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-20C : Our Tesla will not charge
- Thread starter SmartElectric
- Start date
mknox
Well-Known Member
I have had problems like that in the past. Every time it was the UMC and Tesla replaced it. I installed a HPWC last fall and it has been rock solid (he says knocking on wood!).
Question: When you say the charge port is "blue" are you seeing it change from "white" (which on my car looks like light blue) to dark blue after it clicks and locks?
Question: When you say the charge port is "blue" are you seeing it change from "white" (which on my car looks like light blue) to dark blue after it clicks and locks?
beeeerock
Active Member
I don't think I saw mention of whether you have a single or dual charger setup in your car... presumably 'single'? Out of interest, does anyone know what would happen if the first charger failed in a dual charger car? Would the second one be taken off-line too, or continue to function?
ArtInCT
Always Learning
Jerry33 is totally correct. I asked my local SC service manager this exact question a while ago, thinking that the second charger could give me some higher availability.
It does not provide higher availability but does provide more throughput into the battery at greater than 40 amps up to 80 amps... he told me that 50 get you about ~ 25 amps on
each charger...
beeeerock
Active Member
That's really unfortunate. It would be nice if the second charger provided redundancy as well as additional charge rate.
Andyw2100
Well-Known Member
Just found this thread. Read through it, like a mystery, expecting to find the answer at the end, since the Tuesday in question was almost a week ago. Was surprised to find no update with what the problem turned out to be.
So...WHAT WAS IT?
Hi folks, I'm back, and so is our Tesla.
Sat Feb 13 to Monday Feb 15:
Tesla wouldn't charge in -20C cold snap.
Many attempts made to resolve between .
Tues Feb 16:
It was -10C in the morning, car still would not accept charge, I unplugged and re-plugged in, pressed the button on the charge screen to force charging, etc.
So I drove it into Tesla Service a 25 km (just under 40 minutes in traffic) trip. During the trip, the regen braking went from completely disabled, to just about 60 kW (almost fully enabled) by the time I arrived.
I picked up an Audi rental car and went to work. The Audi, being a gas car, was a pathetic driving experience. Yuck. I realize it's cheaper for Tesla than keeping around a loaner fleet, so I understand.
I checked on the car periodically during the day, and found they had plugged it into a 40A capable charging system. My UMC and adaptor is only 32A capable, so I know for a fact they weren't charging the car on my equipment.
Tesla checked on the car that day and informed me the car would accept a charge. They couldn't find any faults/errors in the logs. I pressed them further, stating I wouldn't accept "it just works" as an acceptable investigation result. I also notified them that they should actually test charging using my cord and adaptors, as they clearly were not. Later that day, I did see the car charging at 32A, so at least they checked a few more things.
Tesla was unable to find a 10-30 receptacle to test the same adaptor and UMC I use in my garage. Note that I use 10-30 to limit the current to 24A due to limitations in my garage wiring which I will be solving in summer 2016 by trenching in larger gauge wire.
Wed Feb 17:
Tesla informed me they performed additional service on the vehicle, including tire rotation, fluid check and seatbelt recall checks. They also updated the firmware to 7.1, which is something I had requested as the car never prompted for 7.1, even after a month more than anyone else I knew on the forum.
Tesla informed me the battery had reached -23C during the cold snap, and that the battery would not accept charge at that temperature. Upon further discussions, including emails and phone calls, it became clear that Tesla could not explain why my car could not warm the battery to sufficient temperature to charge, even though the car was plugged in for the entire stretch of 3+ days.
Thurs Feb 18:
Discovered the Audi rental car had been patched together with duct tape (not kidding) and zip ties to hold under-body plastic panels together, which fell down and was scrapping on the road during my drive back to the Tesla service centre. Tesla followed up with the rental company on the matter, and I received additional follow up call so I could express my displeasure.
Our Tesla was washed and interior cleaned very thoroughly by Tesla, which was nice, and something my wife appreciated when she saw the car.
I attempted to supercharge the car, and that worked perfectly (as it always has).
I then drove to a public L2 charge point I have tried before, and it also charged the car (left it on for 30 minutes).
I then got home and plugged the UMC into the 10-30 receptacle via the adaptor, and waited a bit just to make sure the UMC was fully started. UMC had a green light, so I plugged the cord into the Tesla, and the car charge port went RED and then YELLOW and then I unplugged. I then plugged in again, and now the charge port went green, and the car charged.
Thoughts:
I am not sure what to say. While we are thrilled to have our Tesla back, we aren't 100% sure why it refused to charge for the 4 cold days last week.
Tesla suggested that leaving the car with the scheduled charging might have been contributory, but given the car was plugged in for 3 nights, and never charged, there is a real issue.
So, one of the posts here said "your battery was too cold". Well, that looks to be a prime suspect.
Another post said "my UMC failed multiple times, eventually went with HPWC". Well, that too looks like a suspect, especially when the UMC + 10-30 adaptor led to a RED/YELLOW light sequence when I first plugged it in at home. This after trying public L2 and superchargers, both of which worked, with no issues just prior to that.
Next Steps:
1. Trench in 100A capable wire to the garage.
2. Buy HPWC and use that for charging in the garage. Put UMC in trunk and likely never use it again.
Meanwhile:
My incredibly cheap to run Smart Electric Drive has never refused to accept a charge, no matter the temperature or conditions. It has never seen service, not for any reason in 2.5 years, since I drove it away from the MB dealer, I've never been back. It's braved -24C temperatures a dozen times, with only one interesting experience with the dreaded "warming battery" indicator where I needed to wait 5 minutes for the car to warm the battery to minimum operating temperature before I could drive away one particularly frigid day a few winters ago.
I would never buy any other car than a Tesla in the future, provided they offered a small commuting appliance like the Smart ED, as I love the size/utility of super small cars.
My wife, she loves her Tesla Model S, and would never want a smaller car. So our garage has two perfect cars for their respective owners.
Thanks for listening/replying/helping/advising, this forum has been a wealth of knowledge, and if my personal plight to attempt to charge our Tesla by performing all sorts of things like pulling fuses and blow drying charge ports has been helpful, well, that's fine with me.
Guidance:
If you ever encounter this behaviour in cold weather, just drive the car at least 30 minutes, and hope that drive warms the battery enough to accept a charge.
- - - Updated - - -
Thank you.
JayRo, for your 8th post ever on TMC, you get reputation points!
Your explanation was the best one and I should have tried harder to get battery up to temperature by driving a longer distance, as having minimal regen from the 10 minute drive wasn't enough.
The issue wasn't only the cold battery, there is a fundamental problem with my UMC + 10-30 adaptor given the RED/YELLOW lights I saw on the charge port once I got back home after getting the car back from Tesla.
Cheers. Wish I could have fully comprehended the fact that Tesla has not put enough logic on the car to make sure it can self-heat without needing to be driven 30 minutes, but live/learn.
Sat Feb 13 to Monday Feb 15:
Tesla wouldn't charge in -20C cold snap.
Many attempts made to resolve between .
Tues Feb 16:
It was -10C in the morning, car still would not accept charge, I unplugged and re-plugged in, pressed the button on the charge screen to force charging, etc.
So I drove it into Tesla Service a 25 km (just under 40 minutes in traffic) trip. During the trip, the regen braking went from completely disabled, to just about 60 kW (almost fully enabled) by the time I arrived.
I picked up an Audi rental car and went to work. The Audi, being a gas car, was a pathetic driving experience. Yuck. I realize it's cheaper for Tesla than keeping around a loaner fleet, so I understand.
I checked on the car periodically during the day, and found they had plugged it into a 40A capable charging system. My UMC and adaptor is only 32A capable, so I know for a fact they weren't charging the car on my equipment.
Tesla checked on the car that day and informed me the car would accept a charge. They couldn't find any faults/errors in the logs. I pressed them further, stating I wouldn't accept "it just works" as an acceptable investigation result. I also notified them that they should actually test charging using my cord and adaptors, as they clearly were not. Later that day, I did see the car charging at 32A, so at least they checked a few more things.
Tesla was unable to find a 10-30 receptacle to test the same adaptor and UMC I use in my garage. Note that I use 10-30 to limit the current to 24A due to limitations in my garage wiring which I will be solving in summer 2016 by trenching in larger gauge wire.
Wed Feb 17:
Tesla informed me they performed additional service on the vehicle, including tire rotation, fluid check and seatbelt recall checks. They also updated the firmware to 7.1, which is something I had requested as the car never prompted for 7.1, even after a month more than anyone else I knew on the forum.
Tesla informed me the battery had reached -23C during the cold snap, and that the battery would not accept charge at that temperature. Upon further discussions, including emails and phone calls, it became clear that Tesla could not explain why my car could not warm the battery to sufficient temperature to charge, even though the car was plugged in for the entire stretch of 3+ days.
Thurs Feb 18:
Discovered the Audi rental car had been patched together with duct tape (not kidding) and zip ties to hold under-body plastic panels together, which fell down and was scrapping on the road during my drive back to the Tesla service centre. Tesla followed up with the rental company on the matter, and I received additional follow up call so I could express my displeasure.
Our Tesla was washed and interior cleaned very thoroughly by Tesla, which was nice, and something my wife appreciated when she saw the car.
I attempted to supercharge the car, and that worked perfectly (as it always has).
I then drove to a public L2 charge point I have tried before, and it also charged the car (left it on for 30 minutes).
I then got home and plugged the UMC into the 10-30 receptacle via the adaptor, and waited a bit just to make sure the UMC was fully started. UMC had a green light, so I plugged the cord into the Tesla, and the car charge port went RED and then YELLOW and then I unplugged. I then plugged in again, and now the charge port went green, and the car charged.
Thoughts:
I am not sure what to say. While we are thrilled to have our Tesla back, we aren't 100% sure why it refused to charge for the 4 cold days last week.
Tesla suggested that leaving the car with the scheduled charging might have been contributory, but given the car was plugged in for 3 nights, and never charged, there is a real issue.
So, one of the posts here said "your battery was too cold". Well, that looks to be a prime suspect.
Another post said "my UMC failed multiple times, eventually went with HPWC". Well, that too looks like a suspect, especially when the UMC + 10-30 adaptor led to a RED/YELLOW light sequence when I first plugged it in at home. This after trying public L2 and superchargers, both of which worked, with no issues just prior to that.
Next Steps:
1. Trench in 100A capable wire to the garage.
2. Buy HPWC and use that for charging in the garage. Put UMC in trunk and likely never use it again.
Meanwhile:
My incredibly cheap to run Smart Electric Drive has never refused to accept a charge, no matter the temperature or conditions. It has never seen service, not for any reason in 2.5 years, since I drove it away from the MB dealer, I've never been back. It's braved -24C temperatures a dozen times, with only one interesting experience with the dreaded "warming battery" indicator where I needed to wait 5 minutes for the car to warm the battery to minimum operating temperature before I could drive away one particularly frigid day a few winters ago.
I would never buy any other car than a Tesla in the future, provided they offered a small commuting appliance like the Smart ED, as I love the size/utility of super small cars.
My wife, she loves her Tesla Model S, and would never want a smaller car. So our garage has two perfect cars for their respective owners.
Thanks for listening/replying/helping/advising, this forum has been a wealth of knowledge, and if my personal plight to attempt to charge our Tesla by performing all sorts of things like pulling fuses and blow drying charge ports has been helpful, well, that's fine with me.
Guidance:
If you ever encounter this behaviour in cold weather, just drive the car at least 30 minutes, and hope that drive warms the battery enough to accept a charge.
- - - Updated - - -
Thank you.
JayRo, for your 8th post ever on TMC, you get reputation points!
Your explanation was the best one and I should have tried harder to get battery up to temperature by driving a longer distance, as having minimal regen from the 10 minute drive wasn't enough.
The issue wasn't only the cold battery, there is a fundamental problem with my UMC + 10-30 adaptor given the RED/YELLOW lights I saw on the charge port once I got back home after getting the car back from Tesla.
Cheers. Wish I could have fully comprehended the fact that Tesla has not put enough logic on the car to make sure it can self-heat without needing to be driven 30 minutes, but live/learn.
Just a wild wild guess, could it be possible that in extreme cold weather, Tesla wanted to heat the battery with high power, like 7kW? 7kW requires 30 amps at 240V. I'm wild guessing that this is a bug with the firmware that it doesn't try all the available current (in this case 240Vx24A) for a few minutes and see how it fight against the ambient cold temp. If the firmware did see that 24A is not enough to heat the battery, it should have shown some error message.
mknox
Well-Known Member
@SmartElectric, something still seems off to me. You shouldn't have to drive the car to warm the battery before charging AFAIK. This is my 4th winter with the car, and here are a few of my observations given that we live in the same general area:
For the first time ever, I noticed something different during the recent cold snap (same one you had problems in). I have a dedicated meter on my car's charging circuit and am very observant as to what is going on. When I started to charge my car, I noticed that the current (as reported by my meter) was less than what I expected. When I checked the mobile app, it was showing <something less than 40> / 40 amps, with 24+ hours remaining to go from about 70% to 90% SOC. After about 20 minutes, the charge current went up to 40 amps and the car began to charge (based on the now much more reasonable estimated time to complete). What I am pretty sure happened here is that the heating system was activated to warm up the battery before actual charging began. It was very cold, and I am sure this is the desired and appropriate behavior. The interesting thing to me is I have never seen this before in spite of several winters with cold temps like this. Maybe something in v7.x that makes the car more "conservative" as far as battery pre-heating goes??
I always leave my car plugged in when parked. I have never once seen the car draw power from the wall unless a) it is actively charging, b) I have turned on the HVAC via the mobile app, or c) I have opened a door and the HVAC has come on. In other words, I've never once seen it draw shore power for battery heating on it's own. I know that it has been parked in ambient temperatures of -20 C and below at certain points over the past 4 winters. It must have to get pretty darned cold for the car to do anything on it's own about a cold battery.
- - - Updated - - -
For my first 3 winters, I only had 20 amps / 240 volts in my garage, and my car was set to charge at 16 amps (80% rule). What always happened in my case is that the car would draw the full 16 amps from the wall, but would "make up" the rest from the battery. My battery would deplete, just not as fast as it would have without the extra 16 amps from the wall.
For the first time ever, I noticed something different during the recent cold snap (same one you had problems in). I have a dedicated meter on my car's charging circuit and am very observant as to what is going on. When I started to charge my car, I noticed that the current (as reported by my meter) was less than what I expected. When I checked the mobile app, it was showing <something less than 40> / 40 amps, with 24+ hours remaining to go from about 70% to 90% SOC. After about 20 minutes, the charge current went up to 40 amps and the car began to charge (based on the now much more reasonable estimated time to complete). What I am pretty sure happened here is that the heating system was activated to warm up the battery before actual charging began. It was very cold, and I am sure this is the desired and appropriate behavior. The interesting thing to me is I have never seen this before in spite of several winters with cold temps like this. Maybe something in v7.x that makes the car more "conservative" as far as battery pre-heating goes??
I always leave my car plugged in when parked. I have never once seen the car draw power from the wall unless a) it is actively charging, b) I have turned on the HVAC via the mobile app, or c) I have opened a door and the HVAC has come on. In other words, I've never once seen it draw shore power for battery heating on it's own. I know that it has been parked in ambient temperatures of -20 C and below at certain points over the past 4 winters. It must have to get pretty darned cold for the car to do anything on it's own about a cold battery.
- - - Updated - - -
For my first 3 winters, I only had 20 amps / 240 volts in my garage, and my car was set to charge at 16 amps (80% rule). What always happened in my case is that the car would draw the full 16 amps from the wall, but would "make up" the rest from the battery. My battery would deplete, just not as fast as it would have without the extra 16 amps from the wall.
Thanks, @mknox. Seems something has been changed in the firmware 7.1, that the car uses less (or zero) battery power when connected to shore power, to heat the battery? In any case we will need more similar cases/tests from people in cold climates.
I had a terribly scary experience that same weekend. Took the kids to the Poconos for skiing and waterpark. Planning the trip, I happily discovered that Tesla has a supercharger right near the mountain, in middle-of-nowhere PA. I got there with 54 miles of charge on the car, and parked for 2 nights, thinking that even with normal degradation I could make to to the supercharger 2 miles away. After two bitter-cold, single-digit Fahrenheit days, I checked the app and it said I had 0 miles of charge. To say I was surprised would be an understatement. Fortunately, the car started and I drove very slowly to the supercharger 2 miles away. I plugged in but the chargeport started flickering green and then 15 minutes later, it still wasn't taking a charge. So, I called the Roadside Assistance and they explained the supercharger would heat the battery about 1 degree every 5 minutes. It was at that time 1 degree Fahrenheit outside and the battery was frozen solid. It took well over an hour before the car started to take a charge, and then I had to wait the 50 minutes for a full charge. Over 2.5 hours later, we were finally on the way to our next destination, the Hamptons on Long Island.
Amazingly, Tesla still only has one supercharger on Long Island, in Syosset, which was 67 miles from our destination. I stopped at Syosset and, mindful of my experience in PA, put 200 miles on the car before continuing. It was still very cold, weather was bad and I was driving fast. When I got to my destination, I only had 84 miles of charge left. My friends were kind enough to let me park in their garage, but when we left the next day, the car was down to 69 miles of charge, and we had to make it 67 miles away. Stress? You could say so. It was a very tense, slow, no climate control drive. Fortunately, the weather had warmed up to the 40s/50s but it was raining and I had to use wipers. I tried to keep the estimated range about 1-2 miles above the distance to destination, as much as possible. For the last 20 miles of the trip, I was driving 40-45 mph. When we got really close, the estimated range plummeted and I drove the last 1.5 miles to the destination with the car showing 0 miles of charge remaining. Jeez, that was not fun. We did make it, plugged in and fortunately the car charged up and we were on our way 20 mins later.
I'm still a huge electric fan, but this type of extreme weather really kills the battery so the point where it's going to be very hard to combat ICE.
Amazingly, Tesla still only has one supercharger on Long Island, in Syosset, which was 67 miles from our destination. I stopped at Syosset and, mindful of my experience in PA, put 200 miles on the car before continuing. It was still very cold, weather was bad and I was driving fast. When I got to my destination, I only had 84 miles of charge left. My friends were kind enough to let me park in their garage, but when we left the next day, the car was down to 69 miles of charge, and we had to make it 67 miles away. Stress? You could say so. It was a very tense, slow, no climate control drive. Fortunately, the weather had warmed up to the 40s/50s but it was raining and I had to use wipers. I tried to keep the estimated range about 1-2 miles above the distance to destination, as much as possible. For the last 20 miles of the trip, I was driving 40-45 mph. When we got really close, the estimated range plummeted and I drove the last 1.5 miles to the destination with the car showing 0 miles of charge remaining. Jeez, that was not fun. We did make it, plugged in and fortunately the car charged up and we were on our way 20 mins later.
I'm still a huge electric fan, but this type of extreme weather really kills the battery so the point where it's going to be very hard to combat ICE.
In this kind of cold, I'd be afraid to have an ICE car with that little gas remaining, forget about an EV.
The pack heater is seriously undersized. You can see me complaining about it in other threads. It's a ~5kW heater, when it really should be a 30-60kW heater, which would also mean regen limiting would become a rare thing in the cold.
Sounds about right.
Given your situation I would have definitely spent the extra 40 minutes or whatever to range charge at the supercharger.
Cottonwood
Roadster#433, Model S#S37
Hindsight is always 20-20 (6-6), but in this situation, if you had just plugged the car into a 120V outlet in your friends' garage, you would have added about 3 rated miles per hour to the car 36 rated miles in a 12 hour stay. That would have helped...
One is plenty, long island is not that big. Syosset to Montauk and back, even in 0 degree weather (241 rated miles according to EVtripplanner) should be easily doable in a fully charged 85.
Would obviously be nice to have more, but there are far more critical areas.
Would it really have added that many even in the cold? A 120v outlet is only 1.4kWh, which isn't even enough to offset the battery warmer. But it might have prevented at least some of the loss. Of course the battery would have been warm already if you plugged it in right when you arrived.
I would have guessed not really, but you would still be at a slight advantage. Most of that 14kWh or so would just have been lost to the environment.
@ SmartElectric,
Please don't judge me to the 8th post thing, (read them) lol. I am always on the this web site and others and keeping an eye on the stock daily, ok I lied Hourly. I am a huge believer in Tesla and the ideology and technology. I have owned many many comparable ice cars and the MS hands down is the best. It does have it's issues hence my reply to you. I seriously don't waist my time with over postings that are silly but entreating from the stands as you can see but always reading and try to fill in when I feel I have the answer and experienced similar issues.
I have to say your initial reply to my post, left me saying not so good things about you (Inside voice) and I hoped that I was wrong and you had another issue that would be solved quickly. I always keep track of posts and was reading your final one. At first laughed a bit then say you admit fault and thanked me. Not needed for sure but appreciated non the less and speaks volumes of your character and those of this community alike. Sure we have our fare share of Tesla owners that as just plain ignorant and rude and zero class (we know who they are on this site) no names needed. Non the less this revolution started a few years back despite the oil companies trying daily to crush us we still stand strong and united. The facts are the Facts, Tesla might not have got it right with the roadster but it was a great place to start. Now with the MS, it might have started out a little rough but now I would say the product with all its fixes on the fly at the factory is simply amazing.
Sure I don't understand why I can't cancel my call if I choose to while it is ringing and have to wait for voice mail or someone to pickup (i phone). Our trip widget can't seem to count milage accurately and keep track per .1 of a mile and jumps 2-5 miles at a time. Things like that make me laugh a little but those are first world problems for sure. The car does everything a car is suppose to do amazingly well and continues to get better every update, name me any other car that has that capability alone.
Sorry about your cold snap issue. Like I said in my post, I also found it acting weird looking from afar on my app and deducted thus my post to you. This car is a huge marvel. Look forward to more X's and the 3!!!!
Take care and enjoy your baby
Please don't judge me to the 8th post thing, (read them) lol. I am always on the this web site and others and keeping an eye on the stock daily, ok I lied Hourly. I am a huge believer in Tesla and the ideology and technology. I have owned many many comparable ice cars and the MS hands down is the best. It does have it's issues hence my reply to you. I seriously don't waist my time with over postings that are silly but entreating from the stands as you can see but always reading and try to fill in when I feel I have the answer and experienced similar issues.
I have to say your initial reply to my post, left me saying not so good things about you (Inside voice) and I hoped that I was wrong and you had another issue that would be solved quickly. I always keep track of posts and was reading your final one. At first laughed a bit then say you admit fault and thanked me. Not needed for sure but appreciated non the less and speaks volumes of your character and those of this community alike. Sure we have our fare share of Tesla owners that as just plain ignorant and rude and zero class (we know who they are on this site) no names needed. Non the less this revolution started a few years back despite the oil companies trying daily to crush us we still stand strong and united. The facts are the Facts, Tesla might not have got it right with the roadster but it was a great place to start. Now with the MS, it might have started out a little rough but now I would say the product with all its fixes on the fly at the factory is simply amazing.
Sure I don't understand why I can't cancel my call if I choose to while it is ringing and have to wait for voice mail or someone to pickup (i phone). Our trip widget can't seem to count milage accurately and keep track per .1 of a mile and jumps 2-5 miles at a time. Things like that make me laugh a little but those are first world problems for sure. The car does everything a car is suppose to do amazingly well and continues to get better every update, name me any other car that has that capability alone.
Sorry about your cold snap issue. Like I said in my post, I also found it acting weird looking from afar on my app and deducted thus my post to you. This car is a huge marvel. Look forward to more X's and the 3!!!!
Take care and enjoy your baby
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