Lease and Drive the Honda EV+ (EV Plus)--Trip Log of an ordinary driver
18,000 miles
- Friday, May 29, 1998: Missed a few miles of the log. After a week of Lisa having the EV+, last night
I drove the car to Pomona and then Claremont (first three of us, then we picked up a passenger, so four full
seats with about 650 lbs. of passengers and 110 lbs. of luggage, sleeping bags, cameras and books), arriving
up in the hills above the College with a little less than 4 bars left.
For the 50+ miles driving to Pomona and Claremont (Freeway above 60 mph) we had used 6 bars. On the way back, I
drove conservatively (slowly, on city streets). Amazingly enough, we did not lose the 4th bar for 22.7 miles, and
it wasn't even a full bar. We drove through beautiful Brea Canyon after midnight, arriving home (46.2 miles with
an elevation drop of about 1500 ft.) with more than 1.5 bars left (about 2.3 bars for the 46 miles, mostly downhill).
Total trip was (about) 110 miles, with 40 more miles of spare range (at least!). Total energy usage was 8.5 bars,
or (26.2kwh * [8.5/12.5]) or approximately 17 kwh, or better than 6 miles per kwh. At 4 cents per kwh, our fuel
costs drop to 6 mils per mile. This is the way driving an EV should be: You don't have to pay too much attention
to spare energy or exactly how many kwh are left in the battery.
Lessons learned driving the HondaEV+:
- The brakes show almost no wear. The efficacy of REGENERATIVE BRAKING is amazing.
We really do put the energy back into the battery instead of into heat loss and brake wear, and recapture about
80% of energy stored going uphill when we come back down.
- The tires show almost no wear. We were expecting a tradeoff: low rolling resistance tires would wear faster.
However, looking at them, it seems that there is a central stripe which takes most of the resistance out of rolling
straight forward, with excellent gripping surfaces to the sides, which only come into play when turning or churning
mud and show. They sure have tire technology down! Wish our ICE vehicles had traction like that.
- We sure could use another Honda EV+!