A Funny EV Prank You Can Pull For Cheap, But Probably Shouldn’t – CleanTechnica

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One well-known weakness of ICE vehicles is that the car will drive away from a gas pump with the nozzle still in the car. And, because the nozzle goes into the car at a 90% angle compared to the direction of travel, it won’t harmlessly slide out if you happen to do that. Until a few years ago, this was a very dangerous thing, as breaking parts could set gas pumps on fire, but even with the new hoses that release when pulled, it can still get pretty dicey.

At best, the emergency release pops out, you take the released hose to the attendant, and they put it back on. No big deal. But, at worst, your car can get damaged, the flying end of the hose can hurt somebody, or the whole station can go up in flames.

Fortunately, EVs don’t suffer from this malady. When the EV is plugged in, nearly all EVs disable the ability to go into gear and drive off. So, you don’t see EVs driving around with a charging cord hanging from the charging port and dragging on the pavement. You also don’t hear about high-voltage charging mishaps with a broken-off cable flailing around and electrocuting people.

But, what if you could drive off with the charging plug attached? @ryanhuber on X/Twitter managed to get a whole bunch of people riled up with this photo:

Oh geez that’s why everyone was honking. I’m so embarrassed! pic.twitter.com/fYlKO4h0F7

— @ryanhuber (@ryanhuber) April 13, 2024

Most people didn’t fall for it, knowing that a Rivian won’t drive off at “the pump” like this. But, there were still plenty of suckers who were born on some minute or other who swallowed the bait hook, line, and sinker.

This is the third time it has happened. I’m really sorry.

— @ryanhuber (@ryanhuber) April 13, 2024

But, even in skepticism, people had questions:

There’s no way that you didn’t notice the end of the cable banging away on you drivers side door.

— Erikku (@ErikkuKurane) April 13, 2024

It seemed pretty obvious that he bought a Supercharger cable somewhere. So, I decided to go hunting for one myself. But, to buy one, you have to do what Weird Al does and go to the place where they sell Alf alarm clocks and William Shatner’s old toupees. Yes, I’m talking about eBay, the place where they sell Smurf TV trays and used tissues from Dr. Dre.

It turns out that Beanie Babies and busted golf bags aren’t the only thing available. If you snipe people with two seconds left to go, you too can be the proud owner of a used Supercharger cable, with the official connector and everything. Somehow, the cables didn’t get broken up by a meth head, which is a miracle in today’s world. Here’s one such listing:

For only $89 (or best offer), you can have one shipped to your door and you can start pranking people. But, if you don’t have a Tesla, you’ll need an adapter of some kind to make the prank semi-believable. Or, if you’re a skilled and fast enough meth head, you can just saw one from a Magic Dock station yourself to save on shipping (seriously, DON’T do this).

If you want to make the prank even better, you could spend another $1300 and buy the outer housing of a Supercharger, and then stick the cable to it so it looks like you drug off half of the stall.

But, between the cost of this prank and the way some less knowledgeable people might react to it (calling the cops, or worse), this is a creative and funny prank that I wouldn’t recommend doing yourself.

Featured image: screenshot from Ryan Huber’s original tweet.