Breaker keeps tripping with 14-50 app says it was at 48 amps.

[deltacar209]

This past week our model 3 has been tripping the breaker a couple times. Im pretty sure it did it once last week but the problem has gotten worse after taking a trip to a friends house and charging on their 10-30 outlet.

Whats weird was when i pulled open the app today to manually change the amps to see if its just pulling too many amps for the breaker to handle it was set at 48 amps. Gen 2 mobile chargers have a max of 32 amps.

I lowered the amperage and restarted the charge and now its max at 32 amps.

Could it have been a bug or should i be looking into the breaker itself being bad?

 

[Big Earl]

Is the breaker 40 amps or 50 amps? I’m betting the breaker is bad and needs to replaced - I’ve seen it a few times. The UMC will only pull 32 amps. The car might show a different amp limit when it isn’t charging.

 

[deltacar209]

Is the breaker 40 amps or 50 amps? I’m betting the breaker is bad and needs to replaced - I’ve seen it a few times. The UMC will only pull 32 amps. The car might show a different amp limit when it isn’t charging.

its a 50 amp breaker

 

[Big Earl]

Does the breaker get hot to the touch while charging? Do you hear a faint crackling sound from the breaker while charging?

 

[deltacar209]

Does the breaker get hot to the touch while charging? Do you hear a faint crackling sound from the breaker while charging?

its not hot but has a slight crackling/hum

 

[TulsaCoker]

Whats weird was when i pulled open the app today to manually change the amps to see if its just pulling too many amps for the breaker to handle it was set at 48 amps. Gen 2 mobile chargers have a max of 32 amps.

The App defaults to 48 amps (which is the maximum of the on-board charger) until its plugged in then it will show the correct draw.

 

[TulsaCoker]

It was plugged in and charging at 48/48 i lowered it down while it was charging

and you were using the mobile connector?

 

[Big Earl]

Any chance you’re able to get a screenshot of that in addition to a picture of your charging setup?

It’s not that I don’t believe you, but this would be the first time I’ve come across this scenario on these forums.

 

[TulsaCoker]

wow UMC should not allow more than 32 amps through. I would take you Mobile connector to a Service Center to check and possible replacement

 

[Rocky_H]

If you're just looking at it while it's not plugged into anything, then it will just be showing the max default capability, which is 48A. That's not going to matter once you do plug into something. That process will do the negotiation between the charging equipment and the car and pick a good level. So if you are using the mobile charging cable, that can only do 32A, so it will announce 32A maximum to the car, and that is what the car will use. So no, it's not going to try to use 48A through that outlet. There may be something defective in the circuit, though, like a bad breaker, as others mentioned.

 

[voltswagen]

Yeah, that 48 amp setting has to be a bug.

A circuit with a 50 amp breaker can handle brief peaks at max rated load. However, for a continuous draw, tripping at over 80% of maximum (40 amps) is not unusual. Wire gauge can affect max load handling, too.

 

[Rocky_H]

Yeah, that 48 amp setting has to be a bug.

That's not a bug. The OP just said he looked at his app to see what the setting said, but that appeared to mean while not charging. It does normally show 48A while you're not connected to anything that is telling it to use any specific amp value. People were asking to get a picture to show what the screen actually shows while it is charging.

 

[Unclepaul]

A 50 amp breaker is designed to momentairly pass 50 amps, however in continous high amp loads it is only designed for 80% of that.

 

[wpeac]

Looks like I have a similar issue, 32A outlet socket in the garage with pen fault detection, using Tesla UMC with the 32A adapter, worked great for 3 or 4 months, now the circuit breaker is tripping and showing 48A on the App, this appears to be happening 50% of the nights I am charging, I’m suspecting a fault with the UMC?

 

[TulsaCoker]

wpeac, your outlet is not a 32A nor 32A adapter... what is our breaker amperage ? once something trips your charge app will default to 48amps

 

[wpeac]

Hi TulsaCoker, Thanks for the reply, its a 40A RCBO, I didn’t know the app defaulted to 48A once breaker trips. This helps me a lot in finding the source of the problem, possibly dc leakage current as others have mentioned

 

[Rocky_H]

Hi TulsaCoker, Thanks for the reply, its a 40A RCBO, I didn’t know the app defaulted to 48A once breaker trips.

The app is just showing the car's display. Whenever the car is not plugged into a charging source, it just shows the maximum level that the onboard charger is capable of. And of course when the breaker trips, it's disconnected from anything, so the car thinks it's unplugged, so it defaults back to showing that charger capability and isn't seeing anything from the outlet or charging cable.

This helps me a lot in finding the source of the problem, possibly dc leakage current as others have mentioned

That wouldn't be DC. It's looking at the two sides of the circuit in your house, which is still an AC circuit. It's the onboard charger inside the car that converts it to DC.

 

[wpeac]

The app is just showing the car's display. Whenever the car is not plugged into a charging source, it just shows the maximum level that the onboard charger is capable of. And of course when the breaker trips, it's disconnected from anything, so the car thinks it's unplugged, so it defaults back to showing that charger capability and isn't seeing anything from the outlet or charging cable.


That wouldn't be DC. It's looking at the two sides of the circuit in your house, which is still an AC circuit. It's the onboard charger inside the car that converts it to DC.

Thanks for the help guys!

 

[Humbug]

Thanks for the help guys!

Hi wpeac - did you ever get to the bottom of this. I have a similar problem with my 7Kw charger circuit breaker tripping and the app showing 48A. Trying to get to the bottom of it…