Ford C Max Energi Road Trip 12/16-19
 

I left for a road trip to Chandler, OK thence to Sanger, TX then home again early Friday morning on December 16th. I had two mountain passes to go over that used energy to climb but the regen opportunities were great on the downhill side. I drove in EV later mode to see where I could best use EV mode in the route. At Ruidoso I had 14 miles of EV range but was back up to 18 miles later on downhill. I ran out of EV only power by Portales, NM.

I was concerned about the changing weather but it turned out to be in my favor at first. By the time I stopped in Hereford, TX to refuel 391.7 miles I had pulled 52.8 mpg with high winds coming out of the west. The wind turbines were feathered because the winds were too high. I had done 135.5 EV miles using 8.6 KWH so obviously some of those miles were regen miles.

At Amarillo, TX I turned due east and I decided I need to take advantage of the tail winds and just drive 75 MPH. The 11 plus hour trip to Chandler, OK with a time zone switch meant I would not get there until after 9 PM. Driving 719 miles in one day is a ambitious task for a 66 year like me.

I did arrive at my brothers house in Chandler at 9:30 PM that night. I was bushwhacked, felt like I had hit with a stun gun. The next morning I refueled in Shawnee at 406.5 miles and 44.3 MPG. I had done 119.9 EV miles on 5.1 KWH of mostly regen. Rolling hills country affords this opportunity and is not the negative it seems to be with a ICE drive. The ICE shuts off on the downgrades and you switch to electric drive even if you do not have the battery for it. Over my stay at Norms I had charging opportunities and I added another 89.5 EV miles on 2.5 KW

By Sunday morning the ambient temps had dropped to 5 degrees F, not good for any vehicle efficiency. I refueled in Denton, TX at 260 miles at only 37.7 mpg. I had 57.9 EV miles using 4.6 KWH. Not good, this shows you what driving through air densities this side of molasses will do to your MPG returns. On the plus side the C Max Energi does have active air shutters which helps reduces the 20% drag penalty for cooling in cold weather.

Phil Knox liked my Ford C Max Energi and he did get to test drive into Denton when we went out to eat and take in a movie. We saw Rouge One in 3 D which was not my first choice as I would rather watch my movies in the old fashion 2 D easier on the eyes technology.

I got a jump on travel early in the morning leaving at 6:30 AM. Again it was cold but the preheat the cabin options while you are plugged in sure makes driving off on a cold morning much more pleasant. I refueled in Stanton, TX at 318.9 miles and 33.9 MPG. I had 45.7 EV miles using 8.8 KWH. No tail wind in sight but it finally got into the 20 F at refueling time.

I had such a distance to cover in one day I had to do 75 MPH. This brought up an annoying feature of the Energi which I am not sure there is a cure for yet. The top speed is 80 MPH and it alerts you when you get to 75 MPH. It will continue to do this occasionally which is not useful when you are wanting to do 75 MPH on the interstate. You have to hit the OK button on the right side of the steering wheel to clear this alert.

In Las Cruces, NM at 6 PM I refueled at 391 miles, at 37.7 MPG. I had done 39.4 EV miles on .00 KWH. Obviously these miles were all regen generated. Thence home by 6:30 PM.

I had done 1,763.1 miles in four days at a reported 40.7 MPG. I had driven 367.2 EV miles using 23.6 KWH. My actual gallons of gasoline pumped showed I had really netted 39.6 MPG for the whole trip. Not a bad return for such rigorous conditions. My new Ford C Max Energi is now broken in with over 2,000 miles on the odometer.

Great report! Thanks.

Post trip driving shows an entirely different mpg return. Since refueling upon my return my trip one shows 124.7 miles traveled at 80.5 mpg, 76.3 miles of those were EV miles using 16 KWH's. This translates to 1.549 gallons of gas and .488 gallons e. Separating miles shows 31.24 mpg for the ICE and 156.35 mpge for the electric drive. A composite approach yields 61.21 mpg over all.

This results really shows the importance of recharging the battery pack often when you are using the car.

A New Trip Posting. My wife and I took the Ford C Max Energi on a trip to Chandler, OK to visit my brother, then to Mount Vernon, MO to visit my daughter.

We drove a total of 2,031.9 miles on 54.113 gallons of gas costing us $118.88. This netted us an average mpg-e return of 37.54 mpg-e.

We got to charge in our motel at Tucumcari, NM on both legs of the trip, and I charged 2.5 times at my brothers place in Chandler, OK. That netted us 90 free miles because I did not pay for the electricity which would have reduced my mpgs to 36.033 mpg if subtracted from the total miles.

Returning west from Missouri to Chandler on the 7th of Oct, and driving west from Chandler to Tucumcari netted us our lowest returns. A 7-10 mph quartering wind coming from the SW increased our effecting air speed to 80 mph. We tried to drive 72 mph most of the time for best time, distance, and mpg returns.

In order.

Home to Tucumcari 410.9 mi, 10.103 gal, 40.67 mpg e, Oct 4th, 2017.
Tucumcari to Shawnee 407.0 mi, 10.635 gal, 38.27 mpg-e, Oct 5th, 2017.
Shawnee to Joplin, MO 296.6 mi, 7.579 gal, 39.12 mpg-e, Oct 7th, 2017
Joplin, to Shawnee, OK 210.8 mi, 6.253 gal, 33.71 mpg-e, Oct 8th, 2017.
Shawnee to Tucumcari 408.7 mi, 12.265 gal, 33.32 mpg-e, Oct 8th, 2017.
Tucumcari to Home 302.9 mi, 7.278 gal, 41.67 mpg-e, Oct 9th, 2017.

The discrepancy in miles is for taking the back route to home on our return and getting from the gas station to the house at the start. As you can see a trip without headwinds would return better mpg. The free electricity reduced our cost by about 6 cents a gallon and accounting for the added electricity reduced our mpg return figure by about 1 mpg.