charging in public places

rosssr · 07-29-2018, 12:46 AM

i just moved into an apt and contrary to what they told me when i was looking at it, i will not be able to charge the car in the garage. there is a 110 plug near my car from which i ran an extension cord and plugged in my 110 charger, but the fuse was evidently not able to handle my wattage. despite asking them to increase the wattage of that fuse, they refuse. basically, they lied to me, the board of the building doesnt give a **** about what i need.

so, i have to charge the car in the wild, whenever i get a chance. i have downloaded the chargepoint app, and used them a few times. are there any other good ones out there?

Fabulist · 07-29-2018, 02:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rosssr

i just moved into an apt and contrary to what they told me when i was looking at it, i will not be able to charge the car in the garage. there is a 110 plug near my car from which i ran an extension cord and plugged in my 110 charger, but the fuse was evidently not able to handle my wattage. despite asking them to increase the wattage of that fuse, they refuse. basically, they lied to me, the board of the building doesnt give a **** about what i need.

Does the breaker trip when you first plug in the charger, or when you plug it into the car? And is it the breaker that trips or the GFI circuit on the plug itself? These may indicate problems with your charger.

The portable charger should only draw 1.3KW equivalent to 11 Amps. Household outlets are typically rated at 15 Amps (20 Amps for newer buildings) and a correctly working charger should not trip the breaker.

Are you sure that your charger is working correctly? Do you have access to another charger you can try? It does not need to be a Fisker charger, most EV chargers follow the same standard and should work with the Karma.

If the charger is working correctly and the problem is with the circuit, this may help a little: If you are using the Fisker portable charger, you can switch to a lower current draw that may help with the fuse. Plug the charger in, wait for the row of green lights to come on, then use the big orange button to toggle between max current (4 Green Lights) and 1/2 current (2 Green Lights). Obviously this will double the charging time, but at least you can get some benefit from charging the car overnight, however small.

The choice of public charging networks depends on where you live. Here in California, for example, Chargepoint and Blink are the most prevelant. Their respective apps help you find a nearby charger, and in some cases even reserve a charger in advance.

rosssr · 07-29-2018, 05:00 PM

thanks for that fabulist.
the charger works fine when i use it elsewhere -its an aftermarket one ( i dont recall the brand but it is white with a black plug), the original fisker orange 110 charger stopped working last year, and there is no halfway option on the new one.

when i plugged it in, everything worked initially, and i walked away. 10 minutes later the building manager was calling me frantically because the fuse had tripped and that whole section of the garage was in the dark. so i assumed the fuse was insufficient. but they will not investigate where or allow me to, or allow me to change the fuse. i assume it is at the circuit board since the building manager did not go to the plug itself to do anything.

chargepoint has proven to be the best so far for me. and it is free !
i saw a blink charger today but it was not on the plugshare app, so i will download the blink app right away.
i tried Evgo, and it was not as good - difficult to make it work and expensive

PowerSource · 07-29-2018, 05:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rosssr

thanks for that fabulist.
the charger works fine when i use it elsewhere -its an aftermarket one ( i dont recall the brand but it is white with a black plug), the original fisker orange 110 charger stopped working last year, and there is no halfway option on the new one.

when i plugged it in, everything worked initially, and i walked away. 10 minutes later the building manager was calling me frantically because the fuse had tripped and that whole section of the garage was in the dark. so i assumed the fuse was insufficient. but they will not investigate where or allow me to, or allow me to change the fuse. i assume it is at the circuit board since the building manager did not go to the plug itself to do anything.

chargepoint has proven to be the best so far for me. and it is free !
i saw a blink charger today but it was not on the plugshare app, so i will download the blink app right away.
i tried Evgo, and it was not as good - difficult to make it work and expensive

You may want to get a EVSE where you can change the amperage to the lowest possible and see if that still trips the breaker

https://emotorwerks.com/store/juiceb...-24-foot-cable

Not sure how low it can go but worth to contact them and find out the lowest it can go with their household adapter.

LonePalmBJ · 07-30-2018, 12:19 AM

You should check out the PlugShare app. In my opinion it is superior to all of the network-specific options. It's pretty much the only one I use. It's also free.

Fabulist · 07-30-2018, 02:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LonePalmBJ

You should check out the PlugShare app. In my opinion it is superior to all of the network-specific options. It's pretty much the only one I use. It's also free.

Plugshare is great for finding off-network chargers, but its biggest limitation is that it cannot tell you reliably if a charger is being used or not. I have my Chargepoint app set to only show chargers that are currently available, which saves a lot of time driving around looking at in-use chargers.

Fabulist · 07-30-2018, 03:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rosssr

chargepoint has proven to be the best so far for me. and it is free !
i saw a blink charger today but it was not on the plugshare app, so i will download the blink app right away.
i tried Evgo, and it was not as good - difficult to make it work and expensive

You don’t need to use separate apps for ChargePoint, Blink, EvGo and SemaCharge. The ChargePoint app can show you the status of chargers on any of those networks. You just need to select the ones you want on the main screen. See attached screenshot.

PowerSource · 07-30-2018, 03:23 PM

Using public chargers exclusively could lead to an issue where your battery pack is never balanced, which could brick modules in the battery pack. You may occasionally have to plug the vehicle in to a public EVSE for several/hours or potentially days if the pack gets out of balance. Would not recommend your exclusive public charging strategy because it could lead to expensive issues down the road.

RE2020 · 07-30-2018, 07:44 PM

I had a similar issue that turned out to be the outlet was not grounded. I found one that was and used a heavy duty extension cord. Then discovered the warning ‘DO NOT USE AN EXTENSION CORD’ were realized when eventually the outlet got too hot and smoked it.
All the best finding a solution.

rosssr · 07-30-2018, 11:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PowerSource

Using public chargers exclusively could lead to an issue where your battery pack is never balanced, which could brick modules in the battery pack. You may occasionally have to plug the vehicle in to a public EVSE for several/hours or potentially days if the pack gets out of balance. Would not recommend your exclusive public charging strategy because it could lead to expensive issues down the road.

i hear you. i was worried about that.
i let it stay on the chargepoint charger on sunday for 5 hours and topped it up, and it even started to charge it again for good measure.

the managers of my building really annoy me !