Did the DCFC charger increase my drivable mileage?

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MrDRMorgan

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 30, 2013
Messages
1,211
Location
Manteca in Central California
Here is a new "newbie" question: Have any of you 2015 SparK EV owners found, after charging on a DCFC, that your green DIC miles remaining ended up with more mileage? On Saturday I charged my 2015 Spark EV using a NRG DCFC. I disconnected at 99+ percent and 25 minutes into the charge and the gauge showed 88 miles instead of the normally expected 84. As I drove 18 miles home I noticed the gauge was not dropping in approximate sequence with the odometer miles driven - it actually was about half. When I got home in the afternoon, I put the car on the 8-amp charger because it was so hot in my garage and left the charger connected all night. This morning the dash light showed the car was fully charged and the DIC miles remaining gauge read 90 miles. Any ideas as to what is going on?
 
Driving style and terrain seem to affect the values I see. My middle guessometer is usually about 94 in the morning, at full charge. My commute is more than 98 miles. I have done it twice without a supplemental charge. For peace of mind and air conditioning, I usually charge at level I during the day.
 
The spark may be different but... At least with the LEAF fast charging can give a slight (temporary) bump in available KWHR from the pack. At least that is what is reported from the car after charging.
 
ImTedBell:

Interesting. I drove the car about 7 miles today and then put it back on the charger for a full charge. The "guess-o-meter" now reads 91 miles. I will take the car out tomorrow for a respectable drive and then try the DCFC again and see if the mileage will continue to increase. Then I will only use the L1 charger for a few recharges and see if the mileage drops back to 84. I hope it doesn't.
 
I find the guess-o-meter to be a little scary sometimes. Like you all, I'm very conservative. My middle ball starts over 100. The problem is if you drive a little aggressively up and down hills, your estimates start dropping like a tank. I find the best guage is how many bars you have left. I consider the left gauge, which I really like, more of a history meter. If you drive really aggressive, or go up a hill, 1-2 miles later you are going to see the hit in the guess-o-meter.
 
I too am not sure how accurate the "Guess-O-Meter" is but it does give a general visual indication of how fast your charge is being used up. Yesterday my Spark EV got a good workout: 90 fwy miles at approximately 60 mph including driving over and back across the Altamont Pass, plus another 40 miles around town. Fortunately, I got some good regeneration coming down both sides of the pass. The A/C was on all of the time.

I recharged at each of the two NRG eVgo DCFC stations I wanted to check out. At the end of the day the "Guess-O-Meter" read yellow with 17 miles left. So, last night I put the car on the L1 charger at 12 amps. This morning the charge completed at 7 am, the "Guess-O-Meter" read 88 miles and almost 21 kWh had been used to restore a full charge. After the last full DCFC yesterday, the "Guess-O-Meter" read 95 miles.

Adding a second adult person to the car seems to impact the mi / kWh too. Note: it was 104 deg. F here at 5 pm yesterday.
 
I have noticed this too. However probably not as significant as yours. Again the answer might be because of the way you drive. My range meter is slowly dropping back down the the level it should stay at after a bout 2 weeks of driving since the last DCFC.
 
brunoylupe ,
98 miles one way? must be at 45 mph and downhill! With my 2015 Spark At 65mph and basically level driving 68 miles was my max with 2 miles left! At full charge my Spark GOM reads 64 miles, once it read 72, both times dash read "fully charged". Are you "drafting" a semi?

Stephen
2015 Spark EV
 
My increased range seems to be holding although I did have a couple more DCFC charging sessions early last week. Last night, as I do every night, I put the car on the L1 charger @ 8 amps and let it charge to completion. This morning the "guess-o-meter" read 99 miles. I had some in-town errands to run this morning so I turned off the A/C and the daytime lights but left the radio on. I made multiple trips from home and I drove as efficiently as I could. At the end of the 15 miles of short trips the "guess-o-meter" read 94 miles and the car reported 2.2 kWh of energy were used for driving ( 0% for climate and 0% for battery) - That's 6.82 mi / kWh (battery-to-wheel). I find the "guess-o-meter" to be accurate when the trip meter is reading ~5.2 mi / kWh. If I factor the energy used value by my L1 charging efficiency of 65%, I still get 4.83 mi / kWh (wall-to-wheel). At my current PG&E cost per kWh of $0.16352, my wall-to-wheel energy cost per mile works out to be $0.034.

Added Note: I received my email notice from Bosch last week regarding GM's $500 L2 charger rebate. I ordered the 16-amp charger this week and should have it in about 2 weeks.

7/10/2015 AM: I just took the car off of the L1 8-amp charger and I was surprised to see the display showing 102 miles! This is the highest I have seen so far.
7/16/2015 AM: I am still getting 102 - 104 miles after a full 8-amp L1 charge. This is great!
8/1/2015 AM: On 7/22 the reading slipped below 100. Today it read 95 miles after overnight L2 charging.
 
MrDRMorgan,
I ordered the 30 amp L2 Bosch unit and got the instant rebate during purchase, it was an extra $150 or so for the balance plus shipping and handling. If you can afford to have it installed I highly recommend it. Chose the 30 amp version for a 6.6 KW charge rate car I will be buying in the future (16 amp Bosch unit is the 3.3 kw version, OK for current Spark EV) another option is to install a a L6-30 wall socket amp 240 volt wall plug and buy an open ESVE 30 amp combo unit (they have higher amp versions as well). Great device, the only "charger" you will ever need. It accepts any voltage input from 100 to 250 volts. That way with a few adapters you don't have to carry a 120 volt EVSE and a separate 240 volt EVSE around in the car. That really IMHO is the one best solution and its portable! Get the Standard kit "No Solder" version unless you are electronics soldering savvy the assembly is easy with YouTube videos See : http://store.openevse.com/products/openevse-30a-standard-charge-station-combo
A couple of adapters and I can charge almost anywhere! A future proof solution: install 30 or 50 amp wall socket in your house and buy a portable EVSE.
Spark-Cord-Adapt-1-sm.jpg

MrDRMorgan said:
Added Note: I received my email notice from Bosch last week regarding GM's $500 L2 charger rebate. I ordered the 16-amp charger this week and should have it in about 2 weeks.

7/10/2015 AM: I just took the car off of the L1 8-amp charger and I was surprised to see the display showing 102 miles! This is the highest I have seen so far.
7/16/2015 AM: I am still getting 102 - 104 miles after a full 8-amp L1 charge. This is great!
8/1/2015 AM: On 7/22 the reading slipped below 100. Today it read 95 miles after overnight L2 charging.
 
Stevon,

I ordered a 3.3K Bosch charger on the special offer from GM only to find out it would not be shipped until late August or early September. Impatient as I am, I ordered one from Amazon and received it in 2 days. My son and I carefully punched a 1 inch dia. hole in the wall between my garage and the laundry room where I had an unused 240VAC, 30-amp, single-phase dryer socket. I found a perfect 3-wire, 6-ft, 30 amp dryer cable at Home Depot so we routed it through the wall and wired it in. Total installation took about an hour and it works perfectly.

My "guess-o-meter" is still showing 95 - 101 miles after each L2 charge. L2 charging efficiency looks to be about 70 - 75%. I do all of my charging between 11 pm and 6 am (I am getting ready for PG&E to switch all of its customers to a TOU schedule - like it or not). I specify a completion time of 6 am and let the car figure out when to start charging. So far, it is working great! I use my hourly PG&E usage data (available online from PG&E) to determine how much power was consumed during the charging window. I subtract my average hourly baseline power consumption from the actual hourly data to get the amount of power used for charging. Typically my baseline power consumption during the charging interval is .4 kWh per hour.
 
MrDRMorgan
Kudos on the install. My 30 amp Bosch EVSE is still in the box. I own a duplex house and rent both units out, so I will not be installing it there. At my apartment it doesn't make sense to install it there for 3 reasons:
1. I don't own the building or have approval to install it
2. Currently getting free charging 2 miles away.
3. I'm in the process of looking for another multi family income property to live in. That will probably be the install location when I get it.
MrDRMorgan said:
Stevon,

I ordered a 3.3K Bosch charger on the special offer from GM only to find out it would not be shipped until late August or early September. Impatient as I am, I ordered one from Amazon and received it in 2 days. My son and I carefully punched a 1 inch dia. hole in the wall between my garage and the laundry room where I had an unused 240VAC, 30-amp, single-phase dryer socket. I found a perfect 3-wire, 6-ft, 30 amp dryer cable at Home Depot so we routed it through the wall and wired it in. Total installation took about an hour and it works perfectly.

My "guess-o-meter" is still showing 95 - 101 miles after each L2 charge. L2 charging efficiency looks to be about 70 - 75%. I do all of my charging between 11 pm and 6 am (I am getting ready for PG&E to switch all of its customers to a TOU schedule - like it or not). I specify a completion time of 6 am and let the car figure out when to start charging. So far, it is working great! I use my hourly PG&E usage data (available online from PG&E) to determine how much power was consumed during the charging window. I subtract my average hourly baseline power consumption from the actual hourly data to get the amount of power used for charging. Typically my baseline power consumption during the charging interval is .4 kWh per hour.
 
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