nrg EVGo MA DC Combo charger experiences

[WillC]

nrg EVGo's web site is now reporting that they have upgraded their chargers with Combo connections at several mall locations in MA.

If anyone has tried any of these locations with an eGolf it would be nice to know how these are functioning.

The locations are:

Burlington Mall, Burlington
Emerald Square Mall, North Attleboro
North Shore Mall, Peabody
Pheasant Lane Mall, Nashua
Southshore Plaza, Braintree
Square One Mall, Saugus

Thanks,

_will

 

[GadgetGav]

I pulled into the one at Burlington several months ago... almost stepped in dog 5h!# and the charger was out of order. Never bothered to try again.
Pulled into the one at Pheasant Lane a few months ago and they yet operational.

Having looked at the pricing plans for NRG and had 2/2 chargers non functioning when I went to them I am not that inclined to try that hard to join their scheme. I've found enough ChargePoint chargers to use with the card that came with the car or other free charging points that I don't feel the need to join another.

 

[igbright]

I tried the 50 kW NRG evGO CCS/ChaDeMo charger at the Chestnut Hill mall yesterday... Worked perfectly. They definitely upgraded this one from its original ChaDeMo-only version.

There were just two CCS chargers in Masachusetts when I bought the e-Golf six weeks ago... Now I count 13 on PlugShare. This is great! If they add just one more, say, around Danbury, CT, a Boston-New York run becomes quite feasible.

 

[rwill]

Isn't Boston - NYC already possible using chargepoints DC fast combos?

 

[igbright]

Not quite, at least not that I could figure out through Plugshare. There is one final stretch from Connecticut that's just too long.

 

[rwill]

Not quite, at least not that I could figure out through Plugshare. There is one final stretch from Connecticut that's just too long.

Along the 95 corridor...

I see DC's in Cranston, Mystic, Milford and then it's 75 miles to NYC...

Might even be able to skip a station depending on weather, traffic, driving style, etc.

Obviously not very good to DC charge your battery that many times in a row but nice to know it's possible.

Even going the other route seems possible, if not faster, with stops in Auburn, Hartford, + Milford...

Am I missing something?

 

[igbright]

I guess what you are missing is my conservative mindset that tells me not to count on being able to cover 75 miles at highway speeds!

 

[igbright]

Adding to the list above - I did a 126-mile circuit yesterday including quick recharging stops at the following DC quick chargers - both of which worked flawlessly:

Pheasant Lane Mall (listed in OP); and
Rockingham Park Mall

Because you have to pay to use these fast chargers, you can generally count on them being available if you need them - unlike free ones. They are pricey, so I use them very sparingly, but yesterday it was more of a necessity (ok, I also do happen to enjoy taking the e-Golf on long highway drives).

 

[JoulesThief]

Read your owners manual about quick charging, they suggest never doing back to back quick charges, it's damaging to the battery. It may also possibly void your warranty on the battery. They do log your recharges.

 

[f1geek]

JT,

Can you please verify that it would void the warranty? I am completely serious about this. Would you please find out?

I have had conversations with VW customer care about this topic and all they say is "recommend" and they use very careful language. I'm not convinced it would void the warranty. Don't forget - VW and BMW have publicly advertised the Chargepoint DC charging corridors on the East and West Coast. They are encouraging people to have back to back DC charging sessions on the one hand but then on the other they strongly recommend against it because their engineers know something but are not willing to tell us (sound familiar?).

I think they can NOT void your warranty but are afraid of warranty claims when and if DC charging really does damage the battery.

See this for more info about capacity loss:

http://avt.inel.gov/pdf/prog_info/SAEHybridSymposium2014.pdf

There is some loss of capacity, but not much.

Again, could you please verify (in writing, please) that back to back DC charging will void the VW e-Golf warranty? Thank you very much!

Sincerely,

Your e-Golf buddies

 

[JoulesThief]

JT,

Can you please verify that it would void the warranty? I am completely serious about this. Would you please find out?

I have had conversations with VW customer care about this topic and all they say is "recommend" and they use very careful language. I'm not convinced it would void the warranty. Don't forget - VW and BMW have publicly advertised the Chargepoint DC charging corridors on the East and West Coast. They are encouraging people to have back to back DC charging sessions on the one hand but then on the other they strongly recommend against it because their engineers know something but are not willing to tell us (sound familiar?).

I think they can NOT void your warranty but are afraid of warranty claims when and if DC charging really does damage the battery.

See this for more info about capacity loss:

http://avt.inel.gov/pdf/prog_info/SAEHybridSymposium2014.pdf

There is some loss of capacity, but not much.

Again, could you please verify (in writing, please) that back to back DC charging will void the VW e-Golf warranty? Thank you very much!

Sincerely,

Your e-Golf buddies

I don't even need to verify, having been a LONG time VW owner. VW will weasel out of warranty work every chance the dealership can get. Why? Because warranty work pays the dealership peanuts. So the dealership has every incentive to make you pay for the repair, instead of covering it under warranty.

But that's fine, don't take my word for it, read your owners manual on recharging the battery. It's in there, VW recommends using DC fast charging "sparingly". How they define that is a good way to find out an expensive lesson on your dime. They recommend a regular recharge alternately, at a minimum, between every DC fast charge. Go ahead, trust, but verify what I am saying, find it in your owners manual and confirm it. Take a picture of the page, note the page number, and post it up here for all to see.

VW dealerships in the USA are well known for very poor customer care and customer relations. If you go on VWVortex or Fred's TDIclub, the use of the term "VW Stealership" is rampant. I'll let you figure out why they've earned the new nickname.

The trick is to "play their game"... the moment you get off a DC quick charger, immediately go to a level 2 recharger and top off the full 100% for another 1/2 hour, or whatever. You've now alternated between a DC fast charger and a regular charge. Is it ethical doing so? Probably not, but it is "by the book" and within the spirit of the law. It will be logged by VW as a regular charge, after a quick charge. Is it good for the traction battery? Probably not, the traction battery is probably still smoking hot from a rapid DC charge event just prior.

 

[igbright]

Read your owners manual about quick charging, they suggest never doing back to back quick charges, it's damaging to the battery. It may also possibly void your warranty on the battery. They do log your recharges.

JT, as I've mentioned before, it does get more than a little annoying when you systematically assume nobody other than you has ever read the manual.

To address the substantive points in your message:

- I know what the manual says
- These two fast charges were not one right after the other
- The car was parked for a couple of hours in the intervening period
- I made the call that it's probably ok at that point
- the circumstances of the day made it so Level 2 charging was not an option
- I very much doubt this sequence would cause any damage at all, or void the warranty
- I think lawyers would have a field day with VW if it wanted to claim these two charges were a problem

This thread is about experiences with DC fast chargers in Massachusetts (which I extended to just a couple miles into New Hampshire).

I interpret the manual's language to mean - don't plan on long-distance travel by daisy-chaining fast-charging sessions. That is not what I did. In addition, the manual says nothing about voiding the warranty. All it says is that you should not charge at high power stations frequently:

NOTICE

Frequently charging the vehicle with a high charging power, particularly with a direct current (DC charging) can lead to a permanent reduction of the charging capacity of the high-voltage battery. If possible, charge the vehicle with low charging power, like with a home-charging station or with the supplementary charging cable.

 

[JoulesThief]

http://www.torquenews.com/1/why-vw-recommends-using-vw-egolf-battery-sparingly-when-it-comes-fast-charging


When it comes to e-Golf fast-charging VW has a statement in the owner's manual that every e-Golf driver needs to pay close attention.
VW's statement about DCFC reads: “Requires charging at select DC fast-charging stations. Frequent and consecutive high-voltage charging (including DC charging) can permanently decrease the capacity of the high-voltage battery. See your Owner’s Manual for details." There really isn't much more than that in the big manual. And the warranty doesn't apply if the owners manual is not followed.
Ronald B. Vlack explains in a VW e-Golf group on Facebook.
"The e-Golf battery has no cooling system like Tesla, i3 etc. Only passive cooling to save cost and weight. High speed charging generates lots of heat and heat is the enemy of BEV batteries. That's probably why VW recommends using sparingly and not consecutively. When they announced the change to no cooling, they said their tests showed it wasn't needed, but didn't indicate if the tests included some mix of high speed charging.
"The battery warranty does say it doesn't apply if guidelines described in the users manual are not followed. These guidelines are pretty specific, so assuming VW logs battery/charge/temp data, they do have an out on 8 year 70% coverage," Vlack explains.
- See more at: http://www.torquenews.com/1/why-vw-recommends-using-vw-egolf-battery-sparingly-when-it-comes-fast-charging#sthash.abh6fJ6L.dpuf

 

[igbright]

Yes, I had read all of the above before. None of it applies to the situation at hand.

I'm not saying everyone should go ahead and plan a 400-mile road trip with four DC charging stops.

But a 126-mile day with two DC charging stops well spaced apart, including a period when the car is just parked, does not meet the definition of 'frequent and consecutive'.

What counts for warranty purposes is what's in the manual, which starts with "Frequently" (this was not) and ends with "if possible..." (and it wasn't).

I think we all know (or should) that a habit should not be made of long-distance, uninterrupted travel via a string of DC charging stops. But what I described in my original post (and we are now completely off topic) is well within acceptable usage as described in the manual.

 

[forbin404]

It appears Joules is correct


"Requires charging at select DC fast-charging stations. Frequent and consecutive high-voltage charging (including DC charging) can permanently decrease the capacity of the high-voltage battery. See your Owner’s Manual for details - See more at: http://www.torquenews.com/1/why-vw-recommends-using-vw-egolf-battery-sparingly-when-it-comes-fast-charging#sthash.c8axmIhb.dpuf"

From http://www.torquenews.com/1/why-vw-recommends-using-vw-egolf-battery-sparingly-when-it-comes-fast-charging

Because there isn't a cooling system on the battery so Fast Charging overheats the battery and you lose battery life.

 

[f1geek]

And Ronald B. Vlack is an expert on the e-Golf battery? Who is this guy? Is he one of the German engineers who developed the e-Golf?

I love the statement that says " Frequent and consecutive high-voltage charging (including DC charging).." So does that mean 240 V is high voltage? What other type of high voltage charging is there besides DC charging?

Maybe we better not charge at 240 V because it's high voltage!

 

[forbin404]

And Ronald B. Vlack is an expert on the e-Golf battery? Who is this guy? Is he one of the German engineers who developed the e-Golf?

I love the statement that says " Frequent and consecutive high-voltage charging (including DC charging).." So does that mean 240 V is high voltage? What other type of high voltage charging is there besides DC charging?

Maybe we better not charge at 240 V because it's high voltage!

You are confusing who was talking.

Ronald Flack was saying that the eGolf doesn't have a proper battery cooling.

VW was stating that

See the brochure
https://www.vw.com/content/dam/vwcom/brochures/2015models/MY15_e-Golf_Digital.pdf

Look on page 3 And the bottom in the TINIEST PRINT the last line.

 

[JoulesThief]

And Ronald B. Vlack is an expert on the e-Golf battery? Who is this guy? Is he one of the German engineers who developed the e-Golf?

I love the statement that says " Frequent and consecutive high-voltage charging (including DC charging).." So does that mean 240 V is high voltage? What other type of high voltage charging is there besides DC charging?

Maybe we better not charge at 240 V because it's high voltage!

Maybe you need to do a search on what High Voltage Charging is via the DC port. Educate yourself, instead of being snarky.

You can lead a horse to water.... but you know the rest.

 

[RonDawg]

I'm going to side with igbright here. Don't use DCFC as your primary charging source (it would be too expensive anyway as almost all if not all DCFC's in the US charge a considerable sum), but it's okay to do so on occasion. VWoA is basically saying, your eGolf is not a Tesla, don't go DCFC'ing your way across the US (not that it's possible to do so at this time particularly with CCS).

The legalese discourages frequent use of, but does not prohibit, consecutive DC fast charging sessions. On a car that lacks any active battery cooling like the eGolf (and the Leaf), it's simply good practice to minimize anything that quickly heats the battery, like DCFC. But it's also better to not use so much of the battery that it discharges it down to 20% or less, but sometimes you have to do that. It's also better not to charge a battery at all if it's hot outside, but for those of us who don't live in Seattle, sometimes that's not an option in August.

BTW the following is a cut-and-paste from the owners manual of my former 2012 Nissan Leaf:

Quick charging is possible (even several times a day) if the battery temperature is not near the red zone. If the battery temperature reaches the red zone, in order to protect the battery, quick charging is not allowed and the power limitation mode will be triggered.

Even though 2011/2012 Leaf batteries are notorious for their heat-related degradation, Nissan still does not discourage reasonable DCFC use even on the latest models, or older models whose batteries were replaced under warranty.

 

[JoulesThief]

I'm going to side with igbright here. Don't use DCFC as your primary charging source (it would be too expensive anyway as almost all if not all DCFC's in the US charge a considerable sum), but it's okay to do so on occasion. VWoA is basically saying, your eGolf is not a Tesla, don't go DCFC'ing your way across the US (not that it's possible to do so at this time particularly with CCS).

The legalese discourages frequent use of, but does not prohibit, consecutive DC fast charging sessions. On a car that lacks any active battery cooling like the eGolf (and the Leaf), it's simply good practice to minimize anything that quickly heats the battery, like DCFC. But it's also better to not use so much of the battery that it discharges it down to 20% or less, but sometimes you have to do that. It's also better not to charge a battery at all if it's hot outside, but for those of us who don't live in Seattle, sometimes that's not an option in August.

BTW the following is a cut-and-paste from the owners manual of my former 2012 Nissan Leaf:

Quick charging is possible (even several times a day) if the battery temperature is not near the red zone. If the battery temperature reaches the red zone, in order to protect the battery, quick charging is not allowed and the power limitation mode will be triggered.

Even though 2011/2012 Leaf batteries are notorious for their heat-related degradation, Nissan still does not discourage reasonable DCFC use even on the latest models, or older models whose batteries were replaced under warranty.

What is your thought on running the battery down to just short of the "Red" reserve portion, of having the "19 or 18 miles left" warning flashing in the dash, followed by 30 amps at 240v of on board AC charging up to 94% SOC? Is that acceptable, or ?