SoCal LEAF & EV Gathering, Y7 - Finished - 19 Aug 2017

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On Feb 4th we Gather again at the Golden Corral in the City of Industry,
just South of fwy 60, about 4 miles West of fwy 57. Two weeks after that,
on the 18th, we will Gather again at the Hometown Buffet in Santa Ana.

Hopefully, I will see you there ... I plan to arrive within minutes of 8:00 AM.
 
Next EV Gathering in 45 hours and 31 minutes, at the Golden Corral.

I will bring some binders for anybody who wants them.
Possibly other stuff as well.
Like a Show-n-Tell but more of a Give-n-Take.
 
We had a good Gathering on Feb 4th at the Golden Corral.
The next Gathering is on Feb 18th at the HTB in Santa Ana.

Remember Valentines Day on Tuesday Feb 14th.

See the next post for date suggestions for March through June.
 
Our tentative Gathering schedule, that includes two 3-week intervals:

------ 82nd month Gatherings ------
Gathering #82a: 10 Jun 2017 at Golden Corral in City of Industry for breakfast.
Gathering #82b: 24 Jun 2017 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.

------ 81st month Gatherings ------
Note: This leaves May 6th open, for ... the Kentucky Derby.
Gathering #81a: 13 May 2017 at Golden Corral in City of Industry for breakfast.
Gathering #81b: 27 May 2017 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.

------ 80th month Gatherings ------
Gathering #80a: 8 Apr 2017 at Golden Corral in City of Industry for breakfast.
Note: 3-week gap follows to skip Passover and Earth Day.
Gathering #80b: 29 Apr 2017 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.

------ 79th month Gatherings ------
Gathering #79a: 4 Mar 2017 at Golden Corral in City of Industry for breakfast.
Gathering #79b: 18 Mar 2017 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.
Note: A 3-week gap follows to skip April 1st.

------ 78th month Gatherings ------
Gathering #78a: 4 Feb 2017 at Golden Corral in City of Industry for breakfast.
Gathering #78b: 18 Feb 2017 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.

Please let me know if anything needs to be rescheduled.
Thanks to you all, Gary, Nancy, and Heidi.
 
I'll be coming to the breakfast on Saturday, if anyone has a LeafDD and they want to have it work with the new telematics update, I have the firmware and programmer to update it. One time only deal, as the programmer is being shipped off to someone else after this weekend (see the thread for details)
 
I'll miss this one, folks. Still in New York helping my older brother gather his support system back together after his wife's very serious stroke Feb 1. I'll be back in So Cal soon, and back EVing again. See you at the Corral in March.
At least I got to experience snow again without having to drive in it. :)
 
JeremyW said:
I'll be coming to the breakfast on Saturday, if anyone has a LeafDD and they want to have it work with the new telematics update, I have the firmware and programmer to update it. One time only deal, as the programmer is being shipped off to someone else after this weekend (see the thread for details)
Hey Jeremy, I didn't realize you had a leaf as well as the insight and fit ev. I am member insight for life on ic.net. I met you at insightfest last year. Anyway, I thought I would give a shout out.
 
Happy to report that Carol and I now are driving essentially all electric (excepting the very occasional shameful gallon of petrified dinosaur that we put into the 2 gallon range extender of my BMW i3 that will return to its German home in about 13 months), having purchased a new Chevy Bolt EV last Saturday to replace our aging and malfunctioning 2007 Prius.

We got a beautiful Kinetic Blue Premier model with all the bells, whistles, safety features and DCFC that Chevy has to offer. Drove all the way up to Northridge to Rydell Chevy to take advantage of their no haggle $2500 discount. Figured we'd buy this EV instead of leasing because the lease rates aren't very appealing, and leasing two cars consecutively at those prices for 6 years would cost the same as buying it, but we would have zero equity at that point. The car's range autonomy is so good that even if it loses some capacity over the next six years, it'll still meet most of our needs.

For those still unaware, this Bolt EV has a full 60 kWh pack for as little as $38k before incentives. EPA range is 238 miles and combined MPGe is 119. That's Tesla range with BMW i3 efficiency at Leaf prices! DCFC is by CCS, in my mind, the car's glaring disadvantage compared with Tesla, along with lack of Autopilot, radar cruise control and over the air updates.

We love the car. It is so chock full of clever design and features. While not as roomy front-to-rear as the Prius, it has the Prius beat in every other interior space measure, including the utility of the rear storage space. There is a false floor below which we can keep the messy stuff like the fabric shopping bags and the first aid kit and emergency tire pump. Above the false floor is a clear, clean area to haul the groceries or luggage. Passenger space both front and rear is roomy, much like a Leaf.

Favorite features, some of which are optional or part of the Premier trim level, include the rear view camera monitor that displays on the surface of the interior rear view mirror, blind spot alerts that display in the side view mirrors, rear cross traffic alert for backing out of parking spots, four-camera surround-view overhead integrated view of the car for low speed maneuvering and precision parking placement, Apple Car Play or Android Auto for GPS Nav and other apps in the car's large center display, adjustable regen and creep via the shifter for true one-pedal driving with strong regen and extra strong regen whenever desired via a steering wheel paddle, a Sport mode that sharpens accelerator mapping for truly fun driving, SELF SEALING Michelin tires.

I'm planning to bring the Bolt EV to both of the gatherings at the Golden Corral in Industry on March 4 and at Hometown Buffet in Santa Ana on March 18. Test rides will be offered.
 
Congratulations, Boomer, on the Bolt!! It seems like a very practical EV, and it appears that CCS Combo charging will end up being good enough for getting around most of California if you're patient.

We are still appreciating the pre-owned Model S that we purchased last year. It is roomy enough to comfortably enable family camping trips, as evidenced by its now having 80K miles on the odometer (7K driven by us in 4 months of having possession of the car). Last week, we returned from a six day trip to Death Valley, where we stayed at Furnace Creek Campground (NPS) and did some great hikes in a number of locations around the Valley, including Mosaic Canyon where the narrow canyon's walls are composed of marble. Getting there and back required only the use of the Supercharger in Inyokern, CA, as well as the use of an RV outlet at the campground. Being able to set our air suspension to "very high" helped our comfort level when navigating short dirt roads up to trailheads and when crossing large puddles on the main roads left behind by flash flooding.

Unfortunately, our 2012 Tesla shut down last month in a Trader Joe's parking lot and it turns out that the main battery pack had a fault due to moisture intrusion. So we're currently driving around on a loaner pack that appears to be relatively new (it charged to 264 rated miles in Death Valley). Tesla will either repair or replace our pack within several weeks or so. While it's regrettable that our car has had issues, we feel great about Tesla's service and intend to purchase the Model 3 that we reserved for an older family member who wants autonomous driving functionality.
 
See you Saturday the 4th of March at the Golden Corral in the City of Industry.
I should be arriving with Boomer in his new Bolt, right around 8 AM. :)

The meetings for the next few months are listed in this thread's first post:
http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=22460

Cheers, Gary
 
I'll be there! :) Won't have to leave early this time ether. Need to get some family photos with the spark and bolt together. ;)
 
Here's my report of our first long day trip in our Bolt EV today, down to Anza-Borrego. Tbleakne emailed that he would be going there as well with friends. I hope the terrible crowds didn't ruin their day too badly. I just laughed, and Carol just said "Keep driving". The crowds were horrific, their willingness to peep the same flowers as hundreds of other people adjacent to them was appalling, and we couldn't wait to get away from the major intersection that was stopping traffic into the valley and requiring rangers to direct traffic. You couldn't get near the visitor center. What a scene. And the flowers weren't nearly what the news stories are ballyhooing. Super bloom? Not yet.

Anyway, to my story..,

This was a particularly challenging trip because the elevation at Borrego Springs is just 600 feet, but it's surrounded by mountains and plains that are much taller. So the trip felt like heading for a hole in the ground as a destination. EV drivers know the challenges there.

And challenging because there are zero DC fast chargers anywhere east of Route 15, anywhere near where we were going, and darn few Level 2 plugs, though apparently there are 4 Blink Level 2 plugs in Borrego Springs.
This being our first ambitious outing with the car, we planned carefully, and mapped our charging opportunities with Plugshare.

We took our favorite route, down Rte 5 from Orange County, over the 3,500 foot coastal mountains on Ortega Highway, Rte 74 to Lake Elsinore, down Rte 15 to Temecula, DCFC at an EVgo station on Rte 79 while we ate take out breakfast from iHop, then East on 79 to Warner Springs and down into Borrego Springs. Then a fast, steep climb up to Julian (600 ft to 4,000 ft) for lunch and pie, a short 12 mile round trip explore out to Cuyamaca Lake and back to Julian, and then down Rte 78 to Escondido and back up Rte 5 and home. Two hundred ninety-five miles on one DC fast charge. We planned for another DCFC at Escondido on the way home, but we didn't need it and we didn't stop.

We got home having used just 65.2 kWh, traveling 295.3 miles, averaging 4.53 miles/kWh and with the app showing 65 miles remaining range and 23% SOC. We added 18.2 kWh at the DCFC charging stop. If you do the math, we did need the charge in order to make the trip, just barely. If we hadn't charged mid-trip, driving with that 4.53 mi/kWh efficiency with 60 available kWh would have given us only 272 miles of range, and we would have sputtered to a stop 23 miles short of home.

I drove the whole route mostly in L, using Regen On Demand rather than friction braking whenever possible. Freeway legs were kept to an average of 70 mph. We were lucky that air conditioning was needed for only a very few minutes and heating not at all. Temperatures varied from about 53 when we left home about 6 am, to about 70 when we arrived home, with a high of 90 on the desert floor for a short while (but it's a dry heat).
 
At our previous Gathering, on March 4th at the Golden Corral
in the City of Industry, we got to see and ride in Boomer's new
royal blue Bolt. It was the hit of the party by far, with a lot of
details well done ... with lots of "features" to explore and learn.
From the very usable bottom battery to the USB-cord connected
smartphone-sourced navigation, the Bolt appears to be a real
contender in the non-luxury but over-200-mile EV marketplace.

I think that we had about 15 people at the Gathering.
See you at the next Gathering, on the 18th at HTB in Santa Ana.

Remember, the first post of this thread lists the upcoming Gatherings.
The time jumped from 2am to 3am this morning, as Daylight Saving started.
Cheers, Gary
 
As a reminder, I'll be bringing the new Bolt EV to the breakfast meetup on Saturday morning at Hometown Buffet in Santa Ana.

Plenty of opportunities to see the car, check out anything you'd like, sit in it and try out the seats, go for a ride, whatever.
 
This will be an excellent chance to see the Bolt, and talk to someone who
is totally immersed in this new long range EV experience.

I am planning to be there at 8am, with Robert, to see you all.
Hometown Buffet is just 2 blocks East of I-5, on 17th street,
in Santa Ana.
 
Added attraction: A friend, Patrick, with a new Tesla X will also be coming. New to our group, I met him at a BMWi3 focus group over a year ago. He has both the BMW and the Model X.

He'll be happy to show off his recent production Model X in Saturday.

Big fun for EV nerds!
 
Any fellow members with long range EV's, we (myself, Hilda, LeafyD, etc) are heading out to see the Superbloom in the desert tomorrow. Anza Borrego area, Borego Springs, etc.

This might be a once in a lifetime event as the last time this happened was 13 years ago and it wasn't this big... If anybody is interested let me know.. there might be some space still in my car but any EV with over 120+ mi range can make it. There is L2 charging out there...


http://www.abdnha.org/pages/03flora/reports/current.htm

https://www.wired.com/2017/03/super-bloom-2017-california/

http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/the-conversation/sd-anza-borrego-desert-super-bloom-20170313-htmlstory.html

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-anza-borrego-wildflowers-20170310-story.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/anza-borrego-desert-superbloom_us_58c9b17ae4b0ec9d29d87842
 
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