Stress test: Taking a 600km country drive in an EV

We are reaching the point where battery-electric vehicle range anxiety is becoming a thing of the past. Right?

Nowadays we can hop in our EV and be pretty confident we can go for a drive for hundreds of kilometres without recharging. Right?

And if we do have to recharge on the run, we should be able to find a charger to plug in to. Right?

Well, yes that is right if you regard your EV as an urban commuter and you live in a developed area with plenty of infrastructure.

But what happens if you want to drive an electric vehicle beyond the urban fringe?

What if you want to do the sort of interurban driving or holiday touring you take for granted in a vehicle with an internal combustion engine (ICE)?

Leg One
Distance: 128.2km
Stated range start/finish: 487km/337km
Stated battery charge start/finish: 100%/72%
Average consumption: 17.7kWh/100km

A grey and wet dawn greeted our departure from Albury. The first message from the Dynamiq’s trip computer was a range estimate of 487km, despite the 77kWh battery pack being fully charged.

Why so far below the claim? Well, the ADR number is theoretical while the trip computer bases its estimate on known driving behaviour. Clearly, journos on the launch the day before hadn’t been driving with economy in mind…

Our intention was to behave in a less exuberant manner, not that the throttle would be feathered or the clutch disengaged down hills. There isn’t a clutch pedal in the IONIQ 6 anyway, its 168kW/350Nm e-motor drives the rear wheels via a single-speed reduction gear.

The first segment was a relatively unchallenging sequence of country roads rolling between fog-draped hills. Dispatching ambling traffic, it was quickly apparent plentiful overtaking power was on tap, making this capable cross-country transport.

Also quiet and refined, once the laborious process of turning off the overspeed and lane keeping audible warnings had been stepped through. Just so annoying. And sadly necessary to repeat each time the car is started.

Along the way there were stops for photos, ablutions, a coffee and a read of the instruction manual to better understand what drivetrain mode did what.

Those modes are Eco, Normal, Sport and Custom, while regenerative braking support can vary from negligible to full-on one-pedal driving or even a set-and-forget auto mode.

The set-up I started with was power-conserving Eco, while the level of regen was altered depending on whether I was in stop-start urban traffic (max) or out on the open road (reduced), which was most of the time.

At the end of this first drive section the IONIQ 6 Dynamiq was averaging a consumption rate well over its 14.3kWh/100km claim at 17.7kWh/100km and it had used 150km worth of range to travel 128.2km.

But much more dramatic consumption numbers were to come.

Leg Two
Distance: 30.8km
Stated range start/finish: 337km/223km
Stated battery charge start/finish: 72%/53%
Average consumption: 46.2kWh/100km

If you know the Great Alpine Road then you’ll know that from Harrietville it’s pretty much all climbing all the way to Mt Hotham. For an electric car, this is an extreme consumption test.

But for any car in these streaming wet and increasingly foggy conditions it would be a great driving test.

Switched into max-attack Sport mode, the Dynamiq felt unleashed with far livelier throttle response. But it still lacks the punch and grip of its all-wheel drive twin-motor brethren, so it was wiggling and slipping its rear 18-inch Hankook Ventus tyres as it tried to e-motor forward and upward between the tight turns.

As the IONIQ 6 was quietly slurping and sliding its way upwards, a bevy of classic road rally cars were brapping, braying and slithering their way down the hill the other way. Past, present and future going in on opposite directions.

As you can see from the numbers recorded, electrical consumption skyrocketed as the 2.0-tonne EV climbed ever higher.

An ICE car would no doubt suck down heaps of fuel in the same circumstances. But there were more refuelling options for them on this route.

Leg Three
Distance: 52.9km
Stated range start/finish: 223km/206km
Stated battery charge start/finish: 53%/46%
Average consumption: 7.5kWh/100km

What goes up must come down and the numbers tell the story of the run down the southern side of the range to Omeo.

Charge and range were still decreasing, but with Eco mode engaged and regen maxed the gush was reduced to a trickle. In fact, the range even started going back up when the descent was steep and the pace slowed to a crawl behind a truck.

All that meant no need to plug in at Omeo’s sole fast-charger. Instead, we could press on at least as far as Bairnsdale, another 120km down the road.

While the low consumption was pleasing, making way for a sizeable wombat ambling across the road was the highlight of this segment.

He probably didn’t hear the whisper-quiet IONIQ 6 coming round the bend. He was well off the road by the time the trip resumed.

Leg Four
Distance: 119.3km
Stated range start/finish: 206km/89km
Stated battery charge start/finish: 46%/22%
Average consumption: 15kWh/100km

Hyundai has made a big deal about the sporting chassis tune of the IONIQ 6 and this was the section of the Great Alpine Road that really reinforced that.

The run alongside the Tambo River after Swifts Creek is one of the best sections of driving road in Victoria and maybe Australia. It rises and falls, opens and closes, is bumpy and smooth and the scenery is stunning.

The IONIQ 6 Dynamiq loved it. Its long wheelbase was happier on this faster, flowing bitumen than the ultra-tight wet hairpins encountered earlier in the day.

The low centre of gravity delivered by the heavy battery pack’s positioning in the floor helped make the Dynamiq turn with less body roll. The firm-ish passive suspension tune aided the whole objective of keeping the show on the road, albeit at the expense of a little ride comfort.

With no gears to manipulate braking into the corners and the regen paddles an unsatisfactory substitute, the focus was instead on getting the lift and coast right. Lift the throttle too soon and the regenerative braking effect slowed the car too much. Lift too late and a jump on the mechanical brakes was required to aid retardation.

Get it right and it was a satisfying EV driving skill learned.

Bairnsdale reached, it was decision time. With about 80km of indicated range it was safer to top-off than press on any further. The recharge was achieved, but only after a Tesla nipped in ahead of me at the Chargefox 75kW charger and a diversion was required to a nearby 50kW Evie unit.

The objective was to reach the ultra-fast 350kW Chargefox chargers in Moe that would enable the IONIQ 6 Dynamiq to be fully refuelled in the shortest possible time.

Recharge One
Bairnsdale
Charge added: 15.7430kWh
Cost: $7.08

Leg Five
Distance: 147.6km
Stated range start/finish: 178km/17km
Stated battery charge start/finish: 41%/4%
Average consumption: 17.8kWh/100km

The drive from Bairnsdale to Moe was mostly at high speed (well, 100-110km/h) on the Latrobe Valley’s highways and freeways, with the occasional dawdle through towns like Stratford, Sale, Traralgon and Morwell.

The charge indicator became the focus of attention. It was dropping just that frag too fast. The low battery level warning came on at 20 per cent and at 10 per cent the car was urging a visit to a recharging station. The air-conditioning had long since been turned off to eke out a bit more range.

With only four per cent charge still retained in the battery pack, we arrived at the Moe charging station. Phew!

Problem solved? Sadly no. The first 350kW charger hooked up but simply refused to work.

The second 350kW charger plugged in successfully and charged for two minutes before it went out of service.

Move on to a 50kW charger. It plugged in, refused to work and then locked me out of the Chargefox app!

As the car was down to eight per cent battery at the time, real concern was setting in.

I rang Chargefox and they rebooted the 50kW and the two 350kW chargers, but the IONIQ 6 still didn’t want to know.

At this point a guy in an MG ZS EV came over and we unsuccessfully tried to plug in the IONIQ 6 using his Chargefox card.

We then swapped the IONIQ to the 50kW (the last charger) he was using and it hooked up and charged no problem.

Subsequently, cars came to the other three chargers and plugged in and charged without problem. This suggests there was a problem with the IONIQ 6 and Chargefox interaction in some way.

Happily, after an hour there was enough juice in the battery to get home and those troublesome Chargefox chargers were in the rear-view mirror.

Recharge Two
Moe
Charge added: 50.33kWh
Cost: $22.65

Leg Six
Distance: 127.6km
Stated range start/finish: 350km/223km
Stated battery charge start/finish: 74%/50%
Average consumption: 15.6kWh/100km

And so to home, stopping along the way to record a photo at sea level. It had been a descent of more than 1500 metres since the alps.

From a pure driving sense, the journey had been a really enjoyable one. The Hyundai IONIQ 6 Dynamiq proved well-sorted with refined and quiet manners.

But while the car’s behaviour had been impressive, the claimed ADR range and consumption had proved dramatically optimistic.

Okay, being able to go 400km or so between recharges is definitely useable, but coming out one-third thirstier than the range claim is pretty dramatic.

At least the consumption claim wasn’t so over-egged. Over the duration of the trip it was about 20 per cent above the claim.

Combine that level of thirst with the challenges of finding recharging options and then – in some cases – trying to make them work and it’s clear long-distance EV driving in Australia still has its challenges and obstacles and requires some planning.

Like the journeys themselves, there’s still a long way to go.