Is the one cup holder the reason your passenger is taking photos from the backseat? 😂

Sounds like a great trip, thanks for sharing!! I haven't tried Ivy chargers yet so I'll be confident my first visit.

 

Pretty much! Bosses enjoys the view from the back

Can't wait for all IVY chargers to open up. Being able to charge just at OnRoute will be time/money saivng. IVY charges $0.3/minute flat where EC charges $0.57/min@1-350kw and $0.25 1-90kw. Maybe I should had just paid for the $4 Plus membership to take advantage of lower rate (prob even it out).

 

Just want to share my experience driving from Toronto to Montreal. Having the car for a year now, this is the longest I've driven with this car with about 530km one way. My main charging/rest stops were Ivy chargers at OnRoute (highway rest area in Ontario), specifically Napanee (east) and Odessa (west) and Electrify Canada at Cornwall and Brockville.

This was my first time using IVYs stations and they are surprisingly pleasant to use. The app and station had no hiccups. The only downside is some stations are still not online yet even when the website states April for some (Trenton for example).

Electrify Canada stations did work but it was not as smooth as IVYs (station stuck at connecting with the car but you can start charge via the app and it starts). It also stopped for me in the mid-way and I had to reconnect to restart.

I remember driving to Niagara Falls last summer and I was still fairly new with the car so I wasted more time charging longer than I should have. This trip was very smooth, stopping at 20-30 min tops for a quick charge from 20-65% was enough to get me to the next stop while feeling safe. The rest of the charging was at the hotel which we only use to top off before returning to Toronto.

I used ABRP to plan stops and check PlugShare to see if stations are in working condition and the latest info from other users. I personally find ABRP estimates inaccurate (maybe because I have a free tier) and Google map estimates are usually quite pessimistic on the range left (magically gained 10% as I get closer to location).

During this whole journey, I went from winter (-1°C with slush storm) to spring weather (18°C+ sunny weather). 80% highway mainly 100-120 pilot cruising, overtaking traffic) and 20% in city traffic. We had one large suitcase (about an extra 15kg) and our doggy (3kg Yorkie) with us (140kg combined) for this trip. The car is running 20" OEM Conti SportContact 6 summer tires and damping on comfort compliment (F14, R15). Air condition and Eco mode were on at all times with Heater on half the trip.

Quebec being more generous with incentives, I saw many EVs during my time in Montreal. Lots of ID4s and Mach-E and saw only 1 other Polestar and of course tons of Teslas. I also saw a Mazda MX-30 which I had never seen in life (great car but just poor range). There were also tons of street-level 2 chargers which do not exist in Toronto.

This trip gave us a lot of confidence in taking longer trips with the Polestar. I wish we could confidently run 400km from charger to charger but perhaps when the weather is more stable and conditions are met. Overall we love Montreal as it's good to mix of old and new. Food is also great and people are generally more friendly even if I can't speak proper French? Can't wait to return (housing is still affordable... compare to Toronto)! Hope some of you find this helpful.

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Toronto to Montreal total and return.
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Never understood what the fuss is about with the one cup... 😅
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Thanks for sharing this information!! And great photos too.

I find this very frustrating tho tbh. You had no troubles with ivy network, yet I have had almost no luck at all with them. Granted, I have tried only the Cambridge north and Cambridge south and oodstock locations. All have failed. I even had a Polestar tech come out and his car also failed. Polestar engineering is apparently been notified but I've heard nothing yet.

I have had so many attempts that have failed that the operations manager of ivy actually contacted ME. I didn't contact him. He said it's a charger issue and not the cars issue because essentially Polestar hasn't been programmed into their network yet. But there you are having no problems, and another Polestarite on here said he also had no problems charging at both Cambridge north and south ivy. Also has seen a couple of Polestar reviews on plugshare that claimed success on the Cambridge north and south stations.

If you have any more details you can share with me, I'd appreciate it.

Many thanks

 

Thanks for sharing this information!! And great photos too.

I find this very frustrating tho tbh.

Wow, I must have been lucky? When was the last time you tried an IVY? It could just be the stations are newly set up? This is another reason I tend not to push anything longer than a 200km drive. I like to leave some extra in case I need to find another charger nearby. It's frustrating but hopefully, they work all the kinks out.

 

I'm doing this same trip in June for the Grand Prix but don't think my P*2 order will arrive in time so will likely be the last in my ICE car. How long was Toronto to Montreal including charging? Was it close to the time you buffered for when you wanted to arrive?

 

Lucky you! Starting tickets are like $1k? I will have to check the Travel log to be accurate but my impression was about 7.5 hours. Left around 9:45 got in around 4:30. I made two 20-minute charging tops and 1 pee break on the way. The return trip was a lot faster, at around 5.5 hours with similar stops.

 

Hi i will try to go from Montréal to Niagara falls this summer to bring kids to the aqua park😉 , cant wait to do the trip with the polestar, i make few roads trips here in Quebec during last year but doesn't have opportunity to go in Ontario yet😅

 

It will be a great drive! Hope the rest of the IVY chargers come online as in between Kingston and Toronto, you'll have to rely on Petro Canada or Electrify Canada for fastcharge.

 

Please don't take my experiences as representative! I mean, I had good luck, but you have said you have been able to connect at least once in the past, maybe I was just lucky 3 attempts in a row... DC charging is hardly a part of our daily/weekly routine. The next time we might try those chargers is July, coincidentally also when going to Montreal.

That said, there is one FLO charger we have used a handful of times (maybe 4 or 5x now? Just for a little bump), and it has also always worked flawlessly.

 

I doubt you were lucky 3 times in a row. This is getting frustrating. FLO network has been flawless for me as well.

 

It sure should … but there could be variations in how people do the whole charging process from start to end … some people start with plugging a charging cable first, others don’t. Some people use RFID pre-charged card, others use app or credit card rather. Then sometimes the contact of the plug is finicky, so people who are not forth full enough or delicate enough could be the difference. I know it sounds like it shouldn’t matter, but experience not only here but also elsewhere shows otherwise.

It surely is not as simple as shoving gas pump hose into the car and pumping … 😂

 

It's a incompatibility with the Chargers software and polestar software. I am on both polestar and IVY networks to get this resolved.

The Ivy guy opened a ticket to get the Chargers programmed but said the ticket is open. and my polestar tech said that Polestar engineering is working on software updates and should be available on next release. 2.1 says in release notes that dcfc robustness is improved. I'm in constant contact with the Ivy guy. I would suggest maybe contacting your polestar Service centre and letting them know you are having troubles. Power in numbers. I do think this will get resolved soon.

 

If you take two Polestar vehicles with same, let say 2.0 installed, the same individual plugging and initializing the charge the exactly same way should yield the same outcome. But of course, such a test in controlled environment never happens…so you get these anecdotal experiences with results all over the place.

 

Agreed. I'm sure we will get to the bottom of it tho. It seems to be mostly with Canadian charging networks. I don't see nearly the issues in the States that we have. I'm betting that a lot of the Chargers are made and programmed by the same company.

I know that a Petro Canada station in Milton where the charger doesn't work on my Polestar, the charging stations look nearly identical to the Ivy Chargers that failed on me.

Also by the wording I got from the Ivy guy, it seems that Ivy isn't the ones doing the programming, it is the manufacturer of the charging units. And this would exain why the Petro can that looks identical to the Ivy also doesn't work....it's prob the same software.

These issues aside, gawd I love my Polestar!!!!!

 

A few weeks ago we went away for a week in a triangle. Niagara to Ottawa, to Montreal, then home to Niagara. Charging on the 401 was all at Petro Canada with a failed attempt at an Ivy (Three chargers busy and one charger non-functional). We charged once at the hotel, then for free at a friend's house in Ottawa, free at the hotel in Montreal. On the way back we used an Ivy (that wouldn't go past 40kh/hr) and one of the same PetroCanada chargers to get us home.

The whole charger situation was much less worrisome than I was expecting. The total driving cost for the week was in the area of $80.

 

Anybody looking for good restaurants in Montréal can PM me.
The sooner the better.