First road trip - Wind makes a BIG difference!

[pirate4x4lance]

So just got back from a 600 mile round trip road trip from Southern UT up to Park City and back in my brand new 2025 Lariat. Right before the trip, I installed 2" Rough Country leveling pucks because I couldn't handle the silly looking rake. For this trip, I was loaded up with 4 adults, 4 mountain bikes, and gear/beer.

One thing to mention is that the speed limit on I-15 through all of Utah and Idaho is 80mph. You really need to do at least 75 or you're gonna get run the heck over. I opted to set the Blue Cruise at 79mph (the speedo is 1mph off compared to GPS). We averaged a respectable 2.0 on the ride up, I was pretty darn happy with that. We did a quick stop in Beaver, UT, at the Tesla supercharger, and then one more at the Provo Tesla. I fully expected to get even better mileage on the way home since there is more downhill. My ABRP route planner agreed, and suggested I could make it all the way home back to Hurricane with an 80% recharge in Provo. So that's what we did. Well that didn't last long, as the wind picked up BIG TIME just north of Nephi, along with some crazy rain. The rain only lasted about 10 minutes, but the wind never stopped. We went from cruising at 80mph to have to back down to 75, and getting 1.3kWh/mi and hoping I could make it to Beaver for a recharge. I wasn't going to make it, and had to stop at an EA in Scipio, UT. Then had to stop in Beaver as well, and still made it home with only about 15% left. A far cry from making it in one charge stop.

Pretty wild the wind made such a MASSIVE difference, just something to keep in mind when planning your long trips.

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[PJnc284]

a stiff headwind is a rough. The lightning is already a brick and driving into the wind just amplifies it. Shame we can't always have a 20-30mph tailwind.

 

[pirate4x4lance]

For sure. It doesn't help I had four bikes on the back and lift the front 2" to make it even more of a brick. LOL

 

[RLXXI]

For sure. It doesn't help I had four bikes on the back and lift the front 2" to make it even more of a brick. LOL

I'm like you about that rake, I get why they put it in but driving around unloaded as most do, it looks goofy. I'm not going up on the front though, I want to go down in the rear.

 

[On the Road with Ralph]

I do a lot of long-distance driving in my Lightning (14 trips of more than 1500 miles each) and occasionally encounter serious headwinds, especially when crossing Oklahoma and Texas. I often will tuck behind a semi trailer, going an appropriate speed, and take advantage of the draft. This usually gets me a noticeable improvement in efficiency.

 

[I <3 My Lightning]

OP,

Do you pay for the full version of ABRP that includes the realtime weather feature in calculating charge stops?

 

[msdickerson]

So just got back from a 600 mile round trip road trip from Southern UT up to Park City and back in my brand new 2025 Lariat. Right before the trip, I installed 2" Rough Country leveling pucks because I couldn't handle the silly looking rake. For this trip, I was loaded up with 4 adults, 4 mountain bikes, and gear/beer.

One thing to mention is that the speed limit on I-15 through all of Utah and Idaho is 80mph. You really need to do at least 75 or you're gonna get run the heck over. I opted to set the Blue Cruise at 79mph (the speedo is 1mph off compared to GPS). We averaged a respectable 2.0 on the ride up, I was pretty darn happy with that. We did a quick stop in Beaver, UT, at the Tesla supercharger, and then one more at the Provo Tesla. I fully expected to get even better mileage on the way home since there is more downhill. My ABRP route planner agreed, and suggested I could make it all the way home back to Hurricane with an 80% recharge in Provo. So that's what we did. Well that didn't last long, as the wind picked up BIG TIME just north of Nephi, along with some crazy rain. The rain only lasted about 10 minutes, but the wind never stopped. We went from cruising at 80mph to have to back down to 75, and getting 1.3kWh/mi and hoping I could make it to Beaver for a recharge. I wasn't going to make it, and had to stop at an EA in Scipio, UT. Then had to stop in Beaver as well, and still made it home with only about 15% left. A far cry from making it in one charge stop.

Pretty wild the wind made such a MASSIVE difference, just something to keep in mind when planning your long trips.

I remember a few years ago driving from NY to Illinois on I90 towing a small 1200# trailer with a Subaru Forester 5 speed manual transmission. We ran into some pretty nasty lines of thunderstorms which after driving through NY on the flats at about 65 mph (pretty good for the Forester and trailer), we hit the storms in and around the border of Illinois. I had to put the car into 3rd gear , floor the gas pedal, and even then was only able to keep up about 40 MPH. Yes wind kills mileage and efficiency. simple old fashioned physics. Oh yea when we finally got into Illinois the trailer windows had been unable to keep out the rain and all the bed and interior floor areas were soaked. The campground we checked into told up there was a tornado warning and they had been spotted where we just came from. LOL

 

[pirate4x4lance]

OP,

Do you pay for the full version of ABRP that includes the realtime weather feature in calculating charge stops?

Yeah, that's why it surprised me so much!

 

[CD4TNF]

The silver lining part of your story is you had enough charging options along your way to stop twice along your route home. Unplanned too. I'm feeling better about the charging infrastructure with the recent travel reports we've been getting on the forum.

 

[K6CCC]

Same here a couple months ago. Needles, CA to Barstow, CA. Used 70% of my ER battery to get 138 miles. Strong quartering headwind most of the way and cruise control at 77 most of the way. Once I knew I was going to have to stop in Barstow, I made no effort to slow down as it was getting late and I REALLY wanted to get home.

 

[trev5150]

I opted to set the Blue Cruise at 79mph (the speedo is 1mph off compared to GPS).

80 is 80. The system doesn't care it will still work at 80 mph indicated.

 

[sotek2345]

Yup - been there. Coming home across upstate NY on I-90 from Canada we hit some significant headwinds and cold, plus some light snow for fun. I was getting 1.0 mi/kwh at 70mph. Thankfully NY has lots of charging options so it just mean more stops.

 

[pirate4x4lance]

80 is 80. The system doesn't care it will still work at 80 mph indicated.

80 is 81 because the speedometer is wrong. Wasn’t worried about it “working”.

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