We had an unnerving experience last night with our Tesla Model 3, which I thought I'd share if it's helpful to others.
We drove the Model 3 to the ATL airport with about 140 miles of charge remaining, and parked at a charging stall with about 100 miles remaining (we live 31 miles from the airport) for a 3-day trip. I noticed while we were gone that the Tesla app was reporting the car was not charging, for some reason. Temperatures were down near freezing at night, and the car was down to just 62 miles of range midway through the weekend. By the time we returned, the car had 48 miles of range left. The charge port light was white ("The charge port door is open. Model 3 is ready to charge and the connector is not inserted, or the latch is released and the connector is ready to be removed.").
We decided to drive to the Tesla Supercharger at Lenox Mall, about halfway home, to top off the charge, rather than risking trying to make it all the way. About 10 minutes away, we got the message "Preconditioning battery for Supercharging". After arriving and connecting to a charger, the charge port light blinked blue ("Model 3 is communicating with the connector. Either Model 3 is preparing to charge, or a charging session is scheduled to begin at a specified future time.") for about 20 seconds, then turned solid red ("A fault is detected and charging has stopped. Check the touchscreen for a fault message."). The touchscreen said "Unable to charge. Disconnect cable and retry."
Gulp. Fortunately, we were able to disconnect the cable. We tried 3 more times with the same result, then called the Tesla roadside assistance number (877-798-3752). Here is where things took a frustrating turn. The agent we spoke to said the car was too cold to charge, and the battery was 9 degrees C. She said it needed to get to 20 degrees C, so she told us to turn the heater on full blast, and wait an hour, and the car should start charging.
Hmmmmm. I was pretty skeptical; all the online advice seemed to say that a cold car will charge very slowly (or even 0 miles/hour), but I found no evidence that a cold battery would result in a red charge port light. Also, it wasn't that cold; it was about 48 degrees F, and we'd just driven 15 miles.
We followed the advice and watched the range drop to 20 miles before deciding "this seems crazy" and called Tesla again. A different agent told us there was no evidence of a cold battery, and he suggested simply trying another charger. We did, and immediately got a green charge port light, and the car quickly recharged to a full charge in about 40 minutes.
Lessons learned:
1. If you get a red charge port light, it might be a bad charger. Move over to the next charger.
2. If the Tesla support agent's advice sounds wrong, call back and get another agent.
We drove the Model 3 to the ATL airport with about 140 miles of charge remaining, and parked at a charging stall with about 100 miles remaining (we live 31 miles from the airport) for a 3-day trip. I noticed while we were gone that the Tesla app was reporting the car was not charging, for some reason. Temperatures were down near freezing at night, and the car was down to just 62 miles of range midway through the weekend. By the time we returned, the car had 48 miles of range left. The charge port light was white ("The charge port door is open. Model 3 is ready to charge and the connector is not inserted, or the latch is released and the connector is ready to be removed.").
We decided to drive to the Tesla Supercharger at Lenox Mall, about halfway home, to top off the charge, rather than risking trying to make it all the way. About 10 minutes away, we got the message "Preconditioning battery for Supercharging". After arriving and connecting to a charger, the charge port light blinked blue ("Model 3 is communicating with the connector. Either Model 3 is preparing to charge, or a charging session is scheduled to begin at a specified future time.") for about 20 seconds, then turned solid red ("A fault is detected and charging has stopped. Check the touchscreen for a fault message."). The touchscreen said "Unable to charge. Disconnect cable and retry."
Gulp. Fortunately, we were able to disconnect the cable. We tried 3 more times with the same result, then called the Tesla roadside assistance number (877-798-3752). Here is where things took a frustrating turn. The agent we spoke to said the car was too cold to charge, and the battery was 9 degrees C. She said it needed to get to 20 degrees C, so she told us to turn the heater on full blast, and wait an hour, and the car should start charging.
Hmmmmm. I was pretty skeptical; all the online advice seemed to say that a cold car will charge very slowly (or even 0 miles/hour), but I found no evidence that a cold battery would result in a red charge port light. Also, it wasn't that cold; it was about 48 degrees F, and we'd just driven 15 miles.
We followed the advice and watched the range drop to 20 miles before deciding "this seems crazy" and called Tesla again. A different agent told us there was no evidence of a cold battery, and he suggested simply trying another charger. We did, and immediately got a green charge port light, and the car quickly recharged to a full charge in about 40 minutes.
Lessons learned:
1. If you get a red charge port light, it might be a bad charger. Move over to the next charger.
2. If the Tesla support agent's advice sounds wrong, call back and get another agent.
