Broken DC Flap Causes Bad Charging Day

[DerekS]

TLDR: Be careful not to break your DC flap inserting the Magic Dock (or any other CCS charger)

I decided to drive to Fort Worth this morning to try out the Magic Dock Supercharger.

I arrived with pretty low SoC and was a bit stressed, but hey these things work great right?

The app and dock worked, but charging immediately halted with an error.

I tried several times and it would not work. I also tried another stall.

At this point I am experiencing range panic for the first time. I limp to nearby Kroger with a Blink AC charger to find one stall can’t scan my card and the other just didn’t dispense any power.

I’m currently waiting for a tow to get it home and hopefully charge there before I assess further.

if that doesn’t work then I’ll have it towed to the dealer Monday morning.

I’m sorry I tried this.

EDIT: What I think happened here is I broke the DC flap while plugging in the Magic Dock, which put some plastic debris in the channel around the DC pins preventing a solid connection. Car is fine both AC/DC working as expected. I'll try it again one day but with more overhead for contingencies.

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[snstevens]

Sorry to hear your experience! Send an update if you go back.

 

[DerekS]

Sorry to hear your experience! Send an update if you go back.

I definitely will not.

I will try again, one day. I'm pretty sure I understand why my session failed and will make sure to have more overhead next time.

 

[DerekS]

I do wonder if my 150kW charger upgrade failed.
That will be difficult to assess.

 

[007]

That sucks!!

 

[Teufel Hund]

I decided to drive to Fort Worth this morning to try out the Magic Dock Supercharger.

I arrived with pretty low SoC and was a bit stressed, but hey these things work great right?

The app and dock worked, but charging immediately halted with an error.

I tried several times and it would not work. I also tried another stall.

At this point I am experiencing range panic for the first time. I limp to nearby Kroger with a Blink AC charger to find one stall can’t scan my card and the other just didn’t dispense any power.

I’m currently waiting for a tow to get it home and hopefully charge there before I assess further.

if that doesn’t work then I’ll have it towed to the dealer Monday morning.

I’m sorry I tried this.

Oh man. Sorry to hear about this. I think a lot of people would have had the expectation that the Tesla Magic Dock would have worked. Unfortunate lesson learned I suppose. Hope you get home soon and it sorted out Derek.

 

[DerekS]

I think it absolutely should have worked. Lots of people on PlugShare reported success with CCS vehicles.

 

[Teufel Hund]

I think it absolutely should have worked. Lots of people on PlugShare reported success with CCS vehicles.

Yeah so hard to say whether it was a fluke with the charger or like you are wondering if it’s your 400V/150kW hardware. I suppose your dealership should be able to determine that.

 

[DerekS]

Yeah so hard to say whether it was a fluke with the charger or like you are wondering if it’s your 400V/150kW hardware. I suppose your dealership should be able to determine that.

My goals right now:

1. Get it home
2. Attempt to AC charge, which hopefully works
3. If I can get a healthy charge on the car, try a DC charger to confirm that still works. If not, dealer Monday morning and I’ll expect a very long period without it.

 

[Teufel Hund]

My goals right now:

1. Get it home
2. Attempt to AC charge, which hopefully works
3. If I can get a healthy charge on the car, try a DC charger to confirm that still works. If not, dealer Monday morning and I’ll expect a very long period without it.

Good luck! Hope all is well with the car. You’ve already had a huge headache with this so hopefully it’s not worse.

 

[DerekS]

Good luck! Hope all is well with the car. You’ve already had a huge headache with this so hopefully it’s not worse.

Thanks! I’m actually optimistic. The blink charger that refused to work is apparently decommissioned according to PlugShare. I bet it charges right up at the house.

 

[007]

Is Porsche assistance towing you or AAA or someone else?

 

[Leawood CT]

What a bummer. I hope that when you get it home the charger lights right up and all is good again. Good luck Derek!!

 

[DerekS]

Is Porsche assistance towing you or AAA or someone else?

I called 1-800-PORSCHE to get a good flatbed.
Nearly $500 to get it towed to my house. Free to a Porsche dealer, but they are all closed today.

The car just made it home and thankfully is charging successfully at home, so at least that still works! Will assess fast DC after it gets a healthy charge.

There were a couple of screwups today:

1. Me - I pushed it way too close going to the Supercharger. I had full trust it would work.
2. Porsche - Their GPS should not have listed the Blink charger that was decommissioned and out of service. I could have tried an alternate within the same range.
3. Me/Tesla - The Magic Dock broke my DC charging flap; it no longer stays down on its own.

My hope here is that the broken flap (which did result in a piece of plastic in the DC channel) was the cause for the Supercharger failure. I'll know more later.

This is my all time record low Soc!

 

[DerekS]