My Trip Report: BC2BC Return: Portland, OR to Sacramento, CA to Home (630 miles) June 24 - 26, 2012
NOTE: For real data-hounds I uploaded the XLS to GoogleDocs HERE.
Note 2: Not included are about 65 miles June 27 visiting SMUD, and 50 miles June 28 to hand LEAF to driver #3 in Davis.
I have duplicated GaslessInSeattle's data, since he was the first driver and handed me the data-logging sheets.
The return journey started on Sunday 6/24/2012 in Shoreline, GaslessInSeattle driving Tony's LEAF, and carrying one passenger. JohnnySeebring had departed in his LEAF for Portland the day before, and overnighted there to get "GasLess" and passenger back home. They arrived in Portland at Electric Avenue early, meeting Johnny, then drove both LEAFs to meet me at Amtrak PDX Union Station. I had arrived 35 minutes early. We chatted some, tried (unsuccessfully) to find Tony's AV-FOB and other EVSE station RFID cards. I ended up borrowing GaslessInSeattle's AV-FOB, and took off for Electric Avenue a little early. I made Electric Avenue my 16:00 departure point after parking there for a few minutes for photos.
After leaving Electric Avenue, Tony called back with his "hiding spot" for all the cards/AV-FOB. Since QCs every 25miles are so FAST(!), I decided to stop in Salem for 1hour L2, not only for a boost, but for enough time for a "real" dinner. Note: Each QC I used I stopped manually with the Stop Button on the AV station, to meet my desired target SOC.
Overnighted at Oakland (Rice Hill) Motel 6, where DC QC is located. Tried to do a timer charge (7am end time) to 80%, since next day would be frequent QCs. I authorized with the AV-FOB around 22:30. The timed charge FAILED ! I suspect the authorization may have expired at midnite or after the car was not drawing power for some time. Caught the error in time to do a QC in the morning (Monday 6/25) prior to 7am departure from 14 (GOM) to 44 (GOM).
Back in the little quaint town of Wolf Creek I located the PostOffice and mailed back GasLess's AV FOB. The two postal workers there had heard of the Mexico-to-Canada trip (northbound) on the news; they couldn't believe I was QC'ing nearby ! At the next stop, Grants Pass, I arrived with a relatively high SOC (52%) so I skipped the QC and L2'ed instead to minimize battery heating, while staying on the originally planned stops & schedule. In Ashland (below) I finally saw the effect of battery heating. Naturally, I could have skipped every 2nd QC, but my belief is it would have heated the battery more due to the larger total depth-of-charge/discharge.
As you can see above, despite the elevations to cover, I arrived an hour earlier than even my optimistic plan. Due to the fact that I was now entering the Slow-L2-Land of California (!) I relied heavily on drafting trucks (please see cautions in other posts). I did not need to do that in the Fast-QC-Land of Oregon. I had simply driven Tony's LEAF like any other car right near the speed limit (except the last 10 miles before Halsey, and except between Wolf Creek & Grants Pass).
I had originally (reluctantly) planned to use the backroads, despite my misgivings about the LEAF showing as a "weak EV" effect. But the experience of drafting prior to Shasta Lake, as well as prior experience in other EVs, convinced me the LEAF is a good drafting candidate. As you can see above, the flat stretch from Orland to Woodland (84 miles) was most interesting. The light tail wind did not amount to much, but at least it wasn't a cross-wind, which tends to play havoc with slipstreaming, and I was using A/C. Although I recorded 56mph, I know the (conservative) speedometer read 57 most of the time. The key data point, however, is the EE = 5.2. Per Tony's charts this is the equivalent of going 45mpg without any "help". The LeafCAN helped a lot with its real-time display of amps from the battery to optimize the distance from the truck (semi-safe, and energy conservation).
Elevation Charts: These are shown as I originally compiled them during trip planning. I did not actually stop at Woodburn, and in Salem I decided to go to the Nissan Dealer instead. Mount Shasta KOA was changed to Dunsmuir RailRoad RV Park. The first one is an overview of Portland to Ashland with subsequently more detail.
The charts show some of the "challenges". But, as we now know, in QC-land these "challenges" are easy-peasy. Not so south of Ashland, OR !
And that happened before I even got to Portland (like, prior to my departure around here at home and at the train station, and on the train Saturday night/Sunday).
See you soon !