Despite the use of “standard” in the name of the North America Charging Standard (NACS), aka Tesla plug; NACS isn’t actually a standard. There are procedures around how standards get made, and Tesla didn’t do that. That’s not always important, Apple’s Lightning Connector isn’t a standard either, and it does just fine – well, until recently. What really matters is […]
Read more
Ford has been hella coy about the price for their Blue Cruise Level 2 hands-free driving feature. When I bought my 2021 Mustang Mach-E, the hardware was optional (shown above), and Ford pinkie-promised that it would be $200/year to re-up the Blue Cruise. The ability to opt-out of the hardware went away with the 2022 models, and Ford went silent […]
Read more
Vehicle-to-Load (V2L), as demonstrated in the video below, is seriously cool. If you have an EV that does it, there will be scenarios where it could be awesome; like saving your food during a power outage. I wanted to start with that, so that it doesn’t get lost in what I’m going to say next. As cool as V2L is, […]
Read more
OK… I guess it takes seven seats, or is it all-wheel drive (AWD), to make an SUV? But why does AWD matter for the ID.4, but not the Model Y, or Mach-E? This matters because not-SUVs price out at $55,000 where SUVs are good to $80,000. There doesn’t seem to be a consistent theme in the IRS’s guidance around what […]
Read more
Generally, I’m a fan of both of Alex’s car focused channels. I only know of one other YouTuber that gets into the weeds (in a good way) to the same degree that he does. I say that because I approach his content with PMA and an open mind, but I’ve been somewhat confused by a couple of the conclusions in […]
Read more
Every so often I see this idea that EVs should carry around their own charge cable, both for Level 2 (L2), and occasionally DC Fast Charging (DCFC). While I can respect the validity of the L2 argument, even though I disagree, for DCFC I struggle to see any compelling reasons around how it could make any sense.
Read more
TLDR; Tesla Supercharger design is creating issues because other EVs have charge ports in different places. That the folks at Tesla didn’t think to design around that when they retrofitted Superchargers for CCS is mind blowing. This isn’t a hard problem to fix, you just use a longer cable.
Read more
This is going to sound crazy, but hear me out. There’s a lot of FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) out there around EV refueling (aka charging), especially when it comes to road trips. I get it, the refueling model is very different, and you need to know that the model is different, to understand that looking at refueling an EV like […]
Read more
Being able to level 2 charge your electric vehicle when it’s at rest is a key part of what makes the EV experience so convenient. Occasionally, there will be times when someone intentionally blocks the EVSE or some other circumstance makes putting the car next to it impossible. That is where this J1772 extension cable comes in.
Read more
When I was in the market for a fully adjustable EVSE, I was somewhat surprised to discover that there just aren’t many of them. The Shell Recharge 32A and 40A EVSE are in a select group that will do 120V (Level 1) and 240V (Level 2) at 12A/16A/24A/32A for the 32A and 12A/16A/24A/32A/40A for the 40A. Like anything, there are […]
Read more