Some California Superchargers not providing maximum charging rates

[No2DinosaurFuel]

For those recommending reporting, I think tesla, at this point, doesn't care. Either they are working on a solution or not. But extra reporting doesn't seem to be helping. I report it all the time. There are others that report it all the time. It is plenty clear here in the forum.

Like I said before they won't admit or react to anything unless it will affect their pocket books. The only way I can see now is we need to get the media to report this and spin it like how getting the Chevy bolt is not that bad in CA because the superchargers in CA are broken anyways. So the DC SAE combo might have as fast or faster charging rate than the supercharger in CA.

 

[apacheguy]

Given that California is Teslas home state and their largest market in North America they should be doing their damnedest to fix this issue ASAP.

5) If it's to protect the car's battery, then run cooling system on max before and during supercharging.

The current taper algo on the 85s never runs the battery too warm even on hot days. However, I have previously suggested something similar:

Supercharging: Chill Mode

 

[ecarfan]

Richard I hope you called Tesla to report. The only way this problem is solved is if every owner who has a problem calls every single time they have a problem.

That sounds like a reasonable course of action to me.

 

[wdolson]

As an engineer who has to deal with problems that crop up and is dealing with one of these sorts of problems in our software right now. These sorts of problems can be like watching a duck on a pond. From the surface it doesn't look like much is going on, but from below the surface there is a lot of activity.

Sometimes these problems are easy to find and fix. Everybody's happy and the engineer is a hero. Sometimes these problems are complex and not easy to figure out. Heat damage analysis and correction is a special discipline all in itself because it can get very involved. Another issue that could be at play is stray currents going somewhere and causing damage. That's another special discipline.

Neither of these are my area of expertise, but as the poor sod who is at the bottom of the sewage hill when these things happen, more frequent complaints usually just slow down the process rather than get it fixed faster.

Tesla experimented with the liquid cooled cables, but it appears that didn't do the job. I also talked to the tech at Manteca while he was working on the superchargers. Tesla is fully aware there is a problem and they are putting effort into figuring out the best fix. It's frustrating as an end user, but like the ducks in the above analogy, I'm pretty sure there is a lot going on under the surface.

Because the media is quick to go FUD on any Tesla story with any negative spin, it's no wonder Tesla is cautious to talk about anything that isn't going right.

 

[wdolson]

5) If it's to protect the car's battery, then run cooling system on max before and during supercharging.

6) Build more superchargers in CA.

Just a quick point, have you been in a Tesla after a few minutes of supercharging? The first time I was I thought something was wrong because a whole lot of things turned on and were roaring at full blast to keep the battery cool.

And Tesla is building more superchargers in CA, so that's ongoing too.

 

[whttiger25]

As an engineer who has to deal with problems that crop up and is dealing with one of these sorts of problems in our software right now. These sorts of problems can be like watching a duck on a pond. From the surface it doesn't look like much is going on, but from below the surface there is a lot of activity.

Sometimes these problems are easy to find and fix. Everybody's happy and the engineer is a hero. Sometimes these problems are complex and not easy to figure out. Heat damage analysis and correction is a special discipline all in itself because it can get very involved. Another issue that could be at play is stray currents going somewhere and causing damage. That's another special discipline.

Neither of these are my area of expertise, but as the poor sod who is at the bottom of the sewage hill when these things happen, more frequent complaints usually just slow down the process rather than get it fixed faster.

Tesla experimented with the liquid cooled cables, but it appears that didn't do the job. I also talked to the tech at Manteca while he was working on the superchargers. Tesla is fully aware there is a problem and they are putting effort into figuring out the best fix. It's frustrating as an end user, but like the ducks in the above analogy, I'm pretty sure there is a lot going on under the surface.

Because the media is quick to go FUD on any Tesla story with any negative spin, it's no wonder Tesla is cautious to talk about anything that isn't going right.

As mentioned before by someone, it sounds like some customers are pretty close to bringing the story to the media. Most customers, including myself, haven't been lucky enough to talk to a technician willing to be open about what's happening. Better for Tesla to work with customers to make them feel taken care of rather than ignored....

 

[ecarfan]

it sounds like some customers are pretty close to bringing the story to the media

Those in "the media" who follow Tesla closely likely have been reading this thread for some time now.

 

[No2DinosaurFuel]

Just a quick point, have you been in a Tesla after a few minutes of supercharging? The first time I was I thought something was wrong because a whole lot of things turned on and were roaring at full blast to keep the battery cool.

And Tesla is building more superchargers in CA, so that's ongoing too.

Yup the car cooling was going full blast at the AZ supercharger. Yuma and casa grande to be exact. The ones in CA the fan would turn on but not as hard. Then it ramps up. But it would not be the same level as the one in AZ. Again it is not charging as fast so there is no need to turn on the fan as hard.

This would point to problematic charger as oppose to my car. The car is just dumb and responding to the heat as generated in the car. The problem IMO is mostly on the charger side. They need to liquid cool everything.

 

[Ulmo]

And Tesla is building more superchargers in CA, so that's ongoing too.

EV Trip Planner has a button for "stop at every Super Charger". Your mention of Tesla building more SuperChargers made me think that this stopping at every SuperCharger along a route might make sense as a bandaid to deal with the slow SuperCharger problem, to try to always have enough energy to skip the next SuperCharger, then try to stop at it anyway, always having at least twice the next distance available. That means a lot more stops, but it also means you can work around slow charging issues by spending the "minimum" time at each slow charging SuperCharger as you feel comfortable with, in order to skip the next charger if it is also slow. This will also allow dealing with skipping broken, full or otherwise closed SuperCharger locations.

 

[whttiger25]

EV Trip Planner has a button for "stop at every Super Charger". Your mention of Tesla building more SuperChargers made me think that this stopping at every SuperCharger along a route might make sense as a bandaid to deal with the slow SuperCharger problem, to try to always have enough energy to skip the next SuperCharger, then try to stop at it anyway, always having at least twice the next distance available. That means a lot more stops, but it also means you can work around slow charging issues by spending the "minimum" time at each slow charging SuperCharger as you feel comfortable with, in order to skip the next charger if it is also slow. This will also allow dealing with skipping broken, full or otherwise closed SuperCharger locations.

Sounds like quite a band-aid!

Regardless I experience throttling at 90% of the superchargers I visit so it doesn't really matter.

 

[Gizmotoy]

Took a trip down to SoCal this past weekend and saw reduced rates at both Harris Ranch and Hawthorne. Hawthorne was strange because it started off normally, but then a new car showed up and my charging got interrupted the second they plugged in. When I unplugged and plugged back in, it wanted to charge at 20kW or so. I moved to another stall and it worked fine at about the expected rate. Similar behavior at Harris Ranch, but it was 30kW there. Tejon Ranch had a broken stall.

I reported it the first time but it sounded like the answer was essentially "I dunno, try another stall" so didn't report the others.

I did OK because it wasn't crowded, but if there were lines it could have been an issue.

 

[FlatSix911]

This does not help ... Barstow, CA Tesla Supercharger Vandalized Before Thanksgiving Weekend

 

[jeffro01]

This does not help ... Barstow, CA Tesla Supercharger Vandalized Before Thanksgiving Weekend

Wow...

Jeff

 

[Bet TSLA]

DC is harder to step up or down. DC to DC converters can do it, but it's a more complex thing than a transformer. DC/DC converters were also uncommon until about 25 years ago because they were expensive. Better semi-conductor tech has made them cheaper, but they are still more complex than a transformer. Tesla converts the AC to DC as close as possible to the SpC, but they still need to run high voltage and current from near the transformer to the car.

Well, there's a bit of talk in the Santa Ana supercharger thread about possible technology changes, maybe a transformer in each pedestal. Tesla might be experimenting with improved solutions. Maybe there will be some hint when it opens.

 

[aesculus]

As reported in some other threads we just completed a round trip across Northern NV. Stopped at all of them on I80 at least once, most twice. We only had other cars at one charging stop. Every charge was well over 300 mph rate. It was wonderful.

 

[Haggy]

No kidding - Cali has some spoiled Tesla owners - you named off more superchargers than we have in our whole tri-state area and we have two of the three wealthiest counties in the country (which should mean we have plenty of Tesla adopters)

I would love to wait 20 minutes for the juice!

I don't have any more accurate numbers than anybody else, but if 50-60% of domestic Tesla sales are in California, then having as many chargers in California as in the rest of the country combined would leave California at an unfair disadvantage. Considering that the Bay Area and the Los Angeles area likely have more than half the Teslas sold in California, then there should probably be about 90 superchargers on the route between them to have the equivalent capacity of the rest of the country. I apologize if my estimates are off or my numbers on where sales are isn't current, but anybody can feel free to step in and adjust them. Either way, I think that if the Bay Area and LA area each had ten times as many superchargers as they have now, we'd be fair in saying that the rest of the US was spoiled.

I don't live in one of the wealthiest counties in the country, and only about 7% of new vehicles in my city are EVs. On the top 20 list for California, that puts me somewhere close to the bottom. And there are no superchargers in my city. Places like Berkeley have about the same percentage of EVs as Mountain View, but there are no superchargers in Berkeley, Oakland, San Francisco, or anything on the east side of the Bay heading from Fremont up 880 continuing on up to 80 all the way to Napa.

This goes beyond having chargers where I live though, because I'm talking about two areas 400 miles away from each other, and if you go from either one to the other, you will have problems once you get there and need a charge. The ones that could be near me would be for people who visit the area, not for me personally.

It's easy to tell whether the area you live in has a lot of Tesla adopters. When you are driving on a freeway and you look at traffic in the opposite direction, if you can count to 60 without seeing one pass in the other direction, you don't have many.

 

[whttiger25]

It's easy to tell whether the area you live in has a lot of Tesla adopters. When you are driving on a freeway and you look at traffic in the opposite direction, if you can count to 60 without seeing one pass in the other direction, you don't have many.

With autopilot activated, I assume?

 

[apacheguy]

Agree. California superchargers should receive the highest priority because that's where the demand is.

 

[wdolson]

I don't have any more accurate numbers than anybody else, but if 50-60% of domestic Tesla sales are in California, then having as many chargers in California as in the rest of the country combined would leave California at an unfair disadvantage. Considering that the Bay Area and the Los Angeles area likely have more than half the Teslas sold in California, then there should probably be about 90 superchargers on the route between them to have the equivalent capacity of the rest of the country. I apologize if my estimates are off or my numbers on where sales are isn't current, but anybody can feel free to step in and adjust them. Either way, I think that if the Bay Area and LA area each had ten times as many superchargers as they have now, we'd be fair in saying that the rest of the US was spoiled.

I don't live in one of the wealthiest counties in the country, and only about 7% of new vehicles in my city are EVs. On the top 20 list for California, that puts me somewhere close to the bottom. And there are no superchargers in my city. Places like Berkeley have about the same percentage of EVs as Mountain View, but there are no superchargers in Berkeley, Oakland, San Francisco, or anything on the east side of the Bay heading from Fremont up 880 continuing on up to 80 all the way to Napa.

This goes beyond having chargers where I live though, because I'm talking about two areas 400 miles away from each other, and if you go from either one to the other, you will have problems once you get there and need a charge. The ones that could be near me would be for people who visit the area, not for me personally.

It's easy to tell whether the area you live in has a lot of Tesla adopters. When you are driving on a freeway and you look at traffic in the opposite direction, if you can count to 60 without seeing one pass in the other direction, you don't have many.

According to this 42.5% of US Tesla sales in 2015 were in California:
California Plug-in Sales Led The US Last Year With Nearly Five-Times Greater Market Share - HybridCars.com

There are a number of CHaDEMO chargers around and once a CCS adapter is available, Teslas will be able to use those too. Where CCS or CHaDEMO fall down on the job Tesla could start offering paid charging in cities at a lower speed than the highway superchargers. Once they have the payment system in place it wouldn't be difficult to start installing half speed superchargers that are pay as you go at someplace city dwellers would likely go to like Trader Joe's.

I don't know about California locations, but Portland has lots of chargers for people who are going to most tourist attraction or a civic event. Even the airport has chargers and the Rose Quarter where the convention center is as well as a couple of arenas has a large number of EV chargers. If you're going to be 3-4 hours at a sporting event, a 40A 240V AC charger would be enough for most people who need a charge to get home. Anyone going further would be stopping at a supercharger after leaving the metro area anyway.

 

[Tony8489]

I agree that Tesla should build "metrochargers" in dense areas like the Bay Area and SoCal that are pay for all users. This will be necessary in any case with Model 3 volume, which will include more apartment dwellers with no home charging. And if I were passing through on a trip, I'd rather pay for an immediate charge that wait in a line for free charging.

Thankfully I have not had to wait for a supercharger yet but my most frequent travel route up 395 to Mammoth doesn't have the volume that the drive to the Bay area does. That lower volume perhaps is why I'm not reading about slow charges at Mojave, Inyokern, Lone Pine and Mammoth yet either.

As finally get colder weather it will be interesting to see if the slow supercharging problem fades during the winter. But since the problem seems to be mostly due to intensive continuous use, my guess is not that much. Tesla needs to fix this before we have another summer to exacerbate the problem. .