Exit message

[i3SiliconValley]

Two questions re charging:

1) When I exit my i3 REx, I get the "Goodbye" message. I'm unclear why it says my current setting is "Charging Power of Level 1: (120V Maximum)" but makes no mention of Level 2.

I only charge on Level 2, yet it never reports or recognizes Level 2 as a setting. This message appears whether I'm plugged in and charging, or not.

2) Separately, other then the length of time to complete the charging, I have no way to understand if the i3 is actually charging at Level 2. Per other posts, there is no way to understand how many amps are being drawn at any given time. How do I know charge rates whether at home or at a public charging station? Seems like a huge miss that BMW didn't include this meter on the dash.

 

[Zzzoom3]

Why do you feel you need to know the charging current? It is what it is and you can't do anything about it. All you want to know is your relative SOC and how long to full. The vehicle displays that to you during charging and you can also see it thru the BMW i Remote App.

Some home chargers and public chargers will show you how much power you are drawing which is mainly nice to know. The vehicle on-board charger determines the charge current available from the EVSE based on the J1772 plug when you insert it. There is nothing you can do to change that. BMW provides a software setting in iDrive which will limit the charging current if you wanted to but I'm not sure why you wouldn't set it to maximum?

 

[Chrisn]

I also would like to be able to see this information. It would have made it easier to see whether a given car's L2 charging rate was crippled by BMW, for example.

More info is better, so why not? These cars are still in the "early adopter" category and, as such, attack a lot of techie/nerd owners who like to see under the covers. The info doesn't need to be on the summary screen, but should be accessible via iDrive and the iPhone app. Also would be nice to have a Web interface.

 

[Zzzoom3]

I also would like to be able to see this information. It would have made it easier to see whether a given car's L2 charging rate was crippled by BMW, for example.

More info is better, so why not? These cars are still in the "early adopter" category and, as such, attack a lot of techie/nerd owners who like to see under the covers. The info doesn't need to be on the summary screen, but should be accessible via iDrive and the iPhone app. Also would be nice to have a Web interface.

Yeah ok. If you want to see this thru a web browser, use ChargeNow or Chargepoint, if possible. Great web interface. I don't see anyone else providing this level of networked charging infrastructure today in the U.S.

 

[i3SiliconValley]

..........All you want to know is your relative SOC and how long to full.........

Oh brother. You speak authoritatively like you know what I want and need.

If I went with your logic then I guess my Tesla says I need it, but my BMW says it's unnecessary. I use the feature in the Tesla all the time and it provides a quick and easy data point to know whether a public charging station is Level 1 or 2 and how fast I am charging. A charge rate indicator is a quick and easy way to understand the EVSE performance. What a public charge station claims and what it delivers are two different things. I've moved to different charge stations because some Level 2 stations under perform.

BMW missed including this as a feature, and per the charging problems that some i3's are experiencing, this would be another great way to quickly know if it's an on board system problem. It makes me wonder if BMW purposely suppressed this feature knowing that there are charging issues, but didn't want to make it obvious.

 

[MikeS]

I can understand the desire for the charge rate info. It would be good to see that the rate was as expected before leaving the car……… However, does the car or app show expected completion time to full charge? If so I guess the rate can be interpolated from that?

 

[Chrisn]

@MikeS: The estimated completion time is an extrapolated estimate itself, so does not (directly) reveal the source data (initial state of charge / current rate of charge / environmental or other factors impacting the estimate). In addition, charging is only at a flat rate for the first 80-90%, then it switches to a tapering mode with the charge rate continuously decreasing, again making it harder to use simple math to reveal the underlying data. With some experimentation I think you could come up with a decent guesstimate, but why not just reveal the data?

 

[i3SiliconValley]

chrisn, fully agree with you. That's what computers are for, they give you calculated information that creates efficiencies. I shouldn't have to do a manual calc in my head when this data is so obvious and available.

Here's an image of the 'Goodbye' exit screen I referenced in my original post. Not clear why there is no reference to 220v regardless of being plugged in or not.

 

[tiburonh]

chrisn, fully agree with you. That's what computers are for, they give you calculated information that creates efficiencies. I shouldn't have to do a manual calc in my head when this data is so obvious and available.

Here's an image of the 'Goodbye' exit screen I referenced in my original post. Not clear why there is no reference to 220v regardless of being plugged in or not.

Hello i3SV-

I'm totally with you on this. I'm on night two with my car and my new Level 2 charger and, because of the issue you describe, I simply can't tell if I am actually charging at the maximum level two rate or just the maximum level one rate. And I have no interest in staying up past my bed time to answer this question by see how long it actually takes to complete the charge! Surely someone out there must have some way of working through all the menus to get at this?

 

[jadnashuanh]

A quick sanity check would be to just glance at the main display and see when it thinks it will have completed the recharging cycle...it should be in the order of 3.5-4 hours max (well, if it's hot, and you have the interim software recently released to protect the KLE is may stretch out to 4-5 hours or so - this is for a nearly dead battery). I haven't been monitoring it, but a couple of times I did check, the time to 'full' moves a bit and seems mostly pessimistic (IOW, it's usually charged before the time indicated).