Charging Up for the Next 500 Miles
Aug. 21st, 2022 08:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerThe story of this weekend is "I would fly 500 miles, and I would drive 500 more." I flew to Las Vegas on Saturday morning to meet a friend to pick up his new Hyundai Ioniq 5 from a dealer Henderson. From there we'd begin the 500+ mile drive back to San Francisco.
Now, what's one of the first things you do when embarking on a road trip? Make sure the tank is full! So we located a nearbygas station charging station to top off.
Partly this was to literally top off the tank/battery, as the dealer driving it around to pick us up had run the battery down to just under 80%. But more important, it was for David to get the hang of charging while he was still close enough to get help from the dealer if anything went wrong.
Now, physically connecting the charging cable went fine. As you can see in the two photos above, it looks a lot like a gas pump nozzle. It's the same idea, except with an electrical connection for current instead of a pipe for liquid fuel. That part was relatively simple; "Tab A goes in Slot B". It's what happened next that was... well, a good idea we figured out before leaving town.
Activating the charger turned out to be way fussier than we expected. First, the first charging stanchion we tried was busted. The cables connected fine but the screen wouldn't indicate that the system was ready to engage. After fiddling with it for several minutes assuming operator error, we hypothesized it was the pump and tried the stanchion next to it that another customer had just finished using successfully.
We had trouble getting the second pump going, too. Its computer screen showed a bit more progress. We got stuck on getting it to recognize David's account via NFC from his smart phone.
Yes, I said account. This isn't like Teslas years ago, or various employer-funded spots today, where charging is free. You pay for charging now. Now, David's purchase of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 came with a included 2 year subscription to the Electrify America charger network, so the out of pocket cost is zero— except for certain kinds of overages, which can be avoided. But the pump still needs to know who you are and how you're paying before it dispenses electrons.
David tried calling the dealer first. Was the Electrify America membership activated properly? They had said yes at the dealership; this was literally the first field test of that claim. The dealer wasn't answering.
Next David called Electrify America customer support. The 7 minute wait on hold felt like forever. Were they ever going to answer? But a cheery customer service rep came on the line and walked David through the process. The answer was basically, "Oh, the idea of 'Tap your phone to start' often doesn't work; there's this way more cumbersome method of starting the charger that's much more reliable."
David got the process down, started the charger, topped off the battery to 95%, and we were off!
Now, what's one of the first things you do when embarking on a road trip? Make sure the tank is full! So we located a nearby
Partly this was to literally top off the tank/battery, as the dealer driving it around to pick us up had run the battery down to just under 80%. But more important, it was for David to get the hang of charging while he was still close enough to get help from the dealer if anything went wrong.
Now, physically connecting the charging cable went fine. As you can see in the two photos above, it looks a lot like a gas pump nozzle. It's the same idea, except with an electrical connection for current instead of a pipe for liquid fuel. That part was relatively simple; "Tab A goes in Slot B". It's what happened next that was... well, a good idea we figured out before leaving town.
Activating the charger turned out to be way fussier than we expected. First, the first charging stanchion we tried was busted. The cables connected fine but the screen wouldn't indicate that the system was ready to engage. After fiddling with it for several minutes assuming operator error, we hypothesized it was the pump and tried the stanchion next to it that another customer had just finished using successfully.
We had trouble getting the second pump going, too. Its computer screen showed a bit more progress. We got stuck on getting it to recognize David's account via NFC from his smart phone.
Yes, I said account. This isn't like Teslas years ago, or various employer-funded spots today, where charging is free. You pay for charging now. Now, David's purchase of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 came with a included 2 year subscription to the Electrify America charger network, so the out of pocket cost is zero— except for certain kinds of overages, which can be avoided. But the pump still needs to know who you are and how you're paying before it dispenses electrons.
David tried calling the dealer first. Was the Electrify America membership activated properly? They had said yes at the dealership; this was literally the first field test of that claim. The dealer wasn't answering.
Next David called Electrify America customer support. The 7 minute wait on hold felt like forever. Were they ever going to answer? But a cheery customer service rep came on the line and walked David through the process. The answer was basically, "Oh, the idea of 'Tap your phone to start' often doesn't work; there's this way more cumbersome method of starting the charger that's much more reliable."
David got the process down, started the charger, topped off the battery to 95%, and we were off!
no subject
Date: 2022-08-22 01:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-08-22 02:17 am (UTC)