Tesla Supercharger Membership Pricing Announced For Non-Tesla EV Owners ($0.99/month)

[Tahoe Man]

Don't think having proprietary charging networks will work. Need to have the charger companies (EA, Chargepoint, etc) own the convenience stores. Similar to the gas station model.

It does work. You're selling your vehicles not the electricity by having your own network. You're providing the service and experience. You can dictate if you want to make a profit, be neutral or have a loss from it.

As I said upstream, having your customers on YouTube driving around and saying their family got stranded and the likes is bad for business.

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[emoore]

It does work. You're selling your vehicles not the electricity by having your own network. You're providing the service and experience. You can dictate if you want to make a profit, be neutral or have a loss from it.

As I said upstream, having your customers on YouTube driving around and saying their family got stranded and the likes is bad for business.

Wonder why car companies didn’t do that with ICE gas and gas stations.

 

[mkg3]

It's reasonable to believe that the Rivian Adventure Network will be similar. It's a lot easier when you only support one vehicle make with limited models.

It is reasonable to believe RAN will work the same way...someday.

How many RAN stations currently? Three? Four? How many stalls at each ? When are they going to build it out. Probably with the same schedule pace as R1 production...

As for one make with few models, that's the whole point isn't it. They figured it out and made it work world-wide.

Rivian will have exactly two models to support initially, then whatever R2 variants will be.

 

[LTD in CBTS]

It does work. You're selling your vehicles not the electricity by having your own network. You're providing the service and experience. You can dictate if you want to make a profit, be neutral or have a loss from it.

As I said upstream, having your customers on YouTube driving around and saying their family got stranded and the likes is bad for business.

Agreed and Rivian will be offering a paid membership that will include "free charging" at their RAN locations I believe but you will be paying a monthly fee (TBD) and they are probably betting you charge at home more than on the road (at the 3 currently existing chargers) so they will make money on the membership. Membership is free for a year apparently but that only benefits folks in a couple locations right now. If I recall during the IPO prospectus that they were counting on significant revenues from their membership service. I will pay for it as long as they build out what they promised in the RAN in a reasonable period of time. But alas I have no truck yet. And I got tortured today watching a beautiful blue one that was right in front of me on El Camino Real in La Costa.

 

[mkg3]

I find it hard to believe you have never had to wait for a super charger in Southern California. I have had to wait at super chargers in Riverside county, LA county, Orange County, San Diego county and San Bernardino county.

I don't use superchargers locally because I charge overnight at home. I only used it on road trips. That said, I have gone up and down the west coast on 101, 5, 99 and round trips well over 1,200 miles many times over the past 4 years.

 

[Dirty_B]

No details so too early to tell what the actual terms are but as a Tesla owner and having used the Superchargers, I have never found one that's not working anywhere.

I look forward to signing up. Much rather have a choice of anywhere between 8 to 50 supercharger stalls at any given location than just 2~4 stalls, with some of them not working...

As for the rate, its location and time of the day dependent.

I second that and will join as soon as a CCS dispenser is added. In 4yrs, never encountered a not working SC, have had to wait 3x, and find most locations have a min of 8 stalls and as many as 18... Vs maybe 4.

The downside is Tesla still has a lot of V1 and 2 chargers.

 

[atebit]

Got it, thanks. I can see one also in Santa Monica. 12 wall connectors, Lincoln SM. 20 miles away...

thats the only one I see in the whole US. 2146 miles from me.?

 

[Dirty_B]

... don't use/rely on EA.

I don't now and will never if I can avoid it.

 

[SASSquatch]

Sigh.. first hand report or based on other peoples feedback? Since I easily did a 5000 mile road trip only using EA (with the exception of one stop at the RAN station in Salida) it would be hard for me to agree it is 'hot garbage'

I mean you have a right to your opinion but I find most people slamming EA have never used EA. Then you have some others that slam EA because a stall or two are down but still are able to reliable charge at the working stations and get on their way and then you have the third camp that want to blame the chargers for problems with their vehicle. Could EA be better, do better, absolutely but lets be real here.

I think it will be great if Tesla opens their network, specifically for remote locations or when other infrastructure is down for whatever reason. More options are great. If it is anything like Tesla's open network in the EU it will be more expensive and very few non Tesla cars will use it.

I was literally stranded at an EA charger location one time in my i3. Called customer service, spent over an hour trying to troubleshoot.

That's when a bunch of dudes came out of nowhere and started messing with the machine. I thought I was being punked or something. Little did I realize, I was at their corporate headquarters in Reston, VA. The customer service person I was talking to was in a building 10 yards away.

It took them another half hour to get their system working and for my troubles they used their corporate credit card to pay for my charge.

I think there was a time when they were "hot garbage" but they have been getting better.

 

[texasBuzzard]

Agreed

Do you have to use your own adapter to have the Tesla charger for the Rivian port? If so, does anyone have any advice on the proper adapter?

 

[rhumbliner]

Wonder why car companies didn’t do that with ICE gas and gas stations.

https://americacomesalive.com/when-...-were-first-used-where-did-they-get-gasoline/

They probably didn’t think it was necessary in order to sell their vehicles. Originally, small hardware and grocery stores sold gasoline until the oil companies stepped in and started opening up dedicated gasoline and auto repair stations.

 

[Perkmeup]

I am very excited to see that Tesla will be opening up their charging network to all EV's. I have no issues in paying a little more for charging, even if it's around $0.50 kWh. When I'm on a road trip and need some juice.I really don't care how much it is..I just want it to be there when I need it.

I do think this is a good thing for tesla as well, as it will bring in additional money to help maintain their network, as I think a lot of areas of the country are far from bringing in enough money to cover the maintenance..such as remote areas of Montana or Wyoming...and most certainly other areas of the country As well. Those chargers just sit idle all the time with very few users..this will bring more usage to them and more money.

I think Rivian will eventually do the same thing, once their network is built out a little. For me..I want to be able to drive from Seattle to Montana and not have to worry about finding a charge station that is working...I don't care who owns the charge station….or how much is costs (within reason of course)….as long as I know it‘s going to work!

also….think about what this will do for the folks that want to tow with a Rivian….now they will have reliable charging about every 100 miles or less..….imagine actually having choices on where to charge ?

 

[LTD in CBTS]

Just something to think about. Teslas charge from the back left of the car. Tesla fast charging stations have cords that are about 4 ft long. In order for a Rivian to charge there (front left port), it would have to park in an adjacent stall in order to get a cord to reach the port thereby essentially consuming two charger port stalls since the empty adjacent one will no longer be available for a Tesla. This situation will lead to fist-o-cuffs here in SoCal where Teslas are a dime a dozen and fast chargers are constantly full. I am fortunate to have solar and home charging and I cannot wait for my Rivian but I don't think opening up Tesla chargers to non Teslas is a good idea unless people are willing to buy and carry long adapter cords and then actually use them. It is already entertaining enough (in a sad way) trying to watch Tesla owners backing into narrow charging stalls (while never using the back up cameras with computer guide rails). Just wait until someone backs in (2 minutes later) to find that its little charging cord is being used by the person in the next stall charging a non-testa. Aint going to be pretty. Could be good theater.

 

[domoplaytime]

unless people are willing to buy and carry long adapter cords

Won't they also have to be liquid cooled like the Supercharger cables to handle the intense amount of power transmitted?

I hope that Tesla's CCS cables are longer to accommodate varying car sizes, with no option for non Teslas to draw power from Tesla-only stalls. Is there even an adapter for Tesla to CCS that can handle the requirements of a Supercharger?

 

[Bobthebuilder352]

It's garbage, first hand experience here. I have to do the EA dance everytime I've attempted to use it (plug in, attempt to start, unplug, try again).

There's also Rivian/Lightning owners on Youtube that travel a ton of and post videos about their charging expiriences, and it isn't good. They're on this forum too I believe.

https://www.youtube.com/c/AllElectricFamily

Between it’s spottiness and expense I do what I can to avoid EA.

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