Ecotricity Electric Highway

[Kevin Sharpe]

twitter @ZCWmarketing "#ukcharge @ecotricity M6 Charnock Richard Services M6 Southbound 13Amp working #ev #electriccar Type 2 still not"

[Kevin Sharpe]

twitter @ZCWmarketing "#ukcharge after some fiddling about & witchcraft the 13Amp @ecotricity M6 northbound Charnock richard is working "

[Kevin Sharpe]

twitter @ZCWmarketing "#ukcharge @ecotricity Welcome Break M6 southbound - post turned off at mains due to stealing my #EV cable. No charging available any type"

[ecotricity]

Hiya all,

This is a plea from us to you to help us get it right.

We acknowledge there are still some issues with our network that fall short of our aspirations, but in order to get to where we want to be – we need the help of you pioneers. We’ve had some great assistance from a lot of you already, thanks!

We take this very seriously, and no matter how issues are reported or by whom – we want to deal with them as quickly as possible so that our Electric Highway becomes the useful and reliable service we all want it to be. We’re on the same side.

Could I ask Electric Highway customers to continue to call us on 08000 302 302 or email us at fortheroad@ecotricity.co.uk with any issues? That would be really helpful and will give us the chance to actually see any faults through to a resolution, plus put support in place via Twitter etc.

This is new to us – we’re in the business of generating and supplying renewable energy. And there’s much for us to learn about getting that energy from the grid and into EVs.

Here’s what we’re going to do in the short-term:
Next week we’re sending engineers to each of our Charge Points to give them a thorough shakedown, identify any issues and fix them
We’re also producing clear instructions to be displayed on all our Charge Points
And, we’ve speeded up the investigation of how we can support our customers better – (inc via social media) and how quickly and effectively we can respond via other channels.
Please also bear with us while we investigate reported faults and modify the way we work – so that our Electric Highway can live up to all of our expectations and aspirations.

In the long-term, we plan to have things sorted so that there are no issues to be reported!

As a company campaigning for a better, cleaner world – this is part of our vision for the present – not just the future – a vision I think we all share.

I’m pretty sure that together we can fix this.

Thanks again
Paul

[fraccy]

yeh looks very similar, though the colours are different.

I never knew about that button, whats that do, a sort of reset? I was getting the same effect sliding the switch on the tesla connector.

[fraccy]

Have heard back from ecotricity. They suspect either my connector wasn't pushed in sufficiently, or that the post hadn't "reset" since the last user, recommending I should have pushed that button.

I'm pretty sure the connector was in fine, I did reconnect it several times. I repeated everything more than once, and the door was definitely closed when I arrived so I don't see how it wasn't reset..

... but anyway, will try pushing that button next time, will update here if I do.. but very interested to know if anyone else manages to use michael wood southbound or membury m4 westbound in the meantime? still half wondering if its something up with my mennekes cable or something.

[ecotricity]

I'm not sure anyone comes out of this cross-forum spat looking good, guys. Sure, the original point (namely there are some ecotricity sites not working) needed to be raised, but there isn't a need for name calling and you both represent professional organisations.

We have to remember that these are not closed fora, that the public do read them and that infighting between prominant EV proponents may have a (totally unfounded) negative influence on their purchasing decisions...

Hiya David - yes we're very aware of this. I actually came on here to help our customers. As I said - I won't be responding any more to Kevin - I had to make that clear otherwise people might think we were just ignoring the 'issues'. It's actually quite difficult to start, never mind maintain a conversation with anyone else though... I only saw your post by chance just now!

Cheers
Paul

[Kevin Sharpe]

I'm pretty sure the connector was in fine, I did reconnect it several times. I repeated everything more than once, and the door was definitely closed when I arrived so I don't see how it wasn't reset.

If I understand correctly the theory is that it was the previous user who upset the Charging Station and therefore it required a reset prior to your arrival. I suspect a reset means a site visit by the supplier based on the fact that a Type 2 cable got stuck in a Charging Station yesterday and they couldn't release it remotely for the Ampera driver.

Personally, I don't think it's possible for the connector to not seat in properly.... these things are pretty foolproof IMO.

but anyway, will try pushing that button next time, will update here if I do.. but very interested to know if anyone else manages to use michael wood southbound or membury m4 westbound in the meantime? still half wondering if its something up with my mennekes cable or something.

I've tried pushing this button at Green Park without success... unfortunately, this was before we started videoing the problem so can't provide any useful context.

When I approached Tesla about these issues they were adamant that they have not seen any problems in Europe with their Type 2 ("mennekes") cable.

I know that some Leaf drivers had problems and success with a Dostar cable and the Ampera driver yesterday was using an ITT cable and experienced both success and failure. Personally, I've had both success and failure with both the hcsharp and ITT Type 2 cables with my Tesla.

ZCW have invested a great deal of time and energy debugging these issues (especially with the supplier behind the scenes) and we are currently reviewing our commitment to this going forward. I think it's up to the EV community to decide how best to resource this effort.

[Kevin Sharpe]

yeh looks very similar, though the colours are different.

One thought.... when you plug in the Type 2 connector into the Charging Station is the slide switch on the Roadster connector in the "on" position?

[Kevin Sharpe]

For completeness here are the videos of charging success and failure at M6 Keele Services (where the Ampera cable got 'stuck'). As I'm sure you can imagine, documenting these failures is a time consuming task and I'm not sure how much resource ZCW will commit to this in future...