XEV 9e Owner Drives over 400 km in 65% SoC

Anoosh Gupta who owns a Mahindra XEV 9e Pack Three shared his recent highway hypermiling trip exclusively with ElecTree. He drove from Kanpur to Greater Noida, a 410 km stretch, with the car fully loaded with household material since a relative was shifting. The car had a total of 2 occupants.

The Numbers

At the start of the trip, Anoosh's Pack 3 showed 68% SoC and 393 km of range remaining. He had already covered 2.6 km when he decided to record the journey. Anoosh told us that he kept the AC running throughout and held a steady 60 to 70 km/h for most of the drive, occasionally a bit more. He used the “Default” drive mode.

By the time he reached his destination in Greater Noida, the instrument cluster showed 3% SoC with 20 km of range still remaining, and the trip computer logged 410.8 km covered, with an efficiency reading of 9.1 km/kWh for the trip. The average speed of 51 kmph is not low but is akin to hypermiling on the highway but it provides an interesting insight. Maintaining constant speed often called coasting is beneficial to extract good efficiency. The lower average speed meant good balance between mechanical efficiency and aerodynamic drag. While regenerative braking seems tempting, it involves some energy loss in the form of heat while providing the current back to the battery.

The Load

The car was carrying household items belonging to a relative who was shifting. The images shared by Anoosh exclusively to ElecTree show that the car's boot which is 663 litres is completely filled. 

He also shared the images of the rear seat being folded and luggage filled till the roof. Even the 150 litre frunk had no more room left. This is a common scenario of any Indian household shifting.

The Drive

Anoosh drove at a deliberately gentle pace to stretch the charge across the full distance rather than stopping to top up along the way. He made two stops for refreshments, adding up to around 40 minutes in total. Chargers were available at both stops, but a power cut meant neither was working at the time. Even if they were, Anoosh had a different plan for this journey as he did not make any detour to find a working charger.

Anoosh's Takeaways

Anoosh says hypermiling to stretch the available charge turned out faster and less hassle than stopping to charge along the way, since finding and waiting at a charger often takes longer than simply driving a bit slower. He also found the car's range reporting to be predictable right down to the last few percent, which let him plan the whole journey around the indicated number with confidence. And somewhat unexpectedly, he found the slower, steadier pace less tiring than driving faster would have been.