Tesla blesses other cars blocking two stalls due to short cord

[ChrisInVegas]

Most of us outside of California are lucky to have 8 stalls at a site. Having somebody take up 2 isn't going to be fun.

I guess we should be thankful the Ford trucks have the plugs in the front. I wouldn't be looking forward to seeing a big pickup truck attempting to backup into a stall space next to me...just perpetually praying it doesn't hit me. One supercharger site near me requires sharp turns due to space limitations of an island.

View attachment 1023780

of course the elephant in the room too..

First... We have have a MYLR and a Lightning... Just putting that out there.

Backing up the Lightning (what you mentioned you didn't want to see coming at you) is super easy with the parking sensors and 360 degree camera. The MY may have a tighter turning radius, but the Lightning is much easier because it is clear where everything is around you.

 

[Mardak]

Seems like there can still be full utilization even with some needing to shift over half a stall to the right. Many superchargers have space to the right either as a non-charging spot or even crosshatched area.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Seems like there can still be full utilization even with some needing to shift over half a stall to the right. Many superchargers have space to the right either as a non-charging spot or even crosshatched area.

View attachment 1023807

Depends on the cable reach. That's I think why Tesla has removed some stops and bollards at V3s. In particular it'll allow some of the Detroit cars to offset and charge.

I have a Kona, which is front driver's side. I offset at Brewster, NY. (Not that the single Teslas at a time had trouble finding a spot.)

 

[buckets0fun]

Serious question, how many times have you had to wait for a stall on your long-haul travels?

In 2023, 7-8times. It’s beyond annoying when it queues up and others ‘cut the line’, I imagine this to be much worse in the coming year without significant improvement. I suspect V4’s extended cables will help avoid some of the pain that allowing other cars in ‘the pond’ will cause.

I’m at roughly 350k miles on the tesla network and around 175k on CCS&chademo.

I'm not scared of a plague of Mach Es blocking my charging sites

it’s not the papier-mâché that you have to worry about, it’s the Hyundais bolts and Kias. Add in the rivian owners that tow (myself included) and we’ll see how short tempered individuals escalate this.

this seems like it may work. Although the chances of this happening vs 3 tesla and 1 CCS car (using the 10:1 stated by previous poster) seems unlikely. Then again, a few fords could happen with a more reliable network(tesla vs EA/evgo/chargepoint).

 

[shahryaran]

I was surprised to see, now that Fords, and soon other cars, can use superchargers, that Tesla officially blesses cars parking in such a way as to occupy two supercharger stalls -- or even three! -- due to the short cords. They even show it in a graphic. (They warn them not to park diagonally, though.) It's the last item in the FAQ at https://www.tesla.com/support/supercharging-other-evs#cable

I am surprised because there are some solutions they could have done (and perhaps will do) to reduce the effect of this. They know what sort of car you have, and where the port is. They know what stalls are in use, and what cars are navigating to the supercharger. They know if it's full and if there's a line and how long the line is.

• If the station is full, cars that need to take more than one stall should be made to wait. Failing that, they should be limited in their charge to just enough to get to the next station (CCS or Tesla) on their route. Idle fees should be doubled if taking two stalls.
• If a station fills up while such a car is charging, ie. two drivers are waiting that could use the two stalls, the driver taking two stalls should be signaled on their app and told to move their car and wait until there are again two free stalls.
• For cars with the port on the other side (front left, or rear right) they should be directed only to stalls on the right side of a charger bank and grouped there, while cars with the Tesla configuration would be directed to the left side. If done properly, no stalls are wasted.

In general, I think Tesla should implement a system that assigns you a stall as you arrive at the SC. (You must navigate to SC.) Ford drivers would invoke their Tesla app and be told which stall is for them. No other stall would charge you unless the station is at low occupancy. This would also, at V2 superchargers which share power between stalls, allocate you to the stall at which you would get the most power. (ie. paired with the car that has been there the longest and has already slowed down charging) which is something Tesla knows but you don't. If a stall is broken and Tesla doesn't know it, you would report it broken and get assigned a different stall.

This is even more important for the non-Teslas at the stations to use their assigned stall. As noted, any stall other than the one assigned to them would not activate so they would learn.

V4 stalls will have longer cords so it will be less trouble there, but allocation still makes sense.View attachment 1023664

Tesla opening SC for others is a business model. Tesla sells electricity. You already have a Tesla, so you business is secure with them.
It doesn't matter what they know about you, your car and your state of charge. They know you (the Tesla owner) not gonna go any where else to charge. So you have no choice to wait.
Tesla's plan is to get a big bulk of money from federal and build super charger as much as possible. So it doesn't matter if there are one or two stalls are empty and people are waiting.

Tesla defaults to thinking of you own a Tesla, you must likely own a garage, so charge in garage so Tesla can sell electricity for higher price to non Tesla.

 

[sleepydoc]

What I noticed is that "Tesla drivers" takes the habit to park every other stall,
just as reminiscence of the shared 150 kW chargers, and also to more easily open the doors.

But in this case, this will block any "Non-Tesla" users who otherwise
would need to park half way in the middle of two consecutive stalls:

View attachment 1023703

Many of the older chargers share power between adjacent stalls so parking next to someone meant that both cars would charge slower. (My understanding is these chargers can be identified by the numbering system. If they are identified a 1a, 1b, 2a, 2b, then each number has a shared power supply.) Regardless, proper charging etiquette was not to park in an adjacent stall if you could avoid it.

Newer chargers do not have this issue but the etiquette has remained.

 

[SalisburySam]

Most of us outside of California are lucky to have 8 stalls at a site.

Our small town had a 12-pedestal site go live late last year. And in another small-ish town 20 miles away, a 16-pedestal site has been permitted. That’s in addition to another site with 8 pedestals 18 miles away in another direction in yet another small town. This last has been in operation for a few years now. I see new sites to be generally more than 8 pedestals…a good thing for everyone.

 

[ATPMSD]

If Tesla wants to make money off of non-Teslas they need to change the cords to ones long enough to support them. Suggesting non-Tesla car should occupy multiple spaces is just going to generate a lot of anger.

 

[petercc9]

Our small town had a 12-pedestal site go live late last year. And in another small-ish town 20 miles away, a 16-pedestal site has been permitted. That’s in addition to another site with 8 pedestals 18 miles away in another direction in yet another small town. This last has been in operation for a few years now. I see new sites to be generally more than 8 pedestals…a good thing for everyone.

There's only 4 superchargers serving the entire city of Boston with 8/8/8/10.

I guarantee this won't end well.

 

[RichAZ/CapeCod]

Last Friday at 10pm returning home from a Super Charger and was getting both verbally and physically harassed randomly by some guys (late 20s to 30s) in a newer Camaro RS. They threw stuff at my vehicle, one even exited at a stop light to confront me. I was able to maneuver away but because their car was so fast it made it impossible to lose them. Long story short I was coming over an incline and at the bottom of it were 2 police SUVs pulled to the side. I was boxed in from moving to the left and went by doing approx. 67, only to see the Camaro take a sharp left which led to another highway entrance. I slowed down and veered towards the breakdown lane only to get pulled over. I was shaken to say the least.

I was eventually mailed a citation for doing 80 in a 55 (speeding 90/17) and fined for not moving over for a parked police vehicle (89/7A). My question or advice is: my car is actually speed locked at 70mph, I've never bothered to disable it because I work remote and only travel locally and was part of the reason I couldn't lose the Camaro). The ticket states it was "estimated" and being a Step 9 driver with an immaculate record (only second ticket in almost 35 years) I want to know if you guys think not only should I fight it (speeding 90/17 is more serious than 90/18 I've found btw) but spend the money to hire an attorney with more experience arguing this?

Any advice is greatly appreciated!

There's only 4 superchargers serving the entire city of Boston with 8/8/8/10.
I guarantee this won't end well.

Heck, Cape Cod has four Superchargers; Marston's Mills, Hyannis, Orleans and now Provincetown.

 

[father_of_6]

Serious question, how many times have you had to wait for a stall on your long-haul travels?

I was on a road trip once and arrived at the Supercharger to find an ICE car show and about 500 people in the surrounding parking lot. Food trucks and others had blocked all but 2 stalls of an 8ish stall supercharger.

Wait until 2 Ford F-150s and a single KIA EV9 occupy an entire 8 stall supercharger location for an hour to charge to 100%. It's bound to happen.

 

[brancky3]

I was on a road trip once and arrived at the Supercharger to find an ICE car show and about 500 people in the surrounding parking lot. Food trucks and others had blocked all but 2 stalls of an 8ish stall supercharger.

Wait until 2 Ford F-150s and a single KIA EV9 occupy an entire 8 stall supercharger location for an hour to charge to 100%. It's bound to happen.

As a now non-Tesla owner, charging should be capped to 80% and have enormous fees to charge past that IMO. But even when I had my Tesla, I only encountered a full station once.

Just leave the last two spots on the right open and that will allow 2 non-Teslas to charge, it’s by far the easiest solution until v4 is more widespread. I agree that parking every other stall is the easiest way to park, but far more spots are going to be left unusable for all parties unless teslas stay left and others stay right.

I don’t think this round of access is going to be very problematic, or when us Rivians get it in a month, because most owners are level headed. When the Bolts get access, let’s just hope the amount of v4 far outweighs the amount of v3.

 

[DomDeWild]

It's funny how Tesla has no problem telling Tesla drivers how we should deal with non-Teslas at charging stations.
What Tesla should be doing is telling other manufacturers they must relocate their charging ports to the left rear of the vehicle.
And why hasn't any manufacturer picked up on this already? Ford and GM should be moving the port as a way to attract buyers.
It certainly would be a selling point.

 

[DuncanM]

Tesla sells what, ten cars for every non-Tesla EV in the US right now? I'm not scared of a plague of Mach Es blocking my charging sites.... I'm scared of the plague of new Model Y owners doing the same.

In 2023 it was 55/45% EV sales in favour of Tesla. In 2022 it was about 65/35% in favour of Tesla.

 

[DuncanM]

This would also, at V2 superchargers which share power between stalls, allocate you to the stall at which you would get the most power. (ie. paired with the car that has been there the longest and has already slowed down charging) which is something Tesla knows but you don't. If a stall is broken and Tesla doesn't know it, you would report it broken and get assigned a different stall.
View attachment 1023664

V2 SCs are not enabled for CCS1 charging.

 

[ClarDold]

I think being in California you don't realize Superchargers can be relatively sparsely located in some states.
There's probably more superchargers in the LA metro area than in my entire state.

Even in California, there are areas outside of LA
The Supercharger that I never use in my town has 20 stalls, separate, but in the same parking lot as 6 EVgo with Tesla.
Laytonville, far enough that I might use it, has 8 stalls, in the same no-amenities shadeless parking lot with three Chargepoint stations.

 

[Mardak]

There's only 4 superchargers serving the entire city of Boston with 8/8/8/10.

0 of those 4 are open to NACS. Looks like within Greater Boston including I-95, only 3 are open of 14 Supercharger locations, and expanding to the larger Boston Metro area including I-495 includes an additional 3 more of 11. At least within Boston, doesn't seem like there will be blocking from non-Teslas for now.

 

[father_of_6]

0 of those 4 are open to NACS.

Interesting. I wasn't aware that only certain SuperChargers would be available to non-Tesla. Thought it was the whole network.

 

[ChrisInVegas]

It's funny how Tesla has no problem telling Tesla drivers how we should deal with non-Teslas at charging stations.
What Tesla should be doing is telling other manufacturers they must relocate their charging ports to the left rear of the vehicle.
And why hasn't any manufacturer picked up on this already? Ford and GM should be moving the port as a way to attract buyers.
It certainly would be a selling point.

When the non-Teslas were originally designed, the prospect of using the supercharger network wasn't a possibility. Car companies couldn't agree on a charging connector let alone the location for that connector. (This is not a new problem either... the location to fill up with gas isn't consistent.)

Now, NACS has been accepted as the superior standard (as it should be). Other OEMs are going to start including NACS in their new vehicles over the next couple years. My hope is that the addition of NACS will also include re-thinking the charge port location. As you mentioned, I do think this would be a selling point. One thought though... wouldn't just moving the charge location to the right-front of the Fords solve this problem as well? From an engineering problem perspective, I am betting that is easier than moving it to the back of the truck. Less changes anyway.

I applaud Tesla for helping push the EV movement forward. Will there be some challenges until people figure out the most strategic way to use existing locations? Of course. But... it is done. The walls around the walled garden are coming down and that is a good thing.

 

[ChrisInVegas]

Interesting. I wasn't aware that only certain SuperChargers would be available to non-Tesla. Thought it was the whole network.

It looks like Tesla strategically kept some V3 sites exclusive to Tesla. My guess this is based on how busy they are already. If the site is struggling to keep up with Tesla demand, it wouldn't be smart to suddenly add more vehicles trying to use the chargers.

The find us map on the Tesla site makes it really easy to see what is and isn't open.

https://www.tesla.com/findus?v=2&bounds=50.71869356461947%2C-73.08377040000002%2C18.661296939852146%2C-157.45877040000002&zoom=5&filters=supercharger%2Cparty%2Cnacs

Toggle on/off the buttons to see which sites show up and drop off the list.