3 hours ago, doodsangel said:

Good morning,

We recently acquired a Mini Cooper SE (had it for about two weeks) and will be attempting our first "long" trip from Randburg to Crystal Springs this weekend.

With range anxiety, I think the most daunting stretch would be the Pretoria -> Alzu stretch. It seems that the only charger in between is located at Emalahleni and its at a dealership, so no access after hours.

Will advise how and/or if it went after the weekend.

Also trying out "A better Route Planner" to assist with routes. It is quite configurable, vehicle additional weight. From planning a to and from trip on different plans, it also seems to take elevation into account as the same route gives different total trip time.

Thanks Joe Slow for the tips!

I assume this is the new model with 50kWh battery?  If so,  you can expect a real world highway range of just under 200km.  For your first trip, I would plan to go past Emalahleni during dealership hours to top up, if it does not look like it will work out.

Or travel back roads - range goes up almost 50% at 80km/h vs 120km/h.

14 minutes ago, JustinSchoeman said:

I assume this is the new model with 50kWh battery?  If so,  you can expect a real world highway range of just under 200km.  For your first trip, I would plan to go past Emalahleni during dealership hours to top up, if it does not look like it will work out.

Or travel back roads - range goes up almost 50% at 80km/h vs 120km/h.

For me I would not choose the back roads. No need to travel @ 120 and can just pull over where the road allows it like many trucks/caravaners do. 

Edited June 13, 20242 yr by Scorp007

Meh.  If you are going 80 anyway, then back roads are far more scenic than highways.  Best Cape Town to Pretoria trip I ever did, I just drew a straight line on the map, and tried to follow it as closely as I could.  Some really amazing places once you get off the highways.

5 minutes ago, JustinSchoeman said:

Meh.  If you are going 80 anyway, then back roads are far more scenic than highways.  Best Cape Town to Pretoria trip I ever did, I just drew a straight line on the map, and tried to follow it as closely as I could.  Some really amazing places once you get off the highways.

This route yes. But in Mpumalanga many roads have deteriorated to a pothole jungle. Just look at a place like Lydenburg. 

I once tried back roads from Pta to KZN and never again. Wanted to see the towns in the area I grew up. 

I would say the return journey would be the challenge being uphill. 

Edited June 13, 20242 yr by Scorp007

1 hour ago, JustinSchoeman said:

I assume this is the new model with 50kWh battery?  If so,  you can expect a real world highway range of just under 200km.  For your first trip, I would plan to go past Emalahleni during dealership hours to top up, if it does not look like it will work out.

Or travel back roads - range goes up almost 50% at 80km/h vs 120km/h.

Sadly it is not the new 50kwh battery. It seems that at a push, doing the stretch at 90km/h (uphill) would see me just make it. But we will try to catch Emalahleni. That'll be first prize.

1 hour ago, Scorp007 said:

This route yes. But in Mpumalanga many roads have deteriorated to a pothole jungle. Just look at a place like Lydenburg. 

I once tried back roads from Pta to KZN and never again. Wanted to see the towns in the area I grew up. 

I would say the return journey would be the challenge being uphill. 

We have been advised to use Waze after Dullstroom and GO SLOW. so that should really spare batteries. It is a pitty. I grew up in Lydenburg.

 

Funnily, the return trip part is not a worry, stretch Pta -> Alzu is uphill. Return Alzu -> Pta is downhill. With "ABRP" We should reach Alzu leaving Pta with 6% battery @ 100kph, when we do the return, charging at Alzu, we should reach Pta with 12-14% battery also at 100kph.
 

Edited June 13, 20242 yr by doodsangel

19 minutes ago, doodsangel said:

Sadly it is not the new 50kwh battery. It seems that at a push, doing the stretch at 90km/h (uphill) would see me just make it. But we will try to catch Emalahleni. That'll be first prize.

These numbers are generally pretty good real-world numbers:

https://ev-database.org/car/1409/Mini-Cooper-SE

Highway driving is the pathological worst case for EVs.  High drag, no energy recovery, etc.  The above numbers are real-world highway driving at 110km/h. Cabin heating chews range.  And if you have after-market, non-EV specific, tyres you can probably expect another 5-10% loss above that.

Until you have some good long distance stats for your own car, take any paper numbers with a pinch of salt.

4 minutes ago, JustinSchoeman said:

These numbers are generally pretty good real-world numbers:

https://ev-database.org/car/1409/Mini-Cooper-SE

Highway driving is the pathological worst case for EVs.  High drag, no energy recovery, etc.  The above numbers are real-world highway driving at 110km/h. Cabin heating chews range.  And if you have after-market, non-EV specific, tyres you can probably expect another 5-10% loss above that.

Until you have some good long distance stats for your own car, take any paper numbers with a pinch of salt.

Thank you. The temperature during the stretch, if you can trust the weatherman, should be between 18-20, which seems to be the optimal operating temperature.

And I do agree. We will probably turn on Green+ which switches off all the creature comforts.

Tyres and rims are EV-specific low drag.

"Until you have some good long distance stats for your own car, take any paper numbers with a pinch of salt." - time to get these I guess 😁

The wife drives quite a bit of Highway at normal speeds and the car's energy meter reports about 16kwh/100kmh

 

So we did it. 

Trip Update Report.

Yes, being able to stop at Emalahleni would've have been great, but, thanks to Friday traffic it wasn't possible. 

We charged up at Silver Lakes, then we did the stretch to Alzu. We were quite a bit conservative with power as it was our first time, so did 90km/h on Green +.
Ended up reaching Alzu with 30% battery left.

The rest was uneventful with some serious pothole dodging between Dullstroom and the turnoff from the Orighstad road.

Cruising around was no problem as we could charge at Crystal Springs as well as the Charger in Pilgrims Rest (not a DC charger).

The return home. 

The most daunting probably still was the Schoemanskloof road coming back (we did Dullstroom going there) being very up and down. ABRP estimated that we would reach Millys with -6% battery left. Yes, that is minus 6. But we decided to tackle it and make a call at Sabie to go Mombela (safe) or Schoemanskloof. 45km to Sabie and used about 18% battery. We felt confident, but not stupid, but still tackled Schoemanskloof. With 82% battery, we opted for Green+ and 90km/h for the first 80km, we were doing quite well and did the last 49km in normal Green mode with aircon. 95km/h seemed to make the Mini happy on that stretch and we reached Millys with 13% battery left.

Knowing the car was a bit pessimistic on our going there, we did a solid 100km/h coming back, aircon set at 23% and at night (lights). We ended at Menlyn Maine with about 12% battery left and a quick charge (to 50%) for the final stretch home in Randburg.

 

2 hours ago, doodsangel said:

So we did it. 

Trip Update Report.

Yes, being able to stop at Emalahleni would've have been great, but, thanks to Friday traffic it wasn't possible. 

We charged up at Silver Lakes, then we did the stretch to Alzu. We were quite a bit conservative with power as it was our first time, so did 90km/h on Green +.
Ended up reaching Alzu with 30% battery left.

The rest was uneventful with some serious pothole dodging between Dullstroom and the turnoff from the Orighstad road.

Cruising around was no problem as we could charge at Crystal Springs as well as the Charger in Pilgrims Rest (not a DC charger).

The return home. 

The most daunting probably still was the Schoemanskloof road coming back (we did Dullstroom going there) being very up and down. ABRP estimated that we would reach Millys with -6% battery left. Yes, that is minus 6. But we decided to tackle it and make a call at Sabie to go Mombela (safe) or Schoemanskloof. 45km to Sabie and used about 18% battery. We felt confident, but not stupid, but still tackled Schoemanskloof. With 82% battery, we opted for Green+ and 90km/h for the first 80km, we were doing quite well and did the last 49km in normal Green mode with aircon. 95km/h seemed to make the Mini happy on that stretch and we reached Millys with 13% battery left.

Knowing the car was a bit pessimistic on our going there, we did a solid 100km/h coming back, aircon set at 23% and at night (lights). We ended at Menlyn Maine with about 12% battery left and a quick charge (to 50%) for the final stretch home in Randburg.

 

Thanks for the detail about your trip. Due to the back via Schoemanskloof with caravan I use the Elandshoek via Sappi road as the uphill are flatter and shorter. 

Perhaps what you could try if you take a next trip to Mombela. 

Do you have the price paid per kWh when recharging? 

3 hours ago, doodsangel said:

So we did it. 

Trip Update Report.

Yes, being able to stop at Emalahleni would've have been great, but, thanks to Friday traffic it wasn't possible. 

We charged up at Silver Lakes, then we did the stretch to Alzu. We were quite a bit conservative with power as it was our first time, so did 90km/h on Green +.
Ended up reaching Alzu with 30% battery left.

The rest was uneventful with some serious pothole dodging between Dullstroom and the turnoff from the Orighstad road.

Cruising around was no problem as we could charge at Crystal Springs as well as the Charger in Pilgrims Rest (not a DC charger).

The return home. 

The most daunting probably still was the Schoemanskloof road coming back (we did Dullstroom going there) being very up and down. ABRP estimated that we would reach Millys with -6% battery left. Yes, that is minus 6. But we decided to tackle it and make a call at Sabie to go Mombela (safe) or Schoemanskloof. 45km to Sabie and used about 18% battery. We felt confident, but not stupid, but still tackled Schoemanskloof. With 82% battery, we opted for Green+ and 90km/h for the first 80km, we were doing quite well and did the last 49km in normal Green mode with aircon. 95km/h seemed to make the Mini happy on that stretch and we reached Millys with 13% battery left.

Knowing the car was a bit pessimistic on our going there, we did a solid 100km/h coming back, aircon set at 23% and at night (lights). We ended at Menlyn Maine with about 12% battery left and a quick charge (to 50%) for the final stretch home in Randburg.

 

My question would be how accurate is the fuel gauge? How does the bms differentiate between static and dynamic loads? Driver stress can be part of the problem(mindset) of the driver. Wrong estimation of driving range and the charge level of batteries, wrong estimation of time remaining for a full charge, mismatch between actual and desired cabin temperature, and overvoltage or undervoltage to a module after DC/DC conversion? 

1 hour ago, TaliaB said:

My question would be how accurate is the fuel gauge? How does the bms differentiate between static and dynamic loads? Driver stress can be part of the problem(mindset) of the driver. Wrong estimation of driving range and the charge level of batteries, wrong estimation of time remaining for a full charge, mismatch between actual and desired cabin temperature, and overvoltage or undervoltage to a module after DC/DC conversion? 

I think there is some merit it what you are suggesting we might be wrong. My friend have purchased a 2023 Audi e-tron Sportback 55 Quattro S Line and he suffers from driver stress everytime he drives some distance as he doesn't trust the fuel gauge. When driving from Upington to Kimberly he is stressed out all the way to Groblershoop..The first charging station is in Kimberly but because the road is so deselate he has stress even if the fuel gauge showed ,46%from Upington to Groblershoop is 287km and Upington to Kimberly 403km that means he have to travel 116km to Kimberly on 46% fuel gauge left so history taught him it will reach Kimberly

 

 

Edited June 18, 20242 yr by Derek3

13 hours ago, TaliaB said:

My question would be how accurate is the fuel gauge? How does the bms differentiate between static and dynamic loads? Driver stress can be part of the problem(mindset) of the driver. Wrong estimation of driving range and the charge level of batteries, wrong estimation of time remaining for a full charge, mismatch between actual and desired cabin temperature, and overvoltage or undervoltage to a module after DC/DC conversion? 

So this is very interesting. The Mini seems to report two different ranges. A type of Instantaneous or last few measures kwh/100km and similarly for the trip. Using the trip one seems to be the best. Then when the GPS is active, you can split the screen to show you your range (based on the trip kwh/100km) vs the amount of distance you need to travel. That seems to be very accurate. This is where you can play around with Mid/Green/Green+ and your speed to ensure that the bar on the left (range predicted) is longer than your actual destination. And as a driver you can influence this. I always adapted speed to give me at any one time a 16-20km buffer.

I think the most amount of stress is the South African infrastructure. When you drive an ICE and run out of fuel, AA is there to help. Currently the AA vehicles aren't equipped with Generator units and aren't driving Ford F150 Lightnings or BYD Sharks, which do have onboard facilities allowing you to charge another EV next to the road, should they run out of juice. As Mini told us, currently if you get stuck, you need to phone Mini assist and they will come tow you to the next available charge station.

But then what helped with stress and dynamic and static loads, please see the next part.

11 hours ago, Derek3 said:

I think there is some merit it what you are suggesting we might be wrong. My friend have purchased a 2023 Audi e-tron Sportback 55 Quattro S Line and he suffers from driver stress everytime he drives some distance as he doesn't trust the fuel gauge. When driving from Upington to Kimberly he is stressed out all the way to Groblershoop..The first charging station is in Kimberly but because the road is so deselate he has stress even if the fuel gauge showed ,46%from Upington to Groblershoop is 287km and Upington to Kimberly 403km that means he have to travel 116km to Kimberly on 46% fuel gauge left so history taught him it will reach Kimberly

 

 

A Better Route Planner was a valuable tool in reducing stress.

You select your car and can add stuff like battery degradation, how much additional weight is added to the car, what the state of charge you want at the next charge etc. etc. etc. when planning your route. The App mostly accurately predicts said achievable distance, taking into account the elevation (going up - more power and going down - regenerate power) and other settings just mentioned. It will then also tell you how much charge and for how long you'll be charging to reach your next stop (charge station) with your chosen battery arrival SOC. We used this and didn't charge to full at every stop, only what we needed. It will even (if you set that it is allowed to adapt speed) tell you that on this stretch you can do the speed limit and on which stretches you need to do it at a lower speed than the speed limit (example do not exceed 100km/h for this stretch).

Then once you start your trip, you can say drive on the App and then as your trip progresses, you can slide a bar on the App for the amount of battery percentage you have to match that of the car. We found that the way we were driving, about every 10-15km, we needed to add 1%-2% on the battery on the App. 

So for Shoemanskloof, we were supposed to hit Millys at about 4% battery left driving at 90km/h, but driving the first part of the road on Green+ afforded us to switch to Green with aircon at 95-100km/h for the last part and rolling into Millys with 13% battery (Mini range estimator and the App - via the minor adjustments).

So ABRP alleviated a lot of stress, but I assume, as we drive these cars more and more, it will be like the fuel light comes on on your ICE and you know you can probably do 50km or so. But for now, App assistance really helps. And if you go Premium on the App, it will even take into account real-time traffic (assume this will lead to more starts/stops adding more regeneration) and real-time weather (because a very windy day will affect what you can do).

14 hours ago, Scorp007 said:

Thanks for the detail about your trip. Due to the back via Schoemanskloof with caravan I use the Elandshoek via Sappi road as the uphill are flatter and shorter. 

Perhaps what you could try if you take a next trip to Mombela. 

Do you have the price paid per kWh when recharging? 

Thank you for the tip. We will try this next time.

While at Crystal Springs, we plugged in at our unit starting with 80% every morning for exploring except fathers day where we charged at Highwayman's for the fun of it while having pancakes.

In terms of public chargers, we had the following:

Silver Lakes: 9.2kwh @ T64.38 = R6.997/kwh (charge to 99%SOC).
Alzu: 16.52kwh @ T121.47 = R7.353/khw (charge to 76% SOC)
Dullstroom: 12.77kwh @ T75.14 = R5.89/kwh (AC charger didn't give the SOC)
Millys: 12.15kwh @ T85.02 = R6.998/kwh (charge to 54% SOC)
Alzu: 24.55kwh @ T180.51 = R7.353/khw (charge to 95% SOC)
Menlyn Maine: 12.95kwh @ T95.22 = R7.353/kwh (charge to 49% SOC)

Pilgrims Rest: 19.07kwh @ R112.23 = R5.89/kwh (AC Charger didn't give the SOC) - this was just for the fun as we could charge at CS so left out in below round trip cost and km plus it wasn't part of getting from Randburg to Crystal Springs and back.

So road via Dullstroom: 387km @ R260.99

Road via Schoemanskloof: 438km @ R360.75

Total: 825km @ R621.74 

Our other option was the Mahindra Scorpio Adventure @ 7.75l/100km.
Doing it in Diesel (at today's [19-06-2024] Diesel price of R23.80) would have been: R1521.71

About the Schoemanskloof road. Arriving at Alzu, there was a gentleman with a Volvo charging and he said he also did Schoemanskloof and the car reported that he regenerated 7% charge on that road (the Mini doesn't give this stat).

Edited June 19, 20242 yr by doodsangel

On 2024/06/13 at 8:41 AM, doodsangel said:

Good morning,

We recently acquired a Mini Cooper SE (had it for about two weeks) and will be attempting our first "long" trip from Randburg to Crystal Springs this weekend.

With range anxiety, I think the most daunting stretch would be the Pretoria -> Alzu stretch. It seems that the only charger in between is located at Emalahleni and its at a dealership, so no access after hours.

Will advise how and/or if it went after the weekend.

Also trying out "A better Route Planner" to assist with routes. It is quite configurable, vehicle additional weight. From planning a to and from trip on different plans, it also seems to take elevation into account as the same route gives different total trip time.

Thanks Joe Slow for the tips!

If i may ask what Ev charger do you have installed at home? Is it coupled to use solar assistance when charging?

54 minutes ago, TaliaB said:

If i may ask what Ev charger do you have installed at home? Is it coupled to use solar assistance when charging?

Good question and you might laugh at the answer.

At home we plug into the wall sock, so we charge at 10amps. As the Mini is mostly the wife's car for short trips and a few trips to the office, we currently charge her 2-3 times a week during the night and this so far has been sufficient.

We did get a wall charger that will do 7.2kwh on single-phase and 11kwh on 3-phase with the car, but that is still in the box.

At the moment our solar array 1.5kw panels and 2.2kw batteries only provide backup power that caters for a 5 hour blackout at night. But with the EV, I will be looking to fully populating the inverter with panels (currently at half) and then upgrade the battery so that we can charge her for "free".

Realistically:
With the current Eskom costs, virtually "Free" is charging via the grid rather than spending R30k to be able to charge her for "Free".

To make that cost up, I will need to consume roughly 9400kwh from the grid in charging costs. That equates to 60,645km of driving we will need to do with the vehicle (which will take my wife 3-4 years to do).

So the upgrading will be more towards NOT getting stranded should there be a Municipal Supply problem in our area. On batteries I will just do the needful, as Sun is "cheaper", so she will charge during the day.

But with that said, I will set the Mini to Low (6A) this weekend and plug her into our modest Solar array this weekend and see what happens. 

Edited June 19, 20242 yr by doodsangel

1 hour ago, doodsangel said:

A Better Route Planner was a valuable tool in reducing stress.

You select your car and can add stuff like battery degradation, how much additional weight is added to the car, what the state of charge you want at the next charge etc. etc. etc. when planning your route. The App mostly accurately predicts said achievable distance, taking into account the elevation (going up - more power and going down - regenerate power) and other settings just mentioned. It will then also tell you how much charge and for how long you'll be charging to reach your next stop (charge station) with your chosen battery arrival SOC. We used this and didn't charge to full at every stop, only what we needed. It will even (if you set that it is allowed to adapt speed) tell you that on this stretch you can do the speed limit and on which stretches you need to do it at a lower speed than the speed limit (example do not exceed 100km/h for this stretch).

Thank you.

A while back I came across a gas station with two EV charging points. In Petrus Steyn. I thought well that's nice, but why here in this teeming metropolis?

But maybe the owner of the garage is being very clever. Because as there are more EVs on the road, and as more people start using the sort of app you will describe, more EVs will get steered his way, and they will all have a bite to eat whilst they are charging because he has a coffee bar on the premises as well.

1 hour ago, Bobster. said:

Thank you.

A while back I came across a gas station with two EV charging points. In Petrus Steyn. I thought well that's nice, but why here in this teeming metropolis?

But maybe the owner of the garage is being very clever. Because as there are more EVs on the road, and as more people start using the sort of app you will describe, more EVs will get steered his way, and they will all have a bite to eat whilst they are charging because he has a coffee bar on the premises as well.

Its one of those things. I can find a tweet hinting to it, but it seems not to be connected to gridcars. So currently it seems like there is a EV station at Riemland Country Shop, but as its not on the predominent apps, no-one will find it and neither will the App.

Cool thing is, if this person connects to gridcars, the App will recognise it and route you via Petrus Steyn if it thinks you require a top-up. 

Even better would be if he can slug in a 50/75/100kw DC charger, it will see those gents with the E-Trons and EQSs but the dozen.

Edited June 19, 20242 yr by doodsangel