Lmao take your thanks; some of that hick stuff was pretty catchy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Koflach
I would never buy an EV that can't use the Tesla Supercharging network as it is so easy to use.
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Often it's not even that it's easier to use, it's that all the alternatives are such a broken experience, at least as of right now.
Last December, on the day I took delivery of the R1T, a buddy and I did the 1500km drive up to Vancouver to visit over the holiday break. Mix of Electrify America, EVgo, etc. 1 in 2 attempts to initiate a charge would straight up fail on the first try. And even if it eventually worked, wouldn't deliver the full charging speed. You'd get maybe 50kW or 100kW at a 350kW charger. 1 in 3 would just straight up never work, so you have to hop to another charger (if any don't have a long line: often not). So you call the support number and asked them to reboot the machine for you, sometimes over and over til it works, sometimes never recovers. And - critically - 1 in 5 times, none of the friggin chargers at a station work at all, and things get a little desperate looking on the map for the next closest charger, sometimes having to backtrack a long way, and on very few miles left on the battery. Frustratingly, the map shows plenty of Tesla superchargers all around lol. A hickup here and there on a trip is fine, but when your mind consistently has to be in survival mode, it takes a little away from the experience.
At least with Tesla now opening up supercharger access to other makes, things will get better. Even if they charge a premium, at least now in a non-Tesla EV you no longer run the risk of getting stranded on a road trip. And fortunately, it happens that I get away with doing most of my charging at work (for free), but that's not everyone's situation.