Good News, Bad News
I'm floored
The good news is: I. Love. My. Truck.
About a week ago, I drove up to the family cabin in New Hampshire, where “mud season” is fully underway. Mud season is a phase of spring that looks like piles of melting old snow, temporary meltwater streams, and deeply rutted dirt roads. There’s no way my old ride (the ‘Rolly) would have made it to the cabin in these conditions, but in the truck I floated up the sloppy, hilly final stretch to the cabin.
This will surprise no one, but I’m enjoying getting to know how my truck’s efficiency and range are affected by factors such as temperature, wind, and driving speed. If you’ll bear with me while I nerd out on the numbers… I departed Boston with about 60% state of charge, and used another 40% of the truck’s battery on the 100-mile trip to the cabin. That implies a total range of about 250 miles, well short of the EPA-estimated range of my truck (320 miles). I have heard that one should consider that EPA estimate a best-case scenario, but when I looked into how the EPA estimate is obtained, I learned that it involves putting the car on a treadmill; personally, I do not consider a run on a treadmill to be any type of best-case scenario.
In any event, I drove on a cold day, and batteries are definitely less efficient in the cold. Plus, most of the drive from Boston is on the highway, and cars are less efficient at highway speeds due to increased aerodynamic drag. EVs, in particular, also lose efficiency on the highway because there are fewer opportunities for regenerative braking (most EVs return energy to the battery while slowing down). So, all in all, I think 250 miles of winter highway range is a reasonable number for my truck. This implies an efficiency of about 1.9 miles per kilowatt-hour (mi/kWh). I’ll round that up to 2 for quick mental math, but I’ll also pretend that my truck’s battery is 125 kWh (it’s actually 131 kWh). That way, each 20% of the battery equals 50 miles of range in the winter, on the highway. If I assume those same numbers under other circumstances, I’ll be super conservative and never strand myself with a dead battery. Who’s got range anxiety now?
Anyway, since I arrived at the cabin with only 20% battery remaining, I decided it was time to charge. Charging is a super easy process at the cabin, and I have my family to thank for that: several other family members drive electric vehicles, and they had already paid to have a big honkin’ NEMA 14-50 outlet installed in the driveway. (If you want yet more numbers, it’s a 30 amp, 240 volt outlet, which allows us to charge at a rate of 30 x 240 = 7.2 kW. This is a standard rate for the “level 2” EV chargers that many folks install at home.) This means I can simply plug in and wake up to a fully charged truck.
The next day, I headed to the Harbor Freight store in town. Since I’m planning to use this truck for carpentry, I need a way to carry lumber around, and after considering the options I settled for a rust-proof aluminum rack with an 800-lb carrying capacity. I finished installing the rack just as it was getting dark, and then popped down to the lake for a sunset cold dip.
I put the rack to the test the following morning, when I headed to Goosebay Sawmill & Lumber to pick up cedar decking for the sauna platform. This place is a fully-electric sawmill that produces as much solar power as they consume in their milling operation, so obviously I am a big fan and try to patronize them as much as possible. The cedar boards were 16 footers, which I believe is just about the limit of my rack, but I had them cut down to 14 feet at the mill since that’s the long dimension of my platform. (I get to keep the 2-foot offcuts, which will be useful for all kinds of projects.) After loading the boards up on the truck rack and securing the load with ratchet straps, I was on my way back to the cabin. As expected, I did notice that the truck’s efficiency took a small hit with the lumber up there — but overall, the hauling experience was extremely smooth.
There were rumors of an April Nor’easter coming later in the week, so I was highly motivated to take advantage of the window of fair weather we were experiencing. I laid the deck boards out on the platform, using a metal bracket to leave a small gap for drainage between boards, and fastened them to the floor joists using coated screws. This process took a few days in all, but it was extremely enjoyable work. The weather was crisp and sunny, the birds were chirping, and I was working with my hands and making steady progress.
I was hoping to get the boards finished with some Outdoor Defense Oil before the storm arrived, but I ran out of time. So, I just tarped the platform and hunkered down for the projected 1+ foot of heavy, wet snow.
The storm rolled in overnight, and when I woke up the following morning and flicked the light switch in the bathroom, nothing happened. Power outage. Looking outside, the world appeared as if it had gotten a generous coating of icing at the Frosted Mini-Wheat factory.
I had anticipated that we might lose power, so I had fully charged the truck before the storm. In fact, I was kind of happy about the power outage, because it provided a perfect opportunity to try out the truck as a backup “generator.” There is an official way to use my truck as whole-home backup, but it’s expensive to install, and I think it’s a bit overkill for our situation at the cabin. My setup was significantly more DIY: I just ran an extension cord from one of the outlets in the truck’s bed onto the porch and through a kitchen window. (This required leaving the window open a crack, so I stuffed a towel in there to prevent a cold draft.) I attached a power strip to that, and then sent one extension cord to the kitchen appliances (fridge, toaster oven) and the other to the Wi-Fi router. These are pretty low-power devices — I was pulling about 300 watts except when I used the toaster, which brought it up to about 1 kilowatt. But even if I were using 1 kilowatt continuously, the truck’s battery would keep things running for about 5 days! Walking up and down the road, I could hear all our neighbors running gasoline generators. I have to say that my solution felt pretty nifty by comparison.
So, that’s the good news: despite the storm, I’ve been trucking away. Building. Vibing. In my element.
While I waited for the snow to melt, I decided to check in with the town zoning administrator about the allowed height of the pavilion I was planning to build on the platform. And that’s when I learned the bad news.
It turns out that, the first time I looked into it, I misunderstood this whole zoning business.
We are not allowed to build a sauna on our property where the platform is. It’s too close to the lake.
I’ll own up to that as a colossal oversight. Of course one expects to make mistakes, doing something for the first time. But this one really stung. At least I’m certain I won’t make this particular mistake again.
After a one-day deep depression, I convened a family press conference. I presented two options: 1) Pivot to purchasing a barrel sauna kit, which could be easily disassembled and moved if we ever got slapped with a zoning complaint; or 2) Start the build over at a new site that is farther from the lake, and enjoy the lakeside platform in other ways.
We decided on option 1, the barrel sauna. I’m definitely disappointed that I won’t get to use the knowledge I learned in my sauna construction class, and the barrel sauna won’t provide quite as nice of an experience as the sauna I was planning. But I’m sure I’ll have other opportunities to build saunas soon, and in the end, I just really, really want the sauna at the cabin to be right next to the lake.
So, I’ll order a kit, and at some point I’ll have some family or friends help me put it together. And I think that’s the end of the sauna saga. I’m OK with it.
If I’m not going to be writing about the sauna build, what is this blog going to be about? Well, it’s been a few weeks since the equinox, and my attention is turning toward all things sunny: the arrival of warmer weather, exciting summer plans, and most of all… the eclipse.
As I’m sure you’ve heard, there’s a total solar eclipse in two days, and I’m determined to see it. My plan is to catch the show somewhere near where New Hampshire and Vermont meet Canada. (I had originally planned to head towards Burlington, but the latest forecasts show clouds building in from the west in the early afternoon, so I think it makes sense to pivot further east.) Tens of thousands of fellow sun-worshippers will also be descending on the Northeast, and it’s gonna be a whole scene. Traffic is supposed to be a nightmare. In fact the governor of New Hampshire recently discouraged people from taking EVs on their eclipse adventure, noting the lack of public charging stations throughout most of his state.
To which I say: Challenge accepted.
—Jake
A barrel sauna is certainly better than no sauna! Still definitely a bummer you won’t be able to create your original vision… for now!