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I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

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Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#111

Post by hakfoo »

aidenn0 wrote: post #99

The payment thing just boggles my mind. I've been paying at card readers at a gas pump for 20 years now and exactly once did it not work. It's the one thing that has been completely solved in industry, and it doesn't work with EVs.

FWIW, I think the card industry itself is having to rethink a lot of stuff for EVs.

Petrol pumps with card readers are their own little universe of rules and compliance standards within the credit card industry (the formal term is 'Automated Fuel Dispenser'). It's far enough afield that you're looking at specialized software and vendors, in part because a lot of them support fleet cards, which range from "95% normal Visa/Mastercard, but restricted to a specific merchant category" to "completely different network with its own messaging model".

There's been a lot of new spec documents floating around to accomodate differences due to the EV fueling concepts. I suspect the ways we described petrol-- gallons and grades-- don't perfectly map to electricity, and fleet card customers are looking for similar trackability.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#112

Post by sbierwagen »

speps wrote: post #69

The Aging Wheels channel on YouTube has done a good field test between a Polestar 2 and a Tesla Model 3: https://youtu.be/92w5doU68D8

This description undersells it. The Tesla chargers work perfectly... and every single Charging America station he tries to visit is broken in some way. It's half an hour of pain and suffering.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#113

Post by smileysteve »

api wrote: post #98
nathanaldensr wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess, downvoted because you dared share an anecdote about how vulnerable EVs are in certain circumstances? It seems like people will have to relearn the hard way just why gasoline is probably the best energy storage medium ever invented.

Gasoline would suck just as bad without an extensive distribution network. This isn’t a technology problem. It’s a horse before the feed lot problem.

Except Tesla figured out the feed and nobody else has.

It's also a difficult investment for businesses (gas stations) because with ev adoption, everybody with 120v and a <60 mile daily commute is likely to charge at home 75% of the time

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#114

Post by noirbot »

snapetom wrote: post #87
DarmokJalad1701 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing against Teslas, but the issue is that reality is far from the vision proposed by proponents of EVs including governments and entrepreneurs. EVs are not reliable for long journeys. The person you replied to gave you a counter example which you ignore for ... reasons? All of the five issues you cite are basically non-existent for superchargers. As another anecdote, I have made multiple 1000+mile trips using t…

The reasons are obvious - it's not always possible to rent a Tesla, and in fact, it's usually not. Teslas are expensive compared to other electrics. Rental companies, and the world, are diversifying from Teslas, as we should. This cultish devotion to Tesla is baffling but not surprising.

I don't own or plan to own a Tesla, but the devotion shouldn't be surprising when they seem to have put the most effort and thought into making an EV that's actually functional. They definitely have issues, but most of their competition even now is either a fair bit worse, or even more expensive, or both.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#115

Post by bdcravens »

SkyPuncher wrote: post #59

I almost bought a KIA EV6 two weeks back. The thing that stood out to me was the unreal amount of broken chargers. Tesla charger always seemed to work, but the non-Tesla chargers were broken or slow charging an amazing amount of the time. * At the base level, it looked annoying. Repeating the charging process several times to find the "blessed" charger. You were lucky if the charger was actually labelled as broken. *…

I have an EV6, and have done a cross-country trip in it. In my limited experience (Texas to California and back, and then across Texas, which is a 200+ mile trip one way) the freeway chargers are pretty dependable, but the ones in the major cities are of lower quality.

That said, it is nerve-racking, and I do find myself stopping more often than necessary, "just in case" the next isn't in good condition. I do look forward to a better network like NACS.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#116

Post by p1mrx »

jandrese wrote: post #108

IMHO the state of the charging network is a major disincentive against buying any CCS equipped EV in the US. Fortunately over the next couple of years every company is switching to NACS and will in theory be able to use Tesla's charging network. This is not great news for the cars bought this year or next though, it would be like buying Betamax.

NACS will use the same signalling protocol as CCS, which means existing vehicles will be able to charge from NACS using a passive adapter.

CHAdeMO may be the new Betamax, but CCS is more like VHS-C.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#117

Post by smileysteve »

marssaxman wrote: post #89
chroma wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can charge Teslas at other charging stations. It’s just that other chargers are inconvenient and unreliable. You usually need an adapter. You have to pull out a credit card and maybe install an app on your phone. With the Tesla chargers you just plug in and everything’s billed automatically. Also Tesla’s navigation automatically adds charging stops for superchargers. You don’t have to do much thinking. Just drive…

I cannot imagine having to install an app just to use a car charger. What a nuisance!

But what about gas? Race track, loves, shell. They all offer gasoline discounts if you have their app.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#118

Post by bdcravens »

david422 wrote: post #55

I have an electric vehicle that I charge in my garage. One day that charger broke and I had to charge at other locations for several weeks. There are very few fast chargers in my area. When they were not in use, some were broken. This leaves a pretty big dilemma: My car is low on juice, where do I go? By the time I actually get to an unused charger, it might be taken, or it might be broken. As long as it's not broken…

Was it plugged into a standard 220 outlet? Since I bought mine and my wife's EVs last year, I've used a relatively cheap level 2 charger (about $200) and if it broke I'd Amazon a new replacement in a couple of days. (Perhaps that's the case, and I'm not judging anyone's circumstances; just pointing out that many seem to think the chargers are much more expensive, but the cheaper ones seem to work fine)

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#119

Post by rr808 »

jandrese wrote: post #108

IMHO the state of the charging network is a major disincentive against buying any CCS equipped EV in the US. Fortunately over the next couple of years every company is switching to NACS and will in theory be able to use Tesla's charging network. This is not great news for the cars bought this year or next though, it would be like buying Betamax.

Isn't it easy to have an adapter? Its weird that US is using NACS and Europe CCS, I guess it isn't much different to power socks.

Re: I visited over 120 EV chargers: why so many were broken

#120

Post by bdcravens »

ukd1 wrote: post #61
snapetom wrote: post #46

I have now rented two electric vehicles this past year, both for semi-long distance trips. The first was a Kia from SF to Sacramento, and back a few days later, thinking this was California and it should be fine. I tried to use twelve stations and seven were broken/out of order for various reasons. I was so shocked about the sad state of affairs on this, I logged/blogged it. The problems were pretty much like the art…

Try renting a Tesla next time; the network for charging is great, and I think I've only ever had one failure in years, and just moved stalls.

It's a few years away, but more and more manufacturers are moving to the Tesla standard.
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