blackleaf said:
Has anyone tried the trip to try out the Wenachee & Leavenworth QC's?
Can't find any app that shows someone's gotten a charge at the Leavenworth QC. Anyone?
Lastly Wenachee - no QC there, but a couple of L2's referenced. Anyone use those?
Yesterday there was a rally of 10 Leafs, one Tesla Roadster and a iMiev for the trip over to Leavenworth and Wenachee. As some of these cars had two QCs at Leavenworth, I think we can say that it is working.
There was a schedule to minimize waiting at the QC stations. I was second on the schedule. I charged in Sultan at the QC, then while traveling to Skykomish got a text message that the car read to me from EV0 that the Skykomish QC had a problem. When I arrived, the AV support had just reset the charger for the again (second or third time) and wanted another EV to try the QC, so I plugged in and it worked. After I got a full charge, we switched the QC back to EV0, which then was charging fine. Only comment was I was very careful in how I plugged it, didn't touch the lever at all while plugging in. Took a deep breath and headed up US2 to the pass. Climb was worrying, as I've never done climbing like this before, but it went well. Temp stayed at 6 bars, power stayed between 30 kW and 40 kW, except for a short bit at 50 kW. Speed was 45 mph in the steeper sections, and as traffic was light and as there are passing lanes this was fine. Probably was being too cautious.
Reached the top of Stevens Pass with 8 bars showing. Stopped to take a few pictures and look around. Might be the first Leaf over Stevens Pass? After about 10 minutes EV0 stopped behind me. He had left with 10 bars, had 6. We left at the same time, and for the first half of the decent to Leavenworth drove fairly carefully, ie speed limit. The last part, I was following EV0, and we didn't exactly hypermile.
QC at Leavenworth to 80%, then switched to the L2 and topped back to 100% for the return. Watched the ribbon cutting, etc. Most of the other drivers continued on to Wenachee, I returned from Leavenworth. Traffic was heavy, just moved with traffic most of the time, raining fairly hard after crossing the pass. 4 bars at summit, 4 bars at Skykomish. QC to 80% at Skykomish, returned home with 2 bars showing.
I was surprised not to regain a bar on the decent from the summit of Stevens Pass westbound, as was running 10 kW to 20 kW of regeneration for much of the steep part of the decent.
Most of the drivers continued to Wenachee and returned to Seattle Saturday. Some stayed over to Sunday.
The key DC QC for this trip is the one at Skykomish. Need it for the pass eastbound, need it to recharge after the pass to get back to Seattle westbound. If it isn't working, use the L2 there and make sure you have enough to continue, 10 bars for the trip to Leavenworth should be fine. Remember you can also stop at the L2 at the summit, both eastbound and westbound.
Had fun meeting good people, driving, watching the ribbon cutting... A Wonderful day.
