4 Day Yosemite Trip in R1T

[zipzag]

I've never seen a public level 2 charger > 7kw.

What was the charge rate for the Yosemite waypoint chargers.

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[Grandizer52]

Awsome write up/ Adventure!!!! Nice addition of the point piece as well. YES/NO the government should throw two-tree dollars at EV chargers, they have tossed money towards the oil companies, now help us out, and we'll pay it back.
Awsome adventure too!!!!! bucket list to hit Yosemite park.

 

[pc500]

I've never seen a public level 2 charger > 7kw.

What was the charge rate for the Yosemite waypoint chargers.

They are supposed to all be 11kw, but not saying there aren't some downgrades for electric service availability.

 

[Lionel_Hutz]

Great trip report and very useful information.

I have to say this is the type of trip that makes me a bit anxious about leaving Tesla, as much as I want to for other reasons. We did that exact same trip with a Model Y last summer, and charging was a total afterthought--tons of supercharging on that route, including at a hotel right outside the park. Never got below 20% SoC and never had to stop to charge when I wouldn't have gotten out to stretch anyhow. Not sure how I would have felt about juggling multiple charging networks and wonky chargers.

Here's hoping things continue to improve quickly for fast charging in CA.

 

[DannyC]

I drove in conserve mode on the freeways but switched to all purpose on the windy roads in the park. Used the driver+ a lot and that works pretty good. Really have to pay attention when the lines are not well defined or just are not there. A few scary moments where the truck quickly steered toward the wall because the line disappeared and the wall became the line. Not sure if it would have hit the wall but if your not paying attention that could end badly.

Then adaptive cruise works really well except on the curvy roads. So still manual driving on the curved roads but that's a fun drive anyways.

 

[keithndeborah]

Just got back from a 4 day trip to Yosemite with the R1T. They do have FREE chargers in the valley but almost all of them have Teslas' plugged into them, need more Rivians' down there! Some pictures of the Rivian Blue R1T in Yosemite.

Updated with details:

We drove from San Diego, Was a 1032 mile round trip including a few trips in and out of the valley. Efficiency was 2.16mi/kWh and 477 kWh used. The efficiency going in and out of Yosemite valley was great! Slow 35 to 40ish mph and the up and down hills sipped the electrons from the battery. The suspension on the Rivian handled the curvy roads with ease.

Went up the 5 though LA and came in the south entrance from the 41 (from Fresno) where you come through the tunnel and see the valley open up with an "awwwwwwww" moment!

Fast charging was a mixed experience as most of my fast charging is. The first stop in Valencia was at an EVgo charger. Took us 10 minutes to find it as the directions from their app put us in the wrong mall. Found it across the street next to a Whole Foods. So plugged in and had breakfast at Whole Foods. The charging was fine, got a good charge in and continued on.

Next stop was in Fresno at a Walmart on the Electrify America chargers. The initial charge stopped after just 15 minutes and I had to go out and start it again. No idea why it stopped but anyone could press a button to stop it. Soooooo who knows. Started it again and left there with about an 80% charge.

In Yosemite there was a 7kw charger near our cabin and the chargers in the park are 7kw and FREE! Installed by Rivian. So I would park at a free charger in the park and walk around all day with the free electrons flowing in. Did I mention it was free.

Going home we stopped at another Walmart with Electrify America in Tulare and had issues there. First charger that is a 350kw I plugged in, got to 200kw within a minute and then I walked away to lunch. Lunch was a 10 minute walk so after 20 minutes I checked and it was only charging at 40kw. This is with the battery at about 25% soc. When we got back to the truck I tried again and it gets to 200kw pretty quick and then after a few minutes goes down to 40kw. Moved to another charger and that seemed to work fine.

Then back to the EVgo charger in Valencia again and had no issues there, fast charged quickly Browsed around the Whole Foods picked out a few new things to try and were on our way home.

As for time, beyond eating meals because we need to do that anyways and not going to count the charging while parking and walking around the park. I say it cost us an extra hour total.

I calculated that trip would be about $350 in gas (in my RAM 1500 with a HEMI) and it ended up costing us less than $70 in charging fees. Don't forget we are paying over $6 a gallon here in California.

More:

I was lucky to get spots on both days with all the Teslas' around. I would not mind seeing a reasonable fee for non-Rivian cars so that we actually get a chance to use these chargers. I was happy to see that with full parking lots, ICE vehicles were not taking the charging spots! The clean air spots here in California are a joke, just walk a bit more and get a spot like everyone else. But charger spots are just that, there is a 5 foot cable attached to a machine, if you are parked there and have no reason to be, park somewhere else.

I see ICE vehicles park in charge only spots sometimes but so far it has not been an issue for me personally. Would really piss me off and I would leave a note.

I will state that I am not a fan of subsidies as I don't like the government picking winners and creating losers with shared tax payer money. I am totally fine with paying for the power and offsetting the cost of charging infrastructure. I do understand that without these government incentives there would be a lot less chargers. Hopefully it becomes profitable to install these chargers and we will see a lot more of them. =s0===0n=

I know that gas stations typically make little to no money on the gas pumps and the convenience store pays for everything. I see that being true for chargers, but they are going to have to have a "destination" attached to them for that to work.

Even met one on the way up!

Danny, Thanks for that. We're going to Yosemite for a week towing an Airstream at the end of June as we pick up our LE tomorrow.

 

[DannyC]

The chargers in Yosemite put in by Rivian are 7kw. I too have never seen 11kw public chargers like what I have at home. Not sure if it has to do with wiring/circuit limits or some sort of code requirement that makes it harder to install the larger wiring/circuit.

Would be nice to have the full power level 2 chargers at 11,500 watts in more places (generally referred to as 11kw).

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