I use Tesla Superchargers for my Funky Cat because they are significantly cheaper than other public charging options. I was on my way back from Birmingham, and though I didn’t have enough charge to get home, I did to get to the Gloucester Services. On previous trips back from Birmingham I would visit Frankley southbound services on the M5 and use the Tesla chargers there, which would then get me home. However, my preference was to head to Gloucester as the services there are much nicer than the ones at Frankley and I did fancy getting something from the Farm Shop at the services.
When I arrived, I had a 12% charge left on the Funky Cat. I drove around to the Tesla chargers, and it looked like most were free, and there was a reason for that. I did my usual process of starting the charge on the app and then plugging in the cable to the Funky Cat. This appeared to go okay, but then as I waited for the charging to initialise and start, I saw there were problems. The Tesla driver next to me was having a similar issue. It appeared that the chargers were temporarily out of order.
The Gloucester Services have a set of other chargers in their parking as well. However, all the other chargers were all busy.
I popped into the services anyhow as I needed the loo. My new plan was to go to the northbound services via Junction 12. However, when I came out I saw a car was about to leave the (other) chargers, so I quickly took their place and put the Funky Cat on charge. At 69p kWh not as cheap as the Tesla chargers, but certainly cheaper than Gridserve or InstaVolt at other motorway services.
I went in to the services to get some coffee and browse the shop.
By the time the Funky Cat was at 84% I saw that the Tesla chargers were now working. Was it worth moving the car, well the ones I were using were 13p more per kW. So, using the other chargers and with my 31.3 kWh I was charged £4.07 more than if I had used the Tesla chargers at 56p kWh.
However, moving the car for probably another 5 kWh would save me 65p, so I didn’t bother. I had enough charge to get home, so I unplugged the Funky Cat, took a photograph of what I had been charged and headed home.