Who’s bringing the horse - no - EV to France?

browne_rob5

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120802768#Comment_120802768

Cant you just use the Chargemap app on your phone or is your data not working?

I used the Chargepoint app on my phone and worked with no issues.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120802768#Comment_120802768

Any chargers with green dots in the VW app should be able to start through the app

You need to select the charger and then the individual plug and move the slider to start

Not sure how reliable it is, I think I've done it twice for Ionity and it worked once

EDIT: Apparently there's no location locking. I managed to start a charging session in France from Ireland 😂

Heroditas

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120803075#Comment_120803075

Did you just use RFiD with your phone via the app to start charging or how did you do it?

fits

Thanks for the help! Got to campsite with 27% battery on it so no major panic We will figure something out tomorrow. ( no charging on site)

browne_rob5

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120805229#Comment_120805229

I selected the charger on the app and initiated the charge there but you could use your phone as you described also.

McGiver

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120805341#Comment_120805341

So the app itself is sufficient, right?

browne_rob5

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120805385#Comment_120805385

Yes just find the charger on the app and select start charge.

Heroditas

Brilliant. Really handy to know.

Funnily enough, there's a Super U around the corner from the campsite but the chargers don't seem to appear on any charging app. I have a funny feeling they're exclusive to Super U clubcard holders. Despite that, it's comforting to see that assholes live everywhere and two of the 4 spots were taken earlier by petrol drivers

Heroditas

Well, got back from France this morning. Absolute dream to drive in Brittany/Normandy with an EV.

I recharged once using a public charger on Carnac plage. Carnac isn't brilliant for public charging - there's only about 4 public chargers there but the Chargemap app never let me down so I toddled down one morning to charge the car and left it there for the day.

On the way back, we left Carnac with 100% and got to the Total Energy service stop near Mont St Michel with about 43 or 44% charge. Plugged the car into a 175kW charger for 25mins and got it up to 85% while we went to the loo and have our breakfast. Hit the road again and got to Cherbourg with 39% charge. We live in Dublin anyway so got home with loads to spare in the battery.

Absolutely no hesitation recommending an EV if people are travelling to France. The network is constantly getting better and the rapid chargers in Total Energy and the Novotels is a real game changer.

We're already planning to stick the bike rack on the tow hook next year and bring the bikes, we now have that much confidence in how the car performs with a heavy load/roof box etc and how to plan the stops to recharge.

10-10-20

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120868707#Comment_120868707

Super, great to hear!

godtabh

Just back from France. Rent a car. A lot of the motorway services had 150kw chargers. One had about 20 but the average was 10.

would seriously think about brining the EV next year but the camp site we stayed in had a strictly no EV charging policy. Didn’t see any official chargers and granny charging got you kicked out.

Drumpot

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120868707#Comment_120868707

Was just about the type pretty much the same thing. The speeds charging sometimes were ridiculously fast! I’ve a car that does max 440 and even with a full car I’d say I got circa 350km going over (when I took my time).

I was really worried bringing the EV to France but wouldn’t hesitate doing it again. Whether using Chargemap , IONITY or even signing up for the French one beside my campsite , it was so easy.

As others said, don’t worry about the mileage or percentage , there’s usually a charger near enough by. I used Chargemap and as you said, it was faultless.

Oddly enough, I found charging less stressful than getting petrol. You literally don’t have to deal with anybody, always a plus for me…

fits

We are just back too. Our experience wasn’t quite as seamless as our chargemap card did not arrive on time but we did manage. Chargepoints are indeed plentiful.

Ionity in the busy aires on Saturdays were very busy. I’d think twice about relying on them in a Saturday during holiday season.

prosaic

Report on trip through France in August: Roscoff - La Rochelle - near Montpellier - Le Mans - Cherbourg, about 2000km (2 Mm, never used Mm, mega metre, unit before!).

We had 3 cards: chargemyhyundai, chargemap and Izivia. 

Izivia was fairly useless. Their model of charging by time is way too confusing, and it looked expensive. In the end, we never used it!

We did nearly all our charges on chargemap and a few on chargemyhyundai. Coverage for chargemap was very good and rates were reasonable. There were some very sparse areas going from Pons through Bergerac and Albi to Millau that were fairly low on chargers. We were on vodafone and at times in more remote areas, we lost coverage and couldn't easily figure out where to charge next. Some planning ahead helped but we could have done more.

In general, coverage of chargers was pretty good but sometimes they were only 20 kW in places.

A75 also had some areas with not too many chargers over 50kW. Again, some forward planning would help. We got from Lodeve to Le Mans, 675 km with 3 charge stops.

It was nearly essential to have a navigator in the passenger seat to look ahead for charging options. If you planned ahead a bit more or stopped to do searches, you could manage solo.

Popular areas were well served. Some motorway service areas had banks of high speed chargers, e.g. 8 x 250kW.

Some chargers did not provide the stated power. Most high power chargers gave the advertised power as a minimum but could deliver much more if not sharing with another car. Eg stated as 60kW but delivered near 120kW.

We were able to use chargemap for some Tesla locations (only some were open to non tesla). Slightly trickie to setup for Tesla. Needed to start by making a Tesla account BUT the account needed to have country set to Fr. The app install is different if your account is in France: you get another payment option and can choose chargemap card. 

One late night stop at Tesla in Tours, the chargers wouldn't work. Not sure was it phone connectivity or charger connectivity was at issue. Also, that station was way down the back of a large supermarket parking lot and it felt risky at 11:00pm on Sunday night. If I was alone I would have considered leaving right away. Charger at nearby Ibis hotel much more pleasant and the bar was open.

A curious thing, in some towns/cities in France, since the energy crisis, they now turn off much of the street lighting after 10pm. Tours was very dark when driving through. you wouldn't know you were in a town. Driving at night was harder with only oncoming traffic lights and few cars ahead that you could follow (late Sunday night). If there was a dear, I don't know if I'd see it.

Most of the experience was very easy but there were a few occasions where it was a little stressful (low phone connectivity issues).

10-10-20

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121074560#Comment_121074560

Good job - seems like you got most of France in! So chargemap seems to be the card of choice for France anyhow.

What Hyundai was that in?

prosaic

Ionic 5, 73kWh

ewj1978

forgot to post this..

May-June, about 16 days of travel.

Did Cork-roscoff-rennes-nantes-La Rochelle-Bergerac-Montauban-Perpignan-Barcelona-Zaragoza-Pamplona-Bilbao-Rosslare-Cork

About 2500km in total. Had the Kia charge card and app on phone.

Used chargers at Tesla, LIDL, Mcdonalds, Ionity and a couple of French ones that I don't recall.

95% of the time the app worked and when it didn't I just used the charge card.

Had maybe two faulty charge points in total on the trip.

France and Spain blow ireland out of the water for availability of chargers, even in smaller French towns.

never once had a worry about range /availability of next Charge point.

ewj1978

Kia Niro. 64kw.

ELM327

Got back from france a few weeks ago, trip was unremarkable from an EV point of view. Chargers in every small town. Lidl has HPC and multiple AC chargers. Great Ionity and Tesla cover. It literally wasnt a factor.

prosaic

Quieter parts of France may still be sparse-ish. I'm guessing that it could be that grid doesn't support higher power in remote places? There are some areas where you only get 20kW chargers. Maybe it's economics or cost or priority at play. The local electricity companies have very good coverage of 20kW chargers, even in fairly remote places.

France is quite large and lots of big low-populated areas.

prosaic

About Izivia. You can't leave. In my opinion, avoid this "company", I think.

By mistake (I guess?) I had signed up for the "Grand Lyon" which has a €5/month subscription. I don't know did I check the wrong box or was this subscription activated by default when I signed up.

So, it turns out that to cancel the subscription, you have to send a completed form by post to the Paris office. On the web, there is a Cancel button on the subscription but it doesn't do anything!!

I did send a cancel form around 24th August but they seem to be still trying to charge the subscription. I took my credit card off the payment method. I think they then take the subscription as inactive, but not sure. On the app it says there isn't a subscription active but on the web, there is and they send invoices.

Further, there is no option to close the account. At least I can't see how you can close the account.

At best, this all looks highly incompetent and at worst, somewhat underhand. Not sure they got the memo about GDPR right to be forgotten.

Boscoirl

Made it to my first Charger in France.

Tesla near Mont St Michel so easy Peasy

10-10-20

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121081319#Comment_121081319

Enjoy! Keep us posted!

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121078482#Comment_121078482

There was an interesting article about this recently

https://www.electrive.com/2023/09/01/volkswagen-founds-electrify-france/

Looks like VW are trying to partly alleviate the issue by installing chargers outside the motorway network at their dealership network

Unfortunately it looks like there'll be a few single units among the mix, but I guess for a lot of rural areas that could be somewhat of an improvement

Boscoirl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121081319#Comment_121081319

Our second Charge of our trip to France was at the same charger 5hrs later 🤣🤣

long story need a pint now 😝

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121082749#Comment_121082749

Uh oh, was that an unplanned detour? 😳

10-10-20

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121083608#Comment_121083608

I hope it involved Calvados. Can't wait. ;)

Boscoirl

We are heading to Bordeaux for the Rugby.

had booked “5star” Chateau hotel outside Nantes to break the journey. Arrived at hotel. Looked a lot more run down from the booking.com pictures and it was all locked up. Couldn’t get in. Knocked at door. Looked in ground floor windows. No sign of anyone but there was a car outside. Rang the number numerous times. No answer. It was 7pm at this time and we were starving.

then wife notices her bag is missing which has our passports. 🤣 realise we must have left it at charger. We ring the hotel beside chargers and thankfully they had it. So we found somewhere for a quick dinner and Cue a just under 2hr drive back to get the bag.

currently 2hr from Bordeaux and hopefully no more issues 🤣🤞

Boscoirl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121083964#Comment_121083964

I wish 🙈

the_amazing_raisin

Oh man, not exactly the relaxing holiday you'd be hoping for 😔

I guess the chargers worked, which is a plus 🤷‍♂️

I hope you got to relax with a couple of beers after that debacle