Taking a Solterra EV on a ski day trip

From Los Angeles to the Big Bear Mountain Resorts (Snow Summit specifically).

Snow Summit winter trail map

Bought parking in advance to park near the base, vs. having to get shuttled in from a remote lot. $40. Going up the mountain is about 110 miles and the Solterra is currently estimating it has a 192 mile range on 100% charge (outside temps in the high 50s, low 60s, °F). There are limited charging options in Big Bear, so I’m planning on charging to 80% at a DCFC before starting the climb. Using PlugShare, I found a municipal charging facility run by ChargePoint that is reported to have three (3) 62 kW CCS1 stations at $.35/kWh, which should match the Solterra more or less perfectly (I occasionally see 100 kW at higher speed charging stations, but that eventually settles into something around 50 kW). 

That’s about 80 miles from my starting location – at 3.0 m/kWh for planning purposes, I should arrive with at least 50% state of charge (SOC) (I’m going to say 60%). Bumping back to 80% shouldn’t take more than 30 minutes. At 6 a.m. Apple Maps says it’ll take me 2 hours 3 minutes to get to Snow Summit, so even with that stop I should be there when the lifts open at 9 a.m.

Elevation profile for the trip

With an 80% SOC leaving that “flatland” charger, I should have more than enough to get me up the mountain and back down (a 70 mile loop, with as much downhill returning as uphill going). It’s a roughly 5,000' ascent over ~35 miles, and it’s going to be chilly (right around 32°F on the way up). I’m going to guesstimate, based on my road trips to Phoenix and Palm Springs, that I’ll be lucky to see 2.0 m/kWh on the climb. I’m going to guess it takes me 28% of my SOC to climb the hill, putting me at 52% SOC when I park, more than enough to comfortably get back down.

If I was just making the loop back to my home, that would be enough planning, but I’m not, I’m planning on hitting Disneyland after getting some turns in. So, back to PlugShare. One route puts me right back in the vicinity of that municipal charging station, so that’s good; Google Maps suggests it’s probably the quickest route, too, so I guess my route is planned. Since Disneyland has a large number of (level 2) charging stations, I can charge when I arrive there and at least put enough range on to get back home.

52% at the top of the mountain, with large amount of downhill driving, for a 97 mile trip to DLR, will be tight, so I’ll probably charge back up to 80% “down the hill.” We’ll see how it plays out. There are two chargers around Big Bear Lake and I’ll probably swing by to see if either is an option; one has a PlugShare score of 7.8 and two 50 kW CCS1 chargers (but two recent reports of only the “left” one working), the other has a single 62 kW port.

The two public CCS1 charging stations around Big Bear

Update: Started at 100% SOC, 191 miles predicted range [5012 on the odometer].

By the time I got to the vicinity of the municipal charger I intended to use [5087 (75 miles driven)], zero spots were available. I’d predicted arriving at 60% SOC and that’s where I was (2.9 m/kWh average, through dense morning traffic and then 70-75 mph freeway travel) The car was reporting a 115 mile range, so I decided to go for it, and see what was what up the mountain.

I reset the efficiency average once I merged onto CA-330, and averaged around 1.3 m/kWh for most of the climb. The day is warm for a mountain winter; high 50s down the hill, and high 40s / low 50s climbing up the mountain and at Big Bear Lake.

Once I got to Big Bear Lake and flatter terrain, the total average climbed to 1.9 m/kWh, and I arrived at the HomeStreet Bank charger [5123 (36)] with 28% SOC and an estimated range of 54 miles. (If the flatland estimate had been accurate, I’d have arrived with 79 miles of range remaining, so the car was ~32% off, but in fairness, this is the first mountain I’ve shown it.)

Connected and charging at one of the two CCS1 charging spots in Big Bear

Luckily no one else is here, so there are (2) CHAdeMO spots open, and I’m using one of the two CCS1 charger cables. The station is shared, so while I’m getting 48.3 kW at the moment, if anyone else comes and plugs in that’ll be halved down to around 25 kW. So far I’ve been here 15 minutes and the car’s up to 47% SOC, after 12.29 kWh delivered. Now to get some work done before I head over to Snow Summit. (This is becoming a “proof of concept” day ... Can I take the Solterra for a skiing day trip? Can I both ski and hit Disneyland on the same day (in a Solterra)?)

Another update: I had some work to do, and had brought a MacBook Air to do it on. (Plus this cheap steering wheel desk I keep in the seatback pocket of the front passenger seat, though I might swap that out for something that won’t potentially shred the pleather – sorry, “vegan leather” – on the steering wheel. Or maybe find something that can protect the leather, since it only hits in a couple of places...) Anyway, by the time I was done with what I had to knock out, the car was up to a 93% SOC. The free Sandalwood 1 parking lot was around the corner. Got in a day of skiing. Yay!

Left Big Bear [5124] with that 93% SOC and 168 miles of estimated range. Going down the hill wasn’t the magic huge m/kWh I was kind of expecting but at the bottom [5156 (32)] I’d averaged 3.9 m/kWhh and had actually picked up a few miles of range and percent SOC (172 and 95%). Not bad.

Slogging through Friday LA area traffic got to Disneyland [5213 (89)] at 19:03 (including two short stops on my way down the mountain for a snack and to take in the view) having averaged 4.2 m/kWh; parked with 140 miles range and 77% SOC. Lucked into a ChargePoint spot in Pixar Pals parking structure, which I didn’t need but, why not? $6.31 for 18.0357 kWh ($.35/kWh), over about 3.5 hours, and I was back up to 100% SOC and 199 miles reported range.