HPWC "tripping" red

[GreenT]

I have a 3 year old HPWC, er wall connector and it's worked fine for all this time.

Suddenly it is often failing. Insert cable into car ... RED.

Have to reset the button to the right side of unit.

History:
Installed in prior garage for 2 years. Fine. Disconnected. Moved to new garage. Been in for 9 months. Installed by qualified spark. Just started failing in the past week. What's new in past week?
Added a split duct A/C unit in garage. It is fed off same panel. No breakers tripping.
Added a Big Ass LED light. VERY bright.
Here's the weird thing. A couple of times it trips when I enter the garage from side door and trip the LED motion sensor. But the LED was in old garage too.

So, is it just time for it to be failing? Sometimes it fails when inserting cable, sometimes just walking into garage (coincidence?) or just charging stops.

At Supercharger it worked fine.

 

[pilotSteve]

My HPWC is 4 years old. (Original version, installed with my 2012 Sig). It started to fail in a similar way about 2 years and Tesla came to my house and replaced the the charge cable. No problem since then. Call service and see what they say. BTW if you bought the HPWC with your car it should have 4 year warranty (mine did).

 

[GreenT]

Well, having dealt with this for another day with the car charging ... every time I walk into the garage and the LED goes on, the charger flips to RED.
I do not think it has anything to do with a bad HPWC but I will call Tesla nonetheless.

 

[pilotSteve]

Well, having dealt with this for another day with the car charging ... every time I walk into the garage and the LED goes on, the charger flips to RED.
I do not think it has anything to do with a bad HPWC but I will call Tesla nonetheless.

Yup, that was my assumption as well 2years ago. When I called Tesla they said the logs showed a charger problem hence the ranger visit. See what they say for you.

 

[GreenT]

A week later and thorough testing.
3 days of car charging with no LED and it works perfectly as designed.
Then yesterday and today ... 6 hours of charging and constant interruptions by me ... I used my WINK app to turn LED on and off.
Every single time (more than 30 tests) once charging had reached max amperage ... turn on the LED and presto. Charger trips.
There is a causal relationship between (super bright) LED's and the HPWC.
If there was something wrong with the charger it would fail when the LED was off. Opened cover - no evidence of any charring.

(Can mod change title to "LED's affect reliability of HPWC" please?)

 

[drklain]

GreenT -- it certainly sounds as if the electrical load caused by your LED lighting appliance is in some way causing the HPWC to trip red. I'm not so sure you can say that LED's affect HPWC as it could be any device that generates a similar electrical load/surge on the system. It would be useful to know:
1. what is the setting on the HPWC (how many amps max)
2. what is the amp rating on the HPWC circuit
3. Is the LED light on the same circuit
4. If not, is the circuit adjacent to the HPWC circuit
5. do the wires to the HPWC run alongside the wires to the LED anywhere in the garage
6. how much current is the LED drawing when it is turned on

You don't have enough data (or haven't shared it) to conclusively determine what is going on with your HPWC and why this is happening. It would appear that you aren't drawing too much current because the HPWC breaker isn't tripping at the panel. That would indicate it is going red due to some sort of fault detected inside the HPWC. The fault might be caused by EMI from the LED light but it could also be caused by many other things.

 

[GreenT]

Thanks for your reply. To answer your questions:

1. what is the setting on the HPWC (how many amps max)
... 80amps
2. what is the amp rating on the HPWC circuit
... 100 amps
3. Is the LED light on the same circuit
... no, HPWC on dedicated circuit
4. If not, is the circuit adjacent to the HPWC circuit
... adjacent? if you mean on the next circuit breaker down? No. 5 off, LED is on right bar, HPWC on the left
5. do the wires to the HPWC run alongside the wires to the LED anywhere in the garage
... No
6. how much current is the LED drawing when it is turned on
... it's BIG ASS light. 122W
The Garage Light | Easy-to-install Shop Light

 

[Don85D]

If your source/line voltage is low to start (under 240 VAC) and the LED lamp is only on one side of the line, the voltage could drop enough for the HPWC to see a fault. It may look like an overheating input line to the HPWC.

I would get rid of the shop light and install some fluorescent tubes or task lights. You might also try reducing the HPWC to 60 amps and see if it holds. My HPWC is running at 40 amps and I only charge late at night so no conflict with any workshop loads from lighting or machine tools.

Sharing of the source line may need load tuning especially if you have low voltage from your utility.

My thoughts for your consideration.

 

[GreenT]

My line voltage is a good, solid, 240V. And the LED is only 100 watts.

How can there be a voltage drop? We're talking about less than 20 feet per line ... too short for a drop at 240v.

Fluorescent or tasks lights would have a higher amperage than the LED.

 

[Don85D]

OK. As a test run the 100 Watt LED load on the other side of a 240V circuit. You may have too much loading on one side of a 240V panel. That's my theory.

Have you considered charging over night? For us the rates are lower and there are no extra loads being generated while we sleep. I use Neurio to track electrical loading and they have just upgraded with an EV sub panel feature that tracks both sides of a 240 VAC circuit then adds the results together. You could easily see if one side of the line is being affected.

When you discover the problem be sure to let us know. Perhaps it is a failing HPWC cable.

 

[boaterva]

We are clear that the 100 W LED lamp is under 1 Ampere, no matter what voltage (120 or 240), right? How is that drawing down the HPWC circuit?

Just for testing, I'd remove the LED and use an incandescent 100 W bulb. That's a direct test. And will see if interference is involved or not; before changing circuits.

 

[Lbkmxp100d]

Are you on 200 amp service? What large appliances, For many HVAC units and what size breakers are they using. I too have 100amp circuit on my HPWC but had to lower in the car from 72 to 60amp to prevent my HPWC from flashing red as well. I have 2 HVAC units and several large appliances along with sub panel for an addition we added that causes an overload under certain scenarios. If both my A/C units are running than some time just turning on my garage lights would cause my HPWC to flip red. It not necessarily the size of appliance/light that causes the HPWC to fail as it's a combination of all the amperage added together and a small increase to that number that caused my issues.

I'm going to add an additional 200amp service to my house dedicated to my HPWC. Especially since I have another X that I take delivery of next week so I will have 2 HPWC on 100 amp/ each.

I recommend sitting in your car and watching amperage drop while turning on more and more appliances. When you see the amperage start dropping into the 235 range you will know your at your limit. Obviously like some have stated that charging at night when least amperage is being pulled is ideal. However, I like the ability to charge rapidly encase of last minute trip that I need to quickly charge and hit the road.