Supercharger - San Diego, CA - Friars Road (Mission Valley, LIVE 31 Jan 2019, 24 Urban + 24 V3 stalls)

[RandyS]

I'm hearing that it is fenced off for mall redevelopment space. It will be there for about 2 years or so...

I also found a story from a UT article back in November...

Fashion Valley is getting a resort-style makeover

 

[Jubess]

I find that the Superchargers at Fashion valley are hit and miss. I have my favorite stalls that I know will give me at least 72KW but they are only a few. Plus I understand that leaving a stall open between cars charging will help. Not sure if that's true. This supercharging station really leaves a lot to be desired. Plenty of times there are at least 2 stalls that are out of order. The only upside is that it's located 5 minutes from my house.

 

[Mediocrates]

I find that the Superchargers at Fashion valley are hit and miss. I have my favorite stalls that I know will give me at least 72KW but they are only a few. Plus I understand that leaving a stall open between cars charging will help. Not sure if that's true. This supercharging station really leaves a lot to be desired. Plenty of times there are at least 2 stalls that are out of order. The only upside is that it's located 5 minutes from my house.

Fashion Valley has "urban" style Superchargers that have a dedicated 72kW per unit, so they are not shared like other types of Superchargers. Leaving stalls open will have no bearing on the actively charging spots, and you won't achieve a higher charging rate than 72kW.

 

[Jubess]

Fashion Valley has "urban" style Superchargers that have a dedicated 72kW per unit, so they are not shared like other types of Superchargers. Leaving stalls open will have no bearing on the actively charging spots, and you won't achieve a higher charging rate than 72kW.

Interesting. Good to know.

 

[tcbailey239]

Charged on September 29th. All spaces were full when I arrived (5 chargers out of service and coned off). After about a 3 minute wait, a spot opened up. The *first* plug I tried ended up giving 44kw. I arrived around 22% SOC so I should have been getting more. Two more cars left during my first minute so I moved to another plug. This one only gave 25kw. A few minutes later I moved again and got a plug that reached the upper 60's. Charged from 30% to 96% in 1 hour and 6 minutes.

This location seemed to have a high turn over rate. It went from full to five spaces empty when I walked away from my car a few minutes later. When I came back, there were 4 cars waiting in line again. Having 5 spaces out of services didn't help but be prepared to wait at various times throughout the day.

 

[P85_DA]

help but be prepared to wait at various times throughout the day.

This place is getting beat up ..I just drive downtown never crowded there

 

[Reevo]

I was at this supercharger yesterday, and spent one hour there around noon. There was no line, and the turnover was pretty high. Two stalls were offline, and nearly every stall remained occupied.

My issue was that I could only get between 15-20 kW from my stall. Over the duration of my visit, I barely put 50 miles into my battery. I arrived with 30% SoC.

 

[Dave EV]

My issue was that I could only get between 15-20 kW from my stall. Over the duration of my visit, I barely put 50 miles into my battery. I arrived with 30% SoC.

That's ridiculous. Tesla needs to do a better job of maintaining these high usage locations.

I wonder if Tesla plans to start deploying urban charging pedestals in combination with V3 style cabinets. With some modifications to allow more plugs to be hooked into the same cabinet, they could potentially use fewer cabinets and deliver more consistent power to each stall, while also better limit total peak demand for the site. Each V3 cabinet has 2 DC-DC modules per post, so for an urban site you could instead use 1 DC-DC per post and have 8 stalls per cabinet. One of the improvements mentioned with V3 Superchargers is improved Thermal Foldback in hot weather - what this does is better keep the electronics from overheating in hot weather, which should improve reliability. Given that high usage Superchargers seem to need quite a bit of maintenance, it'll be interesting to see if V3 sites are more reliable or not.

 

[TangoDiva]

I was at this charger a week ago, Sept 30th and it was a friggin nightmare. Only one charger had a cone, a really good day in the slum that the Fashion Valley SC has become... or so I thought. I backed into an empty stall, got out, then noticed a little post it "Broken". Sigh, back into the car. Moved one spot over, plugged in. Charging started ... yay! Wait... 24kW. I wait a little longer to see if it picks up, but then it drops to zero. I unplug and plug in again... Same thing 24kW, add two miles and then zero. Grrr. Back in the car, Pull out, back up, Plug in again. 24kW then zero. Charging cancelled, tried "Start Charging" STILL NOTHING. Repeat various voodoo trying to get charging to behave.

By this time I'm late for an event I'm supposed to be photographing, thankfully nearby, so I left. Came back after the event (after stressing out the whole time) and tried again. Zero charging at all this time! The "Payment Method needed" was red, so I thought maybe it was a me problem (I had just updated to paid premium connectivity and maybe had screwed it up?) even though I have another year of free SC. Also noticed the display was misbehaving, rebooted just to check. Re-entered CC via my phone. Still ZERO charging. OK, 5th time's the charm, unhook the cable, pull forward, back in .... Back to 24kW aaaaaand then ZERO. GAAAAAAHHHHH! I have enough charge to make it home, but maybe not enough to make it back and no good way to charge at home yet.

As I am sitting there doing math on miles home and back and charge loss from sitting, the guy next to me gets out to disconnect his car (very few cars had left - one car that was plugged in when I was first there was STILL plugged in the second time - it was ALL weird!). I jump out and disconnect mine to be ready to take his space, that hopefully gave him a charge. I pull out as he does and give no one else a chance to act (it's like 10pm by now, and only half the slots are taken, but at this point I have identified 5 broken chargers!). I hook up, wait, 5,10,15,20, 25kW .... 30... 40, 50, 60!!! Woo hoo! I've never been so happy to see our shitty San Diego 62kW charge speed. It took for-frickin-ever to charge, but at least I wasn't stranded and I noted my saviour charger, lucky 11B as I left.

I was back there Monday and that entire bank of chargers was cordoned off (6!) EVEN lucky 11B. With so many out of order, there was a line, but we got a good charger on the first try (I did notice that someone near us seemed to be having troubles, but he just left before I could ask what was wrong).

As a contrast I charged in 29 Palms (the town near the Marine base North of Joshua Tree) where the car charged redonkulouly fast (150kW max). It is insane that the main charger for central San Diego (yes I know about the terrible pay to park one downtown) is such a complete disaster. I can't wait for the one they are building on genesee and Balboa. I see soooo many Tesla's in my neighborhood and for us to have such terrible charging infrastructure really annoys me.

OK, rant over. I love my car, eventually I will have my own place to charge it, I'm just shocked how bad the charging is in San Diego!

 

[P85_DA]

I was at this charger a week ago, Sept 30th and it was a friggin nightmare. Only one charger had a cone, a really good day in the slum that the Fashion Valley SC has become... or so I thought. I backed into an empty stall, got out, then noticed a little post it "Broken". Sigh, back into the car. Moved one spot over, plugged in. Charging started ... yay! Wait... 24kW. I wait a little longer to see if it picks up, but then it drops to zero. I unplug and plug in again... Same thing 24kW, add two miles and then zero. Grrr. Back in the car, Pull out, back up, Plug in again. 24kW then zero. Charging cancelled, tried "Start Charging" STILL NOTHING. Repeat various voodoo trying to get charging to behave.

By this time I'm late for an event I'm supposed to be photographing, thankfully nearby, so I left. Came back after the event (after stressing out the whole time) and tried again. Zero charging at all this time! The "Payment Method needed" was red, so I thought maybe it was a me problem (I had just updated to paid premium connectivity and maybe had screwed it up?) even though I have another year of free SC. Also noticed the display was misbehaving, rebooted just to check. Re-entered CC via my phone. Still ZERO charging. OK, 5th time's the charm, unhook the cable, pull forward, back in .... Back to 24kW aaaaaand then ZERO. GAAAAAAHHHHH! I have enough charge to make it home, but maybe not enough to make it back and no good way to charge at home yet.

As I am sitting there doing math on miles home and back and charge loss from sitting, the guy next to me gets out to disconnect his car (very few cars had left - one car that was plugged in when I was first there was STILL plugged in the second time - it was ALL weird!). I jump out and disconnect mine to be ready to take his space, that hopefully gave him a charge. I pull out as he does and give no one else a chance to act (it's like 10pm by now, and only half the slots are taken, but at this point I have identified 5 broken chargers!). I hook up, wait, 5,10,15,20, 25kW .... 30... 40, 50, 60!!! Woo hoo! I've never been so happy to see our shitty San Diego 62kW charge speed. It took for-frickin-ever to charge, but at least I wasn't stranded and I noted my saviour charger, lucky 11B as I left.

I was back there Monday and that entire bank of chargers was cordoned off (6!) EVEN lucky 11B. With so many out of order, there was a line, but we got a good charger on the first try (I did notice that someone near us seemed to be having troubles, but he just left before I could ask what was wrong).

As a contrast I charged in 29 Palms (the town near the Marine base North of Joshua Tree) where the car charged redonkulouly fast (150kW max). It is insane that the main charger for central San Diego (yes I know about the terrible pay to park one downtown) is such a complete disaster. I can't wait for the one they are building on genesee and Balboa. I see soooo many Tesla's in my neighborhood and for us to have such terrible charging infrastructure really annoys me.

OK, rant over. I love my car, eventually I will have my own place to charge it, I'm just shocked how bad the charging is in San Diego!

LOL long post I gave up here just go A St less crowded all chargers work full speed and only few miles down road

 

[TangoDiva]

LOL long post I gave up here just go A St less crowded all chargers work full speed and only few miles down road

TL;DR It took 6 tries to find a "working" charger (still only ~60kW). The A street one is such a PITA to get in and out of and smells like pee on top of paying to park. I'll keep tilting at the Fashion Valley windmills until Balboa is done.

 

[PLUS EV]

I was at this charger a week ago, Sept 30th and it was a friggin nightmare. Only one charger had a cone, a really good day in the slum that the Fashion Valley SC has become... or so I thought. I backed into an empty stall, got out, then noticed a little post it "Broken". Sigh, back into the car. Moved one spot over, plugged in. Charging started ... yay! Wait... 24kW. I wait a little longer to see if it picks up, but then it drops to zero. I unplug and plug in again... Same thing 24kW, add two miles and then zero. Grrr. Back in the car, Pull out, back up, Plug in again. 24kW then zero. Charging cancelled, tried "Start Charging" STILL NOTHING. Repeat various voodoo trying to get charging to behave.

By this time I'm late for an event I'm supposed to be photographing, thankfully nearby, so I left. Came back after the event (after stressing out the whole time) and tried again. Zero charging at all this time! The "Payment Method needed" was red, so I thought maybe it was a me problem (I had just updated to paid premium connectivity and maybe had screwed it up?) even though I have another year of free SC. Also noticed the display was misbehaving, rebooted just to check. Re-entered CC via my phone. Still ZERO charging. OK, 5th time's the charm, unhook the cable, pull forward, back in .... Back to 24kW aaaaaand then ZERO. GAAAAAAHHHHH! I have enough charge to make it home, but maybe not enough to make it back and no good way to charge at home yet.

As I am sitting there doing math on miles home and back and charge loss from sitting, the guy next to me gets out to disconnect his car (very few cars had left - one car that was plugged in when I was first there was STILL plugged in the second time - it was ALL weird!). I jump out and disconnect mine to be ready to take his space, that hopefully gave him a charge. I pull out as he does and give no one else a chance to act (it's like 10pm by now, and only half the slots are taken, but at this point I have identified 5 broken chargers!). I hook up, wait, 5,10,15,20, 25kW .... 30... 40, 50, 60!!! Woo hoo! I've never been so happy to see our shitty San Diego 62kW charge speed. It took for-frickin-ever to charge, but at least I wasn't stranded and I noted my saviour charger, lucky 11B as I left.

I was back there Monday and that entire bank of chargers was cordoned off (6!) EVEN lucky 11B. With so many out of order, there was a line, but we got a good charger on the first try (I did notice that someone near us seemed to be having troubles, but he just left before I could ask what was wrong).

As a contrast I charged in 29 Palms (the town near the Marine base North of Joshua Tree) where the car charged redonkulouly fast (150kW max). It is insane that the main charger for central San Diego (yes I know about the terrible pay to park one downtown) is such a complete disaster. I can't wait for the one they are building on genesee and Balboa. I see soooo many Tesla's in my neighborhood and for us to have such terrible charging infrastructure really annoys me.

OK, rant over. I love my car, eventually I will have my own place to charge it, I'm just shocked how bad the charging is in San Diego!

The old timer's here will remember all the way back to 2 years ago when Qualcomm was the only supercharger in the San Diego area. If you didn't want to deal with that disaster, you had to drive up to Temecula or the even bigger disaster of San Juan Capistrano

A couple points about your trials and travails...

I'm not sure how long the ramp up to 24kW and back down to 0 was lasting, but I was in a similar situation once and was able to gain enough charge by repeatedly stopping and restarting the charge on the Nav screen (you could probably do this on the app in your phone as well). Unlike you, I really had no other option as I was in the charging desert of West Texas and the entire Midland supercharger was behaving the same way. It was annoying, but I was able to gain like 60 rated miles in 30 minutes which was enough to get me to the next supercharger.

Also, do you not have even a 110V outlet available to plug into at home? People often dismiss the value of 110V charging, but it is literally infinitely better than not plugging into anything. I lived in an apartment with no EV charging for 4 years, but was able to park near a 110V outlet, which met most of my charging needs as I don't drive that much other than long road trips where I of course use superchargers. In your case, it seems like an overnight charge on a 110V outlet would have at least been enough to put your mind at ease and give you enough miles to get down to A street the next morning. And yes, in case you are wondering, your complaints about this supercharger ring somewhat hollow when there is a perfectly functional supercharger just a few miles away. Paying a few bucks to park is not that big a deal when you're in a pinch.

 

[TangoDiva]

The situation at Friars today... At least it is easy to back in and no risk of door dings. 7 SC out of order (6 the same since last week's nightmare) The first spot I tried was charging at 26kW, I moved once to lucky 10b again and now am getting 44kW. I guess it will do for now, Balboa can't be done soon enough.

 

[lUtriaNt]

thanks for these updates. im heading down to san diego today for the first time to visit a friend and trying to find the best spot to charge. this place is closer to where i am going in SD but good grief im not sure if I want to do the stall dance....

 

[P85_DA]

thanks for these updates. im heading down to san diego today for the first time to visit a friend and trying to find the best spot to charge. this place is closer to where i am going in SD but good grief im not sure if I want to do the stall dance....

use A st downtown probably the least used SuC in SD

 

[TangoDiva]

use A st downtown probably the least used SuC in SD

If you can go at off hours, Friars sucks but is still usable, but at peak ... eeeesh! There were 7 cars waiting at 5:30 and it was taking forever for the line to move since the charging was so slow (several people gave up and left). The highest speed I've gotten there in the last month was 60kW, I settled for 44 last time. Most times I try to go at night and I am now just prepared to try a couple of chargers (the 6 in a row was just a baaaad luck - I'll be curious to see how long it takes fix those... I won't have to charge for awhile now - back to WAH. I hope other people will update when they get those 6 stalls fixed.

If you're in a hurry, A st, might be for you. I still can't bring myself to go back, even with all the problems at Friars. The tight parking, homeless, general terrible smell make A St even less appealing (and you get to pay for the privilege!). There are homeless wandering through Friars too, but there is also security, and always other Tesla people there (even when I charge at 3am). I won't say I'll never do it, but at the moment I'm still putting up with Friars ... doesn't mean I won't complain though ;-)

 

[lUtriaNt]

i ended up going 15 minutes out of my way to eastlake /chula vista V3 charging. they had several stalls down and it was packed at 230 when i got there. found the last spot right away so not an issue.

thanks for the heads up on those locations. ill revisit this thread next time im headed that way...

 

[P85_DA]

i ended up going 15 minutes out of my way to eastlake /chula vista V3 charging. they had several stalls down and it was packed at 230 when i got there. found the last spot right away so not an issue.

thanks for the heads up on those locations. ill revisit this thread next time im headed that way...

this place like 5 min from my house it took forever to go live >8months when it finally came on line the V3 speeds were great now this place is all beat up less than few months after turning on .....however it is the first V3 in SD ​

 

[Stereoshopper]

Amazingly I saw this location ICED several weeks ago. Was pretty funny to see the Kia festooned with garbage and rude signs by the time I left.

 

[tmoz]

Amazingly I saw this location ICED several weeks ago. Was pretty funny to see the Kia festooned with garbage and rude signs by the time I left.

One stall? The entrance? The whole location?