Supercharger stall numbers

[Boatguy]

Tesla labels the Supercharger stalls with the charger number/letter so we can avoid sharing whenever possible. This is great, except they put the number/letter on the bottom where it can't be read when there is a care in the stall.

Is there anyone else who thinks the stall number/letter should be at the top of the supercharger?

 

[Benjamin Brooks]

Tesla labels the Supercharger stalls with the charger number/letter so we can avoid sharing whenever possible. This is great, except they put the number/letter on the bottom where it can't be read when there is a care in the stall.

Is there anyone else who thinks the stall number/letter should be at the top of the supercharger?

View attachment 222566

You can use inverse logic, not hard... if you see 2 stalls with the same number (since no cars are parked there) then they are unpaired; however if you drive around and only see a single letter (A or B) for every numbered charger then there are no unpaired stalls available. I don't think parked cars blocking the stall labels is an issue, you can still deduce best place to plug in.

 

[HankLloydRight]

I've ranted about this a lot in other threads. You can tell their current scheme was developed by engineers.
I've proposed that Tesla should color-code or symbol-ize the stall pairs and throw away the number/letter scheme altogether.

There should be two RED stalls, two GREEN stalls, two BLUE stalls, and two ORANGE stalls (or whatever colors or symbols you want for color-blind people).

And these colors/symbols should be at the top of each stall. So as soon as you drive up, you can instantly see there are two cars on the BLUE stalls, one on a RED stall, and none on ORANGE.. so you can pull into either ORANGE stall without tracking down and looking at each individual open stall to figure out which one is best.

This proposal could be accomplished merely by affixing signage or stickers on the top of each stall. No hardware or software upgrades needed.

I've also proposed a status light on the top of each stall to show "Full Power available", "Partial Power available" and "Out of Service".

This would require some hardware and software to implement.

It's not rocket-science, folks.

 

[bmah]

I've ranted about this a lot in other threads. You can tell their current scheme was developed by engineers.

Hey as a software engineer I resemble that remark!

Actually I'd say the current numbering / labeling scheme was designed by people who don't actually use the Superchargers (or didn't take into account input from people who use the Superchargers). I think if you don't experience some of these things first-hand (like the frustration of trying to find an unpaired stall but all the information you need is hidden by car bodies) you have no idea there's a problem to be solved, or you think it's not worth solving. Yeah I know that's not incompatible with what you wrote.

Slight digression: Similar things can be said of many aspects of the Tesla experience (well I've said this anyway). IMHO Tesla should take some "you have to live with it to get it" input like this from something like an owner advisory group which isn't filtered by the "Thank you for your feedback" first-tier support personnel. Maybe employee/owners of Model 3 might help this a bit.

Bruce.

 

[apacheguy]

@HankLloydRight - instead of the status light, why not have the CID simply list amps available at each stall? No hardware modification and minimal software coding required.

 

[bmah]

@HankLloydRight - instead of the status light, why not have the CID simply list amps available at each stall? No hardware modification and minimal software coding required.

Not @HankLloydRight but...

The status light idea doesn't depend on data connectivity to the car. Also as a safety issue it's probably better for drivers to be looking at the Supercharger pedestals than the CID. I get the advantage of no hardware modifications, though.

Hrm, it might be possible to do this with minimal hardware modification if they could blink the lit-up TESLA logo on the top of the pedestal to indicate "hey you might want to charge here". Probably a bunch of reasons that wouldn't work though.

(Really I'd like to see both of what you guys suggested.)

Bruce.

 

[HankLloydRight]

@HankLloydRight - instead of the status light, why not have the CID simply list amps available at each stall? No hardware modification and minimal software coding required.

Sure, but it would have to be bullet-proof. As we've already seen with the in-car stall availability info, it's often not accurate, or slow to update or not available at all.

With a local based hardware system, as @bmah suggested, it's an immediate readout of the current status of each stall. No polling data collection to HQ, reformatting, transmitting (via API) to the car, to then display, assuming the car has good connectivity, which isn't even a given 100% of the time.

I'd prefer the drive-up method.

 

[HankLloydRight]

Hrm, it might be possible to do this with minimal hardware modification if they could blink the lit-up TESLA logo on the top of the pedestal to indicate "hey you might want to charge here". Probably a bunch of reasons that wouldn't work though.

That actually could work, with minimal hardware mods.

Solid ON would be 'Available', Blink could be 'partial power available' and off would be 'occupied or out of service'.

Or.. alternatively, Solid ON is 'Occupied', slow blink could be 'Available partial power' and quick blink could be 'optimal charging here'.

 

[SomeJoe7777]

Blinking lights might be distracting to the local businesses, especially at night.

I'd just do small color coded lights at the top of each pedestal:

Off: Occupied and charging another car, or out of service, do not use.
Yellow: Available at reduced power, either because of malfunction or limitation, or because the paired stall is charging another car.
Green: Available at full power.

I wouldn't use red because that blends in too much with the Tesla color scheme. I don't think you need to differentiate between malfunctioning stalls that have reduced power available and paired stalls that have reduced power available.

With this scheme, just drive in and park at a green light. If none are green, park at a yellow light.

 

[BerTX]

The problem with lights and blinking the Tesla lights is that you can't see them on a sunny day.

I like the idea of a colored stick-on sign atop the stanchion. Simple to implement and easy to explain and remember.

 

[Boatguy]

Information rich would be nice, but requires a big retrofit. I'd be happy with some very obvious color coded markers, or even just numbers, which show which stalls are paired. We don't need the a/b, but I think Tesla probably needs them to identify the specific stall when we call in with a problem.

 

[Blu Zap]

Information rich would be nice, but requires a big retrofit. I'd be happy with some very obvious color coded markers, or even just numbers, which show which stalls are paired. We don't need the a/b, but I think Tesla probably needs them to identify the specific stall when we call in with a problem.

I am sure everyone on this thread has noticed that the charger pairings are not consistent between locations. Fremont is a great example of not having sequential pairing numbers as one would expect. Petaluma another example where 3A is diagonally across all 10 chargers from 3B. Go figure. The Tesla guys I have talked to said that it is left up to the local contractors as to how they lay out the SuperChargers. Trenches, conduit, cabling are the consideration, NOT user interface. So, yes we are on to something and it gets back to @bmah 's comment "you have to live with it to get it". Or even better "eat your own dog food!"

 

[f-stop]

I am sure everyone on this thread has noticed that the charger pairings are not consistent between locations. Fremont is a great example of not having sequential pairing numbers as one would expect. Petaluma another example where 3A is diagonally across all 10 chargers from 3B. Go figure. The Tesla guys I have talked to said that it is left up to the local contractors as to how they lay out the SuperChargers. Trenches, conduit, cabling are the consideration, NOT user interface. [...]

I was wondering about that inconsistency.... it seems that if paired stalls were simply ALWAYS beside each other in a row, it would make choosing the best spot easy. But I guess no chance of that now

 

[bob_p]

What Tesla could do...

As you're approaching the Supercharger - Tesla should know which of the stalls are currently being used and display on the console recommendations for which of the stalls to use, and could even show a map highlighting the recommended stalls.

 

[jelloslug]

I have been thinking about the paired supercharged "problem" a bit recently also. Like all of us here, I keep hearing rumblings about the upcoming supercharger 3. One of the actual benefits of that unit would be that reduced charging from shared pedestals would no longer be an issue for the current cars.

 

[HankLloydRight]

What Tesla could do...

As you're approaching the Supercharger - Tesla should know which of the stalls are currently being used and display on the console recommendations for which of the stalls to use, and could even show a map highlighting the recommended stalls.

It would be nice in a perfect world, but as mentioned above, this would require near-real-time updates from the SC stall hardware, transmitted up to the mothership, reformatted, and then relayed back to the car to display in less than a second. Too many points of failure and delay in that round-trip loop... and it requires the car having good cell connectivity, something that is not always a given. We've already seen the attempt to put stall availability into the Nav, and I'd guess that works at about a 50% success rate, the other 50% being inaccurate or very delayed updating, or no info at all!

And also mentioned above, the driver should be driving and watching the local (probably unfamiliar) roads, not the touchscreen.

 

[apacheguy]

Hmm. I tend to think that SpC availability works better than that. The only times it didn't work at all were in remote areas where the stalls entered sleep and therefore were not reporting status, AFAIK. I agree that it's hardly realtime, but it does update every 2-3 minutes which is pretty good, but not perfect. @HankLloydRight can you refresh my memory as to why you say it does not work?

 

[HankLloydRight]

There were plenty of spotty reports in the original stall availability thread. Also, lots of youtube videos of people trying it out, and the numbers just not accurate -- going either way -- saying stalls are occupied and they're not, or empty stalls being occupied.

Whatever system they have in place needs to be troubleshooted and optimized to provide better, more timely stall availability.

edit to add: I drive by the SCs along i-95 in CT all the time (Darien, Milford) and the ones on the Merritt Parkway in Greenwich, and so far every time the in-car status has never been accurate.