SuperCharging - Station not charging at optimum level

[YVR88]

When I plugged into the super charger everything looked right until I took a closer look on the in car display and noticed the car was only charging at 48A. I was the only car charging at the time. The thought has crossed my mind that Tesla might slowing down the super chargers remotely. As these are smart chargers which should be able to be remotely monitored etc.

Not being able to charge quickly at a super charger puts a damper on things.

Has anyone else experienced this?

 

[YVR88]

Photo of Display showing supercharging 48A

 

[Moonwick]

I notice this occasionally and it usually clears up if I move to a different stall, making sure to choose one that isn't paired up with the stall I originally had trouble with. Also, you might consider cleaning your charge port terminals (the two big ones that carry current) by spraying some electronic contact cleaner on a swab and carefully rubbing it around the outside of the contacts.

This isn't officially recommended by Tesla and you need to take care not to damage the pins that are in the center of those contacts, but after doing this I noticed that I had less trouble with power throttling at Superchargers and I also noticed that the charger handle didn't get as warm as it had prior to the cleaning. Dirty contacts increase resistance and thus heat, and I believe each charging station monitors the temperature of the handle/connector and begins throttling if it starts getting too warm.

 

[Villa-Lobos]

jUST CHANGE STALLS. Always works for me

 

[NOLA_Mike]

Photo of Display showing supercharging 48A

Picture is very blurry but it looks like the 48A you are referring to has nothing to do with the supercharging session in progress. That is the maximum amperage allowed when you are AC charging. It looks like you are charging at 52kW which is probably slower than optimum for your battery's state of charge but way more than "48 Amps".

Mike

 

[Rocky_H]

Yes, @NOLA_Mike is correct. Although hard to read, that does say 52kW, I believe. At 400V, that would be about 130A. Also, let's check if 52kW is reasonable.
Doing a little conversion, since I don't normally use kilometers...
I don't know what size battery your car is, but I can run some numbers for an 85.
265 miles is about 425 km for total range of an 85kwh battery.
Your display shows 184km out of 425 is 43%.
43% + 52kW = 95
The handy rule of thumb would say that the sum of those should be around mid 120's if everything is optimum. But if you have a 70 or 75, Supercharging runs a little lower power from being a 350V pack, not 400V, so I think maybe that 95 factor might be closer to right. Also, if it is still pretty cold, that might be making it a little slower.

 

[TexasEV]

As NOLA mike said, that box in the charging screen has nothing to do with supercharging. It's where you can set the amps for AC charging. You can't set any parameters for supercharging other than percent charge limit. Look at the display line for km/hr (which is the average over the charging session) and kW (which is the instantaneous power). If your battery is cold it will start low and increase, then decrease as you get to higher state of charge.

But if you want to know if others have experienced slow charging rates and speculation for the reasons, use the search function of this site and you'll find hundreds of posts about it.

 

[YVR88]

Thank you for the feedback. Sorry the image was low res. The car is a 75D

271 km/hr +25 km 54kW Charge Current 48A.

It seems not all super chargers charge the cars at the same rate. What is the standard rate at which one can expect their car to charge in the real world? I will do the search in the forum thanks TexasEV to see what others have experienced.

 

[Rocky_H]

Thank you for the feedback. Sorry the image was low res. The car is a 75D

271 km/hr +25 km 54kW Charge Current 48A.

It seems not all super chargers charge the cars at the same rate. What is the standard rate at which one can expect their car to charge in the real world? I will do the search in the forum thanks TexasEV to see what others have experienced.

As others mentioned the 48A doesn't relate to Supercharging.
Most of the Superchargers do generally charge the cars at the same rate. However, apparently some new owners aren't familiar with the tapering factor, where it is much faster when the battery is empty and slows down as it gets more full. So it's not a constant speed all the time. Check out this page, and scroll down to the section with the green graph that says "Supercharger Charging Profile".
Supercharger | Tesla

 

[larmor]

I had some slow charging this past weekend at Tejon harris ranch. I called tesla to alert, they are going to look at it. Started slow, but eventually speed of charging picked up. First needed 1hr 20 min to continue on trip-voltage, amps all were down, should have been 25 min, eventually speed picked up, and needed 35 min total.

With pay for SC access, will speed of charging be more stable?

 

[Hash Browns]

Thank you for the feedback. Sorry the image was low res. The car is a 75D

271 km/hr +25 km 54kW Charge Current 48A.

It seems not all super chargers charge the cars at the same rate. What is the standard rate at which one can expect their car to charge in the real world? I will do the search in the forum thanks TexasEV to see what others have experienced.

Keep in mind, your car tells the Supercharger what to do, not the other way around. The car will request power from the Supercharger based on your battery state of charge, temperature and many other variables Tesla doesn't disclose.

Given that you have your heat set to 23C and seat heaters on (from picture) my guess is that it was cold outside and your battery may have been cold as well (was it sitting for a while without driving?) . That, combined with the fact that you also have a half full battery, suggests the 54kW you experienced could have been the max power your car could safely consume at that point, while your battery warms up.

 

[TexasEV]

Thank you for the feedback. Sorry the image was low res. The car is a 75D

271 km/hr +25 km 54kW Charge Current 48A.

It seems not all super chargers charge the cars at the same rate. What is the standard rate at which one can expect their car to charge in the real world? I will do the search in the forum thanks TexasEV to see what others have experienced.

No, please read my post again. The charge current setting has NOTHING to do with supercharging which was happening at 54kW. It was the setting from the last time you plugged into AC charging.