What will they think of next? An all electric car!
I have been wondering about a problem-recharging. Ok, when you get home from work (must be less than 50 miles distant and you are guaranreed there will be no major traffic stalls, otherwise you will cause one when your car runs out of electrons), you plug it into an outlet in your garage overnight. Got to wondering how this car (Leaf e.g. 100 mile range) would work going to the gulf coast from here (450 miles). The morning paper here today stated that most public stations will take 8 hours to juice up your car all the way (so you can go another 100 miles). A partial charge will take only 2 1/2 hours, but will get you another 30 miles (wow!). A limited number of chargers will be "fast chargers" that will full power you but still take 30 minutes. You won't find any of these in Lavergne Alabama.
Back to the Gulf trip. 100 miles won't quite get me to Huntsville. I'll run out of juice 15 miles before I get there. But if I could coast into town and find a plug, in only eight hours I will be ready to go again. Dang! Gotta find a motel. Next day I make it to Birmingham, but cant get to Montgomery without a recharge. So I recharge again, another 8 hours and another motel bill-plus food! (but the barbeque in B'ham is great!)
Now I'm off to Montgomery. Whew! Ony 90 miles so I'll make it ok. But another 8 hour recharge! Dang! another motel bill-and more food! Now the real problen arises. Will there be a recharging station in Opp Alabama? Got on the smart phone and checked. No, but Bubba's Garage will let you plug in there for 25 bucks-and if you'll stay at his aunt's B and B. Ok, whats another night's lodging? Besides, she puts on a great spread at dinner and has grits and country ham for breakfast. Worth the wait. On to the Gulf! Finally got there. Three charging stations there, but since its peak season, I need to make an eight hour appointment three days in advance.
Only took 5 days down and only 5 back. Not bad, but two problems: One, I will have already spent most of my alloted budget for vacation on food, lodging, and juice getting there and back. Had only two weeks vacation, which shrunk to 4 days. Had to refigure budget and decided to forget next years vacation. But I was ONE GREEN DUDE FOR TWO WEEKS! (Actually, i was red AND green. Got bad sunburn.)
Will stick to my gas guzzlin' Altima!
Bad Bob
A Trip to the Gulf in my Electric Horseless Carriage
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john elder
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