Street Smart in San Diego

[KarlK]

Here are the pictures that I was able to take, but not as good as Randy's. This is my first attempt at "Flickr", so I hope that this works right. I am going to be adding the pictures that show me in the car, but the did not email for some reason. Please give me feedback, and I would appreciate it if someone can tell me how to rotate the pictures.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/53984456@N08/with/4987996884/

Karl Kirker
Mossy Nissan of El Cajon
EV Sales Specialist
(619) 588-0500
[email protected]

 

[mwalsh]

I would appreciate it if someone can tell me how to rotate the pictures.

Editing software generally, though Windows Picture and Fax Viewer can do it.

 

[mossyleaf]

Nice pics Karl. Thanks for taking them.

 

[Randy]

Tom from Nissan told me that he was the one who drove it down, and he just made a quick statement that he drove at about 70-73mph for the duration and it was "Fine". I was about to stick my USB stick in the audio system and probably should have asked him more questions about the drive, but I was salivating too much and shaking at the thought of getting to hear my tunes in the Leaf....

 

[DaveEV]

Frank, I thought of you when I took the photo of the stats screen that shows miles per kWH. The Nissan rep said that he had driven the car down from LA on the freeway to get it to SD, so that number might be indicative of some freeway driving...

Any idea from/to where specifically? That's pretty close to the limit of the Leaf depending on how you are driving.

 

[kmp647]

I think everyone would like to know where he drove from at those speeds

might help us on those range estimates!

 

[indyflick]

I thought the NAV said it had traveled 93 miles. So if much of that was at 70 mph, I'm impressed. It is all highway from that location up to OC. By the way the average kWh/miles number showed **.* There has been a lot of speculation on that metric. I thought it was interesting that it had apparently been disabled.

 

[Randy]

My picture 02.jpg shows 194 miles on the car, 113.3 on the Trip A odometer, and a range left of 93 miles.

My picture 45.jpg shows the average miles / kwh to be 4.2. The instant reading was blank, of course, because the car was standing still. This picture also shows the 93 miles of range left.

 

[mossyleaf]

MIssion Viejo, but had a charge overnight somewhere else really close by :roll:

 

[SanDust]

I thought the three test SDG&E EV tariffs vary to save only a cent or two for EV charging, but go up nickles or dimes at "peak" times. That is OK for EV charging on a 2nd meter, but generally not good for whole-house use with afternoon A/C as the biggest load.

Also, SDG&E does not appear to have a good way for solar PV generation to offset EV charging. Currently, one-meter net-metering seems closest (almost) to "fair" for those with PV and EV (is that PVEV?).

I thought the tariffs varied a lot. The one with little variance between the rates at various times of the day seems very similar to the existing separately metered rates, but the other two have wide variations between the super-off peak and peak -- like six cents super-off peak versus thirty-eight cents peak. Six cents is about half the normal rate. I'm assuming if you have to pay $.38 per kWh you'll find some other way to do it. (What's somewhat weird is that for nine bucks or something a month you can have a second meter with breakers so you'd think they would just have used this for the test rather than going through all this process to figure out if your panel can handle a 240 circuit).

With your PV system, if you're producing more than you're using, just plug the Leaf into a standard 110 outlet and call it a day. For a lot of people even the 3.3 kW charger will be overkill.

 

[SanDust]

Translation: Of course I want my "free" charger and L3 port, which I don't believe is a direct cost to SDG&E, and I want to share my data, but I don't want to be penalized for simply having gone too far too soon down the path of doing something sustainable (generating much of our own supply, at considerable expense).

If you're really producing 3K - 4K kWh more than you're using then, absent the "freebies", you would just install a 3.3 kW unit and never pay anything on a monthly basis. Basically to get the freebies you have to pay ever month. Not really a penalty more like having to weigh the cost/benefit of the freebies.

You could of course take the freebies and just plug the car into one of your standard 110 outlets. That should work most of the time. Probably most days a faster charger would probably not be needed.

 

[LEAFer]

Avoiding use of the "blink" ... will certainly skew the data they are trying to collect :mrgreen:

But hopefully not void any commitments you sign up for (agreement posted in another thread somewhere).

 

[kmp647]

MIssion Viejo, but had a charge overnight somewhere else really close by :roll:

ok so I am not from CA but mission viejo to san diego is 74 miles
mostly at hwy speeds depending on traffic down I5

thats pretty strong

 

[derkraut]

MIssion Viejo, but had a charge overnight somewhere else really close by :roll:

ok so I am not from CA but mission viejo to san diego is 74 miles
mostly at hwy speeds depending on traffic down I5

thats pretty strong

Yup...I-5 from Mission Viejo southbound thru Oceanside is usually similar to the Indy 500 on race day. CHP takes in lots of money along this route. I'd have to assume the leaf was "humming along" to keep up with traffic on that stretch.

 

[SanDust]

ok so I am not from CA but mission viejo to san diego is 74 miles
mostly at hwy speeds depending on traffic down I5

It would be closer to 65 miles since they ended up in at Kearny Mesa Nissan, which is north of downtown San Diego. Traveling at 70-73 MPH would put you in one of the two right hand lanes. That's well above highway speeds, which are more 45-55 MPH. (The EPA Highway Cycle is more like a rural road drive).

Then it took Sunday to charge it!

 

[SanDust]

Avoiding use of the "blink" ... will certainly skew the data they are trying to collect :mrgreen:

But hopefully not void any commitments you sign up for (agreement posted in another thread somewhere).

Without looking at the agreement, mandating use of the charger would as a practical matter be impossible to enforce. And what could they do? Take the fast charger on the car back?

The most obvious solution would be for them to allow the two meters to be netted out. But even if they came to that conclusion, as a regulated utility, they might not be able to implement this solution. They had to go through a process to get the experimental rates approved.

Given that they're in front of the PUC now on how to handle excess production of PV systems, they might want to work that into this process. Otherwise they're just going to force people to be switching back and forth between outlets. One (of many) complications is that the EV tariff is based on time of day and the standard tariff isn't (though that may be changing).

 

[indyflick]

Yup...I-5 from Mission Viejo southbound thru Oceanside is usually similar to the Indy 500 on race day. CHP takes in lots of money along this route. I'd have to assume the leaf was "humming along" to keep up with traffic on that stretch.

Exactly! You try to go with the flow of traffic. Then you notice you're doing 85mph and being passed on both sides! Occasionally you'll see a red dot in your rear view mirror which turns out to be a Porsche coming from behind attempting a land speed record. When he flies by, your car rocks from the wake turbulence.

I wonder if the speeds will decrease on that stretch with more and more electric cars? Drivers will likely become more aware of speed to extend their range I would think. I guess I'll be traveling on the shoulder going 65 until then.

 

[Frank]

ok so I am not from CA but mission viejo to san diego is 74 miles
mostly at hwy speeds depending on traffic down I5

It would be closer to 65 miles since they ended up in at Kearny Mesa Nissan, which is north of downtown San Diego. Traveling at 70-73 MPH would put you in one of the two right hand lanes. That's well above highway speeds, which are more 45-55 MPH. (The EPA Highway Cycle is more like a rural road drive).

Then it took Sunday to charge it!

I heard from a reliable source that when the Leaf arrived in San Diego from Mission Viejo that it had approximately 20 miles of charge remaining. Now if we only knew if Tom from Nissan was using the AC during his drive. If he drove during the day, the temp was in the low 70s so there wouldn't be a need for AC. But to keep the wind noise down maybe he did use the AC with the windows up.

 

[mossyleaf]

I have a strong suspicion that the A/C was blowin, Eco mode was off, and the gas pedal was firmly depressed.

 

[LEAFer]

I have a strong suspicion that the A/C was blowin, Eco mode was off, and the gas pedal was firmly depressed.

WHAT gas pedal ? :lol: