A Trip in Three phases… Phase 1… The Tesla Owners Club 2017 Leadership Conference

The beginning of June has been a jam-packed time for our EV life. We packed three differing EV related events into six days on a trip to the Bay Area.  Thus, this series of a trip in three phases.

A few weeks prior to this trip, I’ve been playing #EVBingo with a bunch of fellow EV enthusiasts on Twitter. Derek Osborne, from Glasgow, Scotland sent the following Tweet and I became addicted playing this game with them since the last week of May.  (We decided on Twitter to handicap California scoring from the US system that they came up with by 50%).

EV Bingo Card - US Edition

The game is played by tallying up the points for all the vehicles that is spotted on the road and adding the point totals. There’s a lot of EVs in California, so this particular game had to be handicapped for us at 50% the total value.

So, the first phase of the trip (June 1-June 3, 2017) was focused on meeting with the leadership of the official Tesla Owners Clubs and working with Tesla on the relationship between the clubs as well as the relationships between the club and Tesla.

Phase 1 – Tesla Owners Club Leadership Conference

June 1, The Drive and Reception

The drive on June 1st targeted arriving at the Marriott, Fremont (which is across the freeway from the Tesla Factory) in time for the evening reception for all the participating Tesla Owners clubs at the hotel.  We left home and proceeded North through the I-405 traffic in West Los Angeles because of the #EVBingo addiction.  I figured to spot more EVs in the heavier, more direct West LA traffic than going the longer, but less populated route through the foothills.

Even with my more direct, but heavier traffic route, the in-car Trip Planner only required us to make two stops to make our destination.

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Before leaving the LA Metro area, we spot a very positive sight. The California Aqueduct is flowing with lots of water again.

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Additionally, in the interest of figuring out how many #EVBingo points I would spot on the drive within the LA area vs. between metro areas vs. Silicon Valley/Bay Area totals.  So, as we pass the California Aqueduct in the northern parts of LA County, we ran through our totals for the drive through traffic.

So, before we headed into the parts of California in between the LA Metro Area and Silicon Valley/Bay Area, we did a quick total count.

Total – 6/1 In LA Metro Area On Car Carriers Total Spotted Points Per Car Total Points
Tesla Model S 55 55 1 55
Chevy Volt 43 43 1 43
BMW i3 16 16 3 48
Tesla Model X 8 6 14 5 70
Mercedes Benz B250e 3 3 15 45
Ford Fusion PlugIn 1 1 2 2
Ford C-Max PlugIn 1 1 3 3
Nissan LEAF 5 6 11 1 11
Fiat 500e 6 6 7 42
Kia Soul EV 1 1 15 15
Volkswagen E-Golf 2 2 8 16
Toyota Prius PlugIn 6 6 3 18
Sonata 0 15 0
Chevy Bolt EV 8 8 15 120
Chevy Spark 0 15 0
Honda Fit EV 0 50 0
Honda Accord PHEV 0 50 0
BMW i8 1 1 15 15
RAV4EV 2nd Gen 2 2 30 60
Mitsubishi iMiEV 2 2 50 100
Audi E-Tron 1 1 12 12
Golf Cart 0 0 0 0
Total 675

Which means that with the California 50% handicap, we’re at 337.5 points.

And we’re reminded of why California is called the Golden State. Dry Brush sure looks like gold.

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#EVBingo was not the only game that I was playing on the road.  I was also helping beta-test TezLabApp (iTunes or Android) from HappyFunCorp. And one of the categories in this Tesla Social/gamifcation app is number of superchargers visited for the week, either for all the folks on the app, or your “friends.”  So, I made a deal with my better half that we would stop in as many supercharger locations and plug in as long as we got to the conference in “decent” time.

Besides, there were several added new superchargers along the route (as well as some expansions to existing capacity.)  We stopped at all these superchargers, but charged for a very short time at each one as the time required to charge in the one stop only required fifteen minutes.  We did stop at the Tejon Ranch supercharger for about ten minutes (Supercharger D in the image below), but that had a lot more to do with the coffee I drank in the morning, than really needing to stop and charge.  If you look at the map below, it was directing us to the Bakersfield Supercharger (which is the end of the BLUE highlighted GPS route, before it turns GREY.)

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If you look above, the Tejon Ranch supercharger has four more supercharger stalls deployed. Granted, they are of the “mobile” supercharger variety, but this is usually an indication that further, more permanent stalls will be placed at this location in the future.

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Our first new, to us, supercharger stop was at the Bakersfield Supercharger. This location is interesting in that it is one exit South of the Buttonwillow Supercharger on I-5. Having stopped at Buttonwillow late night/early morning in the past, we can attest that this location with its placement at a gas station location (and IHOP, as well as being located a block away from the California Highway Patrol) makes it ideal for any late night supercharging that we may have to do on this route in the future.

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Our view while supercharging at the stall perpendicular to the rest of the installation has a nice view of the current gasoline prices on this route.

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What it looked like behind me, before someone else was by to join us at the supercharger.  The Trip Planner had us originally scheduled to stop and charge here for fifteen minutes before we headed to Harris Ranch.  However, I was pining for some coffee and we knew that Buttonwillow (which is the next exit North of us) was collocated by a Subway and Starbucks.  So, we unplugged and headed North.

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Moments later, this white Model X took the spot behind us.

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So, we headed to Buttonwillow, one exit North of the Bakersfield Supercharger.  (approximately 3 miles, I believe.) As I previously mentioned, this stop had a lot more to do with the collocated Starbucks than anything else (that and getting the TezLabApp (iTunes or Android) points. We were joined by a Signature Red Model X with some interesting rims.  Getting our Starbucks order completed took longer than the recommended supercharging stop for our next stop at Harris Ranch.

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On the drive along the I-5, we’re reminded that as long as the grid has a connection, we’re sure to find a way to recharge any EV.

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It’s just great that Tesla provides the supercharger network to do it in a quicker way than most other EVs.

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We continued on to Harris Ranch, an Oasis on I-5 for its great steaks, but also for its industry leadership in supporting clean fueling. From its original Roadster charging station to its Hydrogen station. (note the Hyd sign on the exit.)  The only thing missing is standard J1772, CHAdeMO or CCS at this stop (I’m not sure if CNG is available here as well, I don’t normally check for that.)

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This site has expanded again for the third time and is now up to 20 supercharger stalls.  It originally had six charger stalls, then 13 charger stalls, and now 20 supercharger stalls.  The last two are reserved to be used last for handicap access.  I made a mistake on this stop and charged there.  I read the sign for the one I was using when we LEFT Harris Ranch, so I was charging at one of those two chargers that were reserved to be used last on this trip.  To be fair, the last one was the extra-wide that is common for handicap access.

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We’ve been spotting a ton of Tesla vehicles on car carriers on this trip, and we finally caught one on film.  Luckily, the #EVBingo folks said that we can count EVs on car carriers that are NOT found in a dealership or Tesla Gallery.

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It seems that most of the Teslas on the transporters on this day are predominantly Model X.

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Though the better half caught this one carrier with a lot of S on it.

Before making the turn-off for Gilroy, we pass 77,000 miles.

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Now, the navigation didn’t require us to stop anywhere else, but it’s common practice for us to supercharge to near maximum at Gilroy so that we’re not so reliant on supercharging or destination charging while visiting hotels in the Silicon Valley/Bay Area. So, the warning below was for our destination for the evening.

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However, instead of going to Gilroy directly, we noticed that there is a new, to us, Supercharger at Gustline that was about a six mile detour from our route.  So, we decided to go ahead and get the points for the TezLabApp (iTunes or Android) contest.

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Have to be careful of the dip in the charging stalls.  So, if one has air suspension, remember to use it before backing into the stalls.

This is the view from our charging stall.

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We didn’t really need to stop, and after a few minutes of photo taking and documentation and obtaining TezLabApp (iTunes or Android) points, we headed to Gilroy.

The drive to Gilroy we’re greeted with a welcome sight. The reservoir that has looked rather parched in the past few years and previous trips looks like it’s almost at capacity.

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Even the little duck pond that we’ve passed has water in it again.

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The Gilroy supercharger location is another of the original locations in the Supercharger network.

We noticed that this was yet another location that had been expanded for a third time or so.  Originally, when we picked up our Model S in 2013, this location had six stalls.  It’s expanded to twelve last year and now to sixteen stalls.  (Not to mention the CHAdeMO  and CCS stations at this location as well.)

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We decided to check out the newest four stalls and charged at one of them.

Spotted another EV (Golf Cart, which unfortunately has mixed consideration for #EVBingo).

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Did spot a JdeMO powered 2nd Gen RAV4EV pull up to the CHAdeMO/CCS station at Gilroy.

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Spoke with the owner for a few minutes before heading onward to the conference.  The JdeMO from QuickChargePower is a device that adds CHAdeMO DC Fast Charge capability originally for the 2nd Gen RAV 4 and now the Roadster.

We figured that this location was a good one to delineate as “in-between Metro Area spotting” so, quickly tallied our #EVBingo points

in Between Metro Areas
Total – 6/1 in Between Metro Areas On Car Carriers Total Spotted Points Per Car Total Points
Tesla Model S 26 8 34 1 34
Chevy Volt 8 8 1 8
BMW i3 0 3 0
Tesla Model X 12 16 28 5 140
Mercedes Benz B250e 0 15 0
Ford Fusion PlugIn 1 1 2 2
Ford C-Max PlugIn 1 1 3 3
Nissan LEAF 9 9 1 9
Fiat 500e 1 1 7 7
Kia Soul EV 0 15 0
Volkswagen E-Golf 0 8 0
Toyota Prius PlugIn 0 3 0
Sonata 1 1 15 15
Chevy Bolt EV 0 15 0
Chevy Spark 0 15 0
Honda Fit EV 0 50 0
Honda Accord PHEV 0 50 0
BMW i8 1 1 15 15
RAV4EV 2nd Gen 1 1 30 30
Mitsubishi iMiEV 0 50 0
Audi E-Tron 0 12 0
Golf Cart 1 1 0 0
Totals 263

Which means that with the California 50% handicap, we’re at 181.5 points.  Or 938 total points without the handicap or 469 points after the 50% handicap, for today’s drive, so far.  We headed from Gilroy to the Fremont Marriott and for more metro-area #EVBingo, in the middle of Silicon Valley Rush Hour traffic.  And another Tesla filled Car carrier on the other side of the freeway.

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It wasn’t just Teslas in this part of the drive.  There seemed to be an inordinate number of LEAFs in traffic with us. It was not uncommon on this part of the drive to catch a few LEAFs at the same time. It was like a flashback to 2012 or 2013 when it seems that every other EV was a LEAF.

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Here’s an interesting shot that my better half and co-pilot captured with the former Solar City location sporting Tesla signage and one of many LEAFs that we spotted for #EVBingo in the Silicon Valley area.

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Before heading down to the Tesla Owners Club Leadership Conference Thursday Reception, we do a quick #EVBingo tally.

Silicon Valley
Total – 6/1 Silicon Valley On Car Carriers Total Spotted Points Per Car Total Points
Tesla Model S 7 6 13 1 13
Chevy Volt 22 22 1 22
BMW i3 2 2 3 6
Tesla Model X 2 6 8 5 40
Mercedes Benz B250e 4 4 15 60
Ford Fusion PlugIn 1 1 2 2
Ford C-Max PlugIn 1 1 3 3
Nissan LEAF 35 35 1 35
Fiat 500e 2 2 7 14
Kia Soul EV 1 1 15 15
Volkswagen E-Golf 1 1 8 8
Toyota Prius PlugIn 7 7 3 21
Sonata 0 15 0
Chevy Bolt EV 5 5 15 75
Chevy Spark 1 1 15 15
Honda Fit EV 1 1 50 50
Honda Accord PHEV 0 50 0
BMW i8 2 2 15 30
RAV4EV 2nd Gen 0 30 0
Mitsubishi iMiEV 0 50 0
Audi E-Tron 0 12 0
Golf Cart 0 0 0
Totals 409

Which means that with the California 50% handicap, we’re at 204.5 points for Silicon Valley.  Interesting to spot a lot more LEAF and Volt than S and X this close to the Fremont Factory.  Still didn’t spot any Model 3 on this drive.

And adding all the legs of this one day, gives us the totals for this Thursday.

Day Total
Total – 6/1 Total Spotted Points Per Car Total Points
Tesla Model S 102 1 102
Chevy Volt 73 1 73
BMW i3 18 3 54
Tesla Model X 50 5 250
Mercedes Benz B250e 7 15 105
Ford Fusion PlugIn 3 2 6
Ford C-Max PlugIn 3 3 9
Nissan LEAF 55 1 55
Fiat 500e 9 7 63
Kia Soul EV 2 15 30
Volkswagen E-Golf 3 8 24
Toyota Prius PlugIn 13 3 39
Sonata 1 15 15
Chevy Bolt EV 13 15 195
Chevy Spark 1 15 15
Honda Fit EV 1 50 50
Honda Accord PHEV 0 50 0
BMW i8 4 15 60
RAV4EV 2nd Gen 3 30 90
Mitsubishi iMiEV 2 50 100
Audi E-Tron 1 12 12
Golf Cart 1 0 0
Totals 1347

Or 1347 total points without the handicap or 673.5 points after the 50% handicap, for today’s drive.

I’m not even sure if that counts the points for the Teslas that we can spot from outside our window from our room today.

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I know it didn’t include the ones across the freeway at Tesla’s Factory from the Marriott’s Executive Lounge.

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Either way, we headed to our evening reception with fellow Tesla Owners Club leaders.  Aside from folks from all over North America, we had friends fly all the way in from Europe and Australia to join us in this first formal event.  Those that followed us on last year’s Long Way Round trip to the Gigafactory would remember the lunch that we had with fellow clubs before the event.

The evening reception was casual and provided the attendees with the time to “get to know” each other again.

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Zeb (pictured on the right) had done this trip on the furthest drive for the group, having driven cross-country from North Carolina and documented it on Google Plus.

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Our Belgian friends, who would later capture some great Model 3 shots on this trip at the reception were all wearing their club polos.

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And here I am speaking with some of the Europeans again.

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Before turning in for the night, went back up to the Executive Lounge to get a nice shot of the Tesla Factory across the street.

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June 2, Conference at Tesla Fremont Factory

Day 2 of the Conference starts off with a bunch of us that drove to the conference providing Zero emission transport from the hotel to the Tesla Factory. Tesla provided the clubs with a room and the time with quite a few employees and executives to spend the day with us as we brainstormed how to make the Tesla Owners Club Program a bigger success.

At the hotel driveway, before we took off… Here’s the panoramic I took after a few of the cars took off…

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Here are four shots of the driveway before those cars took off.

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A hotel driveway full of Teslas mean that either I’m in Heaven, in California, Norway, or Amsterdam’s Schipol Airport… One of those four things is accurate.

Our event with Tesla was occurring during the same time as the Model 3 VIP Event/Factory Tour for folks from the Referral program, so I’m not sure whether they had us park for our event or the other one, but we parked by the supercharger/delivery center at the Fremont Factory.

We headed through security into the training room set aside for the TOC Leadership were meeting.

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We were asked some ice breaker questions.

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and waited for the start.

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It was a long, productive day and we got a break in the middle to do an updated factory tour.

We saw 100,000 Model 3s produced and ready to go…

…JUST KIDDING…

…We saw the production line and the factory itself seems to be “more full” than I’ve ever seen it before. This was the third time that I’ve visited the factory and it seems like they’re now fully utilizing the building.

But we had NDAs and couldn’t take any pictures whatsoever.

It wasn’t all serious work. In between sessions, the tables were provided some pipe cleaners and folks got creative with what was provided for them.

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Here was a rendering of a Model 3 supercharging.

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Either a Rocket Ship to Mars or La Tour Eiffel from Stephen Pace as well as some chocolate covered macadamia nuts from the Hawaii Club.

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And the better half was not immune from the pipe cleaner fun…

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Doing a Tesla logo and the notebook that we used at the conference.

Here are the selection of pipe cleaner fun that the folks put together.

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Aside from the goodies that Tesla fed us with, our friends from Hawaii brought some chocolate macadamia nuts that were in bite size packages on our tables, the Belgians brought Godiva.

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After a long day of brainstorming and working with our Tesla hosts, we had some dinner and drinks at the Factory.

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and some special Tesla cookies for dessert.

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We had some further interesting happenings that I won’t be sharing with you here… But, let’s just say that I got a good idea of the differences in size between the Model 3 and Model S.

And then we were back at the Marriott. When we got back to the hotel, we found out that Robert R and our friends from Belgium were busy taking pictures of the Model 3, both in the wild and on the Test Track near the Factory.

This was what they first spotted that first evening of #Model3 spotting.

They were also by the Tesla track beside the factory and had a few shots on their Twitter page as well.

Had a good time with some late night discussions at the hotel lobby with fellow club leaders, but decided to turn in.

June 3, Club de-brief, hanging at the Computer History Museum, and Model 3 Spotting

The next morning, we had a half day session left for the conference. But before the start of the conference, I thought to see if I can clean the windshield on the car.

Want to spot Teslas from the hotel window? Our S is parked beside the traffic cones on the bottom right corner of the picture.

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Here are some of the Teslas that I could spot from above.

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Lot of other folks did this drive in their Model X. Zeb from North Carolina had already headed back at this time. I was trying to find his car to show the guy with the farthest drive from this group.

And our friends from Belgium were up to their tricks again…

But eventually, we all met back for our clubs debrief and we had a productive session amongst the Tesla Clubs.

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It was good to get a grasp of what other clubs are up to, what sort of response they get and strategies on how to work within the community and with Tesla. We strengthened our bonds and said goodbye to old friends and new. With the full expectation to spot some of these folks on Tuesday for the Tesla Annual Meeting, which is Phase 3 of our trip.

Besides, we were provided with the last gift from the event planning committee.

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The chocolate was enclosed in this puzzle box adorned with all four Tesla vehicles produced or about to be produced, so that was cool.

The rest of Saturday, the 3rd was hanging out with Trevor Page of Model3OwnersClub. We were in contact with each other because he was flying in for the Referral Program VIP Tour and Q&A Session that was held during the same weekend as the TOC event. We were trying to find a time to hang and I volunteered to take him to the airport, so we hung out for a while before his flight.

He hasn’t visited the area before and I didn’t know what traffic in the area was like, so figured to take him to the Computer History Museum in Mountain View. The museum is a short drive, even in traffic, from San Jose Airport. Additionally, the museum is the same location as the Tesla Annual Meeting and figured that he would enjoy that.

We’ve been in the building last year for the Annual Meeting, but never really visited the museum.

Needless to say, it was a blast.

We saw some really old computers.

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Here’s Trev taking a photo.

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And a lot of very important historical computers. Like this Enigma Machine.

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Or this really old memory tube that was 2560 bits of RAM.

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Trev in front of some old military computer installation.

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A couple of old Cray computers.

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Of course, video games…

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They even had some kids playing PONG.

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and finally an old Apple 1.

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Before we took Trev to the airport for his flight, we take a picture in front of the Google/Waymo Pod Car.

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He had a little fun with his Twitter followers with this car…

After dropping Trev off at the airport, we decided to charge up at the supercharger at the Tesla Factory. Though our hotel is a host to in the destination charger program, one of the L2 was broken, and it was easy enough to catch a charge there. Besides, I had to get another drink of the Tesla Blend drip coffee that Tesla was serving us during our conference the other day.

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I was trying to do some lazy Model 3 spotting at the factory.

And actually caught the Alpha being loaded back in the truck.

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Except, I was asked not to take any further pictures. It’s cool, but I’ve been way up-close to that car already. It’s the same one that was at the Tesla Solar Roof and PowerWall2 Announcement from a few months back, and I have a ton of better pictures of that.

After being emboldened by our spotting of the Alpha car… I figured to take the long way back to the hotel, and drive close to the track that our Belgian friends spotted the Silver and Red cars being speed tested. And sure enough, we spot two of them.

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There are definitely better pictures, but these are the ones that I spotted. We even captured their drives on video… Have to zoom in though! 😉

Either way, we had some fun on #EVBingo with that…

So, the first phase of our three phase trip was complete and we had a night to recover before our drive down to Morro Bay for the ActiveE West Coast North-South Reunion 4. (or WxNS4 as they’ve abbreviated it.) Click here for the next phase on this trip.

If you want to join us on some of our other trips, here’s day one of our cross-country trip from 2015 or last year’s Long Way Round to the Gigafactory which took us to the Vancouver, BC and back.

To the Bay Area and Back in One Day

A little over a week ago, we returned home from a day trip to the Bay Area and back. We didn’t set out on Thursday morning to go on a 22 hour road trip. We figured to find a place to stop overnight once we got to the Bay Area.  However, we did end up on a 22 hour drive and this is the post of that particular trip.  After our 808 mile day on our Here, There, and EVerywhere series, a drive of approximately 400 miles isn’t “too bad.”

We started our trip on Thursday morning after an overnight charge in our garage.  Figuring to head to the Bay Area using the I-5 route means driving through the Grapevine and since I haven’t driven that route in years, I didn’t remember if the climb was both ways or if it was just one way, so we range charged.

One question that is often asked by folks waiting for delivery of their Model S is whether to purchase the HPWC and dual chargers.  As you can see below, the Model S was drawing 20 miles per hour on 30A.  At the time we were faced with that decision the HPWC was over $1000 (was it $1500? I don’t remember) for the device alone.  Additionally, because our garage is the furthest point from our Main Electrical Panel, a 100A circuit was prohibitively expensive.  So, we opted to use an existing Chargepoint EVSE that I had installed for the Active E.  We opted to install 2 NEMA 14-50s and a NEMA 6-50 throughout the garage and outside to accomodate up to 4 EVs charging at the same time.

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We rolled out of the garage just a tad under “full” but with enough range to tackle the drive from home to Tejon Ranch.

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Moving the car out of the garage requires a bit of a maneuver and takes a lot of going back and forth.

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Southern California Traffic

One of the challenges of leaving Southern California during the rush hour is the amount of time spent in traffic.  The navigation does an adequate job of routing us through traffic, but it doesn’t calculate “potential frustration” with certain routes and though I-5 is the most direct route to Tejon Ranch, we opted to go I-605 to I-210 (less immediate traffic) and more.  Note the estimate below of a 10:31 AM arrival to the destination through the original route.

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The other benefit of the longer route that we took was access to the HOV (High Occupancy Vehicle or carpool) lanes.  In some parts these lanes can be as congested as other lanes, whereas in many they are still beneficial for drivers.  In many of the routes, an HOV only requires two passengers or an HOV eligible vehicle with a sticker (such as an EV, PHEV, Hydrogen, or CNG.)  Though I have some opinions on PHEV eligibility, unfortunately the legislature is fairly lenient about that.

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Visitors to Southern California freeways might get confused by the on ramp stoplights. One of my close friends, who is British and was visiting from England, was pulled over when he just passed through one of these many years ago.  The one in the photograph is between I-605 and I-210 and requires all lanes to stop and proceed with 2 cars per green. There are many on ramps in the Los Angeles area that actually only uses the on ramp stoplight for one of the lanes, the other lane is an HOV lane and does not use the stoplight.  This is not the case in the one below.

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As we were driving along, I noticed that we passed 44,000 miles early on this drive, 44,008 miles.

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Grapevine

And we are thankfully out of SoCal traffic.  The folks going the other direction, however, are heading into it.  There is a reason that California is called the Golden State. And part of me wonders if that’s more because of the Golden Brown that the hills take rather than the “Gold Rush” of the 1800s.

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In the Winter, this route can be closed to traffic when it snows.  Which happens occasionally.  But, we’re in a drought and it’s Summer, so, that’s not a worry.

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Ooh a water tower.  We have to build them lower to the ground in “earthquake country.”  I do wonder how much water Gorman actually has in that water tower, we’re in the fourth year of the drought, after all.

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Apparently, the Grapevine drive is downhill when heading North. So, I guess we’ll have to pay attention to what we charge on the way back for that climb.

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Peering West from the car during the descent we capture this view with our camera. The landscape scene is quite stunning and in looking at the picture now, we wonder whether we can pass it off as a painting.

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Tejon Ranch

The exit for the Tejon Ranch Supercharger is ahead, away from the outlet mall on the East Side of the road.

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Take the West exit from the Northbound 5.

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Believe the sign, that’s one weird curve coming up.

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There looks to be two Starbucks in this exit, one East (probably in the mall) and one West, a free standing one with a drive through. We opted for the one up the street from the superchargers on the East side.  We futilely waited in the drive through, but the line was just too long (wasted 20 minutes and gave up.)  I figured that we would probably see another one on the I-5 drive.

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We would have actually beat the original estimate to arrive at the charger by at least five minutes had we not decided to waste time at the Starbucks line.

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Sharing the same parking lot as the chargers is a Yogurtland and Chipotle.  I went to see about using their “facilities” the Yogurtland doesn’t open until 11:00 am, but the Chipotle was open.

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These guys in the pickup truck did ICE the SC, but only for a few minutes. They were so excited to see us charging and had questions that he drove right up, jumped out and started to fire away.  We had a good conversation and they drove off soon after we were done talking.

Supercharging at Tejon. These guys were excited to see a @TeslaMotors Model S, that they stopped by to ask questions

On the next leg of the drive to Harris Ranch, we swapped drivers, so it was my turn to take pictures of the view outside.

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It’s amazing what farmers in the Central Valley are able to grow in such an arid place. Not really sure what they’re planting and my wife and I spent the time guessing what they are.

The cows that we saw on this drive were all penned up and had shade that were installed over them.  They were carport like structures.

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Since I wasn’t driving, I took the opportunity to play with Periscope and Twitter again. The first attempt at Periscope was about a minute.

The second video was a little longer, I didn’t get to archive the questions that folks were asking on the drive.

Is that Corn being planted outside of our window?

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I wonder what those trees are? I was guessing almonds for some reason. I’m not really very attuned to farms and such.

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We passed some kind of processing plant, I was guessing for the trees that we just passed.

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It would seem that farming in California is a lot of water politics. I can’t verify it, but I think these signs have been around before the current drought. I swear that these were here the last time I did this drive on I-5, which is longer than the current drought.

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I really wonder how old those signs are.

Harris Ranch Supercharger and Battery Swap

And just like that we’re at the Harris Ranch Supercharger.  There were already two other Model S parked and charging when we got there. Luckily there are six stalls and we took one of the ones that was not paired with either of the other two Model S.

Each Model S at the Harris Ranch Supercharger was charging at one of the pairs. Reading the notes on this location, apparently we were very lucky because these stalls are often full of other Model S with many waiting for a charge.

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The view in front of the superchargers is a restaurant that we ended up skipping.

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We were getting quite a fast charge at the location. When one doesn’t have to share the feed with another Model S, the speed of charge is even greater than when it is split.

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Harris Ranch is also the site of the Tesla Battery Swap Station. I tried contacting the station to see if we can get an invite to use it early. At $80 for the roundtrip, it’s not cheap, but it will also help save time for a very boring stop in Harris Ranch. Unfortunately I was told that there was no way to get an invite early and that I would just have to wait. So, I took pictures of the signage for the swap station instead.

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Here’s a picture of the entrance or is it the exit of the Swap station. We enviously took a picture and drove off. Maybe next time.

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We got enough charge to skip Gilroy and head to the Tesla Motors Fremont Factory as our first stop in the Bay Area was in Oakland.

One of the things about the Harris Ranch location is its proximity to a lot of cattle. If the wind blows a particular way, you will smell the cows from miles away. We were somewhat fortunate at Harris Ranch in the daytime as the winds were in our favor. Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter because the drive through I-5 will have you pass by these cattle pens. And the cabin air filter on the Model S is no match for the smell of cow just North of the Harris Ranch supercharger.

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There were lots of cows for miles.

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The drive toward Gilroy has us go through a reservoir area that truly reflects the sorry state of the California drought.

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The Golden hue of the dry brush is quite stunning.

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The reservoir on the other side of the hill climb shows how really low the water levels have gotten.  If you look at the striations on the shore-side, you will notice rings.  Those rings are where the water should be.  On a positive note, there seems to be an abundance of windmils on that mountain ridge.

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This shot shows the water as it buttresses up on the dam on the other side.

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Better shots of the windmills, why don’t we also have a solar farm out there California? Readers from our Here, There, and EVerywhere series will note a change of tone here.  Since I’m a California resident,  I have higher expectations of my own state.  So, there.

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This route is pretty well traveled.

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My wife captured the scene below and it’s another that leads us to wonder, photograph or painting.

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We ended up passing Gilroy, as planned and was on the 101 North going toward the Tesla Motors Fremont Factory.  I was quite excited when we spotted our first Volkswagen E-Golf in the US.  Had to fumble for a camera, but my wife was able to catch the E-Golf as it took the exit. (Note the white sticker on the rear bumper.)

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Tesla Motors Fremont Factory Supercharger

We arrived at the supercharger at the Tesla Fremont Factory at 4:25 pm, a few minutes passed eight hours from our departure. All stalls were full when we arrived and we had to wait about two minutes before one freed up.

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At this point of the drive, we’ve driven about 400 miles and have to drive another 20 miles North and then back across the Bay to make it to Sparky’s Garage in San Carlos, CA for the party this evening.

It was on the drive that we decided to see if we can just make this drive a “day” trip and head back home today as well.  Our decision was solidified by the very expensive options for lodging in the Bay Area that we were seeing as we looked for places to stay while charging at the Tesla Motors Fremont Factory, so we figured to skip any alcoholic refreshments at the party.

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I attached the car to the open Tesla Supercharger network that I saw while charging, the result was a strong signal, but no connection.  Had to reboot the main display again and disconnect from that network.

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We made it to our destination in Oakland.  Turned back around and headed to the party in San Carlos.  Since we were on the other side of the bay, we decided to take the San Mateo Bridge (CA-92) across the bay. One thing about traveling in our own state is we are able to use the same transponder as we do at home, so it was a lot more convenient to cross the bridge. Additionally, it seems that the bridge toll of $5.00 is half-price for carpools, so we were only charged $2.50 for this crossing.

My wife took a photo of what looks to be “old windmills” on the side of the low-tide entering the bay.  I wonder if that’s what they are.

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It is wildly disconcerting to have water on both sides of us at such a low point.  It felt as if it won’t take that much for the water to go over the side of the San Mateo Bridge.

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Sparky’s Garage, San Carlos, CA

So, the trip up to the Bay Area was two-fold.  The first part involved our quick stop at Oakland, and the second was to attend a party that eMotorwerks and Wattime.org was holding to announce the launch of the first EVSE that plans its charge based upon “cleaner” energy supply.

Thanks for the party @eMotorWerks, great product launch to have folks be able to decide to charge from renewable sources.

 

The party was well attended.  It seems that I find myself behind Jack Brown at many events, and he’s the tall guy right in front of me at this event as well. I need to either get taller, or find a place off to the side of him instead. 🙂

Jack’s Take Charge and Go tags were the giveaway at the party and it’s a great improvement over the free Plug In America EV Card that I usually use.  The hang tags are attached to the charging nozzle with a red and green side to say whether it’s “ok” to unplug the car, provide the operator’s contact information, and an estimate of the time that the operator would be done charging (provided the operator carries a dry-erase pen with them).  I think that I will probably be moving toward this method at charging stations, as soon as I get a dry-erase pen.

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The product announcement itself was quite interesting. As the title of the blog is quick to point out, I am accidentally environmental. We didn’t join the rEVolution to be green, we just ended up being environmental as we became more involved in electric vehicles. I am sure there are more things that we can do to be better and we’ll get there. The folks at Green Car Reports had a good write-up on the product launch and I suppose that it’s a good compromise for those that don’t have solar panels or their own windmill to try to minimize their use of “dirtier” sources of electricity.

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Wattime’s Executive Director, Gavin McCormick can be seen on the shot below discussing what it is that Wattime is doing. They provide manufacturers with a method to enable the device to know whether drawing power at a certain time will force the utility to source power from power plants that were not using renewable energy.  He was saying that a five minute delay could be the difference between dirty or clean power sources being on or offline.

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As commendable as the goal of Watttime,org is, it is a “guess.”  Granted, it’s an educated guess and it’s better than what is out there, in terms of the environmental concern.  But I am also a capitalist. I am perfectly willing to use the structures in place that motivate me to charge my EV at the lowest rates available. Rather than use an algorithm to see whether we’re carbon neutral or the like, we installed solar panels on the roof of our home to ensure that we offset our usage with as much clean energy as our roof can generate (with summer peaks around 40 kWh of production.)

I suppose the next step for the manufacturer is to allow users of this algorithm to set guidelines of how much they are willing to subsidize others in order to delay their charge for “cleaner” grid power. As with most things, it’s a complicated decision and it’s at least commendable to have this information available to those that wish to make use of it. I wonder how many people will take them up on it. We have enough EVSE and plugs at home to charge four vehicles at the same time, so I wasn’t really in the market for another one.

So, after enjoying the company of fellow EV enthusiasts, and many Electronuts (former BMW Active E Electronauts), who were at the party. We headed South toward home.  Our first stop was to supercharge again at Mountain View so that we can check out the new liquid cooled superchargers and range charge to skip Gilroy, again.

Mountain View Supercharger

The Mountain View Supercharger is the first new supercharger with the liquid cooled cables.  Tesla announced this improvement in supercharger technology during the 2014 Annual shareholder meeting the previous month.  Transport Evolved wrote an article and covered a video that was filmed at the location by another Tesla owner and I wanted to see it first-hand.

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We initially picked stall 3A to charge because it and its partner stall 3B were open.

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However, we saw that stall 3A had a blue note saying that it was designed for disabled access and to use it last. So we moved. Now, to ensure that we get the fastest charge, we moved to 3B, the stall paired with this one, figuring that it we were supposed to use it last, then it should stay free the longest, and thus not need to split its feed with another car until all other paired stalls were full.

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I took photos of the other stalls around us.

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I wanted to capture photos of the thinner/liquid-cooled charging cables.

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Has the new circular proximity button for charge door and cable release.

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Since the cable is thinner, it is more flexible than previous generations of superchargers.

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To show the thickness of the new cable, I figured to compare it to a quarter. (A 25 cent coin for those non Americans and unaware of our terms.)

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Though the first photograph of the charging showed a 197 mile per hour rate, this actually sped up to close to 340 miles per hour.  It would seem that the chargers in Mountain View are faster than others and we were planning on skipping Gilroy again to get to Harris Ranch directly, we decided to range charge the car again.

So, while waiting for the charge to complete, I did another Periscope session that we archived on Youtube.

As I continue to note, Periscope doesn’t do a good job of saving the chat comments from folks, so I transcribed it below.

@Tim61588: Is that an Eaton supercharger?
@Tim61588: or roush
@Legibly: How long does that last on full?
@ThaddiusT: Insane mode!
@Tim61588: how long to charge from near empty?
[Unknown]: Is that the new P85D?
@ThaddiusT: Meh. Still cool tho. Love tesla
@Tim61588: can it do a burnout
@torfn: and your happy with it?
@DspkMsn: Please show the centre display
@ThaddiusT: Damn. That’s ridiculous. Never seen the display
@Tim61588: Have you done the battery swap program
@DspkMsn: Wow
@STenczynski: Tesla?
@Legibly: Pretty badasa
@JeremyHolleb: Does A/C use really destroy battery life???
@Legibly: Badass
@BradlyBurgundy: This thing have insane mode?
[Unknown]: [missed question]
@DspkMsn: Does it get 400 mi range?
@ThaddiusT: I see model s’ all day around Sunnyvale
@JeremyHolleb: 2.7 seconds
@Tim61588: Have you raced anything yet
[Unknown]: [missed question]
@BradlyBurgundy: How long to charge?
@STenczynski: Doesn’t one of the tesla model drive by itself?
@Legibly: Does it take gas too?
@ThaddiusT: There should be a burger joint there too. Make a killing.
@trprevett: Autopilot
@Legibly: So if you were to go for a cross country drive you’d have to find a charger station?
@STenczynski: @trprevett yes
@ThaddiusT: Meh. Starbucks. All about Philz.
@Legibly: Alright I’ll check it out cool
@tprevett: You tesla employee?
@ThaddiusT: You from around here?
[Unknown]: P85d?
@ThaddiusT: You check out the plant while your here today?
@tprevett: Gonna get a 3 when they come out
@Legibly: How long have you had it?
@ThaddiusT: Nice. Good drive
@tprevett: Any problems with it?
@ThaddiusT: Mind if I ask the final cost?
@Legibly: He said any problems with it?
[Unknown]: What’s your opinion on the bmw i8?
@ThaddiusT: I hear the i3 engine was optional
@ArguablyDefined: Talk about the gaskets. Please.
@ThaddiusT: Chassis flex?
@ArguablyDefined: That’s unusual. Thanks.
@Legibly: Can you show us outside the car please?
@ThaddiusT: They look sexy

We got a full charge and left Mountain View to head to Harris Ranch directly.  Seeing that we were planning on making it all the way home from the Bay Area, my wife, and co-driver, went to take a nap as I drove us to the next supercharger.

On our way to Gilroy, the car hit a repetitive, significant mileage of 44,444 miles.  We’re really racking the miles on this car with all the “short range” driving we’ve done.  😉

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After passing the Gilroy superchargers and on the way to Harris Ranch, crews were doing overnight construction with only one lane open on a two-lane road.

So we found ourselves stopped for what I would estimate to be 20 to 30 minutes.  We were parked on our side of the road waiting for the other side to complete their drive through the construction zone.

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When it became our turn to go ahead, we were led through the construction site slowly by a pilot vehicle.

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It was a dark drive, but still not as dark as what we encountered in other parts of the country.  Additionally, there were no “Deer Crossing” signs to worry about.

Harris Ranch Supercharger and Battery Swap (part deux.)

And a few hours later, we find ourselves back in Harris Ranch Supercharger again.  We joined another Model S charging here.  The Model S was a family from Napa on the way to San Diego for vacation. They told us of pending overnight construction and possible detour. They had spoken with the CHP earlier. So, we decided to fill up the car with at least 40 miles additional rated range.

When not sharing a charger, the rates can get really fast.  The one in Harris Ranch was going around 315 miles per hour.  The Tesla battery swap station is closed and only available from 9 am to 5 pm local time, so that would not have helped on the return journey this evening.

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I wanted to compare the Mountain View supercharger cable that we photographed earlier, so, here is the Harris Ranch one.

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I wanted to give two views of the cable with the quarter, so the older cables really are that much thicker than the new ones at Mountain View.

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I wonder how much faster the liquid cooled cables will be able to charge. I saw it them peak around 340 miles per hour when I was charging.  The original cables are quite bulky and others have found them harder to work with.

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Had my wife continue to rest while I went over to grab some “gas station coffee” from the station close to the supercharger and proceeded South to Tejon Ranch.

The construction zone that we were warned about ended up being a non-event, though at times, we found ourselves on the “other” side of I-5 at times as they were working on the Southbound side of the freeway.

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Tejon Ranch

You know what happens when we show blurry pictures.  Normally, it’s time to stop and find a place to sleep for the night, but we were so close to home from Tejon Ranch.  We plugged in and charged up. We only need to go a little under 120 miles to home.

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My wife felt rested from our drive from Mountain View to Tejon Ranch, so we swapped drivers and she proceeded to take us home, after we got a charge. She took the tough climb up the Grapevine and decided to just drive all the way home, skipping all three superchargers on the West Side, Culver City, Hawthorne, and Redondo Beach.

At that time of the morning, if we had stopped at any of the superchargers, we could have gotten stuck in traffic on the freeway, besides our bed was calling us home.

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After nearly 22 hours on the road, we were home. That was a LONG DAY. Of course, we did do a few things, attended a party, and such. And another interesting mileage pattern in our garage – 44,800 miles. The 852.9 mile journey actually felt shorter than Day One of our Here, There, and EVerywhere trip, perhaps it was the long break in between each half of the drive.  Either way, it’s good preparation for next week’s TMC Connect 2015.

What else will Tesla give you? Free Wi-Fi of course.

I spend a lot of time at Tesla facilities…  Whether it’s a supercharger, a Tesla Store, or Tesla Service, I tend to like to be at Tesla facilities.

Yes, I’m obsessed.  Either way, what else do you get for free at Tesla, well, their guest Wi-Fi is free and the password is the super secure “abcd123456”.

So, if you find yourself supercharging at Hawthorne, CA or at a Tesla Service Center, just remember to connect to the “Tesla Guest” or “Tesla Motors Guest” network and use that super-secure password.

Now, remember, it’s a shared wi-fi network, so be warned, be careful, and be safe.  Use some sort of protection when connecting.

Here’s my Model S at a late night stop on the way home from Hawthorne on our first Tesla Weekend… using the free wi-fi at Hawthorne Design Center/Supercharger.

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Reflections on the Model S Fremont Factory pickup experience…


It has been two weeks since we first got our Model S.

So… would we do it again?

A resounding Yes.

Unfortunately, I as with other members of the public that have gone on the Tesla Factory tour, I have agreed to a non-disclosure. I can disclose that it was very interesting and quite impressive. The gentleman that led the tour, Anish, was very informative and engaging. He addressed fellow tour group members questions, pointed out interesting things in the factory and was lively.

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As for the Model S pickup experience. There are definitely things that can be improved. I lucked out in that Anish, our tour group leader, was actually the Delivery Specialist to hand over the keys to us. He was a good sport regarding the last $1 that I owed Tesla being paid in cash. He took some time with us throughout the process but it definitely felt like he was hurrying us along.

Wanting to learn from previous Model S owners, I printed out the very handy Delivery Checklist that was compiled by @NickJHowe. Anish saw the list and was dismissive of it and told us to just “get him at his desk” after we’re done doing the presentation “his way.” Though I appreciate his time (as well as mine), I had a few things on the list I wanted to cover and I felt that the guide was a good way to tackle this.

My wife had a question on the way the Panoramic Roof was installed and Anish brushed us off and said that this was a minor thing that should “settle”, if not, take it to the Tesla Service Center for repair. Guess what… That turns out to be a two day job that we now have to schedule and do when the Service Center can get to it.

[added these photos November 27, 2013]

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[The glass does not sit in place properly and the gasket is sunken in.]

Lastly… The downside to the “soft-sell” aspect of Tesla’s program is that I didn’t even realize that there is a 4 year or 4+4 year Service Plan (or 50,000 to 100,000 mile Service Plan) that Tesla offers. As well as an extension of the warranty for an additional 4 years. Apparently this option has to be exercised at up to thirty days after taking delivery of the car. I stumbled upon this when I logged into my account and now have to figure out what that means and whether or not it’s worth it for me.

Taking the long drive last weekend from Fremont to Santa Rosa and back down to Southern California is definitely a good way to “shake down” the car and get the feel for it at distance (as well as some traffic.) We encountered some “wind noise” from the front driver’s window that turned out to be a misaligned glass. After less than two weeks of driving the car, this is what the glass has done to the gasket around the window.

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We’re on waiting for parts and service tech mode, so it’s going to be another couple of weeks to resolve this as well.

I have a few nits that will probably continue to reiterate itself as I write about the Model S ownership experience, so please bear with me. (I will probably keep complaining about the missing coat hook.)

The entertainment system is very well integrated. However, it seems strange to me that it only handles one bluetooth input. The Active E and other vehicles can handle multiple bluetooth devices connected at a time and it is disappointing that the vehicle can only handle being connected to one device at a time. Now, I am not saying that the Active E can play two different bluetooth sources at the same time. What I am saying is that the Active E can connect and switch between two devices at a time. Whereas the Model S has to be manually connected and disconnected.

We took the 101 route back to Southern California as an overnight drive and we could have done this drive quicker had I pushed the car and hit only a couple of Superchargers along the way and not the five stops that we took.

The only real negative as for the pickup experience has been the “one on one” with Anish. We felt hurried and that he didn’t really adress concerns. I felt that my mother had a better experience with Jeb from Nissan of Duarte when she picked up her Leaf a few months ago.

Second Day of Tesla Model S Pickup Weekend – 1740. First Supercharge

Ok…

Made it back down to the Fremont Factory and Supercharging…

One word – AWESOME.

We arrived with 70ish miles and Supercharging here because I figure that Gilroy would have greater demand.

Decided on a 101 Route, so next Supercharge stop should be Altascadero.

On the Flickr Tesla Model S Delivery Weekend set are pics around Sonoma area.

[updated 2013-11-10 22:05 for photos and additional content on where we went in Sonoma. The following pictures and content are all new.]

So, first are some Sonoma pictures.

First stop for me was the Sonoma Country Drive for a quicker J1772 charge than the 110V at the Hotel. Sonoma County Drive was less than two miles from the hotel. It has a few CONVERTED Prius to Plug-in as well as a current Plug-in Prius.

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I drove over there to plug in while the better half took time to do some work and get ready. Was able to get some additional miles buffer.

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If you want to see more, go to Flickr Tesla Model S Delivery Weekend Set.

We then went to the Peay Vineyards Open House.

The Wine was great but no charger.

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Lunch was the order of the day at the Francis Ford Coppola Winery, where there was a 30A Chargepoint Charger (minimum $3 at $2.50 per hour) and the food was good, but the Wine does not agree with us. Great building and views… The home of two of my favorite Model S shots this weekend.

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and

The one with two of my favorite things…

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And lastly, the Fremont Factory…

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Once again, if you want to see more, go to Flickr Tesla Model S Delivery Weekend Set.

Model S Pick up day… 0215

Today is the day.

We’re on a morning flight out of LAX to SJC to pick up our new Model S.

It’s approximately eight hours and forty minutes until our appointment to tour the Tesla Factory AND pick up our S85 Model S… Yes, it’s 0215/2:15 AM and I’m writing on my blog because I couldn’t sleep.

Stay tuned…

I’m hoping to at least provide updates on flickr for pictures…