I made gas prices largely obsolete

I got my self a used home portable DC rapid charger. They retail for $4,500 new.
I got a used one with a bunch of extension cords for $1,200. With the adapter cords I don't need I should be able to resell them and pock at least $200.
I have lots of 240v extension cords for my air compressors, plasma cutter and welders. They all use the 3 prong clothes dryer nema 10-30 or 3 prong "crows foot" electric range plug nema 10-50 std. So all I had to do was change the machine plug over to a nema 10 serries.

There are 2 ways to charge most electric vehicles. The most common way uses the J1772 plug it sends 120 or 240v AC power into the cars on board chargin system. All electric vehicles use this, nissan, mitsu, VW, bmw, chevy, ford, tesla and the the zero bike electric motor cycle.
Most vehicles have the charger built into the main AC drive traction power inverter.
Some of the first gen mass production electric vehicles like mine made before 2013 have a seperate charger stashed up inside the vehicle some where.
Older ones like mine also charge slow. Limited to 3.8kw.
Everything made after 2013 charges at 6.6kw and the newest teslas charge at 7.2kw.
So if you have a newer car you don't need one of these at all.

Unfortunately the manufacturers did not standardize on DC rapid chargers.
There are 3 different ones. Tesla made their own rapid charger because Elon musk can't stand anything his company didn't design and then there is CSS that US and euro cars use. But to make things even more confusing there are 2 different CSS plugs....
Mine uses CHAdeMO which is the most popular. It supplies up to 125 amps at a maximum of 500v. That's 62.5 kilowatts. That's enough to power to run 20 or 30 homes.
This other plug uses an external DC power source to pump high voltage DC straight into the battery.
This is what I have now.
The vehicles computer controls the DC charger.
My rapid charger is just a baby. It only does a maximum of 10kw, 20 amps at battery voltage which on my car tops out at about 400v.
When the battery is low it sits at about 360v, plug it into a low battery it provides 7.2kw of power, as the batt charges it gets closer to 400v and the charger provides a constant 20 amps makes closer to 8kw.

This is a huge improvement over the slow 2009 to 2013, 3.8kw charging standard my car has.

And no I can not plug in the J1772 and CHAdeMO at the same time. There really isn't any physical reason that both charing protocols couldn't run at the same time. Best I figure is nissan assumed that no one would ever build a tiny 10kw rapid charger and just assumed that if you plugged into a CHAdeMO you would have 62.5kw of power on tap and there was no reason to energize the puny 3.8kw on board charger.

 

The new 2nd Gen 40kwh 2018 battery leaf battery is exactly the same externally as the 24 and 30kwh 2011-2017 batteries. All the electrical connectors are the same, it's the same case, same weight to with in a few pounds. It just holds 2/3 more power.

 

Well it was about a year ago that I started seriously considering getting a nissan leaf.
One of the first things I did was search for public chargers, not expecting to find anything and that's exactly what I found, so I made my own charging network around town.
A year ago the nearest fast charge station was over 200 miles away, none on I-40 until you got to a big city.
There are alot of RV parks registered as EV charging friendly, buy you bring your own charger so it will take a while, cause we are talking about the difference between 6.6kw built in charger and 45 to 60kwh for a fast charger.
Well a year later they are starting to pop up along I-40 between Oklahoma City and Albuquerque. But they are usually 20 and up to 100 miles apart.
Looking on the east coast they are everywhere.

 

Have seen a lot of people bitching about how slowly electric vehicles charge at home.
They all reference 120v 15 amp charging.
Yeah I agree. 120v 15 amp charging sucks.
But that is not the only option.
The J1772 built in charger protocol has been approved for charging at up to 80 amps. On 240v power that's 19kw.
As far as I'm aware tesla has the fastest built in J1772 charger at 7.2kw.
The 2019 nissan leaf is supposed to have a J1772 fast charge option allowing charging at 11kw and possibly up to 22kw on home charging.

All you have to do is run a couple of 3 gauge lines on a 100 amp breaker with a ground to your charge point and install the charger. It's not god damned rocket science. The ridiculous 19kw home charger is going to probably cost up to $2,000.
Of you are not in that big of a hurry you can get a much smaller and cheaper 6.6kw to 7.2kw charger for around $400.
Or if you are cheap and not in that much of a hury then a 3.8kw J1772 charger exactly like what I use is about $160, run it on a tandem 20 amp breaker and standard 12 gauge romex wire.

I'm pretty happy with my portable DC rapid charger pumping out 7kw to 8.1kw.

 

Wife wants a new car.
I think I have her talked into a lease turn in. She likes hyundai sonata.
There is a plug in verson.
I'm already set up for 240v j1772 charging.
In early 2017 the plug-in version cost about $10,000 more than the non plug in version.
Now that difference, about 2 years later is less than $3,000 between plug in hybrid and non hybrid.
The plug in hybrid has gone from original MSRP of $38,000 down to around $17,000 in 2 years, this is much faster than my original projections.
It lost more than half it's resale in 2 years, I was figuring it would loose between 1/3 and 1/2. Not more than half.
Must be low gas prices and all the useful idiots buying up all the pickups and SUVs faster than manufacturers can build them.
These things are dumping resale value as if they were on fire.
I figure by 2020 I should be able to cut a check for one.

I like not having to buy gas.

I'm not all about electric vehicles and hybrids. In 2014, after what seemed like unending near $4 gallon gas prices and after no one had seen gas under $3 a gallon for a few years I bought my 1985 GMC suburban 3/4 truck with 7.4L engine, 3 speed auto and 4.10 rear end.
Hell they practicality paid me to take it.
I like buying under valued machinery when no one wants it.
Now with gas under $2 a gallon in a lot of states no one wants fuel efficient vehicles.

 

Alright I have put 10,000 miles on my nissan leaf. It has used around 2.5 megawatt hours.
That's the electricity a large upper middle class family of 4 home will use in about a month.
For me that much power costs around $200.
The cheap gas is putting a dent in my pay back time, but give it a few years we will probably be back over $3 a gallon.
By around 2030 I expect the oil reconciliation. As asian and middle eastern economies become more western like and and people use more oil, buy more cars, use diesel powered farming implements, pumps for irrigation, ect.

I have recently installed a pair of michelin energy saver all season tires. The new tires appear to have no negative impact on range, unlike the other tires I put on there a few months ago. These tires replaced those other new tires lol.
I didn't expect going from one eco tire to another eco tire to make such a big difference.

 

Got a 2016 hyundai sonata plug in hybrid for the wife. It took a little convincing.
I told her if she didn't like it, drive it for a year or 2 and when gas prices go back over $3.50 a gallon and stay there and everyone is losing their shit we resell the plug in car for top dollar and find some one trying to give away a bigger cross over thing.
It should use just about 0 gasoline driving to and from work, to the store, around town, then when she goes to the next town over once every week or so it should be able to cut gas use in half.
If we go to work on our rental house where I installed an outdoor 240v receptacle it can be charged there, so going to the rental should use very little gas, depending on how long we stay there and how much charge we can pickup.
Just going to the rental will deplete half to 2/3 of the battery.

 

They want us to pick it up in Santa Rosa.
Said they would refund the $440 delivery fee. Yeah I can do that.
Hell they already did most of the work, got it here from dirty jerzzy.

 

For the month of March I ran up 1,955 miles, the most I have ever driven the leaf in one month.
Used less than $50 worth of electricity.
If I had an economy gas burning shit box l, I would have spent more like $150 in gas. If I had a big Ole pickup truck, yeah at least $300 in gas and been 1/3 of the way to the next oil change car or truck.

I guess the leaf is due for its 30,000 mile oil change. It's a whole quart, no filter.

 

OK, you've avoided gas tax that is supposed to fix roads and bridges. How is the suspension holding up in the pothole strewn roads around your AO?

 

Had the bike out for 60 mile ride yesterday and less than a gallon of gas used.

 

I am sticking with the motorcycle as well.

 

Leaf now has re-manufactured battery packs (Nissan LEAF batteries replacement program; remanufactured and new) on the market - and you can buy the larger capacity (40 KW) that will retrofit tot he older 24KW units.

There are two places selling Prius replacement cells - you ship the old ones back for credit.

Lots of companies now offering hybrid (or 'range extender) systems at reasonable price points.

Ran across this yesterday - takes a good look at the new wave of 'range extender' vans...

 

I want the 60kwh battery. It would put Amarillo, Lubbock, roswell in range. With the 40kwh battery it's definitely a 1 way trip, with the 60kwh battery it's a lot less likely to be a 1 way trip.

Yeah they let the roads go to shit and let them stay that way for at least 3 or 4 years before starting to fix them.
NM tax is 17 cents per gallon.
They are obviously not using that money for repairs.
Plus it's tractor trailers that cause almost all the damage. How do I know, I lived near the blue Ridge parkway for 15 years, no tractor trailers allowed.
If I thought paying more taxes rewarded society with more services I would do it, but the more we pay in taxes appears to fuel government fraud, waste, abuse, creates more red tape, ever bigger more inefficient bureaucracies, lavish insolvent retirement programs, ect.

 

I just bought 200 mile extension cord, now I just need an electric car to plug into-- any suggestions ? (sarcasm) I'll be riding the Harley a lot more for an old carb V twin it gets great gas milage.

 

The power grid is literally everywhere. Don't need an extension cord.
Remember the biden administration put aside something like 10 billion dollars to try and make you buy an electric vehicle for your next car.
I say if they have to spend all that money to try and make you to buy an electric vehicle, then they're aren't ready for most people yet.

 

You can do better than 10mpg.
I was getting 12 to 13mpg in town with my 454 suburban with 3 speed auto and 4.11 rear end. I only took it on the highway occasionally and for only 50 miles and it appeared to be getting 16 to 18mpg, not that I ever ran a full tank through it all at once on the highway.

 

Yea but that is something you can fix not like these electronic luxury trucks where you R and R a high price part

 

I like it, I especially like the automatic 2x4 braking system, Loose the 2x4, Stop by any construction site and Boom !!!
You have a new brake !