I agree that EA should consistently distinguish fully-working from “working but severely degraded” stations in their maps online and in the app. I *think* I’ve seen limitations like this noted in detailed station listing descriptions but perhaps that was only on PlugShare.
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Electrify America general discussion
- Thread starter Mockingbird
- Start date
Rawlins and Cheyenne are still under construction. The nearest active stations are in Ogallala and Loveland.
Rawlins to Evanston will be 212 miles, which is sure to get your range anxiety going in all but the best weather conditions.
Plugshare sez Rawlings and Cheyenne aren't open. Evanston is only weeks old. And where is Rock Springs?
Tesla had the route completed in 2017. At this point the Cheyenne Supercharger site is an ancient relic, dating back to 2014!
They need one in Laramie as well. The drive up to Medicine Bow is a fun side trip, and important in the winter time.
@Big Earl. Has somebody actually laid eyes on the Covington, LA site? I can't find a mention in the Southeast regional section.
Construction is done.
They can't open because of the lack of transformers and/or switchgear cabinets.
Here is the thread. Supercharger - Covington, LA
You’ll find it in the Southeast Supercharger locations forum.
North American Supercharger discussion has all been split out into sub-forums within their specific regional forums. This helps keep things clean and easy to find.
RTPEV
Active Member
Something that drives me nuts is those that put a successful checkin on Plugshare with the comment "the 2 350kW stations were not working, so I plugged into the 150kW and got a great charge".
This station has a 10 Plugscore, but both 350's (2 out of the 4 chargers at this site) have been down (although they were finally reported fixed a few days ago) for ages. I even put a comment in advising people to check in a "could not charge" for each of the stations that was down. More work, yes, but it's the only way these things are going to get attention!
I perused Plugshare for Tesla superchargers before I bought my Tesla. There were lots of different locations with station number x being out of order but yet the plugshare score was a 10. Of course Tesla charging locations usually have more than 4 chargers so 1 or 2 being down is not like 50% being down.
I just finished my little 700 miles road trip with model Y. I planned to use EA exclusively in this trip. There were 3 charging sessions, the first two worked almost flawlessly. In the first one I need to change stall because it was the first time I charged at EA and I didn’t know where to look to spot the 350kw chargers (are those small labels on purpose?). At the second one I had a failed connection that wasted just about one minute. However the third one at Tracy, CA was a total failure. I arrived with 11% hoping to have the best charging curve with the 350kw charger, but got 28kw instead. It turned out all the stalls in that station were bad without any indication from EA app, as verified by two other EV drivers next to me. Luckily there is a supercharger station in the same mall so I just went there and finished charging in 10 minutes, left the lady next to me at EA feeling jealous (her own words). Attached is a photo I took at the second EA stop at Bridgeport, CA. Beautiful charging location
Attachments
I always use PlugShare to check the recent comments for the chargers at a potential EA location to try to make sure at least a couple of them are in good working order. Of course, that’s no guarantee. I also check the EA app to see what they are claiming.
I try not to rely on EA and aim to use them when I have a backup plan like a nearby Supercharger or maybe even just an EVgo or other 50 kW chargers.
Eventually the CCS charger providers will get their act together and become more reliable.
Agree! I also didn’t trust EA especially this trip was the first time I used it. I wouldn’t stop there with 11% without knowing there is a SC nearby. The one at Bridgeport had me worried since it wasn’t near any backups. But its location is better than any superchargers if you go from South Lake Tahoe to Yosemite. Hope they become much more reliable in the future
Good question. People have been complaining about it for years, and maybe it has improved some, but not nearly enough. So just complaining doesn't seem to work.
GM has tied Mary Barra's salary to the % EVs they sell. If they want to sell more EVs, they need to provide a better charging network. One of the things they're doing is upgrading EVgo sites for a better charging experience.
RTPEV
Active Member
Not to defend EA/EVgo/... too strongly (there is certainly room for improvement), but I do think the complaints tend to be the only things we hear.
We took an 1800 mile road trip in my wife's ID4 last summer and only ran into two issues of any significance. At one stop 1 out of the 4 stations was down which created a bit of a bottleneck. We were able to plug into a station immediately upon arrival, but it was charging slowly, so we moved when one of the other stalls opened up. There was a glitch when we did this, however, that took 20 or so minutes on the phone to resolve to get the car started on the new charger. So this stop wound up being about 40 minutes longer than expected.
The other issue was at a crowded 4-stall site where we first had to wait in a queue, and then had a similar issue with a slow stall. We ended up moving to a different stall, but altogether I estimate this stop was 45 minutes longer than it needed to be.
No other issues of importance for the rest of the trip, at a total of 8 other sites, although I will say that at many sites there were stalls that were either down (on the screen) or appeared down (showed UNAVAILABLE on the app, but actually appeared to be working).
Still, there's a fine line between being inconvenienced by 45 minutes and being stranded.
I think the difference is that things appear to be much worse this summary than they were last summer. Do that 1800 mile trip today and report back your experience. (And some regions might be worse than others.)
RTPEV
Active Member
I won't say that's not a possibility, but there are also far more stations as well (at least along the route we took). For example, last year going from Carlisle, PA to Watertown, NY on I-81, there was only a fastcharger at the NYS Welcome Area that I did not want to press my luck with, and a fairly inconvenient EVolveNY site located on the NYS Thruway an exit or two east of Syracuse.
We diverted to Bloomsburg, PA to hit that EA site (this is the one with the 1/4 stations down), and then also hit a brand new EA site in Syracuse that was so new, even EA had difficulty finding it.
Today, the picture is much different. There are EA sites in Scranton, PA, 2 in Binghamton, NY (although only one is convenient to the route), and 2 right off the highway in Syracuse.
Sure, there could be more crowding, or stations could be down. I pay pretty close attention to checkins near me on Plugshare, and while there are definitely problems, most people are able to get charges.
Electrify America is having trouble getting replacement parts because of the global supply chain issues.
Electrify America is also in the process of replacing its current chargers with its next-generation chargers, so Electrify America probably doesn't want to spend money repairing chargers that are about to be replaced anyway.
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