chargers away from home

J

judithhogg

Novice Member
Joined
Nov 27, 2022
Messages
2
Reaction score
1
Points
1
Location
methley
Driving
MG ZS EV
Hello I’m new to Evs. Why am I only getting 39kW when at a 175kW charger. Same at the next one too?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Is this a mk1 ZS?
You won't get the full 175kW as the car can't take that much i thought it would be over 50kW though.
 
it could be that the charger is cold, give it a few minutes and it should speed up, the batteries in your car may be cold, again, give it time to warm up. max charge rate for a Mk2 is only something silly like 75kW (might be 90, I can't remember which) and that is usually only up until you reach about 80% SOC where it drastically dials back the power so you don't blow up your batteries.

In short, there are many reasons why a charger might not be giving your car the max rate it can take, obviously don't rule out charger fault and load balancing if they have multiple outlets and multiple vehicles charging at once.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I've been noticing past few days that my MG ZS LR has been charging very slow. I have had the battery heater on. Brought it at a low state of charge and only hitting 57 or 58KW. Its becoming a bit annoying. The Kona I had before regardless of temperature would rocket up to peak charging as soon as I would connect it at low state of charge. Its getting frustrating as I rely solely on public charging. Car is still new with 4k miles only.

As you can see in the picture its a 175KW charger and the amps are not increasing.
 

Attachments

  • 20221207_224555.jpg
    20221207_224555.jpg
    262.4 KB · Views: 94
It can be the charger, not the car. Even in ideal conditions in summer, connected to a 120KW charger, the rate was 50KW. A quick check on ZAP map comments, showed that this was common and that this particular bank of chargers didn't always deliver anywhere near their claimed rate

I did say "ideal" because as others have mentioned, temperature and state of charge, are also big factors

FYI my car is a ZS Trophy LR and has charged at 92KW on other chargers
 
I have only charged my car twice, still under 400km but, the first charge was at a 300Kw charger by ENBW and charged at 86kw. The second charge was at a Fastned 300Kw charger and it only managed 40Kw, temperatures were much the same both times. I think charge rate has more to do with available power for the charging station than the car.
 
apzs said:
I've been noticing past few days that my MG ZS LR has been charging very slow. I have had the battery heater on. Brought it at a low state of charge and only hitting 57 or 58KW. Its becoming a bit annoying. The Kona I had before regardless of temperature would rocket up to peak charging as soon as I would connect it at low state of charge. Its getting frustrating as I rely solely on public charging. Car is still new with 4k miles only.

As you can see in the picture its a 175KW charger and the amps are not increasing.
Click to expand...
The ZS will only charge at a max of 90kW anyway so the fact it is a 175kW charger is kind of irrelevant, you might even be paying more because it has a higher potential... I look for 50-100kW chargers as anything less is too slow and anything more is pointless.
 
sgt4hed said:
The ZS will only charge at a max of 90kW anyway so the fact it is a 175kW charger is kind of irrelevant, you might even be paying more because it has a higher potential... I look for 50-100kW chargers as anything less is too slow and anything more is pointless.
Click to expand...
The chargers I have here are 75Kw and 175KW. I know the car can take close to 90Kw but my question here was why I'm only getting under 60 even on lower SOC. I preheat the batteries as well for atleast half an hour.

I feel its the charger not pushing enough power. I'll have to try at another fast enough charger
 
apzs said:
The chargers I have here are 75Kw and 175KW. I know the car can take close to 90Kw but my question here was why I'm only getting under 60 even on lower SOC. I preheat the batteries as well for atleast half an hour.

I feel its the charger not pushing enough power. I'll have to try at another fast enough charger
Click to expand...
And your Upto date with balance charging?
 
N2STY said:
And your Upto date with balance charging?
Click to expand...
The car has had 4.2k miles on it. I have done it once when it was close to 1.5k miles. Mightneed to do it again at some point. Didn't think that would be an issue now.
 
Don't know every DC charge will be slower than the one before in theory as the cells get more unbalanced and regen don't help the situation I suppose how many DC chargers you do?
In mg services book it says
In order to maintain the performance of the high-voltage battery pack, the customer shall carry out equalizing charge
regularly (at least once a month), as detailed in the User Manual.
 
N2STY said:
Don't know every DC charge will be slower than the one before in theory as the cells get more unbalanced and regen don't help the situation I suppose how many DC chargers you do?
In mg services book it says
In order to maintain the performance of the high-voltage battery pack, the customer shall carry out equalizing charge
regularly (at least once a month), as detailed in the User Manual.
Click to expand...
Hmm that's interesting. Once a month is a bit hard to do since I only rely on public charging.

Weird because I barely did that on the Kona I had before this. Over the course of the 13k miles. I think I charged it to 100% 4 or 5 times.

Guess, I'll try to charge to 100% tomorrow.
 
Have you checked on zap map to see what others are saying about the charges your using?
 
N2STY said:
Have you checked on zap map to see what others are saying about the charges your using?
Click to expand...
No recent comments. I have noticed a skoda enyak pulled into that charger and was only pulling 60kw so I have a strong suspicion that the charger is not pushing enough.
 
apzs said:
Hmm that's interesting. Once a month is a bit hard to do since I only rely on public charging.

Weird because I barely did that on the Kona I had before this. Over the course of the 13k miles. I think I charged it to 100% 4 or 5 times.

Guess, I'll try to charge to 100% tomorrow.
Click to expand...
When charging from a D/C rapid unit very regularly, then the MG recommend balance cycle needs to be performed once a month on a A/C supply.
Balancing can not be achieved on a D/C unit of course.
I take it you are not charging to 100% full on every D/C rapid session, as throttling back on charging speeds makes this impractical.
Maybe 🤔 charge to 80+% on a rapid and then move onto a A/C post to finish charging and balance a couple of times a month ????.
 
Lovemyev said:
When charging from a D/C rapid unit very regularly, then the MG recommend balance cycle needs to be performed once a month on a A/C supply.
Balancing can not be achieved on a D/C unit of course.
I take it you are not charging to 100% full on every D/C rapid session, as throttling back on charging speeds makes this impractical.
Maybe 🤔 charge to 80+% on a rapid and then move onto a A/C post to finish charging and balance a couple of times a month ????.
Click to expand...
No tend to stick around the 80% mark on DC chargers. Yeah I was hoping to go to the lamppost charger near my house but as usual someone has been hogging the charger the whole weekend now :)

Guess I'll do this next weekend now
 
Support us by becoming a Premium Member

Latest MG EVs video

MG3 Hybrid+ & Cyberster Configurator News + hot topics from the MG EVs forums
Published
Subscribe to our YouTube channel
Back
Top Bottom