Audi EV's and Towing

[stefdds]

Audi Shows How Towing Affects an EV's Range—and It Ain't Pretty

Unsurprisingly, the e-tron's efficiency takes a huge hit when the SUV is pulling a 4000-pound trailer.

www.roadandtrack.com

 

[NZDubNurd]

My Cousins stepdad had a Tesla Model S P100D, that he recently sold to get a 5.5L Twin-Turbo Mercedes

He said towing a trailer that wasn't even that heavy or big, cut the range down to 20-30%. And that wasn't even towing a massive boat or anything.

 

[Uwe]

That's not at all surprising. A conventional SUV or pickup can easily consume roughly double the fuel per mile when towing a sizeable trailer. The 4000 lb weight of their trailer isn't really the main factor here; the aerodynamic drag is.

-Uwe-

 

[vreihen]

With the Mighty Dodge, I can drive from NY State to North Carolina on a tank of diesel.

Towing my enclosed race car hauler, I had to stop in BALTIMORE to fill up.

Thankfully, my fuel for that trip was sponsored by the relative who owned the contents of the trailer, because I was shocked at losing 50% of my fuel range on that trip.....

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[stefdds]

I agree, that Audi example was quite extreme. I think very few EV buyers are not considering any towing ; the two don't seem to be compatible. At least not at the current time!

 

[PetrolDave]

I agree, that Audi example was quite extreme. I think very few EV buyers are not considering any towing ; the two don't seem to be compatible. At least not at the current time!

This side of the pond and in vacation areas (like Devon where I live) at least 10% of all cars are towing a caravan or trailer tent usually starting in one of the major cities a couple of hundred miles or more away

So EVs having such a massive reduction in range when towing and the ridiculously small number of EV charging points on motorway (freeway) stops could be a major factor in these owners hanging onto their ICE vehicles.

 

[vreihen]

I think very few EV buyers are not considering any towing ; the two don't seem to be compatible. At least not at the current time!

Very punny!

So EVs having such a massive reduction in range when towing and the ridiculously small number of EV charging points on motorway (freeway) stops could be a major factor in these owners hanging onto their ICE vehicles.

As I have said before (with two battery EV's in the driveway), they do not need to meet 100% of your worst-case uses...as long as they can drive you to a place to rent (hire on your side of the pond?) an ICE for those occasional trips where the EV is not the best choice.

Back in April, we needed to take a 2,000+ mile weekend round trip to South Carolina. The Mighty Dodge (our road trip and evacuation weapon of choice) was having air conditioner issues (since fixed), so we wound up renting a brand new Jeep Grand Cherokee Trail Hawk for the 3-day trip. If the timing wasn't so tight on this trip where a few extra charging stops would have messed up the entire schedule, we probably would have taken my wife's Kia Niro EV just for the adventure.

The Mighty Dodge sits parked in our driveway so much since my BMW i3 BEV came along that I just put this vanity license plate on it last month:

Speaking of road trips, the Mighty Dodge will be making another trip down I-81/I-77 this weekend. We're closing on our South Carolina lakeside retirement lot on Monday.....

 

[Bruce]

@vreihen, my guess is many in Europe will not accept the rent concept. Simply put, that is another cost for their weekend get away and many will not have the means to fund a rental to tow their vacation package. As @PetrolDave said, the massive reduction in range when towing could be a major factor in the adoption of EV over ICE.

Each situation has to be evaluated. EV is not yet a direct replacement for ICE.

 

[Uwe]

the massive reduction in range when towing could be a major factor in the adoption of EV over ICE.

Again, ICE vehicles have a similar reduction in range; it just doesn't matter as much, since refueling them only takes 5 minutes and fuel stations are everywhere.

The fact that EVs need a substantial part of an hour to refuel and that fast charging stations are not at every off-ramp from an Interstate makes them entirely unsuitable for long-distance travel to me. My wife and I do 600 mile days fairly regularly. We generally don't spend more than 15 minutes stopped on those trips (2-3 bathroom breaks, one of which might be combined with a refuelling). There is simply NFW that I'd find it acceptable to add more than an hour waiting around for the car to re-charge.

-Uwe-

 

[vreihen]

My wife and I do 600 mile days fairly regularly. We generally don't spend more than 15 minutes stopped on those trips (2-3 bathroom breaks, one of which might be combined with a refuelling). There is simply NFW that I'd find it acceptable to add more than an hour waiting around for the car to re-charge.

You just need to get an OCD psycho dog as an additional traveling companion! As soon as the cruise control is disabled, he goes ballistic anticipating his chance to check the pee-mail. As soon at the truck is parked, my wife has to walk the dog for a lap around the rest area while I use the facilities. Then, she hands me the leash and uses the facility. When she comes back, I hand her the leash and climb into the driver's seat for departure...but the dog needs to do a second lap to make sure that he read all of the pee-mail messages. When she comes back, my vitamin-pee-soaked (diuretics) bladder needs to use the facilities again! In all seriousness, a rest area stop that should take no more than 5 minutes is usually 45+ minutes...which is *plenty* of time to throw enough of a DC fast charge into any EV for it to make it to the next nature call.

When we take road trips with the Mighty Dodge, I only stop for fuel at reputable, high-traffic truck stops that turn over their fuel tanks every day. (The only thing that will kill a Cummins is dirty diesel fuel clogging the common-rail injectors.) From looking at plugshare.com, my choice of truck stops are in the same density as DC fast chargers along most interstates. I don't think that it is too difficult to pre-plan an EV road trip with a 250+ mile EV range these days, assuming that someone wants to.....

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[NZDubNurd]

... A conventional SUV or pickup can easily consume roughly double the fuel per mile when towing a sizeable trailer. The 4000 lb weight of their trailer isn't really the main factor here; the aerodynamic drag is.

My "little" Touran only usually consumes about 30% more when towing the caravan... which nearly weighs as much as the car. It probably helps that I drive it like I stole it most of the time, so it can't get THAT much worse, Hahahaha! It's all on back roads and country driving - nothing is straight or flat here.

Also... Can I just leave this here...

My best mate does stuff like that in his M5 too... and his is a wagon

 

[Trade Member]

I've no doubt that people out there will already be looking at the technical design of these EVs and be saying to themselves "as I already am", I'm going to rework the electrics and use some type of IMA motor (Alternator) that will continuously charge the batteries as I drive. It's not rocket science we already do it with the ICEs. I agree governments and manufacturers won't like it because they won't be holding you over a barrel slapping you for an income to them that could be an avoidable expense to us.