[ix50si]

Planning on taking first long trip with iX. 4 hr drive from N.Y. to PA. On a full charge the bmw app says that I will arrive with 27% charge. How do I find charging station at destination?

[Pictor]

PlugShare app or if you’re in the car I will normally just use my fingers to zoom in on the map at the destination and look for the POI icons.

[Kennethjk]

Another option is ABRP, A Better Route Planner is also a good option and then compare what they recommend to the PlugShare score.

[ix50si]

Thank you both!

[LuisBoston]

Second to PlugShare. Also check the electrify America app to see if there’s a nearby station. It’s free and fast!

ABRP is annoying to use, imo. It’s clunky and overly complicated. Ive quit using it.

[Kennethjk]

Originally Posted by LuisBoston

Second to PlugShare. Also check the electrify America app to see if there’s a nearby station. It’s free and fast!

ABRP is annoying to use, imo. It’s clunky and overly complicated. Ive quit using it.

Don’t disagree but I use it as a baseline and then pick stations I prefer.

[NomoTesla]

Originally Posted by ix50si

Planning on taking first long trip with iX. 4 hr drive from N.Y. to PA. On a full charge the bmw app says that I will arrive with 27% charge. How do I find charging station at destination?

You don't need any apps. Just use the built-in navigation and it will show you all the chargers at or near your destination. You can filter based on operator, charger speed, etc. Please refer to the owner's manual if you do not know how to do this.

[thebishman]

On our latest long distance trip, I pre-planned using ABRP; PlugShare and the EA app; (the EA app primarily to look at the condition of the chargers at the locations I wanted to stop/charge at.

After I had chosen my stops based on around 240 miles range, I loaded each EA stop from PlugShare to Waze, and off we went.
Yes it took me a little more time than simply setting my ultimate destination into the BMW Nav and taking off, but it sure was reassuring knowing that I knew exactly where I was heading; the current state of the DCfC chargers there, and options close by if the EA chargers were unserviceable when we arrived.
YMMV

[RiversPhoto]

Even if I'm using the BMW navigation to find a charger, I check the location with Google Maps connected with my Android phone. The BMW nav sometimes doesn't get me all the way to the charger and leaves me on a major highway. Google takes me to the specific area of the parking lot.

I have also found that the BMW nav in the car is very hit or miss when using voice operated commands. I will find the location in the BMW app and send it to the car which is much more successful.

[Pictor]

Originally Posted by RiversPhoto

Even if I'm using the BMW navigation to find a charger, I check the location with Google Maps connected with my Android phone. The BMW nav sometimes doesn't get me all the way to the charger and leaves me on a major highway. Google takes me to the specific area of the parking lot.

I have also found that the BMW nav in the car is very hit or miss when using voice operated commands. I will find the location in the BMW app and send it to the car which is much more successful.

I've had almost the opposite experience with Google Maps sending me down wrong exists or exits that have been closed for a while due to construction. The only issue I've had in the PNW with using the BMW Nav is that it's very conservative in range estimates and charging recommendations even when I have the settings turned way down for arrival SoC in the preferences. So I will generally look for a stop down the road from the recommended stop so I can ride the optimum part of the charge curve.

[Tigershark321]

On the navigation screen when you are en route to arriving you can just press the blue plug icon on the screen and it looks for the nearest charging stations which can be filtered down to EA only. A little pre-planning helps being aware where things are located via plugshare and EA apps. But honestly, you could just wing it if a co-pilot is there with you to search while driving. The car software is pretty capable of letting the car activate preconditioning by the use of the onboard nav or manually activate it yourself.

[darylp310]

Originally Posted by RiversPhoto

Even if I'm using the BMW navigation to find a charger, I check the location with Google Maps connected with my Android phone. The BMW nav sometimes doesn't get me all the way to the charger and leaves me on a major highway. Google takes me to the specific area of the parking lot.

Interesting, I've found quite the opposite. If you zoom in on the BMW nav map it does a great job helping me navigate specifically to chargers. I'm always surprised how accurate the GPS is in helping me find where the chargers are in a big Walmart parking lot in an unfamiliar city!! I've only been to cities in California and Nevada so far, so maybe it's region-specific?

[RiversPhoto]

Originally Posted by darylp310

Interesting, I've found quite the opposite. If you zoom in on the BMW nav map it does a great job helping me navigate specifically to chargers. I'm always surprised how accurate the GPS is in helping me find where the chargers are in a big Walmart parking lot in an unfamiliar city!! I've only been to cities in California and Nevada so far, so maybe it's region-specific?

Thanks for both responses. It may be regional. I'm in New England and have had trouble three separate times with a goofy location from the BMW nav. One destination wasn't within 4 miles of the EA chargers.

I also am blessed with multiple nearby Tesla Superchargers with Magic Docks that are a much nicer experience. Those won't show up in the BMW nav. Google works just fine for those as I have saved them as starred locations in Maps.

[ix50si]

Got back from my trip this weekend. I used plug and share and it was very helpful. On the way back we needed a quick charge and I noticed that pressing the blue icon in the car navigation would pull up charging stations but would not be accurate with how fast the charging was. A lot of the options showed 6kw but on the Plug Share they were actually up to 200kw. Is that to be expected?

[Pictor]

Originally Posted by ix50si

Got back from my trip this weekend. I used plug and share and it was very helpful. On the way back we needed a quick charge and I noticed that pressing the blue icon in the car navigation would pull up charging stations but would not be accurate with how fast the charging was. A lot of the options showed 6kw but on the Plug Share they were actually up to 200kw. Is that to be expected?

I haven't found that level of discrepancy but it's certainly possible. I don't know if Here is the only place where BMW Navigation sources their information about charging locations (I suspect it's not) but you can always submit corrections to https://mapcreator.here.com

I should add, that some DCFC locations also have L2 charging. So depending on how you have your filter setup in the Nav, it could show only L2 chargers like the 6kW that you found but it would omit the DCFC like the 200kW units. I have one EA site in this area that has three DCFC of 350kW and a single L2 plug. That site always shows availability because then L2 plug is rarely used while the DCFC are almost always busy.

[ix50si]

Originally Posted by Pictor

I haven't found that level of discrepancy but it's certainly possible. I don't know if Here is the only place where BMW Navigation sources their information about charging locations (I suspect it's not) but you can always submit corrections to https://mapcreator.here.com

I should add, that some DCFC locations also have L2 charging. So depending on how you have your filter setup in the Nav, it could show only L2 chargers like the 6kW that you found but it would omit the DCFC like the 200kW units. I have one EA site in this area that has three DCFC of 350kW and a single L2 plug. That site always shows availability because then L2 plug is rarely used while the DCFC are almost always busy.

Will check my filter but I don’t think that’s what it is. I was able to see all types of chargers, just seemed like there were mostly 6kw and the one I specifically went to showed as a 6kw on the BMW navigation but as a 200kw on PlugShare

[Kennethjk]

Originally Posted by ix50si

Will check my filter but I don’t think that’s what it is. I was able to see all types of chargers, just seemed like there were mostly 6kw and the one I specifically went to showed as a 6kw on the BMW navigation but as a 200kw on PlugShare

That’s weird of course, I filter out the slow chargers and I see what’s left, The fast chargers. I forget the filter level but I didn’t have any issues during my drive from Florida to NY.