Road Trip to Amarillo: First Time in the Tesla

[@dmunro9076]

I've found that best time is achieved by driving at ~9mph over the posted limit and arriving at the DCF charger at between 5-15% SOC ( Based upon 3 road trips, each over 4000 miles). I use my CCS1 adapter to stop at non-Tesla DCFCs, as is convenient. My 2022 M3 RWD has about a 5% buffer below '0%' SOC, but the lowest I've arrived at a SC is 2%. I've found that there's very little difference in charging times between a V3 and V2 SC, and when having a meal, even a 50kw DCFC will charge the car to 100% by the time we finish dinner, assuming a 10% SOC arrival. With some attention to charging times, I've been able to drive ~600 miles in ~10 hours.

[@henrymalong4542]

This is a fantastic video of a road trip. Thanks for sharing and taking us along. 😊

[@davidg158]

Thanks for your video, a easy way to identify the difference between a V3 and a V2 supercharger is the V3 does not have a silver band around the neck of the handle while the V2 has a silver band, V3 charger does not share with the charger next to you, another tip if you want to arrive at your destination at a certain percent, you can adjust your speed with the right scroll wheel up or down to maintain your percentage .

[@IuseanXboxController]

Next year will be 10 years of EV ownership for me, about to hit 250k miles total. It's amazing how easy it really is to navigate far distances now. Even with my little bolt I've been able to go from the Carolinas to California only planning my next charge while charging, even went to see the grand canyon on the way. But Tesla makes it all just so much easier, we have rented s, 3, x, and y and loved all them starting with our first rental in 2017. About to buy a Model y after we rented one when we flew into dfw and drove up to Amarillo for a wedding. About to sit back and enjoy your trips video now, hopefully y'all stopped at palo duro canyon. 😀

[@SpinnerEV]

We didn’t stop there on this one, but we did a few years ago. The trip was in our Subaru Crosstrek towing a teardrop camper back from Green River, UT. It’s a road trip in an ICE car but was a warm up for our EV road trip videos. But the video does have about 10-15 minutes of footage taken at Palo Duro Canyon State Park

[@mikefleming8675]

Those V2 units which takes noticeably longer to handshake than the V3. My first and only Bolt trip was stressful worrying about EA chargers and crowds. First Tesla Model 3 road trip didn't even think about charging issues. It was such a relief. And that LFP battery pack maxes out at 171kw so unless you're rolling in Out of spec style at 0%'there's almost no difference between V2 and V3 units. 50:19

[@jerrymildredpetersen3177]

I always enjoy your vids, Luke. This was another good one. We got our Bolt EUV 1-3/4 years ago and have done about 13-14k miles of road trips in it including a 5,400 mile trip from FL, through TX, to AZ, and then back east & north to OH before coming back to FL. The Bolt was fine even though it was a little on the leisurely side. This April, we traded the Prius for a Hyundai Ioniq 5. We took it from FL up to OH and then over to eastern IA before heading home. What a difference!!!! As with your Tesla, we never had to wait for the car and, in fact, most of the time we could not get back from the bathroom before the car was ready. Most of our charging stops were between 8 and 15 minutes. And the 2 free years with Electrify America really cut the cost. Eventually, that will be gone. We found with the Bolt that charging cost per mile was almost double the gas cost for the Prius. But since it's still cheaper than most gassers, that's not so bad given how much more pleasant either EV is than listening to the racket in most gas cars. Amazingly smooth and tranquil in either the Bolt or Ioniq 5, especially in the latter. Keep the travel vids coming!!

[@josephpt9540]

Hi spinners, Your trip video endorsed all experience I had on my new Model 3 RWD. Only difference I used to charge 100pc on every supercharger. Although it takes 35 to 40 minutes the number of stops get lesser. My overall efficiency is 222 wh/mile on my 3100 mile trip. The FSD usage is 3080. Non FSD in parking lots and rest areas only. Your videos are very influencing and truthful. Keep it up ❤

[@SpinnerEV]

Thanks!

[@Geckogold]

Teslas are extremely easy to road trip in. I have done anywhere from 500 to 6300 miles visiting various National Parks such as Yellowstone, Death Valley, Rocky Mountain, Great Smoky Mountains, and even drove around Lake Michigan. I did a 2k mile road trip to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, and visited both the North and South units during the July 4th holiday a few weeks ago. It took about 15 hours or so from where I live around Milwaukee to Dickinson, ND where the closest Supercharger to the parks are located. I left shortly after finishing work around midnight on the 4th, and made it to Dickinson around 2PM (should be 3PM but time zone change). I had originally planned to take a nap at some point after the Twin Cities to avoid getting snarled in major city rush hour traffic. But to my surprise, between the forced Supercharger stops every 1 and a half to 3 hours, the caffeine drinks I had, Autopilot/Full Self Driving doing the boring mundane interstate driving, and the excitement of visiting a new park, I managed to stay awake that whole time, though I did get drowsy right before the sun came up. I did another trip just recently visiting the National Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio, which was about a 7 hour trip, then did a quick visit to one of the Indiana Dunes National Park beaches, and got snarled in Chicago rush hour traffic on the way back (probably a good thing overall because if it was a boring mundane drive where nothing major happened, I probably would've fell asleep). As a slight bonus, they have some Clippercreek chargers there, so I was able to get some free juice while visiting the museum which turned out to be a lot more massive than I imagined. It's also free to visit if you ever happen to be road tripping around there. Driving through much of the Midwest is pretty boring though. Mostly farms, some trees, and some occasional wind turbines. There's definitely more interesting scenery to look at out west, with those deserts, mountains, and buttes/mesas/plateaus to look at.

[@frankcoffey]

We just went from north Dallas area to Denver and back in our ‘22 Model 3 long range. Stopped at those same chargers. Ended up costing about $220 for supercharging round trip.

[@dr.markevers8331]

What kind of mileage range are you getting on the highway? At 75+ mph?

[@frankcoffey]

@@dr.markevers8331 I didn't really keep track of it. We took that trip when the car was new and it seemed about the same.

[@casakalc121980]

I did the same route but started from houston in the winter ​@@frankcoffey

[@tommckinney1489]

Your overall cost was around 9 cents per mile, vs. 12-15 cents for an ICE car. So, good deal! thanks for the video.

[@amaysaia]

Hey there Spinners. I had done that very road trip multiple times in both a gas car and my MYP. The last trip was to LA last year. I love the northern route. Being that I live in the DFW area it was fun to see the trip. I also added a few things to the MYP to make may drive a little easier. Road tripping is fun in the Tesla. I enjoy your channel. Thanks for showing!

[@SpinnerEV]

Thanks! We couldn’t have done this trip with our Bolt, at least not the same route. Still a lack of CCS charging on 287

[@cpl366]

Next time you stop in Childress, there is a great Tea place (HTeaO) across the street from the Superchargers.

[@SpinnerEV]

I’ve seen, I’ll have to try it out.

[@granados1987]

We love HTeaO, we live in Amarillo love visiting those here in town and have family in Vernon and Love stopping at that particular HteaO in Childress.

[@Geckogold]

Also, if you want to keep FSD from constantly switching lanes, in the Autopilot menu there's an option to enable "Minimize lane changes for this drive" or something along those lines. You can also press the right scroll wheel to the left or right, and then that button is there as well to minimize lane changes, so that it will only change lanes when you tell it to, or when it absolutely needs to in order to continue taking you on your route. You have to do this every drive, so every time you park it and then put it back in drive, you have to enable that again. As far as I know there's no option to keep it on all the time. And the real savings from EV's to "fuel up" is when you do home charging. Unless Supercharging is you only option to charge it, home charging is usually cheaper in many places, and is probably 80-99% of what most folks will be doing. EV critics love to use Supercharging costs as if it was the sole source of your charging option, or assume everyone pays California rates when they try to use the "electricity isn't cheap!" option, and are usually comparing it a Prius or other high mpg/hybrid, instead of say, an F-150/Silverado/Ram that many Americans use as a daily driver. Incidentally, they usually forget to include gas car maintenance items, such as oil changes, spark plugs, transmission flushes, head gaskets, brakes, mufflers, timing belts, etc when they argue the "battery will cost $15k to replace when it automatically dies in 3 years like in smartphones!" Replacing transmissions and rebuilding engines isn't cheap either, and is the gas car equivalent to the "replacing the battery" argument.

[@bigdougscommentary5719]

With FSD engaged, push right on the right thumb wheel and select Chill and Minimize Lane changes. See if that helps the tendency to drive in the left lane.

[@HomesteadEngineering]

Nice trip. I prefer autosteer for highway driving so I control the lane changes. Thanks!

[@famousamos1]

All you have to do for FSD is toggle on the “minimal lane changes” that way it stays in the lane longer and you just turn the turn signal to make lane changes.

[@HomesteadEngineering]

@@famousamos1 I have tried that but I prefer autosteer for highway driving. I do use FSD and I have 12.3.6. It came in handy last month in downtown Dallas as I had no idea where I was going and a lot of streets are one way so it really helped. Thanks!

[@famousamos1]

@@HomesteadEngineeringyeah I got my first Tesla MYP in September 2023 and they gave me 3 month trial FSD. I used it every day mainly Highway one way to work 18 miles. I used it even on regular streets. It screwed up a few times turning me where I shouldn’t. The take off from stop light was fast! I then got the 1 month trial of new FSD in May and used it again all the time. It was much better but the take off from stop light was slower. The auto park was awesome! I wish they just give us auto park for free! I also noticed FSD cuts people off when making lane changes!! So I learned to turn the toggle on “minimal lane changes” which helped a lot and left me in control of lane changes still. So now I’m back to using auto steer which is fine however I do miss FSD but I ain’t paying $8k or $100/m for it!!

[@maz94protege]

EV roadtrips are fun. Change the Range from Miles to Percentage. WAY better, using mi is just a guess at most. The Trip planner is really good, low State of Charge (SoC) make SC stops faster than higher SoC.

[@EV-Darryl]

Great video guys. That was fun to go along with you guys on the road trip. Stay safe.

[@SpinnerEV]

Thanks!

[@bigdougscommentary5719]

Tesla could help out the charging stops by adding an advisory when pulling into Version 2 sites about the sharing and to leave a space if possible.

[@mattrocha123]

Love the Henrietta Charger with the Dinos! Stop there all the time!

[@AlexanderWhitehead]

I was just searching your channel last night for this content lol this is hilarious

[@SpinnerEV]

Thanks!

[@bigdougscommentary5719]

I have pulled into a Supercharger with 2% one time and 3% another time. Been driving a Tesla since December 2018.

[@jimsEVadventures]

Mike is good people. Had the pleasure of meeting him in Daytona Beach. Y’all take care…

[@SpinnerEV]

He gave me one of your cards

[@user-oo3uj5ku9r]

Sure beats road tripping in the Bolt.

[@nelsonpun]

i guess thats still the problem with electric. I have fun doing all the math and the stops just like you do - I could not imagine my mom wanting to do the same.

[@Longsnowsm]

Great road trip maiden voyage! Blasphemy about not using ABRP to plan those routes! LOL Tesla likes to do dumb stuff and send you to v2 and bad locations and does not really optimize the range before stops. So I think it pays to review the plan and edit the routes. I think I would feel a little rushed if I listened to the car tell me to go so I would take a few more minutes to get my stuff done. I don't mind a little extra time. I usually have the dog with me so I need a little extra time. It would be nice to be able to leave sooner if I was in a hurry. Compared to the Bolt that would seem too fast. I think the big take away is the lack of worry about chargers, spacing, locations, and that they are going to work. That is the real selling point for the Tesla to me. Last winter with the Bolt gave me reason to question my decision to buy it. So I am "calculating".

[@valeriehake]

Was thinking about getting a used Tesla model 3 or polestar 2. Saw Hertz has used model 3 for sale. Haven't made up my mind about it I'm also in the DFW area .

[@Qrail]

Hi Luke and Rachel. Yes, with the content you post, I think it would be very easy to be your friend. From me always commenting on your trips, I would like to do a meet up sometime down the road. So I just did my own road trip last night. 802 miles. Gas was seen at $6.09 for mid grade Shell. (I didn’t buy it, but it is next to my ChargePoint). The Tesla is more economical the higher the gasoline prices go. Your $66.32 beats my $78.06. In my PHEV. This trip I had a headwind of 30 mph, gusting higher. But I digress. Keep me in mind when I come to visit my sister in Paris.

[@SpinnerEV]

Keep us posted when you’re around

[@Qrail]

@@SpinnerEV let me know how to do so. Rail50 is my iPhone addy.

[@SpinnerEV]

Easiest is to just put it in a comment. I get notifications

[@shou635]

You can still use your autopilot on highways after the FSD trial. Can change that setting now in autopilot settings.

[@stevewoodyt]

I was born in ft worth hospital but I spent my first 10 years in Benbrook. I haven’t been back in nearly 20 years.

[@darmou]

Re dinosaurs guess it's good advert for 'Dinosaur juice' :)

[@frankcoffey]

Sinclair gas stations used to use a dinosaur as their mascot, some still have the statues of the green brontosaurus. I remember seeing them in the 1970s.

[@jhomen2003]

We just merge into the number one lane until the off lane is past.

[@Profimaulwurf48]

Eine Frage noch. Ich möchte mein Kennzeichen behalten, wenn ich meine Zoe zurück gebe. Aber wenn ich dann paar Tage mein MY zulassen... Das ist eine ganz normale Zulassung, Ich muss ganz normal dort hin, oder? Danke Dir

[@russadams3008]

Setting profile to chill may stop it going randomly into Left lane.

[@dirkvanvuuren6227]

I've noticed if there's short dash marks on the road it stays in its lane if no dash marks it wants to take the exit. I've called service center in Minneapolis so they could forward it on maybe they can get it corrected cause my destination was not that turn.🙂 K

[@Ice_Bear1989]

I must ask. Which EV would you recommend, Chevy Bolt or a Tesla Model 3? Charging speed on the Bolt isn't an issue for me. I am researching for my next vehicle. I love the way the bolt is but for some reason I started getting interested in a Tesla. I am just stuck on which one to get. I'll be getting used as well. Also good video. I enjoy watching your videos.

[@SpinnerEV]

Thanks. It really depends most on what you will be using the car for. Both are efficient. The Bolt will feel a little more like other cars but the Tesla will have more bells and whistles. The Bolt has the hatchback, but the Model 3 has a large trunk. The Bolt is easier for me to get in and out of but the Model 3 isn’t too bad. I really like both of ours but the Model 3 is my daily driver. The best advice I can give is to try both out. If you live in or near a city that has a Hertz Car Sales lot, they may have some of each to test drive and my experience with them was not high pressure at all, they were very helpful.

[@Ice_Bear1989]

Thank you so much. This helps.

[@mowcowbell]

I always bring along a bottle of Meguiars Quik spray wax and some microfiber cloths for road trips. I've never liked using gas station squeeges and whatever toxic liquid is in the bucket. Regarding FSD, I had the 30 day trial on my Model Y, really didn't care for it. FSD should not just hang out in the left lane, that is for passing only. I would prefer to drive the car myself.

[@famousamos1]

You have to toggle on the “Minimal Lane Changes” that way it will stay in the middle lane and you can just turn the turn signal to lane change when you want.

[@aaronbounds1336]

Same. I have a 1 liter big box hardware store spray bottle filled with windshield washer fluid and use some of my supercharging time to get the mass grave of bug cemetery off of the front of my bug collector, I mean front fascia, of my M Y. Never seen a car with such a high bug count.

[@777Outrigger]

It took 22 seconds for the handshake on your first charge. It normally takes 6-7 secs. Interesting. I wonder why?

[@SpinnerEV]

Version 2 charger might have been why. I think it just wouldn’t initiate if I was watching it

[@YeOldeTraveller]

Lake of the Ozarks is a great place to visit. 2400 mile road trip last summer with 4 of us in a MYLR. Waited on the car once by choice to avoid a detour for charging at our destination.

[@SpinnerEV]

We leave for there in a few weeks.

[@bigdougscommentary5719]

Auto park at Superchargers should be mandatory. Can't tell you how many times cars are off centered. Cars are off centered because drivers are too lazy and rude to park correctly.

[@darkerbrother1]

Luke and Rachel I’m a little confused . Why didn’t you fully charge at the hotel overnight. I found it humorous when you said you were charging at Bolt speeds 😂 So this trip shows the difference between your Tesla and your Bolt is charging speed except the charging speed that Mike got 😮 I’m curious what the difference would be using level 2 chargers only

[@SpinnerEV]

The original plan was to continue on to a smaller town that would have added about 150 mile round trip. We wanted a shorter drive coming home and figured we could take care of checking in to the hotel while we charged for that extra distance. That extra drive ended up not happening and I wanted to get a tiny bit more juice to make it to a different supercharger on the way home.

[@MikeRadioNY]

Out of all my drives and legs of driving the one to get to Dalhart was the only one that did not rely on Tesla superchargers. I wanted to do an off interstate segment and I went from Topeka to Dalhart through State Route 50, which only supplied a few level two chargers and one slow DC fast charger in a place called hooker Oklahoma when you come to town, they greet you with the hooker hotel! Anyway, normal everything works great and it’s time out perfect using Tesla superchargers… But when you have one option to charge, you need to be careful because you could end up on the side of the road without any electricity in the middle of nowhere. The great thing about Tesla superchargers are if it says you’re gonna end up at a supercharger with 2% that’s fine! Because you know it’s gonna work. Luke I know a lot of times had extra buffer like you were doing with your bolt! We really just don’t have to worry about buffer because it’ll always be ready to go even if it says it’s just a few percent I still have 10 or 15% charging station but if it’s less it’s fine. And you can always slow down to save range which I’ve done before too. But there’s a big difference between Tesla, charging and other CCS charging. But that won’t stay like that forever.

[@StevenYoungcaptual]

Lots of calorie intake and rushing in this video.

[@sptrader6316]

Gas drivers don't have time to talk. They're gassed up and gone in 5 min. EV owners have no choice but to burn up hours, waiting for a charge. They get bored, so they talk.

[@stevendunn264]

Really should not break the law and put it on youtube.