Just Charged at a Electrify America for the first time......Not Impressed

[carlos31820]

For some reason, I've found that my EA attempts fail unless I do things in this order...

Before plugging in, initiate a charge on the EA app by looking up the stall, etc. Once I do that, the EA stall will prompt me to plug into car and that seems to work fine.

Whenever I plug in first and try it, 9 out of 10 times things time out and the car fails to charge and the EA stall gets stuck in a "In use" state in the app so I have to move stalls.

 

[davewill]

One thing to remember about third party DC chargers is that the advertised max rate is only at the maximum voltage that the charger can put out. Since Teslas (and most other EVs) charge at a lower voltage, the practical limit is less. For example 50kW chargers typically top out at 42kW when charging a Tesla.

 

[RichAZ/CapeCod]

I have used EA chargers a pretty fair amount. First with our Chevy Bolt (traded it for a M3 SR last year) then when we traveled from AZ~Cape Cod~AZ in our MY (so I could write about the experience in my book on EVs).

Not a well run operation. My wife had enough eventually and said "no more EA stops!!" She was right.

My staff at an EA station.

Staff confused as to why no gas was coming out of the hose...

 

[tga]

One thing to remember about third party DC chargers is that the advertised max rate is only at the maximum voltage that the charger can put out. Since Teslas (and most other EVs) charge at a lower voltage, the practical limit is less. For example 50kW chargers typically top out at 42kW when charging a Tesla.

The Tesla chademo adapter is limited to 125A, so the only way you could pull 50kW from a chademo would be at 400V, at which point the battery is (probably) to full to take 50kW, anyway.

I haven't tried the chademo adapter with the new Y, but on the S, chademo sessions would start at <40kW if the battery voltage was low and the session was current limited by the adapter. As the battery charged and voltage increased, the power delivered to the car would climb. Eventually as the battery fills, the charge session becomes current limited, and current starts to drop from 125A and power delivery drops.

Tesla still had the chademo adapter listed on the Australia site, and it says 43kW max:

CHAdeMO Adapter

Take advantage of the global network of DC charging stations by enabling onboard hardware and purchasing with an external adapter. CHAdeMO stations enable charging at up to 43 kW or 108 km of range per half hour. For Model S without Supercharging enabled, onboard hardware must be activated to...

shop.tesla.com

 

[tga]

Tesla still had the chademo adapter listed on the Australia site, and it says 43kW max:

I tested my '23 Y with my old Chademo adapter this weekend and got 43kW max. Then I switched to CCS w/ the new Tesla adapter and then a supercharger and got ~70kW on both, so it was clearly capable of taking more than the 43kW the Chademo delivered.

 

[davewill]

I tested my '23 Y with my old Chademo adapter this weekend and got 43kW max. Then I switched to CCS w/ the new Tesla adapter and then a supercharger and got ~70kW on both, so it was clearly capable of taking more than the 43kW the Chademo delivered.

Yeah, the CHAdeMO standard can go higher, but the adapter is limited to that 43kW. Not that it matters very much as almost all of the CHAdeMO plugs in the U.S. are the 50kW variety, anyway.

 

[Silicon Desert]

As a GM Bolt owner I feel your pain. We used the EA charges a few times when I first owned the Bolt. After that I refused to take it beyond the range of the car (160 mile round trip). I always charge my Bolt at home.
Now with my new Model Y I don't worry about trips or range anxiety.

yea and you are likely paying a much lower residential price than you pay at an outside charger

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

One thing to remember about third party DC chargers is that the advertised max rate is only at the maximum voltage that the charger can put out. Since Teslas (and most other EVs) charge at a lower voltage, the practical limit is less. For example 50kW chargers typically top out at 42kW when charging a Tesla.

For DCFC in a "400V" EV you want to know the max amperage of the chargers since that's what is controlled. A bit different for 800V vehicles.

There would sometimes be 50kW chargers that were only 100A.

 

[ElectricWolff]

I just saw that if you buy or lease a Kia EV9, Electrify America gives you 1000 kW charging. I think that's funny as hell, considering their charge stations don't work a lot of the time. You'll be hard pressed to get your 1000 kilowatts