charging port located at the left rear corner of the vehicle.  Stellantis is the maker of Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Maserati, and Ram cars.

This adds another entry to the canonical list.

It will be recalled that seven car makers, desperately hoping to somehow not be completely dependent upon Tesla’s supercharging network, announced (blog article) on July 26, 2023 that Real Soon Now they would provide 30000 high-speed EV chargers across North America.

Now on February 9, 2024, a first big step has been taken toward the installation of the 30000 high-speed EV chargers.  Continue reading “The seven car makers pick a name for their charging network”

In a previous blog article I listed nine states that have “right-to-charge” laws.  Those states were California, Florida, Oregon, New Jersey, Virginia, Illinois, Hawaii, Connecticut and Colorado.  I have now learned that more states have right-to-charge laws.  Continue reading “Which states have “right-to-charge” laws?”

On January 16, 2024, Mazda announced that Real Soon Now, all of its newly manufactured electric vehicles will have a Tesla-style charging port located at the left rear corner of the vehicle.

This adds another entry to the canonical list.

(Update:  Comments have been filed in response to a Request For Information – see blog article.)

The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, enacted on November 15, 2021, established a $5 billion firehose of federal money to help pay for high-speed electric vehicle chargers across the United States.  This Act charged the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) with figuring out how to decide what kinds of electric vehicle (“EV”) chargers would be eligible to receive money from this $5B firehose of money.  To do this, the FHWA took a mere two weeks to publish a Request for Information (RFI) in the Federal Register on November 29, 2021.   Public comments were due within two months of the Federal Register (“FR”) notice, that is, by January 28, 2022.  Continue reading “Will the $5 billion federal firehose of EV charger money become available for Tesla plugs?”

If one defines a relevant metric like deaths per passenger mile, and if one applies the metric while avoiding giving undue weight to things like “magnitude of headline splashing”, then much insight can be gained about relative safety or riskiness of various transportation choices.   And there are many reminders that lots of people are not very good at assessing risks when left to their own devices about it.  Continue reading “How risky are automobile driver assist systems (for example Tesla Full Self Driving)?”