Electrify America - extremely bad first experience

[67 Stang Convertible]

Yeah, Electrify America, well I'd say it has been a disaster for them. Frankly the Germans and their rich history of Engineering should be ashamed. I think we must have opened up too many McDonalds and KFCs over there and there minds have gone mushy. I totally trust the South Koreans now more than the Germans.......Let's not forget the ID3 & ID4 launches.....yikes

What ever happened with the big announcement of the auto manufacturers building their own network?? Did the Tesla deal kill that?

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[RickMachE]

Yeah, Electrify America, well I'd say it has been a disaster for them. Frankly the Germans and their rich history of Engineering should be ashamed. I think we must have opened up too many McDonalds and KFCs over there and there minds have gone mushy. I totally trust the South Koreans now more than the Germans.......Let's not forget the ID3 & ID4 launches.....yikes

What ever happened with the big announcement of the auto manufacturers building their own network?? Did the Tesla deal kill that?

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/15/23960991/mercedes-benz-ev-charging-station-atlanta-chargepoint

https://www.cars.com/articles/gm-pi...Travel Centers and,J locations across the U.S.

 

[Space_Pony]

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/15/23960991/mercedes-benz-ev-charging-station-atlanta-chargepoint

https://www.cars.com/articles/gm-pilot-evgo-open-first-charging-stations-in-nationwide-network-475669/#:~:text=GM, Pilot Travel Centers and,J locations across the U.S.

Just don't pay any attention to the prices at these new stations that make it cheaper to drive an ICEV.

 

[RickMachE]

Just don't pay any attention to the prices at these new stations that make it cheaper to drive an ICEV.

Correct. All 3 Pilot stations I stopped at on our recent trip were more expensive than EA or a nearby ChargePoint.

Also, at one Pilot / GM station, I talked to a Bolt owner and asked if he got a GM discount on the charge rate. He said no, he could select either free home charger install or a $500 gift card for charging on the network.

 

[Yerfdog56]

Plug and Charge transmits the info directly to EA, who then verifies with Ford, and the car starts charging. It probably would not have made a difference in your case, but you never know. There is no reason NOT to use P&C versus swiping in FordPass when at EA. EA is the only place P&C currently works (and only when using the Ford account).

Your experience, that EA is crappy, is true for about 25% of the time. Some locations are great. Most locations have at least 25% down chargers. Some locations have been, and continue to be, crappy for years.

Tesla will change the game in Feb/Spring. What is unknown is whether the deluge of CCS cars makes the Tesla network have problems.

I hear this a lot about the overcrowding once the CCS army arrives. I doubt it will make a noticeable difference.
Reasons:

• Like Magic Dock, (which hasn't had overcrowding issues) Tesla is strategically opening their Network based on utilization.
• SpC's that historically have back-ups will not be opened to non-Tesla's until the pressure is relieved. Re: Europe
• The ratio of CCS vs NACS EV's currently on the road in the U.S. is probably 1:4. Tesla sold more cars this year than all other EV's combined so Tesla's growth is the bigger issue if the SpC build out stalls.
• A not insignificant number of CCS vehicle owners have vehemently stated that they will never give Musk a dime. This forum has a few.
• The price for the SpC will likely be higher for non-Tesla's than the current public charging network. As some have stated, the Tesla SpC Network will be for emergencies only.
• The publicly available SpC's will be V3's and V4's which charge at a higher rate than the majority of public charging. This means nothing to the Bolt owner which maxes out at ~55kW but for the non-Tesla's, they can expect up to 150kW so may reduce the dwell time vs the 100kW they are accustomed to. Not to mention Tesla's peaking at 250kW currently and maybe 350kW on V4 for future vehicles. They probably average 10 minutes (WAG)per stop based on my experience.

 

[Tampamike]

Do Teslas have an 800v battery, or do they just have a different built-in charge curve that gives then the faster charge time?

 

[RickMachE]

I hear this a lot about the overcrowding once the CCS army arrives. I doubt it will make a noticeable difference.
Reasons:

• Like Magic Dock, (which hasn't had overcrowding issues) Tesla is strategically opening their Network based on utilization.
• SpC's that historically have back-ups will not be opened to non-Tesla's until the pressure is relieved. Re: Europe
• The ratio of CCS vs NACS EV's currently on the road in the U.S. is probably 1:4. Tesla sold more cars this year than all other EV's combined so Tesla's growth is the bigger issue if the SpC build out stalls.
• A not insignificant number of CCS vehicle owners have vehemently stated that they will never give Musk a dime. This forum has a few.
• The price for the SpC will likely be higher for non-Tesla's than the current public charging network. As some have stated, the Tesla SpC Network will be for emergencies only.
• The publicly available SpC's will be V3's and V4's which charge at a higher rate than the majority of public charging. This means nothing to the Bolt owner which maxes out at ~55kW but for the non-Tesla's, they can expect up to 150kW so may reduce the dwell time vs the 100kW they are accustomed to. Not to mention Tesla's peaking at 250kW currently and maybe 350kW on V4 for future vehicles. They probably average 10 minutes (WAG)per stop based on my experience.

Many of your points are valid, but...

- Magic Dock hasn't had overcrowding issues because the vast majority of CCS vehicle owners have no clue they exist, or how to find them.

- I've said I won't use Tesla chargers unless there is no other DC fast charging option available. I used one in Moab, UT as a result. Once this rolls out, I may temper my thoughts based on price, and reliability, if CCS hasn't caught up enough, but still I don't want to give Tesla my money.

 

[ChehRob]

It may be too much to hope, but are those going for NACS coordinating with Tesla so we don't have four or five charging stations at one Freeway intersection, and then none for another 50 miles?

 

[Trigger]

https://www.ford.com/content/dam/br...mache/MACHE_PublicCharging_Job_Aid_4_9_21.pdf

 

[bbulkow]

Yeah, this kind of thing does seem to happen a lot. I have charging at home and have only a handful of times *needed* to charge outside the house. But, to feel secure, I went and charged at EA and EVGo a handful of times to make sure all the apps were up and communicating.

I used "plug and charge" that people have been recommending to access my 250KWH from ford. I've also registered my car with EVGo so it has the same facility which is called some other thing. I've also got all these apps loaded. My experience with EA was 100% good. My experience with EVGo is the chargers are rated annoyingly: their "200kw" charger is 1000v * 200a which means the max speed on our 350v cars is about 70kw. Same thing with their 50kw chargers: 500v * 100a means 35kw. EVGos were less reliable in my small sample set than EA, but the prices were very high (except when using my ford-free).

The EA 150kw chargers near me seem super reliable, and actually deliver within our car's peak. I now look for a bank of those 150kw's. Luckily, as I said, I don't have to public charge much. Some EVGo's have a "reserve" function which seems snazzy.

There's a good article out there somewhere about EA's backstory. They were created as a legal requirement when VW lied about emissions and polluted our air. Therefore they aren't super interested in our business. Only now as VW's required investment is tapering off are they needing to be a customer focused company. It shows, no?

I found it's critical to have the charging company's app and check it. It will often show a charger offline when the screen is bright and happy onsite and it says it wants to charge. This is the worst kind of fail and maddening. Fully agree.

Just to stay in practice, I stopped at a fast charger last month that I thought was "loop" brand. It didn't seem to have an app and was credit card only. Fab! I thought, for a change, no app. Yet, it also couldn't figure out how to charge my credit card. Moved to the other reader... success. There was no one reasonable to call, it wasn't "really" loop (it said loop but was something independent).

No wonder my sensible friends are buying plug in hybrids!

Finally, I was reading that Tesla has having trouble with its V4 chargers because they support 350kw and the cable is too heavy and they're having a lot of failing stations, more than ever before. Given our cars don't go up to even 200kw (true of most cars) we really don't want these super heavy cables, yet, people want the big numbers (350kw >> 200kw!!!) which will create problems. "Even" for tesla!

I may have the chance of trying one of the tesla CCS stations (magic dock) today. Kinda looking forward to it.

 

[bbulkow]

I hear this a lot about the overcrowding once the CCS army arrives. I doubt it will make a noticeable difference.

I think it depends a lot on whether the adapter has the extra 18ish inches to allow our MMEs to fit in the same slots in the same order as teslas. If MMEs have to be parked carefully and take up either 2 slots or need to wait for a slot at the end, there will be a lot of grumbling.

I also don't think the rush will be that bad. In borrowing and renting teslas I don't like the charging locations, they are places I wouldn't want to stay. They're often in weird and skeezy parking lots. EVGo and EA are often in nice(er) places with a restaurant to get some fries or a taco truck or a street with shops to browse. I'll pick non-tesla first just for that reason, when I have a choice.

It'll also depend on the reliability. If I find that tesla is 100% compared to the current public networks 80%, I might find myself heading to Tesla as the first choice. That's worth a few extra bucks on the cost of electrons.

I think the price difference won't be that huge, it'll be 10% probably. The charging speed shoudln't be that different, at least, on the rare times I public charge I always filter to 150kw or better chargers and make sure I"m using a charger that maxes out my car if I'm going to be waiting (50kw is OK if I'm shopping and know I'll be 30 minutes anyway).

But most importantly is the cars on road difference. Also remember tesla was selling cars at volume a couple of years later so I think the cars on road difference is massive.

I sometimes look at the number of stalls taken at the Tesla MagicDock equipped station nearish my house. It's pretty empty. Of course probably few CCS users know it's there and waiting, or its in a spot that's rarely a rush. It would be more interesting to hear about the tesla stations in ... NY state, right? .... that are more visibly used.

 

[milepost1]

I apologize for making a post that's probably been made a million times by now, but I felt like I would share it anyway as it's a first for me.

I just bought my MME last month and I've been enjoying it, but it's almost all been charging at home. I took it out for a fairly quick day trip yesterday, and decided that I would top it off just to avoid getting home at <5%. I looked up chargers in the FordPass app and found an Electrify America charger stop at a Walmart that was basically on my route.

I get there and it's empty, with six stations. One of them was offline, but the rest were at least nominally functional. I had 250kW of free charging through the FordPass app, so I tried to use that - I activated the charger through the app, and was prompted to put the handset in and start charging, which I did. After 30-60 seconds, it just failed, with an error like "charger fault" or something, and the charger ring on the MME port started flashing orange. and the app notified me of the failure. Tried again, same result.

Moved to a different station and repeated, and same result.

Tried a third station, and again, same thing.

At this point, I thought that maybe the problem was with the FordPass app, so I started the process of downloading the app, setting up an account, entering billing info, etc. I have my wife and my mother and my newborn with me, so this is starting to feel like an ordeal - after all, I was the one who pushed for an EV when my wife was more hesitant about it.

I get the app set up and go about the same basic process of activating the charger, and starting charging. This time it actually seems to start working! Except... then it fails. The app reports a failure and suggests retrying. But I take a look at the charger port and see that it looks like it's still charging. I look over at the station and verify that it does indeed seem to still be going, even though the app thinks otherwise.

But I look at the station, and notice that it's already charged me $13 before I've really even started charging. The screen literally shows me that it knows my battery was 30% at the start of charge, but for whatever weird failure of code, it's decided that I owe them money for the 30% of the battery that was already charged when I showed up.

Anyway, I charge to about 50% (from starting at 30%) and stop charging. It charged at a rate of around ~100kW, which is fine. I thought maybe it was just a UI glitch, but sure enough, I proceeded to get a bill for $22 for charging 20% of my battery.

I called Electrify America and find that their billing department is closed. I've called back today and I've had to spend like a half hour on hold - I started talking with a guy, I explained the situation, he put me on hold, came back, put me on hold again, and then came back and explained that it was actually MY FAULT, and then I had to explain again what happened and offer to send photo evidence. I'm on hold yet again and still not sure whether this is going to get resolved.

This is frankly just a nightmare scenario and honestly makes me feel like I may have inflicted a big a impediment on my family by buying an EV if this is going to be a recurring theme. I'm optimistic that the Tesla integration will help to avoid this kind of BS, but just feeling pretty uncertain about the whole highway charging experience now.

Almost only complaint from all evs except tesla, is the poir state of charging network. It has only gotten worse with more evs and evs with lots of free charging. At first only one at charge station so could keep trying until 1 worked. Now all the ones that work are full. Or ppl with free charging sit and charge to 100%

 

[milepost1]

This is issue with EVs. Lots of answers on what could be wrong, 42 differant apps, that may or may not be accurate. It shouldn't be this hard. For gas may use 1 app if trying to find cheapest gas, however never once to see if I could possibly get gas there, and how many of the pumps actually work.

 

[ArthurDOB]

My first experience with EA was strange. I was just trying out DCFC for the first time and I did not understand that I could just plug in and it would charge, I used the app because I thought I was supposed to and didn't realize that this was not necessary. Fortunately, they were having some payment issues or something and all the charging I did was free, so I didn't get charged anything or lose any of my 250 KWh. Now that you've got an idea of what to do, it shouldn't be too difficult.

 

[GreaseMonkey]

It would be helpful for new EV drivers to try the main charging networks in their home towns before they get on the road to ensure things are set up properly and avoid wasting valuable time.

I say that in hindsight, as a result of using DCFC extensively since I took delivery 1.5 years ago.

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