
Tesla's First 6 Superchargers Open to Public Today - MikeCapone
http://www.treehugger.com/cars/first-6-tesla-superchargers-open-public-today.html
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ck2
I'm really looking forward to buying my first electric car secondhand in a
decade.

Should be lots of hobbyists rebuilding their own battery packs - pick up a
dead car with no range left and make it like new.

Many thanks to early adopters!

~~~
sliverstorm
_Should be lots of hobbyists rebuilding their own battery packs - pick up a
dead car with no range left and make it like new._

Except, aren't the battery packs a very significant portion of the value of
the car? I don't see how you will be able to replace them cheaply enough to
come out on top, unless you use inferior battery technology and settle for
two-digit range.

~~~
MartinCron
Two digit range in a dirt-cheap super-fast roadster? Yes, please.

~~~
sliverstorm
* very low two digit. If you use, for example, a bunch of lead-acid or something like that, you'll see much more than 2-3x reduction in capacity.

~~~
MartinCron
Even with a 6X reduction in capacity, that gives me a ~40 mile range (assuming
the Tesla Roadster's 241 mile range), which is enough to get from from the
house to the coffee shop to the office to the cafe and back home.

~~~
sliverstorm
At "only" 6x reduction in capacity, you're still looking at $10,000 of battery
if you get a Li-Ion battery. I'm not sure of the costs of a lead-acid, but
expect 2x the weight of an equivalent Li-Ion, up to 10x the volume, and much
less flexibility in shape.

Sure, if you only travel a handful of miles and you don't mind dropping $20k+
on a car with that kind of range, it works. But it isn't a panacea.

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ben1040
I love the design of the stations, and how it calls back to that '50s and '60s
gas station design that celebrated the promise of the future. Seems really
appropriate.

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rheide
Hm, waiting 30 minutes for half a charge. This doesn't scale at all. If
there's a queue of only one car you'll be there for an hour.

~~~
MikeCapone
Indeed, but I'm pretty sure that they're aware of the problem and will scale
these up so that queues are very rare.

Besides, most people probably won't need a 150 miles charge most of the time.
If you're going back home and need just an extra 30 miles to be safe, that
won't take long.

~~~
001sky
Have you seen the locations? These are for intra-state transit. Not for
getting home from work. The locations are really only for making long trips
feasible you would otherwise need to rent a "real-car" to take. Like SF to LA
or what not (or tahoe, or La to vegas). In that context, it both seems less
likely to find a backup at a station (because few tesla owners would not just
Fly, be realistic), but a bit more of a hassle (extra 1 hr on a 5 hr drive,
etc). You'd also expect to see "full" charges, because of the destinations.

TL;DR Its not the local/commuter crowd they are catering too.

_____________

Edit: Locations - Only the LA and Fremont are even somewhat near major metros.

SF/SValley to Tahoe = 1x (Fremont)

SF LA corridor = 3x+1 (harris ranch, tejon ranch, gilroy, LA)

LA to Vegas Corridor = 1x (barstow)

SF-Tahoe-via Fremont seems the most likely actual drive for the target
audience. Its only 1 of 6 locations.

~~~
jlgreco
I am not sure they should scale any worse than any turnpike rest-stop with
food, the average time any person parked there stays there would be about the
same (and chances are, people are going to want something to snack on while
they wait). _(On that note, I heard an idea in another HN thread about this
that certain small businesses may provide charge-ups for free to customers.
The power cost would be negligible (installation a bit more of an investment),
and currently it would attract a likely profitable demographic. This variation
of the idea should certainly scale.)_

The one problem I see is if you could actually get enough power to a place
like this the size of a parking lot.

~~~
MartinCron
_certain small businesses may provide charge-ups for free to customers_

I just spotted a free electric car charging spot at a drugstore in Seattle
(Wallgreen's on Market st. in Ballard). It made me feel like I was in the
future.

~~~
tomfakes
I saw a pizza delivery guy plugged into a Walgreens charging station near
Seattle last week! Don't know if he was in the process of delivering a pizza
at the time, but he had the doohickey on the roof.

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mbell
What a confusing name. Did they really need to reuse a term that is already
very well defined in the automotive world?

~~~
error54
I fully agree. From the title I had assumed that Tesla had added a new model
with a supercharger option.

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lelf
<http://www.teslamotors.com/supercharger>

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revelation
This is a terrible blogspam site citing yet another blogspam site. The new
information in here is "open today".

I would like to actually see pictures of these stations, or mind you, a video!
Not the old rendering.

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ujeezy
The images embedded in that article aren't zoomable right now. Until they are,
here are direct links to the fullsize images:

Current supercharger locations:
[http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/10/Tesla-
supe...](http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/10/Tesla-
superchargers-oct-19.png)

Supercharger mockup: [http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supe...](http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supercharger-003.png)

Long-term plan: [http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supe...](http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supercharger-010.png)

Supercharger close-ups:
[http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supe...](http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supercharger-006.png)

Charging dashboard: [http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supe...](http://media.treehugger.com/assets/images/2012/09/Tesla-
Supercharger-007.png)

~~~
andrewcooke
thanks. is the radius the full range or half the range? i mean - if you want
to drive to tahoe, can you get back again? i guess the idea is that you have a
charger at your cabin by the lake (or maybe they are villas, i am a little out
of my social class here) so you can charge up before you come home?

~~~
ujeezy
Looks like the radius is half the range. A Tesla Model S gets 300 miles per
charge, and the distance from Barstow, CA to Vegas is about 150 miles:
<http://bit.ly/PGUXSU>

~~~
andrewcooke
oh, thanks. that's very nice of them. i really didn't expect that level of
honesty.

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protomyth
I do wonder how many of these will be put up before a state imposes an
electric tax equivalent to the gas tax. That is going to be some fun math with
politicians.

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daimyoyo
30 minutes for a half charge, or less than 5 for a full tank(with 4X the
range)? The time is going to need to be cut drastically(though I'm not sure
how without violating the laws of physics) before this business model will be
able to gain any significant traction.

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sejje
Even their future expansion plans won't allow for cross-country trips.

~~~
brianbreslin
I'd bet a super small subset of their customers will ever take a 4 day drive.
They will fly, it would be cheaper.

~~~
refurb
Cheaper? Not sure about that. I've done a couple 3000+ mile drives and the
price was pretty comparable to a flight (in terms of fuel). If you have more
than one person in the car, it's cheaper than flying.

And these are electric cars we are talking about. I would imagine they would
beat the cost of flying every time.

~~~
ImprovedSilence
but you must not forget, time is money.

~~~
refurb
Of course. And don't forget you need a place to stay and food to eat on the
way as well. I was just referring to the cost of transportation.

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reustle
I know they are still a very expensive part of the car, but I look forward to
when you can pull up and simply swap out an empty battery for a full one
(easily automated).

~~~
turbahn
Better Place (<http://www.betterplace.com/>) does this with their electric
cars. They set up around ~10 "swapping stations" around Israel, and
additionally installed charging stations in most malls.

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sixothree
Does anyone have any real pictures of these stations?

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missing_cipher
Here's one: [http://green.autoblog.com/2012/09/24/tesla-supercharger-
netw...](http://green.autoblog.com/2012/09/24/tesla-supercharger-network-
offers-free-solar-energy-for-model-s/)

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ainsleyb
I'm super surprised that the plans for 2013 don't include a charging station
in the Bay Area, seeing as they're headquartered here.

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WatchDog
So telsa vehicles can drive on water now. Neat.

