Wall Connector not charging car

coldie · Nov 8, 2015

Hi all,

Just took delivery of our 85D last week, but having problems getting the wall connector to charge the car.

Symptoms:
- wall connector led light is solid green
- after connecting the cable to the car's charge port, the charge port lights go green to indicate a successful connection. Had a few yellow lights initially because I didn't push the connector into the car hard enough.
- instrument panel displays "preparing to charge" or something like that
- after a few seconds a message appears on the dash saying "No wall power. Please check power source", and the car does not charge.
- the lights next to the charge port turn red

The electrician tried the following:
- turn off and on the circuit breaker
- put the dip switches in test mode and hit reset button for 5-10 secs
- changed the dip switches down to 16A
but the symptoms are the same each time.

The wall connector always shows a green light. No red lights.

The car charges fine using the cable that plugs into a power point, and at the supercharger, so we suspect there is something wrong with the wall connector.

Has anyone had a similar experience?

Cheers,
Carl

ZTrekus · Nov 8, 2015

coldie said:
Hi all,

Just took delivery of our 85D last week, but having problems getting the wall connector to charge the car.

Symptoms:
- wall connector led light is solid green
- after connecting the cable to the car's charge port, the charge port lights go green to indicate a successful connection. Had a few yellow lights initially because I didn't push the connector into the car hard enough.
- instrument panel displays "preparing to charge" or something like that
- after a few seconds a message appears on the dash saying "No wall power. Please check power source", and the car does not charge.
- the lights next to the charge port turn red

The electrician tried the following:
- turn off and on the circuit breaker
- put the dip switches in test mode and hit reset button for 5-10 secs
- changed the dip switches down to 16A
but the symptoms are the same each time.

The wall connector always shows a green light. No red lights.

The car charges fine using the cable that plugs into a power point, and at the supercharger, so we suspect there is something wrong with the wall connector.

Has anyone had a similar experience?

Cheers,
Carl

Well there are a number of things you could do...

The simplest is to look into the charge menu of your car and ensure that you have allowed for charging at an amperage above 10amps...

But assuming that isn't the problem - I guess the next thing you ought to do is drive the car to a Tesla service centre and attempt to charge the car using their wall charger. If so, then obviously yours is bad. It would either need swapping or the DIP switches would need to be rectified. Somewhere someone once said that the instructions that came with the wall charger were different to instructions that he found online. So I would seek out the different one and try changing the DIP switches. It may be as simple as that.

At least the 10amp charger works - so I would pretty much rest assured that it is not the internal charger in the car.

I hate hardware problems. Hope you fix it ASAP.

Good luck.

meloccom · Nov 8, 2015

Have you pressed the big red reset button on the side of the wall connector.
IIRC Mitchell said that was very important the first time you installed the wall connector in a new place.

Discoducky · Nov 8, 2015

Plug the charging cable into a standard outlet and then to the car. Same outcome?

If so, reduce the amperage lower to about 6 or 8 and try again. Same outcome?

If so, most likely is the cable or the car. If not, it is the outlet.

If cable, contact Tesla.

If outlet, it is most likely a faulty outlet, cable connection to outlet or circuit, cable itself, circuit or possibly panel.

Mark E · Nov 8, 2015

Hi Coldie,
I suspect that there is either an issue with the connector or the installation - since the car will charge with the portable charger. You could try to set the car down to 10A on the dashboard and see if that makes any difference - i.e. it could be dropping too much voltage at a higher current. It's probably also worthwhile getting your electrician to talk with Tesla directly as I know that there can be some confusion as to the correct wiring.

The car will monitor the voltage and also checks things like earth connections etc before charging, so it may or may not be a faulty unit. There isn't too much in the unit to fail in reality.

paulp · Nov 9, 2015

Yes had the same issue previously.
The instructions for the electrician supplied by tesla can be easily incorrectly interpreted. This is likely the problem (same thing happened to me - green until you plug in then it goes red when you do). Suggest you get your electrician back to wire it to what normally occurs, rather than to the poorly worded instructions.
Mitchell could also supply some clarity and help. He is a great resource.

RBR · Nov 9, 2015

Exactly the same issues here during our install. Resolved by calling Mitchell. The problem lay in the instruction manual. I don't have it to hand however there are instructions for an Asian install and an Australian install. I could hear Mitchell chuckling in the background as he pointed out the error to the Tesla recommended electrician. The fix was very simple and no damage was done. Did I read here that Mitchell is working in the States just now?

Hope this helps...

raynewman · Nov 9, 2015

RBR said:
Exactly the same issues here during our install. Resolved by calling Mitchell. The problem lay in the instruction manual. I don't have it to hand however there are instructions for an Asian install and an Australian install. I could hear Mitchell chuckling in the background as he pointed out the error to the Tesla recommended electrician. The fix was very simple and no damage was done. Did I read here that Mitchell is working in the States just now?

Hope this helps...

The error in the instructions (at least in my case) left the wall unit with a red (error condition) light. This doesn't sound like that.

Dborn · Nov 9, 2015

Mitchell is in the USA, but he responds promptly to email.

RBR · Nov 9, 2015

Quite correct ray, it was the wall unit showing red. Sorry for the bum steer...

coldie · Nov 9, 2015

Hi guys,

Thanks for all the quick replies!

Sorry I should have mentioned that we did charge the car using the wall connector at the showroom, when we took delivery of the car, and that worked fine.

My electrician also read the Hong Kong installation instructions at first, and got a red light on the wall connector which indicated a ground fault. After calling Tesla and realising the Australian instructions were different, and at the back of the manual, the electrician completed the install and got the green light on the wall connector.

I've got Jesse talking to Mitchell in the states now, so hopefully they'll come up with a solution.

One more thing, we've mounted our wall connected horizontally on the ceiling of the carport. Just wondering if anyone has tried that successfully before? It shouldn't matter, but just wanted to rule out as a possible cause of our issue.

Thanks,
Carl

paulp · Nov 10, 2015

coldie said:
Hi guys,

Thanks for all the quick replies!

Sorry I should have mentioned that we did charge the car using the wall connector at the showroom, when we took delivery of the car, and that worked fine.

My electrician also read the Hong Kong installation instructions at first, and got a red light on the wall connector which indicated a ground fault. After calling Tesla and realising the Australian instructions were different, and at the back of the manual, the electrician completed the install and got the green light on the wall connector.

I've got Jesse talking to Mitchell in the states now, so hopefully they'll come up with a solution.

One more thing, we've mounted our wall connected horizontally on the ceiling of the carport. Just wondering if anyone has tried that successfully before? It shouldn't matter, but just wanted to rule out as a possible cause of our issue.

Thanks,
Carl

I don't think there is any reason to only mount vertically.
Also for memory the instructions had vagueness around the colouring of the active and neutral. If you havnt done so, maybe send Mitchell a pic of the connections. I recall my electrician being a bit surprised by the wiring convention.

timpoo · Nov 11, 2015

Hi coldie

Not sure if you have resolved your problem but if not we might be able to help you with the aid of a few photos. Send me a PM

coldie · Nov 12, 2015

timpoo said:
Hi coldie

Not sure if you have resolved your problem but if not we might be able to help you with the aid of a few photos. Send me a PM

Thanks Timpoo.

Tesla are giving me a replacement wall connector. I'll get it installed this weekend and let you know how it goes. Fingers crossed!

coldie · Nov 15, 2015

The new wall connector has been installed and is all good! There must have been a problem with the old unit. My electrician was very relieved

Thanks everyone for their input.

timpoo · Nov 15, 2015

coldie said:
The new wall connector has been installed and is all good! There must have been a problem with the old unit. My electrician was very relieved

Thanks everyone for their input.

Good news coldie!

cjbutcher · Jun 29, 2017

Hi All,

Sorry to bring this thread back to life, but I just started having a similar issue. Car has been charging fine for 3 years, now all the sudden it doesn't charge anymore. Light on wall unit is green. When I plug the end into my car it doesn't get recognized as being plugged in. (Car ring stays light blue). I've reset the wall unit, power cycled the breaker with no change. When I push the button on the cable head the charge port door won't open. Looking inside the car it shows that the door is open but nothing is plugged in.

Other than the cable head going bad and needing to be replaced...any other ideas?

Thanks much!

CJ

cjbutcher · Jun 29, 2017

Sorry, just wanted to add something: I took the car to a supercharger this morning and it charged fine. Just won't charge at home.

CJ

meloccom · Jun 29, 2017

If you can charge with your Universal Mobile Connector (UMC), I think you have a faulty wall connector, let Tesla know.
I would be interested to know how long the warranty is for the wall connector too.

tpoltron · Aug 13, 2017

cjbutcher said:
Hi All,

Sorry to bring this thread back to life, but I just started having a similar issue. Car has been charging fine for 3 years, now all the sudden it doesn't charge anymore. Light on wall unit is green. When I plug the end into my car it doesn't get recognized as being plugged in. (Car ring stays light blue). I've reset the wall unit, power cycled the breaker with no change. When I push the button on the cable head the charge port door won't open. Looking inside the car it shows that the door is open but nothing is plugged in.

Thanks much!

CJ

The exact same thing started happening to us last night after 2.5 years. UMC works fine.
Did you get yours fixed/replaced?

Wall Connector not charging car

Member

Member

Moderator Aus/NZ

P100DL, 2021 M3, 4 CT reservations and counting

Member

Active Member

Member

Active Member

Confirmed

Member

Member

Active Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

New Member

New Member

Moderator Aus/NZ

Member

Similar threads