Charging across Europe

[EVsince2016]

Aye but add on 400from me to the tunnel. But I’m still considering the whole trip.

Yes, I guess 400 miles in the UK is like 600+ in France / Spain etc! I can get to central France or into Germany quicker than the central Scotland.

 

[Archev]

Yes, I guess 400 miles in the UK is like 600+ in France / Spain etc! I can get to central France or into Germany quicker than the central Scotland.

Yeah it smacks of backtracking a wee bit.
There used to be a ferry to the continent from Rosyth on the opposite bank of the river Forth from me. There’s still boats from Newcastle and Hull I believe. The whole thing is just a pipe dream and was only contemplated a couple of days ago. So I’m just past the “yeah I could just do it” stage and actually contemplating the “how could that be accomplished” phase.
Don’t concern yourselves dear friends, they’re coming to take me out for a little walk later

 

[Gomev]

Yeah it smacks of backtracking a wee bit.
There used to be a ferry to the continent from Rosyth on the opposite bank of the river Forth from me. There’s still boats from Newcastle and Hull I believe. The whole thing is just a pipe dream and was only contemplated a couple of days ago. So I’m just past the “yeah I could just do it” stage and actually contemplating the “how could that be accomplished” phase.
Don’t concern yourselves dear friends, they’re coming to take me out for a little walk later

Yes ferries still go Newcastle to Amsterdam or Hull to Zeebrugge or Rotterdam and then you can go on from there. Much easier than driving all that way south just to drive all the way north again.

 

[rjhfandclf]

Well; just completed the downward trip on our regular biannual drive down to SW France, with some ever-improving stats, I think. Nowhere near as exciting as EVsince2016, but I am finding the three-days continuous driving tiring nowadays, so aim to fine-tune everything to max efficiency and ease. As usual, the door-to-door driving is around 750 miles – this time 745 m. We aim for a ca 11:00 Shuttle and arrive two days later mid-pm, hopefully to warm dry weather. This Autumn, it was tipping it down in the Pas-de-Calais (it always seems to for us!) and only around 20C most of the way down – so not the best for EVs.

We have our ‘comfort’ and eating breaks pretty well mapped-out now, so can often head for extra intermittent breaks at the chargers I prefer for price and speed rather than necessity – so some are not always immediately adjacent to our route, albeit by no more than a mile or two. This means that even our favourite smallest IECharge sites are seldom occupied at all. I have so far never, ever, waited for a charger in my life!

We only need four stops during the whole journey, but this time, my one added aim was to delete the ‘T’-name from my charging list if possible. Their prices have risen a bit this year and some of the more expensive slots have changed to my disadvantage (usually the p.m. times). I previously used four T-S/Cs – north of Le Mans and south of Poitiers going down, then Poitiers again plus Châtellerault and a Calais Shuttle top-up going home. This time, on Electroverse (the only non-operator app I ever use), I managed to find an Engie Vianeo in a B&B Group hotel carpark (just 100yds from T-S/C!) for 35p/kWh against T’s 38p … success #1!

I was then forced to ditch T at Poitiers (where they now boast an incredible 40 v4 chargers – although I’ve never seen more than 3 or 4 cars there!) due to the access road being dug-up (they must have been as delighted as I was!) But fast chargers nearby were getting scarcer along the N10, till I discovered a brand-new block of Alterna Énergie chargers (Electroverse again) on the wonderfully impressive Centre Routier at Payré (where I used to buy very cheap diesel in olden days!) and you have to negotiate dozens upon dozens of neatly parked HGVs to get around. Unfortunately, the experience of Alterna was not good, as out of their three pairs of 360kWh chargers neither I nor a French Peugeot could get more than one pair to ‘fire-up’ the charge – and so wasted ½-an-hour more. As he found the ‘goer’ first, it was me who had to park badly to reach the same-side flap! Luckily no-one else turned up. The price was just 36p against T’s p.m. price of 44p … so success #2!

With my other two stops being IECharge at 21p/kWh (all year), my average price paid for the 237kW used for whole trip was just 28p/kWh – including the 42kW home refill to 100% courtesy of a standard EDF ‘grannie’ at 17.5p/kWh. NB the £/euro exchange rate has also been poor at this time.

The SOC didn’t drop below 15%, from which I find that the MG4 ER’s 77kW battery usually starts charging at around 135/140kWh and doesn’t slow to much below 40kWh till around 85-90% - which I aim for in around a 45 minutes’ break. This gave me a longest (motorway) leg of 184 miles @ avge 70 mph and 3.17 m/kWh, and a best cross-country consumption of 4.2 m/kWh. A précis of the trip ...

Hope not too boring (E&OE)!

 

[EVsince2016]

Well; just completed the downward trip on our regular biannual drive down to SW France, with some ever-improving stats, I think. Nowhere near as exciting as EVsince2016, but I am finding the three-days continuous driving tiring nowadays, so aim to fine-tune everything to max efficiency and ease. As usual, the door-to-door driving is around 750 miles – this time 745 m. We aim for a ca 11:00 Shuttle and arrive two days later mid-pm, hopefully to warm dry weather. This Autumn, it was tipping it down in the Pas-de-Calais (it always seems to for us!) and only around 20C most of the way down – so not the best for EVs.

We have our ‘comfort’ and eating breaks pretty well mapped-out now, so can often head for extra intermittent breaks at the chargers I prefer for price and speed rather than necessity – so some are not always immediately adjacent to our route, albeit by no more than a mile or two. This means that even our favourite smallest IECharge sites are seldom occupied at all. I have so far never, ever, waited for a charger in my life!

We only need four stops during the whole journey, but this time, my one added aim was to delete the ‘T’-name from my charging list if possible. Their prices have risen a bit this year and some of the more expensive slots have changed to my disadvantage (usually the p.m. times). I previously used four T-S/Cs – north of Le Mans and south of Poitiers going down, then Poitiers again plus Châtellerault and a Calais Shuttle top-up going home. This time, on Electroverse (the only non-operator app I ever use), I managed to find an Engie Vianeo in a B&B Group hotel carpark (just 100yds from T-S/C!) for 35p/kWh against T’s 38p … success #1!

I was then forced to ditch T at Poitiers (where they now boast an incredible 40 v4 chargers – although I’ve never seen more than 3 or 4 cars there!) due to the access road being dug-up (they must have been as delighted as I was!) But fast chargers nearby were getting scarcer along the N10, till I discovered a brand-new block of Alterna Énergie chargers (Electroverse again) on the wonderfully impressive Centre Routier at Payré (where I used to buy very cheap diesel in olden days!) and you have to negotiate dozens upon dozens of neatly parked HGVs to get around. Unfortunately, the experience of Alterna was not good, as out of their three pairs of 360kWh chargers neither I nor a French Peugeot could get more than one pair to ‘fire-up’ the charge – and so wasted ½-an-hour more. As he found the ‘goer’ first, it was me who had to park badly to reach the same-side flap! Luckily no-one else turned up. The price was just 36p against T’s p.m. price of 44p … so success #2!

View attachment 39976

With my other two stops being IECharge at 21p/kWh (all year), my average price paid for the 237kW used for whole trip was just 28p/kWh – including the 42kW home refill to 100% courtesy of a standard EDF ‘grannie’ at 17.5p/kWh. NB the £/euro exchange rate has also been poor at this time.

The SOC didn’t drop below 15%, from which I find that the MG4 ER’s 77kW battery usually starts charging at around 135/140kWh and doesn’t slow to much below 40kWh till around 85-90% - which I aim for in around a 45 minutes’ break. This gave me a longest (motorway) leg of 184 miles @ avge 70 mph and 3.17 m/kWh, and a best cross-country consumption of 4.2 m/kWh. A précis of the trip ...

View attachment 39977

Hope not too boring (E&OE)!

That is a masterpiece of planning & driving! Wow!!

Your route is similar to mine, but you were a bit more adventurous in your stops!

Brilliant.