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200 Miles in a DIY EV collecting batteries.

This is the video from the day, in short I didn't end up on a recovery truck, by the skin of my teeth.



I'd planned to stop more frequently that probably necessary, but things didn't get off to a great start, the first charge stop I was getting errors about current miss-match, which I'm not sure we should even car about, so I disabled it and charged away. Maybe the unit was reporting a current slightly different to what it was actually delivering, I didn't check in too much detail. I'll probably keep it disabled, then I can use the heater while charging. The software checks that the current reported by the station is going in to the battery, makes sense right? But not all of it will, some will be used by the DC DC to keep the 12v battery charged and the heater (if in use).


Anyway, I got on my way to the next planned stop. This was a single BP Pulse unit just off the M1 at a pub, a Beefeater I think, anyway just as a pulled up someone was just plugging in an E-tron and then headed inside. So that unit was going to be occupied for quite a while. Onwards to the next charger.

The next charger was Leicester, a 2 unit Instavolt install, 1 unit had a Leaf in-front of it, not plugged in (more on that in a minute), the other unoccupied. I pulled in to the free unit and when I got out an AA man appeared to tell me I might get a fine for blocking the charger, but I explain it's a conversion and want to charge. After giving him a look under the bonnet as he was curious, I plug in expecting the charge to begin. It did not.

The AA man then explained he was there for the Leaf that was empty and wouldn't charge. It was also a rental and the renter had vanished. Now I was at 19%, no other rapid chargers locally. I still needed to get the battery I was collecting, but with no where to charge and already late to meet the seller, I had to get them to come meet me in Leicester instead of Hinkley.

With the new battery onboard, but unusable to me, I decided to limp to a family members in north Leicester, arriving with under 3v per cell, lower than I'm comfortable with. The battery was now below my minimum voltage and so wouldn't start charging until I changed to some settings. I enjoyed a 3 or 4 hours visiting my auntie with slurping up on 10a AC charger, enough to get me to Loughbrough to rapid charge and go home.

So I set off, around 4 I think to head to the nearest rapid, a BP Pulse. When I got there it was in a train station car park and was in use, so I decided to head onwards to the next rapid, which was a single Instavolt in Loughborough McDonald's car park. Again it was in use, but with not enough range to plod on, I waited maybe 10 minutes and then it became free. Charged up without issue.



Onwards I went to my final charge before home, it was back at the same site I charged at earlier in the day. It was now dark, I was fed up and wanted to be home. The unit that I charged on that morning was in use, so I went on the left hand one, well I tried, it kept failing to start. Luckily the user of the other left quickly and I jumped on that one and began charging right away. I checked ZapMap and someone else had an issue with the same unit.


I eventually arrived home, I guess it was a success on one hand, I'd collected the extra battery, not ended up on recovery and visited family, but on the other, the charging infrastructure needs to get better and quickly.

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