Cowmeat learns to drive the Volt

[cowmeat]

So after I fully charged the new Volt Ruby yesterday at work, it showed 56 miles of EV range, which is a couple of miles above the out of the box 53 miles.
As I pulled in at my house I had only used 3.4kWh of the charge after driving 19.2 miles, and I still had 52 miles of range showing!

After driving my full 38 mile commute, when I pulled into work it showed I had 35 miles of range remaining on the charge

I downloaded the "MyChevrolet" app on my phone and I'm going to remote start it ten minutes before I leave work to precondition it while it's still plugged in

So far I'm averaging well over 5 miles per kWh in the new Volt, and with over 14 usable Kwh on a charge I should top 70 miles of EV range in this one

[cowmeat]

I downloaded the "MyChevrolet" app on my phone and I'm going to remote start it ten minutes before I leave work to precondition it while it's still plugged in

I found out that preconditioning only works if you're charging at 220 volts. Preconditioning at 110 volts will draw some battery power and affect the EV range, so I won't be doing that!

Every day so far I have ended up with between 72-73 miles of EV range

[ocnorb]

Originally Posted by cowmeat

I found out that preconditioning only works if you're charging at 220 volts. Preconditioning at 110 volts will draw some battery power and affect the EV range, so I won't be doing that!

Every day so far I have ended up with between 72-73 miles of EV range

Technically the 220v preconditioning can do the same; when it’s subzero my car pulls 5-6k Watts, while the charger can only put 3300 watts in.

Not often a problem in Florida.

[cowmeat]

I do not miss that

I grew up in the Ohio valley and lived there until I brought my family to Florida in 1982, and I've only been north of the Florida line a handful of times since then!

[cowmeat]

I found that the "MyChevrolet" app I put on my phone not only syncs to the Volt to give me real-time info on the charge status, tire pressure, oil life, etc . . . it also grades my driving habits

I did okay overall, but I guess I need to ease off the gas pedal a bit

[ciderbarrel]

Cowmeat,

Since you had a Gen-1, how is the "one pedal driving" feature that I have heard about? It is the only thing that would prevent me trading in to get a gen-2 because I really do love coasting to stops. I never use the Low mode for that reason.

I tried it once and it slowed down so quickly that I had to actually accelerate (even at a slight decline) to get to the stop in a reasonably quick time and distance (I was like 10 car lengths back and was getting impatient)

[cowmeat]

I love it, love it, love it! It's even more fun than using the 3-button shifter on my old Insights.

I spend the entire commute shifting between drive, low and neutral and squeezing every last volt out of the regen. The paddle on the back of the steering wheel makes it regen even more aggressively, so basically the only time I use the brake pedal is to tap it as a heads-up to the car behind me

Check out my 19 mile commute in Ruby's fuel log from this morning. The longer I drive it the better I'm getting at it!

It showed me a 67 mile EV range last night after the full charge

[cowmeat]

So I found out I can change the amps it charges at from the default 8 amps to 12 amps. It was easy, just a couple of buttons on the charge screen, and now instead of completing the charge at 6:30pm it's going to finish at 4:15pm.

I would have known sooner if I had the patience to read the War and Peace length owner's manual, but I do not. I Googled it this morning and now I will be charging at 12 amps every time

[Ecky]

Food for thought. My old cellphone (maybe not directly comparable) had its battery effectively fail around the 2 year mark. It was my first phone which supported fast charging. I'm not an electrical engineer and I can't tell you that it's fast charging itself which more quickly ages a battery, but as a precaution on my new phone I'd like to only charge it as needed, trying to keep it in the middle of its range, and charge it through that range more slowly. Certainly it can't hurt.

Would be nice to hear from someone else who knows a lot more than I do.

[cowmeat]

It says it will revert back to the normal 8 amp charge rate next time I charge it. It only stays at the higher 12 amp rate if I specify that as the "home" charging rate, and I'll only ever need to charge it at 12 amps if it won't fully charge before I leave work

They're pretty cautious with the amount of charge and discharge allowed on the Volt (plus the battery's temperature is maintained within a certain range and is housed in liquid) so I assume it's okay to do it if it's an option on the charge screen

But I'm curious too, in case somebody regularly charges at the higher amps (or 220 volts) I'd like to hear from them