CCS with bundle of wires won't go over 50kW even on 250kw SC [resolved with longer battery pre conditioning]

[ElectricIAC]

Yo-yo it for a couple minutes before arriving at the charger.

 

[bradtem]

Just driving on the expressway, without navigating to a charger to trigger preconditioning, will likely not result in a warm battery, at least as far as charging is concerned.

Of course. That's why I navigate to the supercharger I am going to, or in the case where I went to an EA charger, I navigated to a nearby supercharger along the way. I am not sure why you think I would not do that, especially when going to a Tesla SC.

 

[bradtem]

There seems to be a lack of clear information in this thread. At risk of stating the "obvious" depending on your level of knowledge...

1. A charging station with an "up to 150 kW" or "up to 350 kW" rating tells you nothing as those kW ratings are 99.99% of the time based on an 800V architecture car. All Tesla's are 400V architecture (MS/MX slightly higher). What is most important is the max amps on the nameplate of the station.

I am talking Tesla Superchargers. They do not support 800v vehicles! Generally the 350kw CCS chargers do that at 800v, but AFAIK the 150kw EA stations do 400v at 375a, and they can certainly do more than 125a

1. A station with "up to 150 kw" will only give you around 80 kW max for our Teslas as it is most likely limited to 200 amps. The same can be said for the "up to 350 kW" stations. They will give you around 200 kW max as they are most likely 500 amps max.

I have seen a number of reports here, I believe about 150kW stations doing more than 80kW with Teslas. Can you confirm that what you say is true? Obviously the 350kW stations are 800v to reach that level.

1. Preconditioning your battery is of utmost importance to get the max kW from a station. 10 minutes likely isn't long enough based on a 60 degree ambient temperature. 90+ degrees outside? Yeah, 10 minutes is plenty.

It is not enough for full warming, however, my prior belief (that's what's under discussion here) is that 10 minute warming should generate better than 150 amps -- but that's what we're learning about.

1. State of charge ("SoC") is also of utmost importance. Anything more than ~20% and you won't see the max kW from the station.

Again, there has been no confusion on that point.

1. Additionally, some EA stations say 500 amps on the nameplate but are throttled to only 350 amps, which further complicates the issue. I have seen this firsthand at my local EA station where I never got above 133 kW multiple times.

If you perform/ensure all of the above, you can get ~200 kW from the CCS adapter. I had the Korean Tesla one and now the NA one and have had no issues.

Did you also confirm there are no issues charging at a Supercharger and your issue is solely related to CCS?

Most of my testing is at Superchargers. I did one CCS test to see if they were any different. Perhaps this is the source of your confusion?

 

[ElectricIAC]

I am talking Tesla Superchargers. They do not support 800v vehicles! Generally the 350kw CCS chargers do that at 800v, but AFAIK the 150kw EA stations do 400v at 375a, and they can certainly do more than 125a

I have seen a number of reports here, I believe about 150kW stations doing more than 80kW with Teslas. Can you confirm that what you say is true? Obviously the 350kW stations are 800v to reach that level.

It is not enough for full warming, however, my prior belief (that's what's under discussion here) is that 10 minute warming should generate better than 150 amps -- but that's what we're learning about.

Again, there has been no confusion on that point.

Most of my testing is at Superchargers. I did one CCS test to see if they were any different. Perhaps this is the source of your confusion?

Accelerate full throttle where safe to pull current and build heat, full regen where safe to push current and also build heat.

Do this several times before reaching the DCFC.

 

[Jeremy3292]

Most of my testing is at Superchargers. I did one CCS test to see if they were any different. Perhaps this is the source of your confusion?

Yes, your original post was talking about the CCS adapter and the bundle of wires and EA…that’s why I was confused. Carry on!

 

[bradtem]

Accelerate full throttle where safe to pull current and build heat, full regen where safe to push current and also build heat.

Do this several times before reaching the DCFC.

Can be done, but easier -- though more annoying -- to just ask the car to navigate to a supercharger somewhere else, and perhaps turn down the volume on the directions and navigate to your DCFC using your phone. Yes, that's annoying but better than playing such games I think. Perhaps in a few years, Tesla will put in a feature so that we can say in the navigation "..." menu "This destination is a DCFC, please precondition" and have it work well. They could also recognize the chargers of course, but the former is a pretty easy addition.

Having people fake-navigate won't hurt anything right now. If Tesla were to get really smart, and make use of the information it has on who is navigating to a charger so it could predict and plan charger load, and manage virtual queues, that would screw such plans up a little bit. While the virtual queue would be the best option, they can do a lot of lesser things like say, "Lots of people are driving to that charger and it will be full with a wait when you get there, so perhaps consider another?" It could even just display on the map, the expected number of cars to be at that charger when you get there, rather than now, and how long it will take for a free spot to clear up. (Because it knows how long each car is going to take to charge, roughly.)

 

[Jeremy3292]

I've gotten over 100 on 150-kW class chargers (I think ~110 pretty commonly. 125 on a recent one I checked)... Just only get 150-180ish when I'm on a 350kW.

125kW max (per EAs report) at 350V-nominal voltage suggests a 350-amp max....

All depends on the amps of the charger in question. You can never rely on what the operator calls it. For example, there are a ton of Shell Recharge “150 kW” stations around me that are all 200 amps max but are “150 kW”. I’ll never see north of 80 kW on those ever. You can get 150 kW only if you have 800V architecture.

If it’s 350 amps then I would certainly agree and call that a “true” 150 kW station. But even some EA “150 kW” stations aren’t 350 amps. All station dependent which varies widely based on location.

EA’s new next gen “350 kW” chargers they are installing are all 500 amps and seem to be a great option. The older ones? Man so hard to know without checking the nameplate. And even then they throttle it sometimes to 350 amps only!

All of the marketing makes it hard to know what the specs of the station a person is at. You’ll just hear “I’m not getting anywhere near 150 kW at this station!” But there’s so many variables as to why that may be. It’s obviously very simple to determine if you have all the facts…

 

[ElectricIAC]

Can be done, but easier -- though more annoying -- to just ask the car to navigate to a supercharger somewhere else, and perhaps turn down the volume on the directions and navigate to your DCFC using your phone. Yes, that's annoying but better than playing such games I think. Perhaps in a few years, Tesla will put in a feature so that we can say in the navigation "..." menu "This destination is a DCFC, please precondition" and have it work well. They could also recognize the chargers of course, but the former is a pretty easy addition.

Having people fake-navigate won't hurt anything right now. If Tesla were to get really smart, and make use of the information it has on who is navigating to a charger so it could predict and plan charger load, and manage virtual queues, that would screw such plans up a little bit.

That works, but it doesn’t work fast enough. Yo-yo is still the fastest way to get the pack nice and toasty while in motion.

 

[kilpatds]

If it’s 350 amps then I would certainly agree and call that a “true” 150 kW station. But even some EA “150 kW” stations aren’t 350 amps. All station dependent which varies widely based on location.

I was replying to your statement "A station with "up to 150 kw" will only give you around 80 kW max for our Teslas as it is most likely limited to 200 amps". That's not my experience, although my experience is heavily biased towards EA chargers (for obvious reasons of they're the only other company than Tesla routinely building chargers out in the middle of nowhere, which is where I need them.)

 

[MP3Mike]

I was replying to your statement "A station with "up to 150 kw" will only give you around 80 kW max for our Teslas as it is most likely limited to 200 amps". That's not my experience, although my experience is heavily biased towards EA chargers

Remember that EA used 4 different vendors for charging equipment, with varying capabilities, so what you see in your area may not be what others see elsewhere.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Sounds like it is broken, based on the symptoms. I agree a hard 50kW limit as described implies a limit imposed by the car, and cannot be explained by not pre conditioning, etc. Just makes no sense. Wonder what the issue is?

Maybe you can have someone with a recently built Model 3 try your setup at the charger to rule things out?

 

[MP3Mike]

Sounds like it is broken, based on the symptoms. I agree a hard 50kW limit as described implies a limit imposed by the car, and cannot be explained by not pre conditioning, etc. Just makes no sense. Wonder what the issue is?

My guess would be that the "bundle of wires" that adapts the temperature sensors has a bad/wrong resistor. Or is mis-wired. (Such that it thinks the port is too hot for more than 50kW or has gone in to fail-safe mode.)

 

[Regaj]

If you'll read pack temps directly off the sensors you'll find that the car's temperature behavior doesn't always follow what the car's display is seemingly telling you.

My observations are that when driven in moderate-to-hot ambient temps, the pack temp will generally stabilize (stop climbing from the presumably cooler temp it started from) 10-20F above ambient.

Driving itself has negligible air cooling effect.

Parking in direct sunlight, the pack will absorb heat surprisingly quickly. You'd think that since the pack is shaded by the car's chassis, that wouldn't be the case. But it does.

Heating or cooling the cabin does not seem to have any measurable effect on pack temp.

Navigating to a Supercharger will precondition the battery, of course. However, the display message on the car's screen that it is preconditioning is not very reliable in terms of whether the car is actually pre-heating the battery at that very moment. I have observed rising-above-stable temps (while navigating to a SC) without the display message; and I have observed stabilized pack temps continuing to remain quiescent long after the message is displayed (the latter typically when navigating to a more distant SC; and, of course, battery pre-heating will invariably trigger when much closer to the SC).

Navigating to a close-by SC, as in the OP's example, will always pre-heat the pack. However, pack heating (and pack thermal management in general, I'd argue) is not terribly efficient. The car is unable to raise pack temps very much in only ten minutes. If it's 90F ambient and you've been driving for an hour (meaning the pack temp has stabilized, probably around 105F), ten minutes is plenty for the car to get to its target for supercharging.

But in the OP's example of pre-heating for ten minutes, starting from a cool pack temp... not nearly enough.

My guess is that a much longer drive before trying the CCS adapter will show much better throughput.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

My guess is that a much longer drive before trying the CCS adapter will show much better throughput.

No, it won’t, because the OP states it hits a hard limit. There’s no variation. This is just not how a cold pack behaves.

 

[ElectricIAC]

No, it won’t, because the OP states it hits a hard limit. There’s no variation. This is just not how a cold pack behaves.

So you’re thinking some kind of failsafe mode?

 

[golferguy]

50KW hard limit reads like the CHAdeMO limitation. Perhaps a 2018 model just won't get to the higher CCS1 charging rates?

FWIW, on my 22 MX, using the Tesla CCS1 at 350KW Fast Chargers, it peaks at 194KW when below 30% SOC. MY customers report similar. But these are all 2021/2022 models reporting. Have not seen any reports other than yours on 2018s.

 

[ElectricIAC]

50KW hard limit reads like the CHAdeMO limitation. Perhaps a 2018 model just won't get to the higher CCS1 charging rates?

FWIW, on my 22 MX, using the Tesla CCS1 at 350KW Fast Chargers, it peaks at 194KW when below 30% SOC. MY customers report similar. But these are all 2021/2022 models reporting. Have not seen any reports other than yours on 2018s.

That’s likely an amperage limitation (500A)

Some EA are software capped at 350A.

 

[MP3Mike]

50KW hard limit reads like the CHAdeMO limitation. Perhaps a 2018 model just won't get to the higher CCS1 charging rates?

But they are charging at a Supercharger... (And that isn't it, 2018s can charge at full CCS rates just like newer vehicles.) It is likely a bad "bundle of wires" causing the charge controller to go into a fail-safe mode. (Or maybe the connectors aren't fully seated?)

 

[Thp3]

50KW hard limit reads like the CHAdeMO limitation. Perhaps a 2018 model just won't get to the higher CCS1 charging rates?

 

[davewill]

My guess would be that the "bundle of wires" that adapts the temperature sensors has a bad/wrong resistor. Or is mis-wired. (Such that it thinks the port is too hot for more than 50kW or has gone in to fail-safe mode.)

That was my thinking, although he's gone through two bundles of wires and seemingly had expert help from the seller. I suppose the seller could have a bad batch. The other thought is that there's something different about his charge port that is making it incompatible with the bundle of wires.