CKenergy EV Project

The Best Part of the Trip!! Our first stop after Farmington, NM was in Moab, UT.  My goodness what a beautiful area of the state.  I had never heard of Moab but it is a jewel nestled among the beautiful red rock formations and cliff faces I have ever seen.  And the town was great too.  First things first, we easily found the charging station at the Moab Chevrolet and yes, it was working and available to the public...for free!  Our next stop was Orem, UT, but we spotted this exceptionally beautiful plot of ground and decided to investigate.  See to the left.   If you'll zoom in on the photo you'll see what I mean about the beauty.  Hey wait...isn't this a golf course?  Well shucks, we better play while we're here.  So we grabbed a room in the local Best Western, where there were a load of Tesla chargers, and stayed the night. Okay, we headed out Monday morning with only 4 hrs to go.  The next stop on the list was Orem, UT at...

 Albuquerque, NM turned out to be our first successful search and find mission in regards to a charging station.  As advertised by the PlugShare App, the Greenlots Rapid Charger was in the Montgomery Plaza Shopping multiplex.  So it takes about an hour to charge to 80% capacity.  Not really a big deal since there are stores to go to.  But the charger has a 30 minute limit.  How convenient.  Oh well, charge for 30 minutes, go around the parking lot once and come back for your second 30 minutes.  Can't fool us. The next stop and the final one for the day was Farmington, NM.  Time to shut down for some rest and once again, we find the advertised charging locations.  Hi-Country KIA has an Eaton Level 2 charger open to the public and the Town Suites Marriott where we stayed has four Level 2 Tesla chargers. So after striking out at our first two charging locations in Amarillo and Tucumcari, our luck changed for the better. Sta...

Tucumcari, NM After the hassles of Amarillo we looked forward to destination Tucumcari. We headed to our charging point which was listed on Plugshare as a Tesla Level 2 station.  All I would need is a J-1772 adapter and I can charge!  It was closed on Saturday and the charging points were blocked on one side by their corporate service trailer and on the other by a beautiful new Ford F-250.  I guess that was to prevent the unauthorized use of electricity by a stranded motorist who really needs some juice.  On we go...still cheating.

Destination - Amarillo Hot diggity, we’re on our way.  We arrived after 217 miles in Amarillo, TX to major road construction on I-40.  The exit we needed was closed.  We proceeded on to the next exit, turned around and headed back.  We arrived at our needed exit. It was closed for construction.  We proceeded to the next exit which was a detour and we followed those streets to the Autonation Collision Center.  But, it had recently moved two blocks to the west down a service road that only went east.  Upon traversing several nearby parking lots we finally made it to our destination.  The charger which was listed on PlugShare for this location was supposed to be a rapid charger with the connection appropriate for my Chevy Bolt.  It wasn’t.  It was some brand of level 2 that I hadn’t heard of before.  So there went my 1 hour plan to recharge and I was faced with 10 hours instead.  Except it wasn’t available to the public....

Charging up the batteries and getting ready to go!  Heading out to Salt Lake City for the annual NRECA Connect Conference.  This year includes a special event called the Drive to Connect.  Several teams from cooperatives around the country are driving their EVs to the conference to showcase the electric vehicle and its current capabilities as well as future capabilities.  CKenergy has a team and we're called the "Gas Kickers".  Easy folks, it only sounds familiar. My son, Jay, is traveling with me as my partner so conversation will not be lacking.  He is much like his momma and we will have plenty of conversation.  Okay, I admit, I'm a lot like his momma too, so the miles should tick away before we know it.  One of the drawbacks for cross country EVs is the lack of locations to charge, especially rapid charging.  After plotting my path, I realized I had all of 3 days travel ahead of me and that's assuming I found every charging station pr...

Well, it's been kind of a boring month, not from a driving standpoint, but from a lack of news standpoint.  The little Bolt is just humming along.  As of the end of March I've driven a tad over 13,000 miles without an oil & filter change.  They tell me that first oil should last about 100,000 miles.  I can hear someone out there right now saying, "hey Honey, call CKenergy and find out what kind of oil they're using.  We gotta have some of that!" In all seriousness, the fuel savings after only 5 months is a whopping $818.56! The jury is in and the fuel savings is excellent.  There are a few exposed weaknesses in EVs, but as a commuter and mid-range vehicle, it's fantastic.  The next step is to attempt a multi-state drive next month.  Stay tuned for more information.