Why America’s EV chargers keep breaking .... article on Politico website

[Rogue]

16k miles a year at 3.5 miles per kwhr charged at Electrify America Pass of 36¢ per kwhr equals ~5k over three years. While I would certainly not begrudge the value of $5k, push comes to shove I could pay this.

Those numbers presume you are always DC fast charging. I doubt anyone is doing that. Really, the cost savings of free charging are likely much less.

From a user perspective, easy and reliable charging should be the norm, equivalent to gas station ease.

 

[cardiacTom]

Tesla superchargers are the free market solution.
they were incentivized to make the reliable and they are.
Now if VW and other makers want to enter the field and compete...you need reliable network, or you do what Ford just did.

 

[mardin]

I have owned a lucid air GT for over six months now and I constantly have issues with charging at the EA stations. It seems that no matter where I stop only half of the stations are functioning to begin with. And then when I do try and charge, I always get the authentication error or some other BS message. It’s rare that I can pull up to the charger and plug in and have it work. I’m going to say it works maybe half of the time at best. It doesn’t seem to me that EA does a good job of keeping all the stations running. And waiting on the phone for customer service can sometimes take you half an hour or more. And waiting online for Lucid Service can take forever , not a good way to support the car. I’m hoping that Lucid can come up with other options such as Tesla chargers, and ChargePoints which seem to be everywhere. Lucid should negotiate with those other companies to get the free Lucid charging also. It would eliminate a lot of frustration with owners.

There is little financial incentive to deliver high speed trouble free PREPAID energy!!! Think about it.

 

[Sandvinsd]

ForEA, the plug and charge has been working perfectly for the last several months. That much I am grateful for. However, it has been the lack of charging speed and the constant Yo-yo on the speed which has been frustrating. Charging at 10-50% of the rated speed on a preconditioned, low SOC battery is just not acceptable, nor is the constant yo-yo from 20 to 100 kw over just seconds.

 

[Cosmo Cruz]

ForEA, the plug and charge has been working perfectly for the last several months. That much I am grateful for. However, it has been the lack of charging speed and the constant Yo-yo on the speed which has been frustrating. Charging at 10-50% of the rated speed on a preconditioned, low SOC battery is just not acceptable, nor is the constant yo-yo from 20 to 100 kw over just seconds.

I suspect EA is keeping track of Lucids on the free charge plan and deliberately slowing down the charge rate to discourage us.

I notice the further away from home I go the faster the EA charge rate ... they are tracking us and trying to make us stop using free EA when we are local. Remember, this is a VW offering = they are not incompetent, they are just evil.

 

[DavidBWilliams]

What version of software are you on in your Air?

2.0.68

 

[DavidBWilliams]

Honest question, did the free charging push you over the fence of purchasing? If not, then why not try other chargers and just use those if they work better to reduce frustrations? Free charging is not a benefit if it causes so much headache and frustration, IMO.

Not really.
something practical tells me I should at least get my moneys worth.
I figure that’s over $7000 value and I don’t like to waste money.
I assume the others aren’t any better and appear to be much slower.
the Charge Point I looked at was only 50 Kwh.

 

[CraZ8]

A few days ago I stopped by a fairly new EA in orange burg NY( about 1 year old) but only 2 of the 4 chargers were working. I waited 20 minutes and plugged in and joined wifey for dinner. Timer said 50 minutes to charge to 85% so time to spare. As I’m getting up from dinner noticed charge stopped ( at 80%) strange but no big deal. After running around a few days stop by another EA ( this one had new chargers put in 6 months ago).Only One out of 4 working and that was the 50/150 kiosk #1 that doesn’t even show up on my app. EA seems to be getting worse not better. I realize how lucky I was driving down to Florida last December and having only one miserable experience with a charger that kept kicking off every 5 minutes. Today I might not even attempt that trip

 

[Yossarian]

Before we went off on a 3 week cruise in mid-April, we dropped off our Air Touring at the Riviera Bch Service Center with a list of items to address including the EA no-auto charging problem. The EA plug in worked automatically 1 time in the first 3 months of ownership, all other charging events were done after spending time on the cell phone talking with EA. I don't know what the SC did to it this time, but EA has started to automatically charge shortly now after I plug it in.

 

[Tritouring]

Sure. Who wants to do a business to design charging stations by electric car owners for electric car owners?

This can be done. It will be done. Who does it gets the bulk of the pie.

I'm not an electrical engineer, so... I would need to know someone. Finding someone may be possible. Software engineering part I could do though.

I think you just described Elon Musk and Tesla. It seems Ford and GM have realized that the most difficult EV problem (battery capacity and charging) has already been solved by Tesla. When Lucid has access to Tesla Super chargers....will be AMAZING!!!

Disclaimer: I absolutely love my Lucid Air Touring. I am really happy I bought a Lucid rather than another Model S. No regrets!!!

 

[mardin]

Not really.
something practical tells me I should at least get my moneys worth.
I figure that’s over $7000 value and I don’t like to waste money.
I assume the others aren’t any better and appear to be much slower.
the Charge Point I looked at was only 50 Kwh.

I paid 150k cash for a car and yes 3 years of free charging did make it less painful to write that check.. Just like the epa rating made it less of a guilty indulgence. On the other hand I have a 30 year old MB that has no paint chips on original paint, and a 150k$ lucid I have to pay 10k more for to protect the flimsy paint... Something is wrong with the value derived.i love the lucid but something is amiss here. it's a matter of providing whats been promised!!! Both overtly (reliable charging infrastructure) and implicitly (quality and value total build). That's is what is required to stay in business.... To get and keep a loyal customer base.

 

[Bobby]

I’ve had no paint issues after 11k miles.

 

[Worldwide Beagle]

Excellent discussion. Fascinating. Let me throw this out there. Tesla built the supercharger network for the cold cruel reason to sell its cars, by removing a buyers purchase impediment/anxiety. Not to be green. Most of the others, it appears to me, are out to sell a service or something like support climate goals. For commercial chargers to really work, I am pondering that it has to be a tool in the arsenal to get people to trade in ICE cars, not simply "provide a place to charge."

 

[quantum]

Great topic.

History teaches us we should be thinking about a free market solution. John Rockefeller built thousands of Standard Oil gas stations to sell gasoline at a profit. It enabled the emergence of the trillion dollar automotive industry and it worked out to be extraordinary lucrative for him too.

Anything the government tries to do or throw money at will fail from a customer service and reliability standpoint. One example: Amtrak.

Public utilities are scarcely any better. With local monopoly power they have very little customer service DNA.

Tesla has motivation to build and run a charger network to exploit its first-mover advantage to sell cars.

Until there is a free market solution we will wallow around in incompetence.

But there is one BIG differense. You can charge at home, a gas staton in your own garage. I've only charged 4 times at a public station in the last 5 years of ownership.

 

[shredderc]

I drove with the family round trip from Chicago suburbs to STL over the weekend. Told them we would stop for 20 minutes to charge at a 350 kw charger. Well the EA charger maxed at about 160. So, 30 minutes charging on the way down, and over 40 minutes on the return

 

[Thinjake]

I drove with the family round trip from Chicago suburbs to STL over the weekend. Told them we would stop for 20 minutes to charge at a 350 kw charger. Well the EA charger maxed at about 160. So, 30 minutes charging on the way down, and over 40 minutes on the return

DITTO!!! I will preface everything I say with I LOVE DRIVING THIS CAR!!!!

That being said, I get no where near the quoted range. On trips. I get about 3-3.3. BUT when you stop to charge and:
1. some of chargers are inoperational
2. the other are full and people are lined up to use them
3. they charge WAY slower than capable.

This turns 20 minute charges into an hour or more. I'm to the point that I am going to go back to using our gas guzzler for any trips that require a charge.

 

[Bobby]

I drove with the family round trip from Chicago suburbs to STL over the weekend. Told them we would stop for 20 minutes to charge at a 350 kw charger. Well the EA charger maxed at about 160. So, 30 minutes charging on the way down, and over 40 minutes on the return

Some 350 chargers are shared, so if another car is charging at the adjacent charger, you will get 175 max.

 

[Pittsburgher]

DITTO!!! I will preface everything I say with I LOVE DRIVING THIS CAR!!!!

That being said, I get no where near the quoted range. On trips. I get about 3-3.3. BUT when you stop to charge and:
1. some of chargers are inoperational
2. the other are full and people are lined up to use them
3. they charge WAY slower than capable.

This turns 20 minute charges into an hour or more. I'm to the point that I am going to go back to using our gas guzzler for any trips that require a charge.

My wife and I completed our first "road trip" - Pittsburgh -> Reading PA -> ShortHills NJ -> Rehobeth DE -> Pittsburgh . . . about 1100 miles over 5 days. We averaged 3.8 for the entire trip . . . Touring on 19's with the aero inserts in place, 70% highway at 70-80mph.

My charging experience leads me to similar conclusions as Thinjake. While each charge stop created a level of anxiety, due to the points made by Thinjake, we had mostly positive charging experiences, except our last charge(s) which happened at EA stations in Frederick MD and Hagerstown MD respectively. Frederick had 150 KhW units available . . . but with others charging and whatever power limitations the station had, it was only putting out 30-50KwH. (although I saw an F150 charging at 87 on a like 150 charger. Uugghh. It estimated 1 hr 20 minutes to charge to 88%.

So we only added 10% and drove to Hagerstown. Their 350 KwH chargers kept toggling back and forth between operable / non-operable. Very frustrating. Finally, we plugged into a 150 charger - which actually started us at 175, then slowly decreased as is normal. It took < 45 minutes to charge.

I had a seasoned EV owner at an earlier stop tell me that the chargers can and will charge above their stated capacity, and (more frequently) charge well below their stated capacity - for no apparent reason. He also said that he doesn't have free charging with EA (like we do), but he generally tries EA stations first because they tend to have higher speed charging in his experience, fwiw. Go figure.

That said, all of the gushed upon qualities of the car outweigh these charging constraints, especially when there is optimism that the network(s) will continue to improve in the coming years. I may take Thinjakes ICE tactic for long trips where I don't have flexibility in charging or if I know I'm going to more rural areas where chargers are few and far between.

 

[shredderc]

Some 350 chargers are shared, so if another car is charging at the adjacent charger, you will get 175 max.

The other guys actually moved to a 150kw, because that was their car's max. VW id4 and an Audi e Tron suv

 

[shredderc]

My wife and I completed our first "road trip" - Pittsburgh -> Reading PA -> ShortHills NJ -> Rehobeth DE -> Pittsburgh . . . about 1100 miles over 5 days. We averaged 3.8 for the entire trip . . . Touring on 19's with the aero inserts in place, 70% highway at 70-80mph.

My charging experience leads me to similar conclusions as Thinjake. While each charge stop created a level of anxiety, due to the points made by Thinjake, we had mostly positive charging experiences, except our last charge(s) which happened at EA stations in Frederick MD and Hagerstown MD respectively. Frederick had 150 KhW units available . . . but with others charging and whatever power limitations the station had, it was only putting out 30-50KwH. (although I saw an F150 charging at 87 on a like 150 charger. Uugghh. It estimated 1 hr 20 minutes to charge to 88%.

So we only added 10% and drove to Hagerstown. Their 350 KwH chargers kept toggling back and forth between operable / non-operable. Very frustrating. Finally, we plugged into a 150 charger - which actually started us at 175, then slowly decreased as is normal. It took < 45 minutes to charge.

I had a seasoned EV owner at an earlier stop tell me that the chargers can and will charge above their stated capacity, and (more frequently) charge well below their stated capacity - for no apparent reason. He also said that he doesn't have free charging with EA (like we do), but he generally tries EA stations first because they tend to have higher speed charging in his experience, fwiw. Go figure.

That said, all of the gushed upon qualities of the car outweigh these charging constraints, especially when there is optimism that the network(s) will continue to improve in the coming years. I may take Thinjakes ICE tactic for long trips where I don't have flexibility in charging or if I know I'm going to more rural areas where chargers are few and far between.

I agree. 150-160 is nothing to sneeze at. I could have helped myself by not forgetting to charge to full before leaving home. Then we may have been able to do the first leg without charging. Also, a place like McD's might be a good partner for fast charging. The one we visited was outside Walmart.