mackinaw Posted January 22 Share Posted January 22 Just figured I'd share this. My small northern Michigan town is located off I-75 and has both Tesla Supercharger and Electrify America charging stations at a local market. We were shopping this afternoon and saw several EV's clustered around the charger. Of course I wandered over. There were test vehicles from Ford, Toyota, Kia, and GM waiting for their turn at the charger. None of these guys knew each other, it was strictly coincidental that they showed up at the same time. Only three out of the four chargers were working, hence the backlog. I talked to the engineer driving the Mach-E Rally. Nice guy (are they all so young today?). Mainly we talked about how unreliable Electrify America chargers are, and battery performance in cold weather (it was 24 degrees). I asked him about future Ford EVs. He wouldn't tell me much, but is very excited about the future. Being about 225 miles from SE Michigan does pay off. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DeluxeStang Posted January 23 Share Posted January 23 That's actually a really funny coincidence. "Oh what do you do for work?" "I'm a Ford engineer" "No way! I'm a GM engineer" Kia engineer walks up "Guys, you're not gonna believe this". 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mackinaw Posted January 23 Author Share Posted January 23 39 minutes ago, DeluxeStang said: That's actually a really funny coincidence. "Oh what do you do for work?" "I'm a Ford engineer" "No way! I'm a GM engineer" Kia engineer walks up "Guys, you're not gonna believe this". I thought about that when I got back home. My town, Gaylord, is about 225 miles from the Detroit area. It's about a 3 1/2 hour drive. It was a Monday, and I'm guessing that these engineers all left their office at about the same time (10:00 AM) and drove north. Gaylord is the logical place to stop to recharge batteries, take a bathroom break, and have lunch. I'm going to make it a point of dropping by the EV chargers on Monday afternoons. Who knows what I'll see next. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rick73 Posted January 23 Share Posted January 23 Maybe all doing additional real-world cold-weather testing while it’s still frigid. Would also be interesting to know when other manufacturers will start testing Tesla charging system on their own revised vehicles. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GearheadGrrrl Posted January 23 Share Posted January 23 The automakers have their own or access to cold weather test sites in northern Minnesota and Ontario, so my guess is this is some short notice testing on a convenient route. See a lot of this- 'Bout 10 years ago I talked with a couple hispanic guys stopped at a McDonalds in Iowa City, they were driving a like new VW Anorak TDI pickup and spoke excellent English. This was when VW Group was romancing International Trucks, and Iowa City is a good turnaround point for a day trip out of International HQ in suburban Chicago. Around the same time pictures showed up of Scania trucks with International's manufacturer plates around the Chicago area. VW Group has since swallowed International whole and spun it off as Traxon, and Scania has a huge social media presence in North America that leads me to suspect they're bringing the Scania brand here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DeluxeStang Posted January 23 Share Posted January 23 5 hours ago, mackinaw said: I thought about that when I got back home. My town, Gaylord, is about 225 miles from the Detroit area. It's about a 3 1/2 hour drive. It was a Monday, and I'm guessing that these engineers all left their office at about the same time (10:00 AM) and drove north. Gaylord is the logical place to stop to recharge batteries, take a bathroom break, and have lunch. I'm going to make it a point of dropping by the EV chargers on Monday afternoons. Who knows what I'll see next. Sounds like that would be a good place for prototype spotting if you're into that sort of thing. Interesting comments from the Ford engineer about the future, makes me optimistic. Then again, he probably wouldn't be like "Our future product are terrible". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mackinaw Posted January 24 Author Share Posted January 24 (edited) 6 hours ago, Rick73 said: Maybe all doing additional real-world cold-weather testing while it’s still frigid. Would also be interesting to know when other manufacturers will start testing Tesla charging system on their own revised vehicles. It actually wasn't all that cold. Last week was bitter cold with daytime temps in the single digits. This week is mild. I wish I had more time to talk to the Ford engineer, but he was busy looking at data on his tablet. I did learn that not all Tesla chargers are created equal. There are several varieties with the chargers at the Gaylord site the older type, which won't be compatible with Ford EV's. The newest version Tesla chargers will be. I briefly talked to a gal engineer from one of the other companies who asked me which EV I liked the best. I told her northern Michigan was truck country, so the Lightning. Edited January 24 by mackinaw Added content Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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