MY FIRST, LONG AND DISAPOINTING DRIVE

[BoMW]

Last Tuesday was the day I decided to drive down to London from Robin Hood country, approximately 132 each way. I made plans on Monday evening to find my ideal rapid charging locations so as to avoid using the Rex.

My first leg was to leave Nottingham and head down for BMW Lancaster at Milton Keynes, 81 miles away where ChargeMaster has a CCS rapid charger. As I arrived, (Rex had already activated for the last 5 miles of 70mph motorway driving) annoyingly the parking space had been taken up by petrol cars (bmw employees) leaving me with no chance of attaching the cable to my car. The kerb side spaces had no paint markings to designate a charging point so any car owner is able to park along the road and prevent you from charging. Resident bmw genius suggested I drive into their service garage and charge up there. I did but I realised that it was just a 32amp unit and I really needed something rapid.
Eventually a BMW employee came to move his car but no need, the charger was not registering my ChargeNow card.
I rang helpline and they just confirmed that the charger is showing no errors on their systems. Having wasted an hour I drove a mile down the road to Milton Keynes coach terminus where a another CCS is installed. Miraculously all was working well (user face could be simplified) so within 30 mins I had 85 mile range and was on my way to the olympic village, westfield shopping centre, albeit 80 mins late.
I arrived at Stratford with Rex engaged for last 10 miles.
Now Westfield has plenty of 32 amp outlets but they are on a particular floor and there's no signage. I did eventually locate them and plugged in my bmw cable.
A swipe of my card and charging was in progress. 4 hours later on my return, shockingly my i3 had only 8% charge. No idea what happened but clearly some error. I then had difficulty removing my cable from the unit. I made a phone call to Source London with the promise that the unit owner would call me back, but nothing. With 15 mins of jiggling I got my cable back.
Next plan was to head for Ikea at Tottenham, North Circular which had a ecotricity CCS but, no go, an error showing on my i3 display, saying insufficient power from the unit, with rex on I headed for M1, Toddington services.
Tried ecotricty unit but my i3 was again showing the same error. No choice, had to fill up to the brim with 7.8litres.
Headed back to Milton Keynes coach terminus to charge but unbelievably this time, error showing on the unit before I even plugged it into the car.
Headed to BMW dealer a mile away, no problem with parking this time but still not recognising my card. Headed back to coach terminus, nothing working.
Decided to drive to BMW northampton, near the M1, placed all of my cards on the sensor but not one was recognised, including my charge master card (unit owned by CM).
Arrived at Newport Pagnell services, again an error, ecotricity unit not providing enough power to charge the car (also red lights flashing around inlet).
Carried on driving to Leicester North services 11 miles away on the A50, i had zero electric range and 15 miles showing on the petrol gauge which turned orange in colour from white but within a minute it plummeted to 9 miles! (Wonder if it turns to red when you're into reserve fuel?).
For the last 5 miles I reduced speed to 54mph , switched into eco plus mode and unplugged everything. Thankfully I arrived onto the forecourt to fill up. Interestingly I could only add 8 litres (1 litre reserve?)
I arrived home after an epic 5 hour journey with all that hassle, a journey which would normally take 2.5 hours.

My experience this day had depressed me greatly, although I had embraced the future, clearly the charging suppliers had not, the infrastructure is no where near ready.

 

[SanSerif]

It's very poor, isn't it? Fantastic car but let down by the charging infrastructure. What's galling is that BMW could have simply put a CCS rapid at their i-dealers and they'd have a nationwide network under the control and support of someone with an interest in keeping it working. But BMW aren't alone in this - Renault and Nissan have screwed up on this as well. Only Tesla seem to have sussed it - and they don't even have a network of dealers.

I bought the REx very much because I'd read enough public charging horror stories on the Leaf forums. In a fit of optimism, I also had it fitted for CCS. Which I have never used - and suspect I never will.

Last time I did a long trip, (160 miles) it was a dream. Started off with a full battery and a full tank and kept the battery at 75% and topped up once. With more confidence on the return, I found that I could do the entire run on the initial battery + tank.

 

[BrianStanier]

Only a week with Rex so I haven't has an opportunity to try the new CCS chargers north of Newcastle, but your experience suggests that I'll be lucky if they work. After three years of waiting with the Leaf for a decent working joined-up infrastructure it seems we're little further forward. I'm glad we chose the Rex!

 

[buickanddeere]

I'm considering a BEV but never even thought of taking round trips farther than 40 miles in winter or summer. And maybe 60 miles most spring/fall . Unless commuting from one property to the other where I know my charger works on the other end.
There are all kinds of free L2 chargers in south western Ontario.

 

[Plug]

I bought the REx very much because I'd read enough public charging horror stories on the Leaf forums.

Same here, I wanted the BEV but the i3 is my only car and the more research I did about rapid public charging the more obvious it became that you can't rely on it 100% for the long journeys so REx it was (without CCS). Every week there are trip reports like this on the other EV forums, the accepted solution seems to be to plan a back-up charging point for every stopping point.

BoMW : If you do that trip again it'd be interesting to see how you'd get on if you just ignored public charging and relied on the REx. You'd get all of the way to your destination without needing to stop. Yes, you'd have to pay for petrol but total travel time would be a hell of a lot less, probably only a few mins more than your normal 2.5 hours.

 

[amateurish]

BoMW: that is a really poor show, and confirms what I have read in other forums about the terrible state of the UK charging infrastructure.

I think the best advice for REx owners is just to forget about rapid charging, and just use your REx for long distance driving. For your journey of 260? miles I think without charging you could probably have got away with only two fuel stops. And if you drove economically, maybe just the one. And using the REx is cheaper than rapid charging with Chargemaster.

I too specified the rapid charging option, but I can't see myself ever using it now.

 

[fenlander]

I ordered the Rex without CCS, mostly based on my experience driving a Leaf for the last three years.

Maybe in another three years the rapid charging infrastructure will have improved enough, but right now it is way too unreliable and patchy. Stopping for a couple of minutes to fill up with petrol is easy compared to 30+ minutes for a rapid charge that may or may not work. It's not 'pure EV', but it's pretty rare I need that extended range and when I do the convenience of a Rex beats rapid charging hands down.

 

[BoMW]

Interesting developments today but Firstly I wanted to add that a 40 mile trip to Rotherham resulted in the same errors (AC 63amp outlets).

So today I complained to ecotricity about their charging units and I had an interesting conversation with their engineer. He told me that enquiries have been made with BMW and the problem is down to a connection not being made inside the car socket. He explained that because the cable is pretty heavy the plug is weighted down so a contact at the top is not being made. He suggested that I lift and tilt the plug upwards and hold it until the i3 starts to charge.
So I stopped at Toddington services where I have had errors previously (car blinking red and showing "no power coming from the unit"). I parked up as close to the unit as possible, didnt need to swipe card, plugged in, tilted upwards, activated charging and WOOOALA! Amber blinking , charging in progress! So relieved that it was something so simple.
Of course there are plenty of units still around that show errors before a plug in and card swipe but this error where on the i3 screen it shows " not enough power coming from the charger" seems to be resolved.

 

[MikeS]

Just to clarify - are you talking about the car connection? I ask because if so surely that would be the same using an EVSE at home and I’ve not heard of such problems.

 

[BrianStanier]

I think Ecotricity (and the OP) are talking about the CCS 'gun', which with its cable is fairly heavy.

 

[BoMW]

Just to clarify - are you talking about the car connection? I ask because if so surely that would be the same using an EVSE at home and I’ve not heard of such problems.

Mike, both cables of ecotricity charging stations are heavy and inflexible. They are probably armoured for durability and safety, they can supply 63amps or 125amps so no wonder they are more substantial than your home charger.
When you plug this into your i3 socket you can physically see the plastic panel move because of the strain, there are a few mm of space, so it doesn't sit flush. This has made my i3 not respond to any charging.

Ideally I think the socket on the car should be low with the angle of the plug aimed downwards then the ground can take most of the weight.

 

[SanSerif]

I have had one occasion when I casually stuck the home plug in and it didn't start charging. If I remember rightly, it seemed to recognise that it was plugged in (white light) but it didn't "click" right. I unlocked, reinserted with a bit more oomph and all was OK.

 

[BoMW]

I have had one occasion when I casually stuck the home plug in and it didn't start charging. If I remember rightly, it seemed to recognise that it was plugged in (white light) but it didn't "click" right. I unlocked, reinserted with a bit more oomph and all was OK.

Did it flash red after the white an Dawson there a warning on the screen?

 

[MikeS]

Just to clarify - are you talking about the car connection? I ask because if so surely that would be the same using an EVSE at home and I’ve not heard of such problems.

Mike, both cables of ecotricity charging stations are heavy and inflexible. They are probably armoured for durability and safety, they can supply 63amps or 125amps so no wonder they are more substantial than your home charger.
When you plug this into your i3 socket you can physically see the plastic panel move because of the strain, there are a few mm of space, so it doesn't sit flush. This has made my i3 not respond to any charging.

Ideally I think the socket on the car should be low with the angle of the plug aimed downwards then the ground can take most of the weight.

Thank you.

 

[bxb40]

I suggest making an insert that can prop the heavy cable in the right position when inserted between the car body (i.e., bottom of charging door opening) and the handle. Maybe some sort of hard foam, 3cm thick, square shape...

 

[RJSATLBA]

Please could somebody clarify exactly what sort of chargers and cables this relates to because I have re-read the thread and am still confused.

With the exception of the Milton Keynes area I didn't think any rapid chargers were available, which made me think it related to fast chargers in which case wouldn't this be a type 2 cable rather than a tethered cable but this would probably mean it was the BMW accessory cable, which really ought to work OK as it would be BMW cable to BMW EV.

On the other hand, I can see on Ecotricity's map that they have chargers at Toddington but didn't think they had installed any of the promised CCS chargers yet, which is what BoMW's post refers to (I think someone mentioned like the heavy 'CCS heavy gun').

Also, does whether or not the car has the DC option fitted have any bearing on this?

Apologies if I'm being very thick!

 

[BoMW]

Please could somebody clarify exactly what sort of chargers and cables this relates to because I have re-read the thread and am still confused.

With the exception of the Milton Keynes area I didn't think any rapid chargers were available, which made me think it related to fast chargers in which case wouldn't this be a type 2 cable rather than a tethered cable but this would probably mean it was the BMW accessory cable, which really ought to work OK as it would be BMW cable to BMW EV.

On the other hand, I can see on Ecotricity's map that they have chargers at Toddington but didn't think they had installed any of the promised CCS chargers yet, which is what BoMW's post refers to (I think someone mentioned like the heavy 'CCS heavy gun').

Also, does whether or not the car has the DC option fitted have any bearing on this?

Apologies if I'm being very thick!

RJSATLBA
My disapointing experience was with Ecotricity fast charging stations which are installed in every motorway services. Ecotricity have a tethered, heavy cable (armoured for safety and durability) with the menekes plug, I tried about 6 of them, all fast AC 63amp and the car was flashing red and stating "Mains power too low,Unable to charge, Insuficient power from the electricity mains" on the screen.

The DC stations had different errors before I even plugged in, only one out of three worked but then this one failed to work on my return trip.

This issue about lifting the plug while commencing charging is mainly for AC but I will now do this for any heavy armoured cable.

A few ecotricity stations (toddington) do no require a card to initialise charging so everyone can have a try.hope this is a little more clear.

 

[BrianStanier]

The Ecotricity fast 43kW ac chargers are 3-phase and although they have a Mennekes type-2 plug I understood that the i3 (and the Leaf for that matter) cannot use them. Neither car is in the Ecotricity list of compatibles. We should be able to use the CCS dc chargers of which there are yet only a few.

 

[RJSATLBA]

The Ecotricity fast 43kW ac chargers are 3-phase and although they have a Mennekes type-2 plug I understood that the i3 (and the Leaf for that matter) cannot use them. Neither car is in the Ecotricity list of compatibles. We should be able to use the CCS dc chargers of wjich there are yet only a few.

I thought I'd read around this business of charging cables and got to grips with it about 2 months ago but now I'm becoming confused again. I've just revisited Ecotricity's web site as they have a charge point that will be close to my route for a weekly round trip and their instructions for 'AC medium chargers' http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road/charging-your-vehicle/ac-medium-chargers refer to plugging 'your' cable into both the car and the charge point say:

Here's a list of the electric vehicles on sale in the UK that can use our AC 22kW charge points:

BMW i3
BYD e6
Citroen C-Zero
mia (all models)
Mitsubishi I-MiEV
Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV
Nissan Leaf

I thought 22kw AC was the equivalent of the home charge 7kw DC unit, taking 3-4 hours but requiring a type 2 lead set.

Similarly their instructions for 'AC/DC 50Kw fast chargers'
http://www.ecotricity.co.uk/for-the-road/charging-your-vehicle/ac-dc-fast-chargers show a petrol pump style unit with a tethered cable, refer to plugging the nozzle into the car's socket and their list of compatible cars includes the leaf but not the i3.

'Here's a list of the electric vehicles on sale in the UK that can use our AC/DC 50kW charge points:

Nissan LEAF...'

 

[BrianStanier]

It is confusing, partly because some of the information has not been updated and partly because of differing uses of 'medium', 'fast', 'rapid' etc.

AFAIK:
The Leaf can use the dc Chademo side of the existing 'fast' chargers, but not the 43kW ac side which has the tethered cable. The i3 can use the dc CCS chargers but not the 43kW ac side.

Both can use the 22kW single phase ac 'medium' chargers which have a type-2 socket and need your own cable. Toddington for example does not have a 22kW 'medium' charger only the 'fast' dc/ac 50/43kW units until it gets upgraded to include CCS. So Toddington for example is useless for an i3.