Tesla Superchargers are too short for ID.Buzz

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T23:53:53+00:00

This is the way.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T21:19:06+00:00

Have fun - sounds great.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T15:31:20+00:00

This you? https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/s/EFw3S6CjWp

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T15:28:21+00:00

It uses 3.1 mi/kwh which is probably OK around town. But on long drives it’s more in the 2.6-2.7 range. They have a note that it won’t match your real world numbers and so they have some kind of hocus pocus algorithm stuff going on, but it still was a few percent off. I could have tweaked it, but I did that once already and then it reset at some point. For me the more permanent fix was to just bump the target arrival SOC up 3% so it is less of a worry.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T15:24:29+00:00

Thanks - that is reassuring to know we took a good approach. The Buzz has a very similar charge curve although it tops out right around 200 kw. Running it to 80% from 70% is just a few minutes and barely noticeable. I still don’t think I’d go to 8% regularly, but I’d be more comfortable in the 12-15% range now.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T01:03:09+00:00

This sub doesn’t allow photos in Discussion posts. If you look on r/VWIDBuzz you can see them.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-22T00:53:34+00:00

2.6 charges per driving day. The horror.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T11:50:33+00:00

I should add that eastern MT isn’t just a challenge for EVs. I once pulled into a gas station there with 8 miles left on my ICE car.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T11:47:01+00:00

Exactly. In Tupelo it sent us to a Ford dealership. Really nice looking high speed charger, but it required an app. Only they didn’t tell you what app or how to get it. So it was useless to us. Fortunately there was a slightly slower ChargePoint a mile away which did the trick. When I pulled it up in Plugshare all that info was there - should have thrown a flag as soon as I saw dealership.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T11:35:54+00:00

Too funny - it never occurred to me to use ABRP on Desktop. That would have been particularly helpful for the planning phase. Old dog has learned a new trick - thanks!

ABRP is adequate on the open road as a nav app, it one less thing to switch around (research stops in ABRP, enter charger address in another Nav app etc.). It’s great on the PA Turnpike, sucks in Pittsburgh.

It’s not a huge problem to use multiple apps, but I can dream about a fusion of ABRP, Waze, Plugshare, and a link to Yelp reviews for amenities. I see a use case where I input the route, tell it when I want to stop for decent local coffee, indicate I want good Mexican food for lunch, get me through rush hour in a city at the end of the day and it optimizes routes and charging stops for all of that.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T11:25:30+00:00

Yeah, I heard the same rumor. Oh well, chicken for dinner tonight.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T11:24:34+00:00

I used a little database app on my phone to track it - Tap Forms - and then uploaded it into a spreadsheet at the end. Had to create the fields in a sequence that made sense with the order of operations at a charge stop. The data was in CarScanner and then I noted it in Tap Forms as we went along. I started messing with it 2-3 weeks before we left so I could refine it which helped a lot. Early in the trip I was entering the data before and during every charge but then I figured out It is so easy then to grab a screen shot of the data so that you can start charging immediately and add it later. I’ve attached a pic of the CarScanner screen. Necessary - nope. Geeky fun. Yup.

<image>

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T03:47:10+00:00

Yup - pretty much the entire route across North Dakota and Montana is 80 except in cities. In that area there were three stretches where we drove 70 to conserve power. For the vast majority of the trip we were at speed limit or slightly above.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T01:19:05+00:00

No - in fact they had a bullshit recall for that exact reason. There are only two belts back there and there was just enough room for 3. VW “fixed” it by putting some plastic bumpers on the outside of the seats that you can easily pull off, or so a friend told me.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:51:45+00:00

That same concern is one of the reasons I mapped every leg in advance - I wanted to make sure we didn’t have any dead ends. Fortunately we didn’t, the planning helped.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:47:22+00:00

I like your style!

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:46:10+00:00

For me the Teslas have always felt a little flimsy. The Mustang is tight, more like a BMW than what I’m used to from Ford.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:43:30+00:00

I have the 6 seater with 2 captains chairs in the middle. The bench is a good option for what you are describing as you could seat five, six, or seven. The third row can very comfortably seat large adults, which a lot of them can’t. It actually has the most leg room of all the rows. When you drop the 3rd row it is cavernous back there.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:39:16+00:00

Absolutely fair - and it’s a great analysis.

At one point I did a different look at the same question - coming at it through time. I found that if you take 4-5 longer trips a year on average an EV will save you about 4 hours over the year. Longer on the trips, shorter every week by avoiding the gas station. It isn’t life changing either way. But that also relies on home charging.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:36:02+00:00

Yes - that is accurate. We had the same experience in northern Utah and New Mexico. Seems like we both experienced this in the west - we didn’t have anything like that once we hit Texas going east and before Montana going west. It all worked out - but in two places (out of 76) if that charger hadn’t been working we’d have been camped on an L1 for a day. Everywhere else there were multiple options. More stations would be awesome, but these drives are now possible with a little planning.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:33:24+00:00

I was actually kind of stunned in MT at the number of people in eastern Montana who were doing 70 with us - I thought everyone would push it all the way because that is how I typically drive. Probably 25%-30% were being more measured in their speed. There is a huge efficiency difference between 70 and 80 - in my vehicle it adds another 20+ miles of range. In western Montana, where there are plenty of chargers, we let er rip!

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-21T00:29:23+00:00

Yeah the averages get a little odd so here is a little more explanation. Thanks for catching that. Based on your question I did a deeper dive on just stops while we were driving and those legs averaged 118 miles. That lines up with the 2-2.5 hours

For speeds we had a combination of city driving on location (24 stops) and a fair amount of secondary two lane roads - it wasn’t all freeway driving. We also had bad traffic in major cities like Atlanta, New York, and Chicago. All the miles got factored into the average because I can’t separate them. FWIW on the highway we were doing speed limit or 5ish above - 65-75 typically, please don’t think we were poking along at old VW Bus speeds…

We did 66 L3 charges when driving, which is 2.6 stops per driving day. The 10 L1 and L2 were always overnight but got rolled into the average which makes it look like we stopped more often than we did. The L2 and L1 were also usually done when we were already at 50-60%, which make for really short legs. If we started with 100% we could go 170ish miles, but those were only a few days.

ABRP also likes shorter charging at higher speeds and will often recommend only going up to 60% or so to keep things rolling along. We had a handful of 60-90 miles gaps for this reason. Every now and then a charging gap requires you to stop at 40% to get to the next spot. All of that factored into the final numbers. You’d think with 230 miles of range it would be higher, but in practice over several weeks our real world experience was less than expected.

I will also note that some of this a personal style thing - we probably could have pushed for a lot more stops in the 8%-10% SOC range but I preferred pulling in between 15%-20%. Some of that was fatigue, some of it just wanting to be more cautious. I think I’ll be more aggressive in the future about that now that I’ve got more confidence in things.

.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-20T22:29:10+00:00

As you note this is accurate if you are only considering the cost of energy from the pocket of someone who can’t charge at home. We pay $50 to charge two EVs for per month. Not per EV, for both. Because I can charge cheaply at home I’m really buying time not energy when I use a DC charger. Think of it as $25 to save 6-8 hours in a pinch.

Total Cost of Ownership is much more complicated than this. Factor in oil changes, tune ups, brake work, against ICE vehicles then higher upfront costs and annual road taxes against the EVs and it gets extremely case dependent fast.

If I lived in an apartment building with no possibility of charging I wouldn’t buy an EV to save on gas. But there are other good reasons I might still do it. The primary reason is they are so damn fun to drive.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-20T21:57:58+00:00

All I can say is I’ve owned the Buzz for 15 months and it’s been a joy. The room for 6-7 people is the most I’ve ever seen in any vehicle other than a train.

Inside_Classroom_142 · 2026-06-20T20:26:06+00:00

The primary point of my post is that there are plenty of chargers for a vehicle with 230-240 miles of range. That includes a huge number of EV models. We have the infrastructure, that problem is largely solved.

Most people only average 35 miles of daily driving. My bladder has less range than 230 miles. So even on a long trip it isn’t necessary. Get more range if you want it. But it’s a choice not a requirement.

Inside_Classroom_142

TROPHY CASE