Cold weather expectations for my Kona

To start, see what this says: https://abetterrouteplanner.com/
I wouldn't worry much about electrical load. It shouldn't be more than a KW, (so a 3 hour drive, that is 3KWh, or about 5% battery).
Using the seat heaters is much lower power than the resistive air heater, but again, it is probably only 3KW max (so 9KWh -- 15% battery -- for a 3 hour trip), and in general I'd see it drop down once the cabin heated up (but I haven't tried at -15degF yet).
Can you park the car in a garage at either end? Once you are moving, I'd bet you don't get too much range loss from the cold on the liquid cooled pack. All that energy you are expending to move the car goes into the liquid.

 

In Ontario my winter range with heating and seats and everything going was about 380km or 236 miles. Of course I have the heat pump. But my car is also parked and charged outside. Your milage may vary. Literally!

 

Don't you have any fast chargers along the way? There are a few US owners in the FB group "Hyundai Kona Electric (EV)", one owner, Eric, lives in MA and has had his car all through last winter, parked and charged outside, would suggest asking on that group. He's had no complaints and may be able to advise on range.
Those severe cold snaps are going to be a fixture for some years to come in the US NE as the Arctic ice deteriorates and the jetstreams become more wavey.
Ironically I have both the HP and the battery heater even though our climate here in NZ is very mild. The battery heater assists DC charging anytime under 15°C but is not needed if you DC charge after driving for some hours.

 

I've owned three ev's, the Mitsubishi i-Miev, the Kia Soul, and now the Kona. My experience has been that you can lose up to 40% of range during really cold periods. My Miev went from 70 miles of range down to about 40. The Soul wasn't quite as bad, I went from about 90 miles of range to about 70. I only bought my Kona in March so I can't say yet how it will do. But I can't imagine that it would lose more than 40% and I'm expecting it will be closer to 30%. I'm currently getting 300 miles of range with limited highway driving, so I'm hoping for close to 250 for the same type of driving. Obviously, whatever you can do to reduce heating the cabin will help range. With the Miev, I used to wear a heated vest. Between that and the seat-heater I was pretty comfortable except during the coldest times. I don't think you'll have any problems at all with your 160 mile round trip commute. You'll just be charging every night after making that trip, which you probably do anyway.

 

"really cold" - can you put numbers to that?

 

Teens (Fahrenheit).

 

Hi,

I had my kona last winter here in montreal. So during really cold weather, around -30 celsius, the minimum range I had was about 330km.
I never really used pre heating when the car was connected and had the temperature aroung 20 degrees celsius.

Hope this infomration helps you

 

I'm in northern Vermont so that helps me a lot, thanks.
Of course, you have the heat pump, but I don't think it makes much difference at those temps.
Just one question - what kind of range do you get during the summer?

 

Exactly. The heat pump does nothing when the temperature drops below -15 Celsius.

I'll only have my own kona next week but other people I know from Montreal that already have one say they have a range of 300km in the winter and of 500km in the summer. So 400km on average.

 

Yup, that's a safe generalization from my experience. In reality it skews toward the higher end.

 

Same here in summer I'm always close to 500.
From what I read on the UK forum regarding the heat pump is that is will work down to -25.

 

Whether it is for a house or a car, heat pumps are only useful down to minus 15 Celsius. It does not have anything to do with the quality of the pump. There is simply no heat to be extracted out of the cold air when the temperature drops lower than that.

 

It's a matter of rerigerant phase change vs pressure limitations. There is heat down to absolute zero, -273°C.

 

Hell will freeze over on that day.

 

Very informative post. I live in MA too and am curious about what winter performance will look like since I bought my Kona in June. I have noticed about a 30-mile drop off the GoM if I turn the main heat on.

With my 100-mile daily commute, I’m looking to change up my routine by setting max AC charge to 90% and charging every night so I get the benefit of the temp schedule while connected to the EVSE.

Since this is my first EV, I look at the colder season as a test of my faith in the tech. Lol.

 

Let me relay some advice I have been given for winter .

Your use of ac/heater will impact how fast the battery drains of course, but that's up to you to monitor while driving.

What is good for you to know is that the cold itself reduces what you can have as expected range before you even step in car. So having your battery warm before you leave home will help.

If your model has a battery heater and you can schedule it, set it to two hours before you leave home.

Rather than charging when you get home at night, schedule the charging so that it ends at around the time you expect to leave the house in the morning. Even if you don't have a battery heater, even the act of charging the battery itself will warm it up a little before you leave.

Hope this helps
Francois