So some upfront EV lingo:
L1= plugging into a standard wall socket.
L2= plugging into a 240v socket (or a dedicated) L2 charger.
L3= DC fast charger.
Bottom line upfront– L3 chargers are necessary on your route and L1 or L2 are necessary at your destination.
Back in October of 2020 we took our first long road trip in our 2020 Chevrolet Bolt…from Northern VA to Wilmington, NC. During the height of COVID, there wasn’t much traffic on the road and our travels were seamless, but slow. We used the Electrify America (EA) L3 network for first time and paid about $40 for 4 charges (two each way).
L3 charging was slow due to the limitations of the Bolt which fast charges at somewhere around 50kw/hr…leading to some stops of up to an hour…good time for reading, but not so good if you want to rapidly arrive at your destination.
Another challenge at that time was that Wilmington’s L2/L3 charging infrastructure was pretty weak. Luckily the excellent Mad Boar restaurant and pub about 40 miles outside of Wilmington on I-40 had a free single L3 charger (relatively slow at 50kw/hr, but equal to the capability of the Bolt to receive power)– a great way to attract EV-driving business. And we were lucky enough to hit it twice without having to wait. (they also have a bank of Tesla Superchargers).
And we stayed at a hotel in Wrightsville Beach where we managed to find a wall socket in the garage so we could get a L1 charge.
While we had a good experience on this trip, we didn’t do it again: here’s why:
- Relatively slow L3 charging in the Bolt (50kw/hr).
- A really slow trip…ok if you have the time, but usually we do not.
- Too many single points of failure- if a charging station was out of service, we would have had an even longer wait (or have been stuck).