BC2BC-2014 All Electric Vehicle Rally, 1500 miles from Mexico to Canada

Heya Tony - I like the idea of the different vehicle classes for people to participate in. I'll need to see details, but my immediate reaction is that the unlimited class (which I assume is designed to get the Model S participants to do some work) is probably going to be more than I will attempt in the Roadster. Any ideas on timeline when we'll get details on the routes?

I looked at Team Crazy Daddy's last post. I went up 101 home the same general route he did, including getting a picture of the Roadster going through that tree. I've got to find that and get it posted The NorCal and Oregon coastal charging options are sparse out there, and probably shortened my planned travel days from ~300 miles to ~200 miles, and eventually forced me back to I-5 to finish he trip. I know the West Coast Electric Highway folks are filling in 101 in Oregon - I hope we see some similar activity along that route in California. That route did help me find the coolest place to charge an EV ever. (Somebody described it that way on Plugshare or Recargo - I agree).

Heh - I don't know the official EPA range for the Roadster. I know standard charges are to 170-180ish, and range charges will go to 220 on my car; I think original Roadster range charged to 245 miles. As we all learned clearly on the trip, the extra battery range is nice, but its the charging speed that really matters That's where things get tough for the Roadster and the Rav4EV (admittedly, not tough like it got for the Leafs when they got away from the DC charging infrastructure - there's a theme there around how DC charging infrastructure changes the utility of these cars).

We need somebody that drives a Model S to weigh in on what might work for the Unlimited class. Best idea I can think of would be a series of checkpoints for the unlimited class that keeps bringing them back to Hwy 1 / 101. That probably means a lot of weaving back and forth to the Supercharger corridor and then back to the coast (and after my experience with the charging infrastructure along the coast, staying on the coast sounds like work).

A checkpoint at the Solar Living Institute (link above) - I'd like to visit those folks again.

adiggs said:

Heh - I don't know the official EPA range for the Roadster...

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I think they quoted 245.

See the "driving range" bar on this chart:

No DC charging capability? The challenge with that is that the Leaf and iMiev do have DC charging ability, and one of my interesting ah-hah's from BC2BC 2013 is that the Roadster with its bigger battery is at a disadvantage to the Leafs when following the WCEH; DC charging ability on the car and a well built network makes a dramatic difference in the road trip utility of the car.

Maybe a mix of battery size (EPA range) plus DC charging capability, where >100 mile EPA range PLUS DC charging capability puts you into the Unlimited class.

Any idea yet of how the rally will change between the Unlimited and 100 Mile classes?

Ahh - then maybe there's no issue for me. I'm fine with finishing at the back of the pack in the Unlimited class. As competitors go, I suck My only worry is being expected to drive 1000 miles for a 600 mile stage for instance - that's at least 3 days in the Roadster, where it's 2 in a Model S. I'd be completely fine with times that made me competitive (or not) in the 100 Mile class, while being officially scored in the Unlimiteds. But I just liked the road trip experience and the excuse to see some of the world and meet some neat people.

TonyWilliams said:

100 Mile Class - any street legal car EPA rated below 100 miles with stock battery capacity

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I probably missed "already answered" but in case not:

1. which EPA test (2 cycle, 5 cycle, something else)?
2. < or <= 100 ?
3. if the vehicle was 140 rated new but 70 rated now due to degradation does it qualify?

TonyWilliams said:

What car is rated at 140?

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A random example.

Pretend I said "a 245 roadster with significant degradation bringing it down to 70 rated".

TonyWilliams said:

We're not going to try and determine how much degradation, or any other parameter of the battery, except for the EPA rated range.

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So brand new Model Whatever have an advantage over older Model Whatever (with significant degradation) for example?

(Not a critique, just wanting to clarify.)

Yep - that's part of the challenge and the experience of making the border to border drive (that the batteries degrade over time, to some degree or another).

Of course SC enabled Teslas have it easy, but it also turns out that DC quick charge enabled Leafs do awfully well in Washington and Oregon compared to Tesla's that don't have DC charging available (Roadsters, Model S during the time of the BC rally last year). And then did as relatively poorly as you would expect when we got into California where the DC quick charging network isn't built out very well (well built in the Bay Area and So Cal, but poorly in between and in the Northern end of the state). As a mechanism for drawing attention to the state of the charging network and the corresponding utility that brings to EV's, the event is brilliantly conceived Tony!


To the clarification Tony, we know that for road tripping purposes, a big battery gets you off to a good start and provides options that are not otherwise available. Charging speed is the primary determinant of the rate at which you cover ground though. So both are important to performance in the rally. Basing the classifications on EPA range seems like a reasonable way to separate the classes to me, and I realize that will make it especially tough on Roadsters and Rav4EVs. If the unlimited class gets significantly extra mileage to cover rather than just a separate classification for ranking purposes, then that will probably increase the difficulty beyond what I would take on in the Roadster.

I do hope there is at least one Roadster in this year's rally.

@adiggs - Probably need to put 90 and 120 SC vehicles in different classes. Minutes matter.

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adiggs said:

Yep - that's part of the challenge and the experience of making the border to border drive (that the batteries degrade over time, to some degree or another).

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Do you really think it's a good idea that an identically specced 2015 Model S will pretty much always against a 2012 Model S due to degradation? That kind of says "competition open only to brand new vehicles". Seems bad to me.

And it provides us with a regular way of seeing how the technology is changing the experience with our cars. I know for me, a big learning for me was how well you can get around in WA/OR in a Leaf. Part of the decision making process for the Roadster for me was based on the idea that with the bigger battery, I would have a bigger area and less thought put into driving the car (good thought - that worked).

Another part of that decision making process was that I could head up to Seattle or down to Eugene (I do that 3-5 times/decade, so obviously that was an important point for my buying decision (yes - sarcasm)), and I figured that would be easier in the Roadster (didn't want to wait for M X). Turns out that for back and forth to Seattle, I might be better off in a Leaf. At the very least, it's not a huge edge for the Roadster, and that's entirely due to the DC charging network that's been built out. You can also see some of that coming out in the BC2BC blog posts by the Leaf drivers, and how much easier they navigated WA/OR than big chunks of CA.

We also all experienced how trivial the rally became when we left Santa Rosa for the Model S's - they had just had the 101 SC's switched on (like literally the day before we went through there - no fair!). The Model S's were basically able to drive the course twice from there on (that was the first time they had significant SC access during the summer rally). Just to demonstrate how easy they had it, I think all of the Model S's hit all of the last day checkpoints, drove to the border to officially end the rally, and then drove back north to the end of rally dinner / party. I was going more or less flat out just to get to the party and skipped all of the bonus checkpoints. After the party, that's when I finished the last hour or so south to the border.

I guess at the end of the day, you are right - minutes do matter. And we'll find that the most recently built vehicles using the most recent technology will have a big advantage over older vehicles. That's how I would expect it to be - the technology is moving fast and the capability of the cars is changing fast. I think that having that result show up in the Rally results is completely fine.

One last thought - I hope that we continue to see a wide variety of cars and manufacturers in the Rally. If it turns into primarily a Model S rally next year, or S/X the year after that, then that will be bad for all of us. Part of what makes it so good is seeing just how big of a difference these different bits of technology go together and make a difference in the lives of the owners. I have a vague idea of how hard the Leaf drivers had to work to make it back and forth, and that's frankly more work than I would want to put into the rally. I'm pretty sure that my level of effort to get back and forth in the Roadster is more effort than many others would want to put in, yet I had a great time and learned a lot - about my car, and about EV's in general. For me, the purpose of the rally is that educational effort, and thus, mission accomplished.

That seems reasonable to me. I agree with the POV that a Roadster and other >100 mile EV has an advantage over the <100 mile EV's, and that it is an important one to reflect in the classifications.

I also agree that the DC charging capability, once you get into a "mid-range" battery pack lets that vehicle behave more like a S85 than not. That describes the landscape today - I won't be surprised if the landscape has changed by Summer 2015 with a mid-range DC enabled EV available that will muddy things up more (good!). A 150 mile range Leaf with DC quick charging would be awfully compelling I gotta say.

Worth noting that some of the S60's will fall into the Unlimited category due to SC access.