eGolf for Long Commute?

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joe77

***
Joined
May 8, 2019
Messages
2
Hello everyone,

I just took a job that will have me driving from Oakland to Sunnyvale (about 90 miles round trip). With that trip and errands I figure I could cover around 110 miles. I'm admittedly kind of a style snob, and am a bit turned off by the design of the Prius, and Volt. I've been a VW/Audi owner for a long time, and am liking the e-Golf and I'm being offered a great deal on one, but it's pure electric and only has a range of 125 miles. This will be my only car. There is a charging station at work, and I'm told that it's usually available but if not, I probably get a spot in the afternoon. I'm a little concerned about range anxiety.
http://tradevenue.se/
Thoughts?
Thoughts?
 
Get a charger for home too. Beyond the level 1 that comes with the car.

Have one at work is bonus, even if you have to share. You would only need a few hours.

Also research with the Plugshare map your route, are there charge options that coincide with your errand or shopping activities.

Good luck. The anxiety wears off once you forward think your actions in using the car.
 
I agree the prices on e-Golf's are really good right now - it seems VW is really pushing to sell them, and if you can get a commuter car for around $23,000 (which is what I did), then it's hard to pass up. That being said, it is recommended (by Tesla, VW, etc) to routinely charge the battery to 80 to 90% SoC (State of Charge) for battery longevity. Also, you should probably not routinely take the pack down to less than 10% SoC, either. In the 36 kWh e-Golf, a warning comes on with ~31 miles of range left, but the "fuel" gauge won't be in the red for probably another 15 to 20 miles after that. So let's say you want to be nice to the pack and keep the pack in the 10% to 90% range: that's 80% of 30 kWh (I've seen this much energy available in the winter time in the SF Bay Area), which is 24 kWh. If you drive conservatively with heating and cooling, I bet you can average at least 3.5 miles/kWh. 24 x 3.5=84 miles. If you can get 4 miles/kWh, that's 96 miles of range. If you can charge at work (even with the trickle charging station included with the car, in which case in 8 hours you can gain 9.6 kWh (about 30-40 miles of range, depending on how you drive), then you will be fine. After 5 years of driving like this, I suspect you will see some battery degradation - not much, I suspect in the range of 5 to 10% after 50,000 miles, but that's just a guess. At that point, your commute will become more of a challenge if you can't charge at work.

I think you need an EV with at least 150 miles of range to not worry about charging during the work day. If you able to charge at work, even with the trickle charging station, I think this is a doable commute, but there are definitely caveats.

I love the serene drive I get from my e-Golf and I am hoping to get 1000,000 to 150,000 miles out of it - so far I have put 10,000 on it and it's been great, with no observable battery degradation. Also, I have only DC fast charged the pack three times during that 10,000 miles.
 
If you can charge at work and home that's an easy commute. If you can't charge you may need to stop for a fast charge on the way back. There's plenty of those around though and it really would just be a case of stopping at the Whole Foods (as example), plugging in for 10-15 mins while picking up some groceries for the evening and then you'd have plenty to get home. The 125 mile range is pretty accurate if your freeway speeds aren't exceeding 65mph though so you may find you can do the return trip without charging in a pinch. Probably not ideal though as it would require charging the battery to full.
 
Joe77, I wouldn't do it.

For a 90-mile RT daily commute you should get a car with longer range, especially considering that it'll be your only car.

In a perfect world an e-Golf could do the job, but you'll have to fully charge it every day and you'll have to rely on chargers being available, on chargers being working, on not forgetting to plug in your car one day (it happens), on mistakenly not plugging the cord all the way in (also happens), on the power never being out, on not doing many unplanned side trips, etc.

Also know that the car's range will decrease in the winter as well as over time.
 
It should be fine in terms of range, especially if you live in Oakland and work in Sunnyvale, since speeds will be greatly limited by traffic.

But you'll definitely need a home L2 charger to recover those 100-ish miles on an overnight charge.

joe77 said:
This will be my only car.

Do you regularly go north of Napa or south of San Jose? If the answer is yes, then I'd be hesitant to get an e-Golf. Sure the deals are great right now but that's for a reason: there's lots of 200 mile range cars hitting the market now like the Leaf Plus, Kona, and Niro. And you can score a great deal on a Bolt too.
 
I live in SW San Jose and commute to Pleasanton everyday. About 80 miles r/t. I'm able to do the full roundtrip (including that Sunol Grade on 680) on an 80% charge and usually pull into the driveway with about 20-25 miles remaining. I find that I'm getting an average of 4.4 miles/kwh because of the generally slow traffic. My average speed is rarely over 40.

I highly recommend the driver assist package. The adaptive cruise control makes stop and go traffic stress-free.
 
Voltron said:
I highly recommend the driver assist package. The adaptive cruise control makes stop and go traffic stress-free.

With the SEL I presume you have the lane assist camera. Did you get the Traffic Jam Assist unlocked, by any chance?
 
Sparklebeard said:
Voltron said:
I highly recommend the driver assist package. The adaptive cruise control makes stop and go traffic stress-free.

With the SEL I presume you have the lane assist camera. Did you get the Traffic Jam Assist unlocked, by any chance?

Is traffic jam assist available on the 2017? Is this one of those secret features you can unlock with that coding gadget? Like the lowering the windows from your key fob and remembering the climate settings?

On mine, the ACC does operate in stop-and-go traffic at any speed and will come to a complete stop, but the lane assist feature is inoperative below 40 mph. TBH, steering isn't a big deal at 10mph, but I LOVE the ACC. So nice to be able to relax and not be worried that you'll plow into the guy in front of you.
 
Yeah the 2017 can do it. Any e-Golf with lane assist should have the correct camera hardware.

OBD11 dongle can be used to enable ‘adaptive lane tracking’ option in the infotainment. It’s basic self steering/lane centering above ~40mph. It’s nice on longer trips for reducing fatigue, as a bonus over the safety benefit provided by the stock lane exit prevention system.

There’s another interface that can additionally enable Traffic Jam Assist, which allows the adaptive lane tracking to continue at any speed while ACC is active.

It’s fancy cruise control, and like the name suggests it excels in stop start traffic.
 
I have what sounds like a similar commute to yours. Straight commute is 47 miles each way (downhill on the way, uphill getting home), of which about 75% is on 65mph highway. I make a lot of detours and stops (I play Pokemon Go), so I usually end up about 10-20 miles above the 94-mile minimum.

I have L2 at home and at work, and it's worked perfectly for me. Charge to 90% both at home and at work, usually get down to about 45-50% by the time I arrive. I haven't driven it in cold weather yet, which is not really an issue for you, I suppose.

All 2019 SE's that I've seen advertised have the DAP. VW just seems to be standardizing the build for efficiency's sake, and throwing in the first aid kit and cargo net in the trunk with every one as well.

For $24,000 before incentives, I couldn't pass it up.

--Chris
 
I'm in LA and do ~90 miles highway round trip and only charge at work (though I'm working on installing a Level 2 home charger as well). Basically, I get to work and either start charging immediately or wait until a spot is open (rarely takes more than a couple hours). I usually drive in Eco mode and find that this generally gives me enough for the round trip commute + 30-40ish extra miles if I need them. I have never been particularly close to running out (lowest "miles til empty" I've seen on the dash is like 15). It's a lot less of a headache than when I drove my old GTI, when I would basically have to plan out what days of the week to stop at the Costco for gas on the way in.
 
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