Tesla Supercharger access now stated as February 2024 (by Tesla)

[AhardFSU]

Then I welcome you to show me how this is done in Norway. As a practical example: Fokserød located close to Torp Airport in Sandefjord has a lot of Tesla chargers that is available for use, yet, if I use the infotainment system the only options I get are Ionity and other less known brands. Also worth noting that all chargers and all brands in Europe use either Chademo or CCS connector, so no need to a connector.

He was referring to the Tesla Magic Docks locations here in the US.

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[timbop]

Need to be careful to make sure it's not a V2 station, since those won't work for us. It appears roughly 40% of the US SC stations are V2s still, so gotta check it first. V2's show up as "150kw" and V3's "250kw" on the Tesla map.

And therein lies the rub. Presumably Ford's nav (and probably plugshare also) will only route you to the v3/v4 chargers, "average joe's" who don't spend all day on this forum will try to use V2 chargers and won't be able to. Since they won't understand "why", they will simply complain vehemently and further the "EV charging sucks" narrative.

 

[smunro622]

You are using slow DC chargers. Go to EA and you will nearly double that speed...

I do not have an EA chargers around me, I have a 20 to 25 min drive to get there.

 

[RickMachE]

Twice the speed.

Of course DC fast charging is intended for traveling, so local isn't needed.

 

[AhardFSU]

And therein lies the rub. Presumably Ford's nav (and probably plugshare also) will only route you to the v3/v4 chargers, "average joe's" who don't spend all day on this forum will try to use V2 chargers and won't be able to. Since they won't understand "why", they will simply complain vehemently and further the "EV charging sucks" narrative.

I tend to think as you said that Plugshare and Ford’s nav will identify the V3 and V4 superchargers while leaving out the V2. But you’re always going to have people that don’t use the nav or Plugshare. What’s likely to happen is that those people will drive past a Tesla supercharger and try to charge there while not realizing that it’s a V2.

Those customers will need to be educated about using the nav system to find charges. Hopefully Tesla’s app will be useful in helping driver identify which ones they can use.

 

[Space_Pony]

I tend to think as you said that Plugshare and Ford’s nav will identify the V3 and V4 superchargers while leaving out the V2. But you’re always going to have people that don’t use the nav or Plugshare. What’s likely to happen is that those people will drive past a Tesla supercharger and try to charge there while not realizing that it’s a V2.

Those customers will need to be educated about using the nav system to find charges. Hopefully Tesla’s app will be useful in helping driver identify which ones they can use.

They will need to use the Tesla app to see the prices and pay also, since prices aren't on Plugshare.

 

[Tampamike]

I tend to think as you said that Plugshare and Ford’s nav will identify the V3 and V4 superchargers while leaving out the V2. But you’re always going to have people that don’t use the nav or Plugshare. What’s likely to happen is that those people will drive past a Tesla supercharger and try to charge there while not realizing that it’s a V2.

Those customers will need to be educated about using the nav system to find charges. Hopefully Tesla’s app will be useful in helping driver identify which ones they can use.

Absent an app telling you that you can use it, how does one tell if it is a version 2 or 3,4? Like, visually, as in a drive -by scenario?

 

[AhardFSU]

Absent an app telling you that you can use it, how does one tell if it is a version 2 or 3,4? Like, visually, as in a drive -by scenario?

There’s no way to tell visually speaking bc the V2s look the same as the V3s. The V4s do look different in the black and white motif, but there aren’t many of them in the US.

 

[kennelh]

Absent an app telling you that you can use it, how does one tell if it is a version 2 or 3,4? Like, visually, as in a drive -by scenario?

Differences between V2 and V3 Superchargers

 

[ArthurDOB]

Yes, that's my guess too, even though Farley is quoted in the article as saying:


Everything about the NACS deal with Tesla reeked of them just winging it when they announced it, like Farley and Musk just had a handshake agreement and called a press conference.

Personally I think Farley has signed his own death warrant with Ford, with this being an example of how he will be blamed for their problems with EV adoption. We're getting to a point where new buyers will just wait until the cars have NACS built-in. Good old-fashioned Osborne Effect in action.

We'll see about an Osborne Effect. You sound like an economist. Your prediction of the future is as good as anyone's - you have a 50/50 chance of being right. ?

 

[ArthurDOB]

So, everyone mark the day on your calendar, February 30th! ?

...a.k.a. March 1st in a leap year, March 2nd in the other non-leap years ?

 

[dbsb3233]

Absent an app telling you that you can use it, how does one tell if it is a version 2 or 3,4? Like, visually, as in a drive -by scenario?

For someone on a road trip, waiting until you get to the station is too late. Gotta look it up beforehand. AFAIK, the only way to tell the difference is to look at the power max. "Up to 150kw" is V2; "Up to 250kw" is V3.

And it looks like that can only be found on the website ( www.tesla.com/findus ). The Tesla app (once you have an account for a non-Tesla) only shows the Magicdock stations. I can't figure out a way get it to display the non-MD stations. Gotta pull up the web browser and look that way.

 

[timbop]

They will need to use the Tesla app to see the prices and pay also, since prices aren't on Plugshare.

I can envision situations when someone is going to see a Tesla charger and try to go use it. If it happens to be V2 then their experience will be "I couldn't use the thing, Ford/Tesla/EV sucks and I don't really care why it didn't work for me, just that it didn't". That will especially be true if they are at a CCS station like EA and it's full or broken and they drive across the street/lot to try to use the Tesla stations they could see while fuming about EA being shitty

Absent an app telling you that you can use it, how does one tell if it is a version 2 or 3,4? Like, visually, as in a drive -by scenario?

For the average Joe that just wants to drive their cars, they won't have any way of knowing which it is visually. Sure those who want to do research might know certain small distinguishing features, but not many. As @dbsb3233 pointed out you can find out in the app today by looking at the power level (250kw = V3). My guess is that will change after this really rolls out (not holding my breath for february), with their app and others offering filters for CCS-compatible chargers. That still won't help for when people see the charger and decide to try to use it

 

[MellowJohnny]

The "Transport Evolved" YouTube channel did an interview with EVgo ... and they talked about how their version of plug & charge, which they call Autocharge+, works.

There has long been a standard for allowing IP-based (Internet Protocol) data networking to work over power line. CCS1 uses this for communication between the charging station and the car.

From what I gathered, they don't actually use the VIN number of the car at all (it is probably not part of the data). But they do use two different things that create a pretty unique "fingerprint" of an individual car. This allows them to provide the Autocharge experience to most any EV driver without needing to work with each manufacturer to make it work.

First ... CCS allows for some flexibility of what sort of data is included in the packets and how those packets are formatted. So... there are some generic differences (basic format differences) in how packets are formed depending on the car maker (e.g. Ford, GM, VW, etc.) and just by looking at how the data packets were formatted you can tell which brand car is connected to your station.

Second ... since it is IP-based communication, at the hardware level, every network adapter has to have a hardware address. I'd like to say that address is unique and never changes -- but that's not technically true. But they are fairly unique and it is extremely unlikely that they would ever change.

This means if you combine the packet formate (which helps you narrow it down to a specific manufacturer) with the network address of the car (which is probably unique on it's own), you now have a "fingerprint" that makes your car unique.

EVgo doesn't go through Ford. They totally do their own thing. You use the EVgo app and tell it you want to enroll your car in Autocharge+. They'll have you go to an EVgo station, tell the app you want to enroll, it needs to know WHICH station you are using, and then you plug in your car and it gets the unique identification information to associate that car to your account.

In the future ... you can just plug in without using the app and you'll be billed for the session.



For Ford's relationship with Tesla ... the newer Tesla stations (Gen 3 & 4) use the CCS communication protocol. But older stations did not. This is why we wont have access to older Tesla stations -- they don't speak CCS.

The notion that Tesla can allow some brands of non-Tesla cars and block others ... suggests they probably have a back-channel to Ford. If the article is correct ... what's to stop _every_ EV from using their stations on the day they open it to their first partner?

It would be nice if we had a plug & charge experience.

Great info!

I'd be happy with Plug & Tap to be honest. Anything beyond that is gravy to me at this point

 

[Tampamike]

[QUOTE="timbop, post: 730802, member: 506"
For the average Joe that just wants to drive their cars, they won't have any way of knowing which it is visually. Sure those who want to do research might know certain small distinguishing features, but not many. As @dbsb3233 pointed out you can find out in the app today by looking at the power level (250kw = V3). My guess is that will change after this really rolls out (not holding my breath for february), with their app and others offering filters for CCS-compatible chargers. That still won't help for when people see the charger and decide to try to use it
[/QUOTE]

That’s kind of what I thought. Without having had a Tesla, but now having another EV, I happen to “see” the superchargers. I could see a scenario where you’re, maybe, heading for another charger and then “see” a Tesla bank. You couldn’t just tell by sight whether you could use it or not, apparently.

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