October 20, 2022 and I had a trip to Grand Rapids planned, and I took the opportunity to go and visit by going the long way up north and back south. Taking the opportunity to visit several sites I have not visited before and add more information on sites that drivers might use on a trip up north, whether it be starting from Detroit, Lansing or Grand Rapids areas. On what was likely to be my last long site review road trip of the year, I added quite a few to my list of sites visited.
Route Overview:
Departure:
Initial long distance run:
I charged to full overnight and headed out early in the morning. My first stop was farther north than I have been previously on a single charge. From Novi, I headed west on I-96 and then headed north on US-23. I stopped at the Hartland exit to grab a coffee and a snack. I traveled onwards and followed I-75 north passing both stops in the Bay City area I had stopped at on previous trips. I traveled 153 miles and arrived in West Branch with 23% battery, exactly what ABRP (A Better Route Planner) calculated I would arrive with.
Why use a Dealership stop:
My first stop was a Shell Recharge site located in the parking lot of the Ford dealership in West Branch, MI. Earlier in the year these two 175kW ABB units were installed, and I had been looking for quite some time to make a trip and use this stop. At first I tried to start the charging session from the ChargePoint app so that I could keep the results of the trip in one consistent location. Unfortunately, I was not able to start a roaming session here, and I also wasn’t able to start the charge from the Shell Recharge RFID card. Only starting in the Shell Recharge app worked. While I had driven almost two and a half hours, the near freezing temperatures meant that Elektra’s battery was still cold and not ready to support maximum charge rates. I stayed charging here a little longer than was in the plan, but I wanted to build as much heat into the battery pack as possible to ensure that at further stops I would be getting maximum speeds.
Having charged for 42 minutes and gained 41%, I unplugged and set off to head to my furthest north stop on this trip in Waters, MI. ABRP had estimated that I would need 32% battery for this 56 mile sprint and I ended up using 30%.
Departure:
Arrival:
A classic northern Michigan stop:
With temperatures still just above freezing and an increase in elevation, my efficiency dipped to 2.9mi/kWh, but still a good value for highway driving. Highway I-75 exit 270 for Waters puts you on Marrlett road. This is a classic up north exit with nothing around but a simple gas station. The chargers were simple to find and connected and started to charge without issues, as I have come to expect from these ChargePoint units. While the dash showed temperatures above freezing, there were definitely flurries in the air. Looking at my ABRP plan, the next stop was going to be Gaylord, MI and it was projected that it would take just 8%, while the live view showed 9%. So, a quick stop was all I needed here to review the site, capture my pictures and then get on my way. I charged for just 10 minutes and gained 10% and 20 miles range (85 to 105).
Departure:
Arrival
Into Downtown Grayling:
Since the Red E Charging site in Grayling is in a parking lot downtown, that means that this stop was not close to the highway. I had to travel almost 2 miles off the highway on mostly city streets (speed limit of 35 mph) to reach this location. The ABRP plan called for a 7 minute stop to add just 6%. I didn’t stretch this much, staying for just 9 minutes and adding 7%. Despite this stop being free, I don’t like staying at the Tritium chargers that are used here due to the high pitched noise they make while charging. This stop would be the only stop on this trip where I would see another vehicle charging. There was a Rivian charging up at this site, although I am sure they would have preferred to charge at the Rivian Adventure Network location, it is not open yet even though it has been under construction for 6 months or more. Having completed my site review I headed out and drove the 1.5 miles that it takes to connect back to I-75 south.
I was 24 miles away from my next stop in Houghton Lake.
Departure:
Arrival:
Time for a small break:
After 4 hours of driving and a little more than one hour of charging, I had covered nearly 250 miles, and I was ready to take a bit of a break. The EVSE units at my next stop in Houghton Lake were a set of paired ChargePoint units, so I was likely to get peak charging speed at this stop. Also, looking ahead this was the last stop with per kWh pricing, so the amount of time I spent here didn’t matter as much since I was only being charged for the actual power I was charging. While the trip plan called for a quick 8 minute stop here I stayed for 30. The 30 minute stop allowed me to charge all the way up to 71% and 171 miles estimated range.
Departure:
Arrival:
Towards Cadillac:
After my 30 minute charging rest stop I headed west. Up to this point my travels had been on major highways with 70 mph speed limits. This next leg was going to be my only stretch on two lane 55 mph speed limit roads. I hoped that the slower speeds, warm battery and warming outside temperatures would all work to improve my driving efficiency. But, with the averaging of all the travels to this point I was stuck at 2.9 mi/kWh. It took me roughly 39 minutes to cover the 33 miles from Houghton Lake to Cadillac. This westerly trip along M-55 took me from the US-127 north/south route to the US-131 north south route. I found the Mobil gas station just as I was about to reach US-131. As per usual, no issues; pull up, plug in, tap phone, charging started. The original trip plan showed a 20 minute stop at this location, but since I had taken a longer break at the previous stop, I kept the stop to 11 minutes. Just enough time to get my site review details and grab a quick snack from the Tim Hortons.
Departure:
Arrival
Quick Stop in Big Rapids:
From here on out, I would be making my way south on US-131 trying to stop at the major fast charging site on my way to Grand Rapids. The original plan showed a usage of 23% (from 34% down to 11%) and the live plan showed a usage of 34% (from 68% down to 34%) in reality the 42.3 mile trip from the Cadillac stop to the Big Rapids stop took just 21% (from 68% down to 47%). The ABRP trip planning and live continues to be very conservative on estimating range.
The 43 miles went by quickly, and soon I was at a Shell gas station just off of US-131. The original plan had this as a 25 minute stop, but since I was running about 30% above the plan, I chose to stay for just 11 minutes. On my way to this site, I noticed that there is also a Tesla Supercharger site at the Meier at the exit. Locating close to a Tesla SuperCharger is always a good indicator that the location is good for electric vehicle charging.
Departure:
Off the path in Howard City:
The Howard City Citgo stop was not the quick on and off stop l like to see. This gas station is actually more than 3 miles from the highway and I had to travel though the downtown area in order to get to this location. Determining the actual location was another task when I was planning this trip. It seems that all the data sources I was using for the location of this charger had slightly different addresses. The ChargePoint App had one address, ABRP had a different address and Google Maps had a third different address. So, I used the gas station to reliably locate this charging site. Being some way off the highway, and a little behind schedule, I continued my pattern of keeping the charging stops shorter than planned. Here I stopped for only 5 minutes, yet still I left with 53%, well more than the planned 32%.
Departure:
Final Stop at a familiar location:
My final stop is someplace I have already visited. My route took me to the BP gas station on the north side of Grand Rapids. I had visited this site as part of my Grand Rapids loop test earlier in the year. Here I charged up to enough to support the rest of my adventures. This had been a very successful trip. I didn’t need to call support to get any of the charge sessions started. Almost everything started on the very first attempt, and I didn’t face any unexpected slow charging. This report and site reviews continue to expand my database of detailed site reviews throughout the state of Michigan.
Final Arrival Details:
Final Trip Details:
Total kWh Charged: 126.1 kWh
Efficientincy: 3.14 mi/kWh
Charge Time: 1 h 37 min
Distance: 380 mi
Drive Time: 6 h 5 min
Total Trip Time: 7 h 43 min
Average Moving Speed: 49.35 mph
Plan versus Actual Chart:
