First "real world" trip

[Seasidenj]

2014 coded rex
I made a trip to Philadelphia airport had to drop off my cousin had to leave at 2am. Filled gas, plugged in, set departure time, set comfort. At 2am was 32deg f.
Nice to have a warm car. Was about a 2 hour drive to airport. Needed heat and lights held range at about 50%. Until gas got low.
Made it there with about 10% charge and 10 miles on rex.
Little nervous about gas but found a station and filled tank. Used plug share and found a charging location. 4 stations, none worked! Found another station. Did not communicate! Pretty much drove home on rex alone.
This was a trip I wouldn't give a second thought using an ICE but it looks like the charging situation needs a lot of work at this point in time.
Very happy I have the rex.

 

[ksnax]

Interesting problem about the charging stations. I have not picked up my REx, but the more I read about real world experiences for BEV owners, the more assured I am about making the right choice with the REx for longer journeys. Coding appears to be a functionality imperative for anybody venturing beyond home charger range!

 

[Mehdi]

From my little experience, I also find that DC fast charging is a joke. Most of them don't work. Besides the cost of fast charging and using the REX is about the same. So why bother? Why wait, even 20 minutes, when you can just let the REX charge the battery? But definitely code the car so that you can hold the state of charge and also use the full capacity of the fuel tank, otherwise filling up the tank every 40 miles or so can be very annoying and hard to manage, never mind the anxiety of running out of fuel.

 

[alohart]

From my little experience, I also find that DC fast charging is a joke. Most of them don't work. Besides the cost of fast charging and using the REX is about the same. So why bother? Why wait, even 20 minutes, when you can just let the REX charge the battery?

We all need to reduce our burning of fossil fuels, so driving on electricity that's almost certainly generated with less CO2 emissions than burning gasoline in an ICE should be a goal. Sure, some DC fast chargers are out of order, but isn't it worth at least trying to charge?

Some of the reported DC fast charger communications problems could be due to the weight of the charging plug pulling the plug contacts away from the charging port. Try lifting the plug until the negotiation communications have completed and charging either commences or fails due to a different problem.

 

[Mehdi]

That's good advice alohart !