Have You Ever Been Arrested?

I nearly landed on the Group W bench recently. The Hamilton Park & Ride charging stations were never available on weekdays because the spaces were always full of regular cars. So I went out there one Saturday to paint "Electric Only" on one of the ten spaces. We drove right past the police officer and set up. As soon as I began to paint, the officer came over and told me to stop. He was nice enough to overlook the crime so far and suggested I contact the county to request a sign.

That didn't seem very quick, especially considering I had the stencils and paint right there. So I called the next Monday and a left a message, wondering if anyone would ever even hear it. It turns out that officer G. had already gone into the government building and put in a good word.

A big Thank You to county supervisor Andrea McGimsey for working so tirelessly to get the whole Park & Ride + charging stations to happen. Another well-deserved Thank You goes to Loudoun County Energy Manager Najib Salehi who helped get it done and more recently got the signs in place to ensure the charging stations become useful. And I'm very grateful to officer G. for not arresting me and being so helpful.

Charging Connections

I thought these charging connections were posted earlier; anyway, here it is now. This is where the gas cap used to be. It's a J1772 connection (from tucsonev.com) that takes 240V AC and there's a retractable 120V plug, too. In the upper left, behind the cap in this view, there is a green light indicating that charging power is available to the car. The 240V charges about 2 ½ times faster than the 120V. On the other hand, the 120V is available everywhere.

Shocks and Shock-free

While waiting for the rear suspension springs to be modified (~5 weeks), I replaced the shock absorbers with heavier ones.

I also assembled a relay box to ensure that the 120V plug is never energized while the 240V charging power is connected. It's pretty simple. Here's a sketch.