The FIRST Road Trip In the VW ID.Buzz Was...A TOTAL Train Wreck, And Here's Why!

Estimated read time: 1:20

Summary

In this adventure, the TFLEV crew embarks on a challenging road trip from Pittsburgh to Chicago in the new Volkswagen ID.Buzz, an electric mini-bus. The trip quickly turns into a nightmare due to harsh winter conditions, a lack of reliable charging infrastructure, and inadequate real-world electric vehicle range. Despite these hurdles, the team explores the capabilities of the ID.Buzz, experiencing both its innovative features and numerous charging frustrations. Their journey highlights the stark differences between driving electric vehicles in urban areas versus long-distance road trips in challenging weather.

Highlights

Charging woes turned the ID.Buzz road trip into an unexpected adventure. 🚧
Unexpected detours and cold weather highlighted the ID.Buzz's range limitations. 🌨️
The trip underscored the importance of reliable EV infrastructure and planning. ⚡
Though the ID.Buzz offered comfort, its road trip viability in winter was poor. 🌡️
Navigational glitches led the crew on an extended, anxiety-filled journey. 🗺️

Key Takeaways

The VW ID.Buzz road trip was marred by charging infrastructure failures and winter weather challenges. ❄️
EV range anxiety is amplified by cold weather and unreliable charging stations. 🔋
The ID.Buzz's innovative features, like heated seats, were overshadowed by its limited road trip capabilities. 🚗
Navigating with limited range in an EV requires flexibility and backup plans. 🛣️
Despite its challenges, the ID.Buzz proved cool and stylish but more suited for urban adventures. 🌆

Overview

The journey began with high hopes and excitement for the Volkswagen ID.Buzz, a modern electric twist on the iconic Mini-bus. However, what unfolded was a tale of charging infrastructure challenges and the harsh realities of winter road tripping in an EV. The team set out from Pittsburgh towards Chicago, eager to test the ID.Buzz's capabilities, but they soon faced numerous setbacks.

From frozen screens on charging stations to actual snowstorms, the ID.Buzz faced a baptism of icy conditions that drained its battery faster than anticipated. The chill and the lack of compatible charging stations added layers of complexity to the journey, pushing the crew’s patience and resourcefulness to the brink. In between navigating map glitches and trying new charging apps, hope and range fluctuated with each turn and stop.

Despite the setbacks, the journey underscored the ID.Buzz's stylish design and innovative features, though these were not enough to offset the infrastructural and environmental challenges faced. Ultimately, the trip highlighted the necessity of robust charging networks and the limitations of EV road tripping in severe climates, making it clear that ID.Buzz is best suited for city driving until the infrastructure catches up.

Chapters

00:00 - 02:00: Introduction and First Impressions The chapter titled 'Introduction and First Impressions' begins with a musical and applause-filled introduction. The narrator expresses frustration over an unavailable charger and doubts the possibility of achieving an 80-mile distance. This sets a tone of skepticism and potential challenges ahead.
02:00 - 09:00: Trouble with Charging Stations The chapter titled 'Trouble with Charging Stations' discusses the speaker's frustrating experience with using a shell app for electric vehicle charging. The speaker expresses disappointment and anxiety, describing the situation as a 'train wreck' and comparing it unfavorably to driving through isolated regions with high bear populations in Canada, indicating that the technological difficulties were more stressful than navigating remote areas.
09:00 - 15:00: Experimenting with Features and Comfort The chapter explores the practicality of taking a road trip in the new Volkswagen ID Buzz, particularly under challenging conditions. It begins with the team questioning whether the ID Buzz can handle a road trip amidst less than ideal weather conditions. The setting is marked by cold weather and a snowstorm from the previous night, setting the stage for testing the vehicle under extreme conditions. This scenario serves as a backdrop to evaluate the comfort features and performance of the ID Buzz in adverse weather.
15:00 - 19:00: First Charging Station Failure In the chapter "First Charging Station Failure," the narrator experiences a setback while traveling with an ID Buzz electric vehicle. They had planned to charge the vehicle overnight at a hotel that advertised having EV chargers, but upon arrival, they discovered the chargers were only compatible with Tesla vehicles. As a result, their plan to start with a full battery in the morning is foiled, leaving them with only 18% battery remaining.
19:00 - 23:00: Unreliable Charging Infrastructure The chapter discusses the challenges and concerns related to taking an electric road trip from Pittsburgh to Chicago, covering 500 miles in very cold weather. It focuses on how the new electric ID Buzz, a modern version of the classic Volkswagen Mini bus from the 1950s, performs under these conditions. The chapter raises questions about the reliability of electric vehicles for long-distance travel in harsh weather, highlighting potential issues with the charging infrastructure.
23:00 - 30:00: Finding a Working Charger and Continuing the Journey In this chapter, the focus is on the challenges of finding a working charger for an electric vehicle in cold weather, which affects battery charging speed. The narrator provides background on their journey, explaining that they traded their Cyber truck for a new vehicle at Garnet Auto in Reading, Pennsylvania. They make a note of the dealership's excellent service and mention that the location still has a couple of Cyber trucks available at MSRP.
30:00 - 40:00: Road Trip Realizations The chapter introduces the Volkswagen ID Buzz, highlighting its features that enhance comfort during road trips. It starts by noting the vehicle's heated seats and steering wheel, which offer three levels of heating for personalized comfort. Additionally, the second-row seats are heated, ensuring passengers remain warm as well. The speaker mentions a downside to these features without specifying what it is, but the focus remains on the warmth and comfort provided during travel.
40:00 - 52:00: Realization of Limited Range The chapter titled 'Realization of Limited Range' discusses the limitations and features of a new vehicle. The author highlights the vehicle's official range of 230 miles, which may realistically be closer to 150 miles during actual usage. Additionally, the vehicle has a sunroof feature that can switch from clear to opaque. The decision to buy this vehicle over a Cybertruck, noted for its many appealing features, is also mentioned.
52:00 - 57:00: Successful Charging Experiences The chapter focuses on the innovative technologies of a vehicle, highlighting features such as air suspension, steer by wire, and four-wheel steering. The design and quality of materials used in the vehicle, specified as a Volkswagen model, are emphasized, implying a luxurious feel despite challenges like maintaining a white/copper interior with children.
57:00 - 63:00: Final Thoughts and Conclusion The chapter discusses the design and features of a Volkswagen vehicle, highlighting its stylish appearance and premium features such as floor mats. However, it notes a criticism of the vehicle's slider and haptic controls, which are not favored by the reviewer. The discussion includes a reflection on how the Volkswagen ID Buzz is a modern reimagining of the classic Volkswagen model, blending traditional and contemporary elements.

The FIRST Road Trip In the VW ID.Buzz Was...A TOTAL Train Wreck, And Here's Why! Transcription

00:00 - 00:30 [Music] [Applause] [Music] charger unavailable you're kidding me I don't think we can get even 80 miles to the
00:30 - 01:00 next yay open the shell app follow instructions in the shell app you're joking me this has been pretty much a train wreck I mean I have no other way to describe this I had less anxiety going through the middle of the Yukon Territory and British Columbia with barely a person in sight lots of bears though then I did driving this through the Pennsylvania and Ohio
01:00 - 01:30 Turnpike today we're going to answer a simple question can you Road Trip the new Volkswagen ID buzz and there's already a problem first and foremost this is the worst kind of weather for an Eevee road trip it's cold and last night we hit a snowstorm it doesn't get much worse than that which is great because we want to put it into extreme
01:30 - 02:00 conditions to see just how far it'll go on a charge when the weather is bad but here's the problem so last night we picked this hotel because online it said it had EV Chargers which it does but yeah yeah they're Tesla superchargers so our cutting plan to let the ID Buzz charge overnight and have a full battery starting this morning has fallen apart which means now we have about 18% battery left in our brand new ID buzz and we
02:00 - 02:30 have a road trip from here just outside of Pittsburgh to Chicago which is going to cover 500 miles in some of the most brutal cold conditions so can you Road Trip the new electric ID Buzz I mean I think that's a question a lot of people are going to ask because this is basically a Reincarnation of the classic Volkswagen Mini buus from the 50s and
02:30 - 03:00 60s and it's electric and it's cold and we got to go charge it so let's see how fast the battery charges when it's cold all right let me catch you up if you haven't been watching our new Buzz stop series we just traded our cyber truck in on this uh at Garnet Auto in Reading Pennsylvania and those guys were incredible so if you want the Cyber truck or if you want a 0 Buzz they still have a couple left uh at Ms RP uh give
03:00 - 03:30 them a ring um really nice guys there so the great thing about the ID Buzz is that it not only has heated seats Cole can I turn yours on uh and get this heated steering wheel I probably have to turn it on first there we go heated steering wheel and it's got three levels of heating on the steering wheel look at that one two three it also has heated seats in the second row so your passengers will not get cold now of course the bad thing
03:30 - 04:00 about this is it's expensive $72,000 and and it's only got a range officially of about 230 Mi which I'm thinking today is going to be more like 150 Mi but we'll figure that out along the Route this is also cool check this out so slide this back you have a clear sunroof slide it forward it turns opaque when we first uh decided buying this I thought to myself you know we're trading a cyber truck which has a lot lot of cool
04:00 - 04:30 technology air suspension the first vehicle to have steer by wire four-wheel steering for what is in fact a mini uh but when I got behind the wheel and I saw kind of all the Innovation and all the design uh that voltzwagon put into this I was sincerely impressed I mean look at the quality of the materials everything in here feels expensive now I know if you've got kiddos uh this white/ copper interior is probably not ideal
04:30 - 05:00 uh but for our purposes it's actually not bad I mean it's super stylish uh and Volkswagen unfortunately has kept the slider control and these haptic controls on the steering wheel uh which you know I'm not in love with uh but uh the rest of it um is really nice I mean look at these floor mats I these are that that is a premium floor matat and of course what the ID Buzz is you know is kind of a reinvention of the old Volkswagen
05:00 - 05:30 micrus which is a good thing oh I also have a memory seats so let me hit number one here return that oh yeah look at that um and it's a big vehicle I mean let's face it guys minivans are not cool uh they have never been cool super practical but you know stylish sexy these are none of the words you would associate with with a Toyota Sienna or
05:30 - 06:00 Honda Odyssey or Chrysler Pacifica but these are words I would associate with this ID Buzz now of course the question is does it road trip and over the course of the next 500 Miles we'll find out so let's set it over to the uh EA charger and see how long it's going to take to charge this 16% battery with 31 miles left let me turn the on how do you turn
06:00 - 06:30 the route on there we go thank you Cole appreciate that let's see how long it takes the next stop is on a limited access road now turn right the cool thing now turn right onto Common Drive the cool thing is right there you can the rout contains time restricted roads the rout has multiple necessary charging STS one or more nonpr Chargers are being used to the rout that's a lot of
06:30 - 07:00 that's a lot of small print the cool thing is it tells you uh when you make a turn it also signals it with this light that flashes across the front I think you just saw it happen and it does something that's very tesl likee and that is you plan the route uh and it tells you where you need to stop and for how long you need to stop turn right on there goes our little that's really cool Whoever thought of that deserves a big old cookie all right let's head to the ea uh and let's see if it actually uh does do
07:00 - 07:30 plugin charge which Volkswagen didn't do for a long time which is ironic cuz Volkswagen started Electrify America but if all goes well all we should be able to do is pull up to the charger plug it in the car should recognize the charger the charger should recognize the car and figure out that we have 500 hours 1000t kilowatt hours of free charging access oh bad got to turn there no not there a little bit farther the car should
07:30 - 08:00 recognize that I have uh 500 KW hours of free charging and it should be seamless fingers crossed oh God we got two dark screens and two Chargers that say they're unavailable unavailable and we've got 15% battery charger unavailable so our first snag already we've got 15% battery and
08:00 - 08:30 two Chargers are blank and two Chargers say they're unavailable and we've got 15% battery which you probably get us like 50 Mi maybe maybe maybe 30 Mi Cole why do I have the sinking feeling in my stomach I guess the good news is that we are by Pittsburgh so maybe there might be some more fast Chargers somewhere near here I mean this is a pretty urban area but
08:30 - 09:00 let's see if this works oh God how does EA not get there get four Chargers working all right plugged it in and NADA wow wow yeah all four I think are down
09:00 - 09:30 welcome to L of America my name is Ian how I today hey Ian I am here uh in Cranberry Pennsylvania at the sheets and there are four Chargers two say they're unavailable and two have a black screen and I'm down to 15% is there uh there something you can do to bring these Chargers back up okay well in the system I can see that these Chargers um they have been escalated so this is why they appear like that on the on on the S it seems like they were going through some issues so the team escalated them so
09:30 - 10:00 someone will need to be on the side to do some some work in there so basically it's something that we cannot fix uh remotely it's more related to work that needs to be done on the site okay thanks I appreciate the information have a good day so sorry thank you so much take care wow so Electrify America knows that the stations have been escalated they don't work and yet the vehicle still told me to come here in charge this is about as blatant of an example as you can get gas ation right there 2 minutes four
10:00 - 10:30 Chargers so for for myself uh and no matter you know how much I really enjoy this car um this is um you know this is um this is just crap guys just just crap low range please charge your vehicle immediately no sheets huh no sheets we need to charge it immediately so we found um unplug share which is this app that uh lets you look for Chargers an EO
10:30 - 11:00 with four stations uh that are fast Chargers not 50 KW hours but 150 uh and it says that three out of the four available it's 11 Mi away according to this we have 28 Mi of range or 14% battery so we should be able to make it but I'm turning off the heated seats I'm also turning off the uh how do we turn off where's it off we're going to be cold Co I'm turning off the heat and it's uh
11:00 - 11:30 23 de out there so luckily we brought our winter jackets but uh I don't trust this 31 miles at 14% battery when we left the hotel which is less than a mile from here we were at 18% battery and we're already at 14 so yeah yeah yeah and I'm sure that's in the right direction right it's toward Chicago who knows where at this point we we have no
11:30 - 12:00 choice it doesn't matter um so at this point guys uh the answer is no you cannot road trip a Volkswagen ID just yeah yeah doesn't um doesn't work really well and it's not because of the car because a car is great it's really all about um the crappy non- Tesla infrastructure uh and after
12:00 - 12:30 God how many years is it 10 years Electrify America was started by Volkswagen go figure because of the dieselgate settlement and 10 years later on they still have not been able to get there you know what together uh to make uh road tripping a non- Tesla a viable option uh because this uh is just unacceptable I mean you know I'm here doing a video review so all of a sudden things got very interesting but I can
12:30 - 13:00 just imagine if I were with my family and I had young kids um this would just you know suck especially if I had to make it to Grandma's house for Thanksgiving or Christmas um and the answer I got from the people at the uh other end uh was not acceptable because it it can't be like hey sorry for the inconvenience you're stranded on the side of the road when it's 20° and all you can do is hopefully go beg for electricity from a
13:00 - 13:30 slow charger which is going to take 48 hours to charge this thing up is not something that is acceptable or something that is safe or something that you know I would expect and the cherry on the cake is that Volkswagen's own Electrify America led us to the station where all four Chargers are down go figure [Music]
13:30 - 14:00 so I've calmed down a little bit I was not happy um I think we found a solution uh we're almost down to 10% of the battery with 24 miles of range left um I really don't want to have to
14:00 - 14:30 figure out just how far this vehicle will go when you get to zero because usually even though I think this has about a 91 Kow battery about 86 of that is usable but usually the electric vehicles do let you go beyond empty basically uh but let's not discover that under these uh arctic cold conditions uh and uh hopefully this will just be uh you know a little a little bit of a of a
14:30 - 15:00 detour and we can find um a fast charger oh he's not going to help us uh uh and uh we'll get back on on the road again [Music] all right the good news is um it's
15:00 - 15:30 starting to snow but we have all-wheel drive and there are a lot of wers out there so thank you wers always appreciate the uh heads up where our fine friends at the uh law establishment are hanging out you see him Cole oh Cole saw him okay good oh look at that those look very good oh yes yes yes I hope these are uh fast Chargers hm we can charge up to about I think 200 in
15:30 - 16:00 this vehicle and they're all empty so let's see what we got here we got a bunch of them that's Chad that's not going to help let's let's try this guy oh it's a little cold
16:00 - 16:30 okay keep your fingers cross Cole drink the in all right how does this work probably do the credit card first touch to start touch to start plugin connector okay we can do that plug in connector Let There we go payment has been authorized and come on connecting to your vehicle oh I like this I like this
16:30 - 17:00 indeed come on checking the cable I heard a click this is up to 350 Kow yeah that's good come on oh this is very tense and very cold checking cable safety another click matching voltage oh we're getting close go
17:00 - 17:30 hell yeah I've never been so excited to charge you my whole life oh yeah let's see how fast we're going to go where's our power 45 51 kilow rock rock rock up you go state of charge 10% oh coal let's go inside turn the heat on and warm and look there is uh there's a Trader
17:30 - 18:00 Joe's here dang dude we got a Trader Joe's got some stuff you love at Trader Joe's you can get some road food huh look at this luxury can buy furniture and and Korean barbecue Cole how about that Korean barbecue and Ethan Allen furniture let's go warm up we're charging at 8 85 Kow as a battery warms up maybe that'll slow down and it's going to take us exactly an
18:00 - 18:30 hour to go to 100% at the current state of charge but that last 20% right there uh that's what takes the longest uh so we we'll probably go up to like somewhere on 85% Just to be in the safe side but I figure from here to 80% it probably should take about a half hour um at 85 Kow might take longer but there's a Fairfield in and a movie theater Cole so
18:30 - 19:00 we can go catch a movie I heard the new Gladiator flick is pretty good Ro tripping watch a [Music] movie so we specified only to use E8 stations just because they're always fast Chargers versus is like 50 Kow or
19:00 - 19:30 60 Kow charges which are pretty useless on a road trip so let's see what it's given us here so it's telling us that we should hit this Electrify America uh at Sheets and then it's sending us to a Hyundai dealership which is not an EA then it's sending us to a well that's a 62 Kow at a Hyundai dealership which is stupid and even though we told it we wanted to use only fast EA Chargers it's still sending us to a 62 KW charger then
19:30 - 20:00 sending us to this connect Friendship Kitchen charger uh and then sending us to a Ford dealership uh before we get to our destination I mean come on really we specified only so really the only thing that's going to work is this EA station and then the rest of these are I'm not saying they're useless but uh you know I don't know if I want to pull into a Hyundai and a Ford dealership with the Volkswagen yeah the verdict right now is car ban mini buus micrus whatever you
20:00 - 20:30 want to call it way cool love it um EA and Rob planning um still at least compared to Tesla in the Dark Ages and so maybe the recommendation would be that uh Volkswagen you just uh give up on the EA stations uh and you know get a North American charging standard adapter uh like Ford has done and um make good
20:30 - 21:00 buddies with our man Mr mus for a Tesla and get your uh customers on the Tesla Supercharger Network ASAP because um this is no buo hey guys do you value honest reviews like this where we show you not just the good but the Bad and the Ugly in other words we're not influencers we're actually telling you what's happening and how it's happening well that's all made possible by our
21:00 - 21:30 friends and our sponsors like Scott ulvin from ride or Justice he's a personal law injury attorney he's a friend of mine and if you guys have been hurt and you need some help I can't think of a better person uh just click on the link below and not only will you have somebody who'll be in your corner but you get videos like this where we don't hide the ugly or the good or the bad all right we've been here about 45 minutes and the rate has dropped to 70 kilowatts we we're up to about 111 but
21:30 - 22:00 after 80 everything drops off there's a guy over there in a Silverado EV waiting to charge so I don't want to take up the space beyond 80% and if you guys are doing this road tripping it's not worth you know sticking around above 80% because it just drops and you'll spend as much time for the last 20% as you did for the previous 80% so we're not going to go with whatever EA is uh telling us through the Volkswagen app because I don't trust it now uh so we're going to use a plug share and um we're going to
22:00 - 22:30 kind of go solo and figure out our own station so the next station is only 43 Mi away it's a shell uh but the next one above that is 136 mil and even though it says we've got a range of 159 I don't trust this number uh right now just because it's super cold and um this car is super big and the range is not great so we'll top off at the Shell which is by the highway for 43 mi from there and then we'll go to the EA which is at that
22:30 - 23:00 point like 80 Mi away so um a lot of charging all right let's get out of here so $45 which is probably about as much as we would pay if we were at a gas station yeah okay well that a process there we go almost 70 KW hours dispensed duration 40 minutes um and we got up to 83% the car says we've at 163 Mi of range uh which
23:00 - 23:30 is not Grand by today's standards it would have been grand a few years ago uh but not today and we're getting about two miles two is it 2 m per Kow hour yeah 2 m per kilowatt hour uh put that into perspective when we had the Hummer EV that was getting about 1.2 m per Kow hour whereas the Tesla on a road trip was getting I think we were getting like uh 3. 6 m per Kow hour when we were
23:30 - 24:00 doing Disney to Disney if I remember right don't hold me to that coal um so yeah not horrible but not wonderful either yeah I mean this is the ultimate test of this vehicle cuz we are now driving at U the speed limit 70 mph into a massive headwind I'd show you look you can hear it for yourself Cole
24:00 - 24:30 AR you yeah the uh Buzz is being whipped around like a toy of sailboat on the ocean with all this wind so not only is it cold but we're going directly into a headwind and um now the problem is I can't trust the um navigation
24:30 - 25:00 system so I kind of feel like we need to stop a lot more off at to charge and right now what we can do is we can charge in the next 20 M or so and kind of top it up at a Shell station or we can go For Broke and try to get to the um e which is like 90 Mi away and the buzz says it's got 117 Mi with 60 M range but I don't know if this thing battery management system has you know programmed itself so it gives me real
25:00 - 25:30 numbers here as opposed to guesses cuz when this thing was full at the dealership it said I had 258 miles and wo that was way [Music] off so um Co and I have decided that uh I mean with this incredible head wi and this cold we may have realistically 150 m a range on a full charge cuz right now
25:30 - 26:00 um this is reading 54% 103 Mi but this number is dropping faster than that number so I don't think we can get even 80 mil to the next EA I mean I guess we could find out and then be stranded or not but we're going to just go top off at the Shell station uh so that we can make it to the EA just to be on the safe side um which is not ideal cuz it's once again less time driving more time
26:00 - 26:30 charging uh but um we did want to crucial test of this vehicle's uh road tripping ability and we're getting it out to charge use the shell app oh for sake open the shell app follow instructions in the shell app shell could you make this any more less convenient I mean I think it's on purpose now right the shell just stuck this here so that people are dissuaded from actually going and using electric
26:30 - 27:00 Chargers all right let's get the freaking shell app well that only took about 15 minutes first um my great videographer Cole had to load the app while I went to the bathroom uh then we tried the first station that wasn't working then we tried the second station that wasn't working and now finally at the third station uh and it is working and we're up to uh 73 71 KW of char charging
27:00 - 27:30 uh this has been pretty much a train wreck we're charging here at 67 71 KW on a station that apparently is capable of 180 uh and when we turned off the highway we had like 54 I made a wrong turn we had to come back here so that wrong turn cost us like four percentage points and it's taken us a half hour to regain that because of all the silliness of the app and the charger is not
27:30 - 28:00 working and um I hope it just gets better uh cuz right now I'm it's hard to say just how discouraged I am a charging stop is no longer necessary on your route hey it just says a charging stop is no longer necessary on our route to get to the EA station so I think we're good to go let's see how fast we're charging um charging I got to let's see we're down to
28:00 - 28:30 72 um and if we go to navigation which is right there except route it says we can make it to the EA station which is 95 miles away and according to this we've got 156 miles of range so I don't know what magic the car is doing but for a long time it felt like we needed a charging stop to get to the EA which is 95 mil away even though we're at 83% so uh I think we sat here long
28:30 - 29:00 enough Cole huh Let's uh let's hit the [Music] road so we managed to make it uh almost 100 miles this time to the ea uh we figure in this weather with this wind we probably got about 120 M range at 80% charge maybe if you had 100% you can go 150 so the way this should work with plug and charge is I should just be able
29:00 - 29:30 to plug this into the car and it should recognize it connecting to the vehicle and then it should realize that we have free charging and it should just start charging that would be authorized that that's good we actually may have a good charging experience ah here we go so looks like we're actually having I wouldn't say painless charging experience I'm freezing my you know what off uh but much better than the previous
29:30 - 30:00 ones we've had so we're up to about 140 KW 136 I'll take that now we're 140 and but I didn't even realize that the last uh charging stop was that we're shattering um these guys from Hyundai that's a manufacturer vehicle I was so bummed out that's the new ionic 9 that just was unveiled at the o auto show I was actually there for the unveiling of it uh and we're doing the exact same thing they are because well because these are the fastest Chargers around so not as bummed anymore I mean we are you
30:00 - 30:30 know pushing this to the extreme both in terms of weather and range uh but um hopefully we'll get to Chicago tonight I mean originally we were supposed to get there about 6:00 tonight I think we'll be lucky to make it there by 10: 65 kilowatt hours delivered um yeah it's great uh and we actually managed to have lunch while we were charging and stay warm so you know this road trip has gotten better and there's better news
30:30 - 31:00 yet let me show you when we get inside you know I grew up in Chicago and I just forgot how cold this humid air can get almost forgot about windshield but that was a Brisk reminder of it but let me show you the good news so there look at that because we filled up all the way we only have to stop at two more EAS uh to get to our Target which is the Chicago o airport where we fly the heck out of here so how cool is that let's uh let's
31:00 - 31:30 hit the road my man this is good I'm enjoying well I'm not enjoying life I'm not I'm not I'm not as miserable I guess I'm not not enjoying life let's put it that way all right now turn left all right is this my ideal idea of a road trip no by far it's not my idea of an ideal road trip but you know sometimes uh as
31:30 - 32:00 the Rolling Stones like to say now take the second left if you try real hard you just might get what you need not what you [Music] want last time my videographer and myself did a road trip was from Anchorage Alaska down the Alaska
32:00 - 32:30 Highway all the way to Boulder and that was 3,100 Miles and I got to say at the beginning of this road trip I felt like I had less anxiety less range anxiety going through the middle of the Yukon Territory and British Columbia with barely a person in sight lots of bears though then I did driving this through the Pennsylvania and Ohio
32:30 - 33:00 Turnpike but now that we've had a good charging experience I kind of feel like even with this bad weather my level of fear of getting stuck by the side of the road has greatly diminished especially since we were able to get a full charge and especially since now the car says on a full charge well 90 8% or 96% I've got 174 miles of range so that kind of gives
33:00 - 33:30 you a realistic number of what you can accomplish you know when you're in a snowstorm when it's 23° when you're driving into a headwind so subtract about 10% off of that so figure 1560 M range down from 2 30 some mil of range that BW States and in the summer of course your mileage
33:30 - 34:00 will vary in other words it'll get better anyway hit the road let's uh get to Chicago yes Chicago [Applause] [Music]
34:00 - 34:30 hey guys so I think we're going to uh call it here on our road trip as the sun is going down because it's going to get dark now we've just had uh basically three seamless charging stops uh at EA along the turnpike here I don't know I just opened up for no reason wonder if I can close it here you close it
34:30 - 35:00 yeah that was weird anyway new car um and uh I've done some math that I want to share with you and then I'll give you a conclusion so we left at 9:00 and we're going to get into Chicago at about 9:00 so that's 12 hours of driving so it's taken us about five 12 hours to go 500 Miles which means we're averaging about what 40 some miles per hour now last week I drove uh 700 mi from give or take Phoenix up to
35:00 - 35:30 Moab in about um well just over 10 hours don't do the math lot less people uh in a gas car it was the uh Defender that we have and it was a much more pleasant and warmer road trip so the conclusion you know is that on a cold day into the wind with a snowstorm this is not a road triable car I mean I think this will be great for
35:30 - 36:00 zipping around town if you got a home charger picking up the kids taking Grandma to church you're going to have a wonderful experience but on a cold day road tripping it it's just not doable at least not with the battery size I was talking to my man Cole behind the camera and we figure that you need at least 120 KW hour battery instead of a 90 KW hour battery to make this a you know a modern Road triable car the good news is look it's holding right now 57 KW um which is actually pretty fast uh so it does
36:00 - 36:30 charge quickly but it just doesn't have enough range I mean we're struggling to get if if we if if we weren't afraid to go all the way to the bottom we might get 130 Mi a range out of this thing under these conditions and you know that's well that's better than our mini SE uh that's better than the smart EV we had that's better than the spark we had but for God's sakes I mean look look at this it's a freaking minivan bus micro
36:30 - 37:00 bus if there is such a thing as a road trip vehicle this is it so Volkswagen once again you are building cars for Europe and not for America look look at our highways Volkswagen look look look at all the trucks this is just non-stop flat I mean we covered basically a 15% of the country and we've had to do that stopping at least what seven or eight times coal I mean come on that's crazy so to be continued because I do want to
37:00 - 37:30 try to road trip this in a warmer climate and my goal when we bought it was always to do like a dream road trip up the PCH Highway from let's call it mesino all the way down to San Diego and even after this experience I think in the warm California Sun driving along the ocean I mean this would be fabulous this Cabana blue car but here in the Midwest on a cold
37:30 - 38:00 day it's not Grand anyway thank you guys for watching and thank you Steve and all the guys over at uh gardet Volkswagen and reading you guys with nothing but great thank you Scott uh for sponsoring the series and uh the good news is colado and driving Chicago and fing back and then Grant from my office is driving it the rest of the way to Colorado so great you're going to have an adventure my man get your phone out and start figuring
38:00 - 38:30 out how to use uh Electrify America charge Point better R planner what else have we use Cole e EV go yeah you going to need all that we'll see you guys next time ciao [Music] oh
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