interrupted charging every 5 minutes

[mikew]

We picked up our new Rex this last Saturday. We made a few trips around town that first day and ran the batteries down to about 5%. We connected to a ClipperCreek HCS-40P L2 EVSE and began the charging process…but after about 5-6 minutes charging stopped and the car displayed a drivetrain malfunction error. We’d disconnect the cord, wait a few seconds and reconnect…the charging would start again but then stop again with the drivetrain error after about 5 minutes. After repeating this for about an hour we tried the L1 charger that came with the car and saw the same behavior. We went back to the L2 charger and after several hours of reconnecting the car was charged up.

Sunday morning we took a short trip and ran the batteries down to about 70%. Came back and reconnected to the L2 charger and the car charged back up to 100% with no disconnects and no drivetrain errors.

We dropped the car off at service on Monday and it seems they haven’t really found anything wrong. They’re going to try and run the batteries completely down and see if they can recreate the issue.

Has anyone seen this condition where charging stops with a drivetrain error after 5 minutes? Any ideas what might be going on?

 

[jadnashuanh]

There are a couple of signals going back and forth between the car and the EVSE. Is there any fault indication on the EVSE when this happens?

Essentially, the EVSE sends out a square wave indicating how much power is available, the car announces it is there and when it is ready to charge, sends a voltage back to trigger the contactor or relay to energize. THen, if I remember, there is a safety ground between the two. If any pin is intermittent, the EVSE or the car, depending on exactly what's happening, will either tell the EVSE it doesn't need any more power, or the EVSE will detect a fault (primarily a ground fault), and shut down with an error. The US J1772 plug has a thumbswitch that breaks the interlock signal when you press it to de-energize the power contactor before you can release the plug...on the European plug, the plug has internal shutters that close to block any possibility of there being voltage available. THey both work...I think the European plug as a result is much more expensive, but that's just me.

 

[mikew]

I don’t remember if the ClipperCreek “charging fault” light was turning on when the fault occurred. The fault occurred with both the ClipperCreek and the L1 charger that came with the car.

The service dept was able to reproduce the error at the shop this morning. This afternoon I was told they are “talking directly with Germany” on the next steps to take…our fingers are crossed.