This is the overly large fuel canister I brought with me on my most recent backpacking trip to the Sierras for cooking in the backcountry. Waaay too large of a canister for my needs, but I forgot to buy a smaller one before my trip. This 450 grams of isobutane/propane, according to my very rough and crude calculations, equates to about 6 kWh of energy; if I would have carried three of these canisters (for some god-awful reason), this would be roughly the amount of energy available to me in the Spark EV battery pack.
When I got my Spark EV, I knew that I might have to borrow a car from my parents for longer trips, especially to my favorite summertime destination, the Sierra Nevadas of Central California. However, after mulling it over, I thought it would be incredible, at least just once, to have the Spark take me to the Sierras. I knew logistically it would be a stretch, but I figured I could pull it off. By the end of the trip, I was blown away by the capabilities of this car, I can hardly believe I wasn't stranded with what I did.
My destination on the border of Sequoia National Park was very rural, and I knew places to charge would be limited. No electrical lines exist in the Kennedy Meadows areas, and the power that is there is generated by diesel generators. I really didn't want to take any power from a diesel generator, but I called ahead and I was told that the Kennedy Meadows General store or the Blackrock ranger station would allow me to plugin, if needed. Before going on the trip, I was almost certain I would need to plugin at one of these locations in order to make the round trip from the trailer park I planned to charge at and the trailhead I was planning to depart from for my backpacking trip.
Let me start by displaying an elevational gradient from my starting location in Victorville, CA, to my destination, 12 miles NW of Kennedy Meadows in the South Eastern Sierras:
http://www.csupomona.edu/~rcstanfield/Pics/Sierra%20Trip%20Overview%20copy.jpg
The major stop on this path is marked by the red arrow, where I charged on my way to, and coming back from the trailhead I was setting out on. I made some stops along the way to the trailhead, but most of the time I was on the road.
Some data on the mileage, and energy usage, notes on speed for each stop along my path to my destination:
-Victorville to Inyokern (Stopped at trailerpark for charging; marked with red arrow on map): 86.37 miles / 4.8 mi/kWh | I averaged about 60 MPH on this first leg; I spent the night at the trailer park
-Inyokern to Kennedy Meadows (12 miles short of trailhead): 38.52 miles / 3.8 mi/kWh | I spent a short time on highway 395 before going up 9 mile canyon road; I took a parallel road along the highway so I could go about 35 MPH, and once I got on the windy 9 mile canyon road to Kennedy Meadows, I set my speed on cruise to the minimum 24MPH for the rest of the trip.
-Kennedy Meadows to ranger station: 12.73 miles / 3.3 mi/kWh | After realizing the general store in Kennedy Meadows was not open yet (I left 6:30am from Inyokern) I went up to the ranger station.
-ranger station to trailhead: 8.07 miles / 3.9 mi / kWh | The ranger station was closed on this day, so I had no choice but to forge ahead to the trailhead!
By the time I reached the trailhead parking lot, I had used about 16.1 kWh of battery pack, and had an estimated range of 14 miles, with two bars remaining.
Picture at trailhead: http://www.csupomona.edu/~rcstanfield/Pics/20140611_094347.jpg
I took a lovely overnight backpacking trip to the Jordan hotsprings, and had a pristine mountain canyon all to myself (I didn't want to take anyone with me on the trip, due to the extreme patience needed to get to the destination).
The next day I hiked back to the trailhead, made lunch, then set on back down the mountain. Leaving the car overnight, the battery pack must have discharged a bit, because the estimated range went down to 12 miles remaining. I had roughly 58 miles to cover with this very limited supply of energy, but was counting on massive amounts of regen going down by 6500ft. Here's what happened on the return trip down:
-Trailhead to Kennedy meadows general store: 20.69 miles / 51.1 mi /kWh | At the start, I had 16.1 kWH used, by the time I reached the lower elevation Kennedy Meadows (6200ft), I had gained back 0.8 kWH; still at 2 bars here though. I know to get out of KM, I had to climb over a 1000ft pass. I was taking a huge risk by not charging at the general store, but I decided to go for it!
-Kennedy Meadows General Store to Inyokern Trailer Park: 38.46 mi / 30.7 mi / kWh | This portion of the trip included a 1000ft elevation gain to get up and out of Kennedy Meadows, at this point I was well above 18.3 kWh used on the battery pack and showed 6 miles remaining. Fortunately that was the last of the uphill, and I had a nice 4000ft slope to regen. By the time I was off the mountain and to the valley below, I gained 4 kilowatt hours from regen and had 3 bars remaining! By the time I reached the trailer park to recharge, I had an estimated 16 miles remaining. The total round trip on a single charge was 118.47 miles. Victorious, I charged up and headed back home to Victorville.
Yes, I had to do this going between 25-30 MPH on average, and each way it took me about 1 hour and 45 mins to cover 59 miles, but it was still very impressive given the elevational changes.