Nightmare at Electrify America

[electric9925]

On Thursday my wife and I took our first trip in the Taycan we planned it out well, we’d just have to stop once to charge on the way to Pennsylvania and charge back at the same Electrify America Station we charged at originally in NJ.

Going there was fine, it was around 30 degrees F when we got to charge in NJ. Charged okay, at 87 kW, and then we head nicely to our destination.

Nightmare begins on our way back, at this point In Pennsylvania it is 1 degree F, Taycan range had around 100 miles, but the charging station was 64 miles away so we were sure we were fine.
I suppose because of how much we had to use the HVAC we got to the station with around 20 miles left, no problem though because we’ll charge and go.

Except when I plugged in I only received 20 kW, weird but I figured since the battery was 50 degrees it was to cold for a proper charge. Left it, and all of a sudden it dropped to 0.2 kw, essentially not charging, tried a few other ports same problem. Other cars were there but their chargers worked fine, I even tried theirs after they left and same problem, charged at 20 kw for a while then dropped to 0.2. Called electrify America, nothing they can do.

The battery at this point was also 70 degrees and still same issue. I was able to get to a different charger and it charged fine.

But my question Is what did I do wrong? Was I supposed to pre-heat battery? But even so, the battery was warmed up and the charger didn’t work seemingly only for my car, but at another station it did.

Not sure what to think but if anyone has any advice on how can I avoid this happening again I’d appreciate it.

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[Clod Reed]

On Thursday my wife and I took our first trip in the Taycan we planned it out well, we’d just have to stop once to charge on the way to Pennsylvania and charge back at the same Electrify America Station we charged at originally in NJ.

Going there was fine, it was around 30 degrees F when we got to charge in NJ. Charged okay, at 87 kW, and then we head nicely to our destination.

Nightmare begins on our way back, at this point In Pennsylvania it is 1 degree F, Taycan range had around 100 miles, but the charging station was 64 miles away so we were sure we were fine.
I suppose because of how much we had to use the HVAC we got to the station with around 20 miles left, no problem though because we’ll charge and go.

Except when I plugged in I only received 20 kW, weird but I figured since the battery was 50 degrees it was to cold for a proper charge. Left it, and all of a sudden it dropped to 0.2 kw, essentially not charging, tried a few other ports same problem. Other cars were there but their chargers worked fine, I even tried theirs after they left and same problem, charged at 20 kw for a while then dropped to 0.2. Called electrify America, nothing they can do.

The battery at this point was also 70 degrees and still same issue. I was able to get to a different charger and it charged fine.

But my question Is what did I do wrong? Was I supposed to pre-heat battery? But even so, the battery was warmed up and the charger didn’t work seemingly only for my car, but at another station it did.

Not sure what to think but if anyone has any advice on how can I avoid this happening again I’d appreciate it.

 

[Tooney]

Advice: (In US) Plan your trip so that when you stop at a DC fast charging site, you have enough range to reach the next DC fast charging site along your route as a backup.

In US, you cannot rely on getting a charge at a planned DC fast charge site. You need enough remaining range to reach a backup site.

 

[wemct]

@electric9925 - here is a link to a Youtube video regarding deep freeze charging of an EV. The video involves a Tesla, but is applicable to all EVs.

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