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Interesting article on towing with an EV

2kwik4u

2kwik4u

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Found this while researching eTrons as the price has dropped significantly as of late.

It's from early '21, and from europe, so it only has freedom units every so often. It does have a couple interesting points about aerodynamics, as well as some interesting pictures of pull-thru charging stations in Europe.

Audi e-tron & Tesla Model 3 Towing Large & Small Caravan - CleanTechnica

Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News! A couple of months ... [continued]
cleantechnica.com cleantechnica.com
 
Did you see the size of those RVs on a single axle? Holy crap, lol.

The e tron didn't seem to be all that big to me, it's funny to hear them talk about it like some large SUV. It seemed basically A7 sized to me.
 
BlkGS said:
Did you see the size of those RVs on a single axle? Holy crap, lol.

The e tron didn't seem to be all that big to me, it's funny to hear them talk about it like some large SUV. It seemed basically A7 sized to me.
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It's the same general size as a Q5. Maybe a shade longer and lower.

And yeah.....better licensing laws let them get away with WAY more ridiculous towing setups.
 
Fun fact, in their infinite "wisdom" Audi has 2 models known just as the e-tron, in addition to an endless list of their regular cars.

The e tron s is basically a q5 sized vehicle. I'd never seen one, or if I did, thought it was a q5. I assume its a fancier VW id4. They also have the e tron GT, which is like somewhere around an s5 sportback or s7 in size, and is the one I've seen. I assume is a budget taycan.

Stupid. That's the worst naming convention this side of continental tires.

Re the trailer, I was more talking about how it's either gotta be crazy light, or just taking some serious liberties with robustness. Them again, I've heard when towing they're limited to like 40-45mph, so maybe they don't have to be as robust?
 
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eTron is the Q5 sized SUV. eTron S is the SUV, but with 3 motors instead of 2, kind of like every other label (A4->S4, etc). eTron GT is the S7 sized car (essentially a Porsche Taycan with Audi badging). They realized it's dumb, and are moving back to "normal" conventions with the new Q6 eTron. So at least you get a platform designation first, then the EV indicator. However, the originals eTron's aren't getting rebadged/named until their lifecycle runs, so for a few years we'll have both. It's not great.

What's wrong with Continentals naming scheme? I run "ExtremeContact" DWS (Dry-Wet-Snow) on my passenger vehicles, and the "TerrainContact" AT on my trucks. Feels pretty descriptive and appropriate, if not a little hokey. The "VikingContact" winter tires naming seems a bit silly, but I get it.

And yea, europeans aren't allowed to take a a 2500 pickup with 10k lbs and drive 80mph on the interstate after a test and a 30day probationary period like we are. Between tighter licensing, higher fines, and tighter restrictions on trailering in general......They don't need to have near the safety factors built into the system. Tongue weight is a great one. You can run down into the 4-5% range and still maintain a stable twing dynamic. We recommend 10-15% because, in general, people towing in this country are far less experienced and care far less about being safe then just getting it done.......SO, I would imagine the running gear and general construction isn't nearly as robust in those caravans, as our travel trailers here.
 

This list kind says it all, but their naming is a jumbled mess of the words "conti", "contact", "pro", "control", and a random ass number. They had a decent idea in the beginning, but it's a jumbled mess now, especially if you're comparing 5 versions of sportconti ontactosportcontis and have no idea which is which.
 
BlkGS said:

This list kind says it all, but their naming is a jumbled mess of the words "conti", "contact", "pro", "control", and a random ass number. They had a decent idea in the beginning, but it's a jumbled mess now, especially if you're comparing 5 versions of sportconti ontactosportcontis and have no idea which is which.
Click to expand...

That's fair. Hadn't seen the full list there as I'm typically at each end of the spectrum. When we put Continentals on her Rogue this spring I just found her size, then picked based on price and treadwear. Didn't really pay much attention to the naming convention.

I'm fan of Continental. Run them on damn near everything in the house. Including my bicycles. Only thing that doesn't have Continentals is the lawn mower and the boat trailer.
 
2kwik4u said:
That's fair. Hadn't seen the full list there as I'm typically at each end of the spectrum. When we put Continentals on her Rogue this spring I just found her size, then picked based on price and treadwear. Didn't really pay much attention to the naming convention.

I'm fan of Continental. Run them on damn near everything in the house. Including my bicycles. Only thing that doesn't have Continentals is the lawn mower and the boat trailer.
Click to expand...

I almost got the DWS06 for the TBSS, but then as ran a special on the Pirellis (which btw have a nearly as stupid naming system - I bought scorpion Nero zero as, not to be confused with pzero Nero zero as, or scorpion Nero Verde as. What's the difference? Who knows, only thing I've seen was that the Verde ones are low rolling resistance. Scorpion is supposed to be for trucks and SUVs, and pzero for cars, but that line is blurry because they offer them that for each other...)

My parents have used contis a lot though, never any complaints. I'd buy them, but they don't do incentives through Sam's club, and I'm a big fan of them, since they include road hazard for free and we get cash back.
 
BlkGS said:
I'd buy them, but they don't do incentives through Sam's club, and I'm a big fan of them, since they include road hazard for free and we get cash back.
Click to expand...

Tire rack throws Road Hazard in for free when you buy over like $150/tire or something. I've used it a few times, and it's surprisingly easy process. Takes a day for shipping, but otherwise really straightforward.
 
2kwik4u said:
More EV charging stuff this morning.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Rivian/comments/17okdac

Pilot now setting up pull through charging stations. Almost as if the people that dispense energy into vehicles know how to organize that delivery system logically!!
Click to expand...

Smart, it's almost like we've been building energy filling stations for 100 years and figured out the right way to do it already.

I think EV charging ended up as parking spots for 2 reasons. 1) it took a lot of time, so it made sense that was a parking spot. 2) It was put in the least valuable space in most places, which was far off parts of the parking lot.

All that said, this is a big step forward for a bigger reason as well... Most of these chargers I've seen are in weird places. For EVs to go more mainstream, they need convenient chargers right off the highway. That space is all but full already with gas stations and such a long major interstates. So being able to combo that in at an existing truck stop is a big deal.
 
BlkGS said:
So being able to combo that in at an existing truck stop is a big deal.
Click to expand...

Agreed, this is huge.

Imagine a Bucees with 10-15 of these lanes. That's a small 10% change, but would make for a huge leap forward in accessibility.
 
2kwik4u said:
Agreed, this is huge.

Imagine a Bucees with 10-15 of these lanes. That's a small 10% change, but would make for a huge leap forward in accessibility.
Click to expand...

Yup and a buccees is one of the few places I'd be ok with waiting an hour to charge at.

Was watching a video about the blazer EV the other day, despite boasting charge capabilities to like 200-400kW, it was only hitting a peak of 120 then falling off to 70 on one charger, and the first it peaked at like 80 then fell to 40. These were side by side chargers outside a Walmart or something. So while a lot of times we talk about charge times based on their "best case", and it's likely that will not be the case all the time.
 
BlkGS said:
Yup and a buccees is one of the few places I'd be ok with waiting an hour to charge at.

Was watching a video about the blazer EV the other day, despite boasting charge capabilities to like 200-400kW, it was only hitting a peak of 120 then falling off to 70 on one charger, and the first it peaked at like 80 then fell to 40. These were side by side chargers outside a Walmart or something. So while a lot of times we talk about charge times based on their "best case", and it's likely that will not be the case all the time.
Click to expand...
That's an interesting point.

"Most" EV's do that. Peak early around 30-40% state of charge, then drop back off as the packs fill up. Audi catches a lot of crap online for having "only 150kW" charging capability, but they maintain that from 0-90% or something like that. The charge curve is flat as a pancake, which leads to really similar charge times as other EV's that have charge curves that are much more pronounced.

Really wish the eTron S had more tow rating. We really want a bigger boat in the spring, and I really want to commute in an EV. Right now that means R1S for me, and I just can't justify $90k SUV. Even with a tax break and fuel savings.
 
2kwik4u said:
That's an interesting point.

"Most" EV's do that. Peak early around 30-40% state of charge, then drop back off as the packs fill up. Audi catches a lot of crap online for having "only 150kW" charging capability, but they maintain that from 0-90% or something like that. The charge curve is flat as a pancake, which leads to really similar charge times as other EV's that have charge curves that are much more pronounced.

Really wish the eTron S had more tow rating. We really want a bigger boat in the spring, and I really want to commute in an EV. Right now that means R1S for me, and I just can't justify $90k SUV. Even with a tax break and fuel savings.
Click to expand...

Man, you're gonna not justify it a lot more when you find out that the tax break goes away when the MSRP is over 80k :-P

This didn't seem to be a state of charge related issue. Just something with the chargers themselves maybe? Could have been temperature related, or any number of other things. Unfortunately, there was no "charging slowly due to x" prompts,.which would certainly piss off a lot of people.

A Ford Lightning might fit the bill for you if you can get into an extended range Lariat. But then it's a truck, not an SUV.

I know we've talked about it, but if I was you, I'd have a 2 (or 3) vehicle solution.
 
2kwik4u said:
That's an interesting point.

"Most" EV's do that. Peak early around 30-40% state of charge, then drop back off as the packs fill up. Audi catches a lot of crap online for having "only 150kW" charging capability, but they maintain that from 0-90% or something like that. The charge curve is flat as a pancake, which leads to really similar charge times as other EV's that have charge curves that are much more pronounced.

Really wish the eTron S had more tow rating. We really want a bigger boat in the spring, and I really want to commute in an EV. Right now that means R1S for me, and I just can't justify $90k SUV. Even with a tax break and fuel savings.
Click to expand...
Bye-bye torque curve. Hello charge curve!
 
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