Can someone tell me how much energy ( watts or kw what have you) that your vehicle uses at cruising speed. I am working on a school project and need to know about how much energy is used at normal cruising speed for an electric vehicle.
thanks
38 Amps/72 Volts @ 25 MPH. 1999 GEM 4 seater. On flat ground.
thanks for the reply house boater. i like the gems for local community travel but not for high way stuff.
any one have any highway amps/volt calculations
thanks again:)
I just bought a 2015 Ford Focus Electric and I’ve been testing the different levels of efficiency over the past week. The EPA claims a range of 76 miles on a 23Kwh battery pack. Now, I’m pretty sure Ford limits the charge capacity to probably around 85% to alleviate battery degradation, so I’m assuming I have about 19.5Kwh available to me. So using elementary division that gives me about 3.9 miles/Kwh, which seems to be an accurate number for most modern EVs on the road today (Tesla and Rav4 excluded, due to their specific nature). Some models can go higher, some lower, but for most people just driving without thinking, between 3-4 miles/Kwh is normal. Side note, using the heat in an EV cosumes a lot of energy. A/C use is fairly negligible (maybe a couple miles off of your total range), but heater use brings the numbers closer to 2-3 miles/Kwh (20-30 miles off your total range). This goes against everything we’ve been taugh about HVAC use in gas cars, but since electric cars generate very little heat on their own, ambient heat is practically null and generating it takes a lot of energy. Now, in the Focus, efficiency is measured in wh/mile, so that would mean 3.9 miles/Kwh translates into roughly 256 wh/mile. The longest continuous trip I’ve taken yet was from West Hollywood to Pasadena, which is just over 19 miles. About 5 of those miles are city driving (very stop and go, lots of red lights/traffic) and the other 14 are highway (the first 3 of highway were stuck at around 35mph, the final 11 miles were at 60mph). Going to Pasadena from Weho, there is an elevation climb of about 600 feet over the course of the trip, so going there was slightly less efficient than coming back. Going to Pasadena I averaged 254 wh/mi. Coming back from Pasadena I averaged 179 wh/mi. So that’s an average of 216.5 wh/mi, which is about 4.6 miles/Kwh; slightly above average efficiency. Now, that’s the combined with stop and go plus cruising highway speeds. The stop and go driving allows for a lot of energy recuperation from the regen brakes, so while it may take 600wh to go from 0-40, when you come to a stop half a mile later, you’ll regain a majority of that, lowering your average consumption. But to answer your original question, the freeway cruising, once up to 60mph, I average about 150-200 wh/mile, or 5-6.5 miles/Kwh. So between the two trips, my range was effectively 90 miles, 14 more than the EPA averaged. And I’m certainly not a grandma behind the wheel! If someone was driving very carefully and limited their crusing speed around 45mph, I wouldn’t be shocked to see someone do 110+ miles on a single charge (6 miles/Kwh). Hope this helps! You can tell everyone in your class that EVs are awesome 
tried to post screenshots of my stats, but I’m not allowed until I become “established”. Promise my numbers are real!
Great Post!
thanks a bunch… this helps a lot with my calculations for my class project.