Passengers

Can anyone comment on how passengers effect range?

Plankton said:

Can anyone comment on how passengers effect range?

Click to expand...

If my mother-in-law is in the car 50 miles feels like 550 miles.

A friend of mine said that you can figure your watt-hours/mile consumption by taking the weight in pounds for the vehicle and dividing by 10. So, a 2000 lb vehicle gets 200wh/mile. I think you could apply that rough rule to take the standard 250wh/mil you get with no passengers and if you were to add 500 lbs (pretty much the max of what you should have in the i), your wh/mile would be more like 300, taking your EPA range from 62 down to 53 (and I'd say that's a maximum reduction). Of course, it depends on terrain (on flats, added passengers probably don't do much), temperature, driving style, etc. I think if you plan to make trips of more than 60 miles with 4 people in the i, you better be prepared to drive like a saint and/or have the opportunity to charge in the midst of that.