1. Tesla predicts and routes through super charger depending on battery state. Can I trust they prediction? Or should I charge a bit more at the supercharger? Or should I try to make it to the supercharger before the battery goes below 10% ? (I've noticed Tesla routes only if battery gets below 10%)
I think the bottom line with an EV is to plan ahead. Use the tools available (such as A Better Route Planner) to get a feel for where the fast chargers are and over time you will become more familiar and comfortable with both the range of the vehicle and what you need to do have a comfortable and reliable trip.
In general I find Tesla’s range predictions to be pretty accurate. But things like very strong headwinds or heavy rain can impact range by the order of 20%. So it’s always prudent to not sail too close to the wind and charge a bit more where it’s convenient to do so. But the other thing is it’s very easy in an EV to reduce your power consumption by 20% - simply drive slower (e.g. 80-90 km/h instead of 110). If you are really caught out for some reason (and you shouldn’t be if you’ve planned ahead), you can probably “hypermile it” to the nearest charging point.
What I don‘t like about Tesla’s charging nav is it ignores third party DCFCs, so I use ABRP to plan trips on routes I’ve never driven before.
2. Fuel stations barely break. Infact I've never seen an broken pump. Why do chargers break? I understand and sudden increase in voltage or current could cause this, but a quick google search shows it's too common to find a broken charger. I don't think that electrical components fail that frequently (unless the build quality is that bad). Does anyone have an insight of what breaks a fast charger or supercharger (NRMA, Tesla, ...)
In one of their “lessons learned“ reports to ARENA, Chargefox claim that most faults are due to software not hardware. They said some chargers need weekly physical on-site visits to clear false alarms, something that should be fixable remotely. They also said that while they were initially concerned that critical high power components and vehicle connectors would be the most likely source of outages, that has not been the case in practice.
In my experience, broken third party DCFCs that are a “surprise” are rare. I say that because if I plan a trip that uses third party DCFCs, I always check Plugshare to see if there have been recent successful charges, as well as the provider’s own App on the day of travel to verify ports are working. And if I can see sites are offline or reports of them being faulty, I simply avoid them and stop at an alternative charger. Hence my use of the word “surprise” - all reports look good, but when I turn up it’s not. NRMA is the main problem, as many sites are single stall, and they don’t yet report real time status, so Plugshare is the only source of intelligence.
The only time I have encountered a faulty DCFC in 3 years was at the single-stall NRMA site in Young not long ago. I plugged in and the unit faulted after only a minute of charging. I unplugged, re-holstered the gun, plugged in again, and then charge went through to completion. So in the end even that was OK.
