On-board charger replacement options @ yellow Electrical System Fault @ out of warranty?

[DannyD]

Hello. Yes, I know this is the 999th topic, pardon me, but I want a discussion about the on-board charger replacement (what I believe to be the culprit) for a car out of warranty.

Bought a used 2021 4S (with 22kw onboard charger) few days ago and after I plugged my 1.9kw* (see P.S.) single-phased AC charger for the first time, the charging process started acting weird: the remaining estimated range started to increase by +1km every second, then after 10 seconds it started to decrease, then the house fuse tripped. Then the dreaded yellow Electrical System Fault. Imagine my horror.

Problem is the error is accompanied by car being stuck (can't enter drive/reverse) and the error won't disappear on itself, even hours after waiting and/or resetting the car and/or disconnecting the 12v battery and/or doing a two-fingers reset. From reading so many topics, my sunday-evening-conclusion is that the on-board charger is dead and is causing the permanent yellow error.

I read about many people going through multiple OBC replacements, but I assume all under warranty. What about those out of warranty? How are you dealing with having the on-board charger replaced (over and over?)? Going to the dealer tomorrow, but... what should I do if this is the case? Just accept the replacement cost, maybe over and over? What about the recent recalls regarding battery/etc, could those aid me in supporting these costs? Any chance?

*P.S.: Why did I try such a low kw charger!? Been hearing about so many fails, wanted to "start safe" (lol. was probably too safe)

Sponsored

 

[chun]

This is solved by resetting the 12v battery usually.

Unplug it, leave it 30seconds-2minutes, replug it, and all should be fine.

Maybe try a stronger connection, or have an electrician install one if you don't have. But definitely don't attempt again exactly what just tripped your house fuse and your car.

Also, the porsche charger has the option to configure your charging speed, and what kind of connection you will use.

The 22kw onboard charger is prone to failure, and porsche does not offer it for sale as an upgrade or as an option on new cars anymore. The only use existing stock for warranty work.

 

[W1NGE]

Hello. Yes, I know this is the 999th topic, pardon me, but I want a discussion about the on-board charger replacement (what I believe to be the culprit) for a car out of warranty.

Bought a used 2021 4S (with 22kw onboard charger) few days ago and after I plugged my 1.9kw* (see P.S.) single-phased AC charger for the first time, the charging process started acting weird: the remaining estimated range started to increase by +1km every second, then after 10 seconds it started to decrease, then the house fuse tripped. Then the dreaded yellow Electrical System Fault. Imagine my horror.

Problem is the error is accompanied by car being stuck (can't enter drive/reverse) and the error won't disappear on itself, even hours after waiting and/or resetting the car and/or disconnecting the 12v battery and/or doing a two-fingers reset. From reading so many topics, my sunday-evening-conclusion is that the on-board charger is dead and is causing the permanent yellow error.

I read about many people going through multiple OBC replacements, but I assume all under warranty. What about those out of warranty? How are you dealing with having the on-board charger replaced (over and over?)? Going to the dealer tomorrow, but... what should I do if this is the case? Just accept the replacement cost, maybe over and over? What about the recent recalls regarding battery/etc, could those aid me in supporting these costs? Any chance?

*P.S.: Why did I try such a low kw charger!? Been hearing about so many fails, wanted to "start safe" (lol. was probably too safe)

Your AC EVSE power output is way too low.

13A 3kW would be the minimum recommended.

 

[DannyD]

Your AC EVSE power output is way too low.

13A 3kW would be the minimum recommended.

Would you consider this a possible reason of the fail?

 

[chun]

Would you consider this a possible reason of the fail?

Yes

 

[chun]

from an electric standpoint, I don't see the problem in charging at low Amps-Kw/h.
also, if I slide the Amps to the minimum, the porsche charger has 6A as minimum (so in my case, 1.4kw/h) and it's also the minimum suggested..can't go lower anyway!

Porsche themselves don't recommend charging at such low speeds.
I remember there being a TSB about it.

 

[Shug]

If you are looking for an innovative solution that side steps Porsche, possibly fitting a used charger from a damaged car, you need to be aware that the on-board charger has something called component protection on it.

Component protection can only be removed by someone that has access to the online Porsche PIWIS system to code the charger to your car.

The purpose of this is to ensure that stolen parts are not fitted to your car.

I have heard that component protection can be removed with the engineering application within PIWIS, but not seen how this could be done.

There are specialists that have access to the online Porsche PPN system that provides an ability to remove component protection, but you would need to have all the agreements in place first since anyone with PPN access will not risk coding a stolen part to your car.

In conclusion, you are unlikely to find a solution that completely removes Porsche from the repair of the on-board charger.

 

[chun]

Just to clarify for OP, if it's not red error, likey not broken. You won't have to replace the charger or charging port or anything. And if you did, warranty would cover it.

Try resetting the 12v battery, don't charge at such small speed again.

Ask an electrician to install you a stronger connection.

 

[W1NGE]

Would you consider this a possible reason of the fail?

It could well be.

 

[W1NGE]

Just to clarify for OP, if it's not red error, likey not broken. You won't have to replace the charger or charging port or anything. And if you did, warranty would cover it.

Try resetting the 12v battery, don't charge at such small speed again.

Ask an electrician to install you a stronger connection.

If you read the original post the OP already tried that.

 

[chun]

If you read the original post the OP already tried that.

My bad.

Since you are paying out of pocket @DannyD , absolutely do not get the 22kwh anymore, get the 11kwh. The 22kw has been discontinued and not offered as an option because it failed all the time. In switzlerand they have stock of it only for warranty work, and directly advice against the paid upgrade to it if you ask about it.

 

[tycanmt]

I plugged my 1.9kw* (see P.S.) single-phased AC charger for the first time, the charging process started acting weird: the remaining estimated range started to increase by +1km every second, then after 10 seconds it started to decrease, then the house fuse tripped. Then the dreaded yellow Electrical System Fault. Imagine my horror.

I don't know anything about this system, so I'm theorizing as an electronic engineer and software developer and Taycan owner:

1. Charge control software may have unstable areas at the edge of the envelope -- imagine it has a control loop where it computes, say, HV charge current every second based on a bunch of parameters. If that software ends up suffering quantization errors, or some other unforeseen math failure, other code that's likely present that aims to stop the charging algorithm doing "weird stuff" might step in and shut things down for safety reasons.

2. Tripping a circuit breaker indicates a building wiring problem. Shouldn't be possible to draw so much current from an outlet that the building breaker trips. It's quite likely that the charge control software can't always cope gracefully with sudden power loss. It may either be designed to put the car into an inoperable state (for safety reasons), or that might happen as a side effect of stale/corrupt data left after the power loss.

Therefore the advice to hard reset seems good (might cure any corrupt data/intention inoperable state). But I'd also resolve whatever wiring problem led to the breaker trip. And I'd try charging at at least 220V/10A to move out of any weird charging envelope that you might have been exercising down at 2KW.

 

[Gino]

if they have an internal bulletin, but nothing on the car's manual, it's not my problem!
charger says minimum 6A so if something happens at 6A, it's not my fault..
also, the Porsche Home Energy Manager, manages the recharging speed and it goes even that low..

The idea that charging at the lowest charging rate Porsche has built into it’s own charger capabilities will damage the charger or the battery is complete nonsense.
I’m an electrical engineer in the semiconductor industry for the past 30+ years and the only reason charging at the lowest rate offered by Porsche could cause failures is if Porsche designed it incorrectly or the manufacturer built it with substandard components which fail over long charging periods.
8 years or 100,000 miles should be enough time to determine if the chargers are a faulty design or have chronic failures.
If they do fail at any charge rate it will be Porsche’s problem under warranty which is why I purchased the extended warranty on the vehicle so that both my main battery as well as the entire vehicle coverage lasts until Jan 2030.
By then any chronic parts failures will have been corrected with components which do meet Porsche’s life expectancy.
Without the extended warranty you are flying without a net.
Even for charging at 120V at 10A which is low voltage but higher current than 220V at 6A there are no issues with using the Porsche charger at 120V for long periods beyond 12 hours as Porsche stated in a Service Bulletin back in early 2022.
Porsche advised me my vehicle charging system has no issues with charging at 120V based on their analysis & testing of my VIN.
They stated clearly there is no risk of fire, increased battery degradation or charging system (external or on-board) by charging albeit so incredibly slow at 120V.
They said I can charge to 100% saying there is no risk of fire for my VIN charging to 100% at 120V, 220V or DC fast charging.
They did say charging to 80-85% instead of 100% could prolong the life of the battery but gave no figures to quantify the amount of battery degradation if charging to 100% routinely.
My 2021 CPO had 30K miles on it and was charged to 100% by the previous owner (Porsche sales manager) every day on his 100 mile commute.
The battery range had dropped from 225 at delivery to 205 today, roughly 3.4 years after delivery.
That’s a range loss of 10%.
I have not lost any range in the last 10K miles over 14 months so it appears the battery degradation has plateaued for the moment but I’ll be interested to see what happens over the next 4.6 years until my warranty expires.
Just to be a bit careful, I typically only charge to 85% unless we’re going on a long trip since 160 miles is plenty of miles for us in a week since we have 3 other vehicles between my wife & I to drive when we’re actually in town.
I highly doubt our battery will suffer any significant degradation in range when we only charge to 85% once a week at the most.
Our Taycan is basically living the life of a retired Porsche where the only thing we do during some weeks is just take it to get the dust cleaned off to be ready for the next joy ride…

 

[DannyD]

Got the official conclusion: it's the on-board charger ?

Since you are paying out of pocket @DannyD , absolutely do not get the 22kwh anymore, get the 11kwh. The 22kw has been discontinued and not offered as an option because it failed all the time. In switzlerand they have stock of it only for warranty work, and directly advice against the paid upgrade to it if you ask about it.

I asked them and they say there's no possibility of installing a 11kw charger if the car is configured with the 22kw charger. Anyone has any input on this, if it's real or not?

 

[chun]

Got the official conclusion: it's the on-board charger ?

I asked them and they say there's no possibility of installing a 11kw charger if the car is configured with the 22kw charger. Anyone has any input on this, if it's real or not?

Likely real, as they would have to replace several parts to install a 11kw, and they don't want to.
But that preatty much locks you into their warranty forever, otherwise when it barakes next time, you have to pay from your pocket. And it will lickely brake again.
So a porsche approved warranty is preatty much mandatory

Sponsored