Supercharger - Mountain View, CA (12 V2 stalls)

[chickensevil]

Hearing you guys complaining about CA locations... I hope some day our area gets that full to start nitpicking like that, haha! At least you have options for which road you want to take going North/South... On the east coast you have to come all the way out to 95 as pretty much your only option north/south right now, and 77 and 95 are separated by more than a couple hundred miles between Ohio and NJ/MD... Nevermind going down Eastern MD (Norfolk still not online yet) or 81... And the New York guys are really quite frustrated from what I have gathered.

So just remember, your area is better than pretty much everyone except for maybe Norway as far as coverage goes... and we are still only 3 years into this, and Tesla is growing as fast as they can manage. If it isn't right today, it will only get better tomorrow.

About location choices, they are bound to make some bad choices here and there, but overall Tesla has tried to put a decent amount of effort into picking good locations to Supercharge. As compared to locations put in by other companies... Whoever though that prioritizing charging outside of a Walgreens was a good idea, especially for L2 charging made a very bad decision. And if you are trying to drive greater than 1000 miles, you are very likely driving it just to drive it, as airline prices have gotten quite reasonable compared to making the trip in a gas car over the past few years. Not saying Tesla can't make better choices, or we all wouldn't prefer a bit faster recharge time, just that I don't see this as being a limiting factor for mass adoption come Model 3. The choice to road trip will be there, most will drive because they want to drive, not because they have to drive.

 

[Tyl]

Mountain View's superchargers are 135's...... we may see 150's sometime in the future....we'll see.


from seekingalpha.com


Elon:

Superchargers have really grown rapidly, I mean it’s sort of like kelp on steroids here. When we launched the Model S and just three years ago, there were no Superchargers anywhere, in fact we didn’t even tell people there were such things as Supercharger. People for the first six months of the car, bought the car not even knowing that there was, there were going to be Superchargers. And we would actually put a high voltage DC bypass in the car; people didn’t even know it was there. So, we opened the first Superchargers I think early in 2013, something like two years. And now you can travel almost anywhere in the U.S. using the Supercharger network and then going to some of next year. That’s next year. Thanks a lot.
So you can see that that’s from zero to that in three years and similar level of density is going to be the case for Europe as well as Asia and eventually we’re willing to go anywhere in the world using the Supercharger network. And we’re planning on some further upgrades to the Supercharger system. We’ve just introduced an upgrade which is a liquid cooled cable which means that the cable can be really thin. In fact, we have the first working version of that here at the Mountain View Supercharger location, so you can try it up for yourself. It has caused some customers to be quite puzzled that they are plugging a Supercharger with this tiny cord and they thought something was wrong but that’s actually just our next generation cord, because if the cord is liquid cool, you can actually make it very thin and subtle. So instead of trying to wrestles, it’s sort of a good sized snake into the car, it’s the thin subtle cord; it’s really great. And it also has the potential for increased power of the Supercharger long-term.

 

[brianman]

I personally think Tesla screwed up on the location of this SpC. They should have built it off I-280 by 85 or 84, away from densely-populated areas. Then it would truly be a "long-distance travel" SpC, which is what Tesla says their purpose is, and wouldn't be as hogged by locals as Shoreline. Half the cars were full of people waiting in their cars anyway, so it's not like they're coming to visit the computer history museum or something. Color me unimpressed...

The underlined confuses me. How does people waiting in their cars at a supercharger say anything about whether that location is a good choice or not?

At crowded locations, I prefer that everyone that's charging is in their car rather than off shopping or eating. Being in the car makes it more likely they'll leave soon after the needed charging has been accomplished rather than "sometime after, hopefully not measured in integer hours".

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Any markings/writing/printing/etc on these cables?

Yes. Sorry I didn't take a picture of the writing when I was there.

 

[Kbra]

Im not a huge fan of those pull forward chargers. Prefer the back in spots, though i see the draw for those who aren't comfortable with reverse. Maybe 7.0 will do it for them

 

[markb1]

Mountain View's superchargers are 135's...... we may see 150's sometime in the future....we'll see.


from seekingalpha.com


Elon:


<snip>
When we launched the Model S and just three years ago, there were no Superchargers anywhere, in fact we didn’t even tell people there were such things as Supercharger.
<snip>

Elon is incorrect about the part in bold. Supercharging was listed as a feature before the Model S started shipping. From archive.org:

Model S Options and Pricing | Tesla Motors

 

[brianman]

It might have just been my imagination, but one thing that struck me at the MV location was that the width of the stalls looked much roomier than I'm used to seeing at superchargers.

 

[dhanson865]

New cables are cool though, didn't feel that flimsy at all. I took a photo of the cable with a quarter for reference.

View attachment 83989

Wow, a quarter. That looks like it might be from the 70s. I hardly ever see change anymore and when I do its usually the new quarters in the 1999 to 2009 or 2010 to 2021 series.

I wonder how many other people find change to be uncommon.

 

[wk057]

Yes. Sorry I didn't take a picture of the writing when I was there.

Based on the quarter-assisted scale image, I'd be willing to be the main conductors are similar to the HPWC, either #6 or #8. The cable will say something like "2C6" or something similar to indicate. Little far from me to check personally....

 

[TEG]

 

[glenhurst]

I hope those cooling vents at the bottom of the charger are not bothered by snow. Since they're giving off heat, I suppose they would just melt the snow. But I still worry that in the spring when the snow melts, there will be dirt, salt, and debris that could block the vents.

 

[sorka]

This location is useless and will do more harm than good as the NAV routes true long distance travelers to this location only to find that the stalls are always used by Google employees who are using this location as a destination charger and will just leave their cars there all day until they're ready to leave. Therefor folks will wait until they realize that nobody is going to vacate. I will avoid this location like the plague.

 

[bxr140]

As previously noted, Google has plenty of chargers. Theres no point in not charging at work only to supercharge down the street from work.

What is a problem is the roadster that is EVing 3B right now....

 

[Benjamin Brooks]

This location is useless and will do more harm than good as the NAV routes true long distance travelers to this location only to find that the stalls are always used by Google employees who are using this location as a destination charger and will just leave their cars there all day until they're ready to leave. Therefor folks will wait until they realize that nobody is going to vacate. I will avoid this location like the plague.

I'm fairly confident Tesla will contact people who leave their car parked in the SuperCharger stalls all day. Yes, it will be a busy SuperCharger even without Google employee squatters, but I don't think that will be a big percentage of the problem in the long run.

 

[hans]

This location is useless and will do more harm than good as the NAV routes true long distance travelers to this location only to find that the stalls are always used by Google employees who are using this location as a destination charger and will just leave their cars there all day until they're ready to leave. Therefor folks will wait until they realize that nobody is going to vacate. I will avoid this location like the plague.

But Google has chargers for employees in their own parking lots. Why would they use the Tesla supercharger when it's more convenient to charge at their own lot?

 

[Bet TSLA]

This location is useless and will do more harm than good as the NAV routes true long distance travelers to this location only to find that the stalls are always used by Google employees who are using this location as a destination charger and will just leave their cars there all day until they're ready to leave. Therefor folks will wait until they realize that nobody is going to vacate. I will avoid this location like the plague.

You realize you are just making this up? What's your point? I'm pretty sure that with 12 stalls it will all be fine. But the truth is that we just don't know anything yet. We'll see how it goes.

 

[sorka]

You realize you are just making this up? What's your point? I'm pretty sure that with 12 stalls it will all be fine. But the truth is that we just don't know anything yet. We'll see how it goes.

We have plenty of level II chargers at my work too but if I had a access to tesla supercharger within a short walking distance of my office, I'd pick it first.

 

[cantdecide]

Yep... I expect that between Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, 23andme, intuit, BMW research there would be ability to charge 1000 cars at once Already... And most of those charge 2 per day after a lunch switchover.
There is no reason for someone to waste time waiting for a supercharge 10 minutes walk from work when they can gain 150 miles per day at their office.

 

[hans]

Yep... I expect that between Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, 23andme, intuit, BMW research there would be ability to charge 1000 cars at once Already... And most of those charge 2 per day after a lunch switchover.
There is no reason for someone to waste time waiting for a supercharge 10 minutes walk from work when they can gain 150 miles per day at their office.

And be in the cool shade of the huge solar canopies in the google parking lots.

 

[Bet TSLA]

We have plenty of level II chargers at my work too but if I had a access to tesla supercharger within a short walking distance of my office, I'd pick it first.

I'd say that says more about you than others.

 

[sorka]

I'd say that says more about you than others.

I seriously doubt google will let you park your car in a level II spot all day long. Most companies, even the ones that have a lot of chargers, have rotating time slots. Good for a Nissan Leaf but I doubt there are spots at Google where you can just leave your MS all day long to charge.

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I'd say that says more about you than others.

Geez. If only I were special