Fast charging

[heydrive]

Well immediate reply from MMC from the CS supervisor is that it has been passed to senior management and they will inform me of their conclusions.

We wait to see, but I would encourage others who had a problem to also contact them in writing as the more who do will put more weight behind getting them to do something.

 

[Neverfuel]

Got a little worried yesterday when trying to charge at Ferrybridge Services on the M62. Card was accepted but then the charger came up with a "communication error" it let me view the details and it said something was creating a conflict on the Canbus. I followed the instructions for it to restart only for the problem to reappear.

Having read the posts on here about faulty chargers I thought I might be going home on the back of a recovery truck! Anyway I moved over to the other charger (car started normally) and it was fine. It made me twitchy though. Interestingly enough, an I3 had parked up and was charging normally when I came back to the car, but they use a different connector - so I wonder if it was something to do with that?

 

[Wuduslad]

Hi neverfuel, I'm still convinced it's a software problem. Being in the electronics business for over 40 years, I can only guess that the connecters/cable have the power conductors ( -ve & +ve ) and other connector/s to communicate between car and charger. Granted, if there is a 'bad' connection, it won't work, but the software should
be written to just refuse to accept a charge voltage in such a case and not lock the car up totally. Likewise, if the 'signals' or data from the charger are incorrect, the same should happen. Is there not a universal EV standard? Or is the same scenario we had with DVDs when they 1st became available? It too the industry several years to agree on a standard system. Once done,discs could be played in any DVD player! Shouldn't be too difficult to sort out. The way DVD's work is far more complicated than recharging a battery!

 

[goodbus]

I had successfully grabbed a quick (10-15 minute) fast charge at Fleet Services (enough to give me 10 or so free miles) while I bought a coffee about 15 times..... Then came the day when I had the dreaded error code, car had to be recovered to the Dealer and reset & I lost a days work.

I agree with the conclusion that it should be possible to reset the car at the location if it happens by the driver - this is the fix that is needed (or solve the root problem!). I won't use Ecotricity fast chargers again until a fix is confirmed. (Not a huge deal for me either way as I love the car, but disappointing that something which is claimed to be a safe charging option by both Mitsubishi and Ecotricity is not.....)

 

[Titan]

I won't use Ecotricity fast chargers again until a fix is confirmed. (Not a huge deal for me either way as I love the car, but disappointing that something which is claimed to be a safe charging option by both Mitsubishi and Ecotricity is not.....)

Good luck waiting for that to happen

 

[Neverfuel]

Went to charge today with 17 miles left. Charger showed 71% starting charge. It took 27 mins to get to 95% (where it cut off) and was showing between 9 & 6 amps in the last 5% of charging. 15 bars were shown on the guessometer with 27 miles showing. Not done anything over single charge 80% before so this was an interesting experiment - especially as a Nissan Leaf pulled up with 10 mins to go! :lol:

The Nissan lady was rather clear about her next choice of car though - "I think I'd rather have the choice of electric or petrol - like you have". Please enjoy the Leaf, as its days seem to be numbered. :ugeek:

 

[gwatpe]

Is it possible that the lockout that seems to happen with fast chargers may be reset, with a reset of the AUX battery. Like to disconnect the AUX battery for a time. There has to be a reason for the rapid access cover.

 

[greendwarf]

I assume that this was an AC Fast charger rather than DC Rapid - otherwise 27 minutes & over 80% would be very odd.

 

[Neverfuel]

No it was a DC Rapid - I thought it might just charge to 80% (it started at 71%), but carried on going until 95%. That gave me an indicated 27 miles.

 

[maby]

No it was a DC Rapid - I thought it might just charge to 80% (it started at 71%), but carried on going until 95%. That gave me an indicated 27 miles.

It's well documented that if you let a rapid charger take the car up to 80%, then disconnect and reconnect, then it will take it up to close to 100% - I guess that by connecting with it over 70%, you got the same effect. This is not recommended by Mitsubishi and could lead to battery damage.

 

[Neverfuel]

I didn't think that it would go over 80% on the first time through though! I was pretty surprised when I got back to the car and it was at 85% and charging at 9 amps so I stood there while it finished as I didn't want to disconnect half way through a cycle. We have all read those horror stories! I know better now! :?

 

[steviechi]

Add another to the list of unhappy drivers to have the car totally disabled by fast charger. On New Years Eve in the middle of Scotland.

Mitsubishi answer, i dont know how to use fast charger.

Shame i use fast charger a few times a week, and actually design and manufacture Electric Vehicles Controllers and Chargers and appear to know lots more than Mitsubishi.

 

[ChrisMiller]

Were you able to use the 'magic' override, (gear selector right, handbrake & footbrake on, start button) described on the 'sticky' pages?

 

[maby]

Were you able to use the 'magic' override, (gear selector right, handbrake & footbrake on, start button) described on the 'sticky' pages?

That is not a magic wand to solve the fast charge lockup - just to release the parking brake in order to simplify loading the car onto a trailer to get it to the nearest Mitsubishi dealer.

 

[maby]

Add another to the list of unhappy drivers to have the car totally disabled by fast charger. On New Years Eve in the middle of Scotland.

Mitsubishi answer, i dont know how to use fast charger.

Shame i use fast charger a few times a week, and actually design and manufacture Electric Vehicles Controllers and Chargers and appear to know lots more than Mitsubishi.

It seems pretty clear that there is an incompatibility - the only question is whose fault it is.

 

[TC1978]

I've never yet done this, not because I'm worried about the potential issues (as I hadn't read this thread!), but more because I'm not convinced it would give me any benefit.

I don't live anywhere near any fast chargers, as the majority appear to be in motorway service stations and I live in a county without any motorways (and, perhaps as a result, no fast chargers). I do, however, do very regular motorway long journeys, but even then - if I stop for the 20 minutes or so (which would be practically unheard of, I like to keep my pit stops to five minutes or so, enough time to invariably fill up, and have a jimmy riddle).

If I'm then going to crash down the motorway for another couple of hundred miles, the benefit of having an 80% charge, to me, is negligible. Am I missing something?

 

[maby]

I've never yet done this, not because I'm worried about the potential issues (as I hadn't read this thread!), but more because I'm not convinced it would give me any benefit.

I don't live anywhere near any fast chargers, as the majority appear to be in motorway service stations and I live in a county without any motorways (and, perhaps as a result, no fast chargers). I do, however, do very regular motorway long journeys, but even then - if I stop for the 20 minutes or so (which would be practically unheard of, I like to keep my pit stops to five minutes or so, enough time to invariably fill up, and have a jimmy riddle).

If I'm then going to crash down the motorway for another couple of hundred miles, the benefit of having an 80% charge, to me, is negligible. Am I missing something?

Likewise, I've never used public chargers. As you say, almost all rapid chargers are on motorway service areas and they only give you 80% charge. At motorway speeds, this will take you less than 20 miles - quite a lot less at this time of year - and it will take close to half an hour to get you there - really not worth it even if there were no risk to your car...

 

[ChrisMiller]

Thanks for putting me right, maby - I'm in a similar boat with regard to fast chargers. I haven't even used public slow chargers as they all (round here) seem to require you to join a scheme costing around £8 a month (and some charge per kWh on top).

 

[maby]

Thanks for putting me right, maby - I'm in a similar boat with regard to fast chargers. I haven't even used public slow chargers as they all (round here) seem to require you to join a scheme costing around £8 a month (and some charge per kWh on top).

The usefulness of the public charging network really rather depends on your pattern of use of the car. There was a time, long before I owned a PHEV, when I would drive into central London almost every day to work and would park in an NCP a mile or so from the office. That car park now has charging points fitted and if I were still making that journey frequently, I guess I might charge up there. The London office is about 30 miles from our house and a charge at the far end would mean that I could run close to 100% EV - and I would be there for several hours, so I could take on a full charge from an ordinary fast charger without risking my battery.

But, these days I work almost exclusively from home and my pattern of car usage is a combination of short trips to the shops and long trips to the boat for the weekend - no possibility of charging there. If I'm driving a hundred miles to get to the boat, the last thing I want to do is to stop at a service area for half an hour to save (optimistically) half a gallon of petrol! We usually do that trip with our cat and he gets very bad tempered if I stop!

 

[greendwarf]

If you are coming into London from the West, say from Heathrow, then the Rapid charger at Heston Services will give you EV motoring in town or perhaps you've gone shopping at Lakeside in the East and a boost at IKEA will get you back home. :mrgreen: