Charging Station NS not starting/car seems to be always connected

Q&A and troubleshooting
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1

Hello,

I have a strange behavior with the Charging Station NS. It is brand new.
After initial setup, everything is fine, no car connected, also the Station reported, car not connected.

First time connecting the car:

  • connected car was not detected
  • than CP calibration done
  • car connection detected successfully
  • than charging started via web surface
  • no relay clicking was hearable, status jumps directly to charged

After that, the station is somehow stuck in the same states. Hitting “Stop” charging and the station goes back to status “Waiting for start”, Unplugging the car doesn’t change this. Rebooting the station doesn’t change this. Directly after reboot again “Waiting for start”. Everything without plugged car. (Car and cable are working fine on other charging stations.)

After factory reset, I can reproduce the same behavior.

It sounds like this problem: EV Charger NS charging not starting / relais not hearable

So I measured the CP line to PE, result: 12V. So it is probably not the mentioned root cause?

How is it ipossible, that a car is dected, although the measured voltage on CP line is 12V? This should be a clear indication for an unplugged car.

BR
Martin

2

What FW is on the CS?
What car do you have?
Did you try to set a higher charging current in the CS? Some cars can’t start with 6A.

Maybe the contactor inside the CS has a problem?
Check all the wiring inside the CS.

3
  • FW is v2.0 (just did a fresh FW update)
  • Its an VW ID.3
  • I tried with other/higher current settings as well, no difference (since the contactor doesn’t click, it never comes to the point, where current is drawn)
  • I also tried with automatic start and manuell start

I hesitated openig the CS so far, because it is brand new and I don’t want to risk any warrenty. If the policy is, that it doesn’t affect warrenty, I can open and double check everything.

4

I don’t see a problem, there a no warranty seals.
If you want to be safe ask your seller/installer.

5

Ok, I will l double check the wiring.

Is it an option to force a start of the charging by connecting the CP line with an external diode + resistor to ground?

I will also do another test with a different car and a different cable the next days.

6

Ok, I have tested with another car and another cable. The same behavior. I have also checked the cabling, no obvious problems found.

Is there anything else I can do?

Another question: which state of the vehicle is required for CP line calibration? Vehicle connected (2.7k Ohm) or charging requested (880 Ohm)?

7

Can you please make a few pictures of the inside of the CS?

8

I did a bench test. Connected to a completely different AC wiring. Emulated the car connection with the required resistor/diode configuration directly connected to the CP line.
Found out, that everything worked fine with this configuration. No CP calibration required, car detected, charging can be started, contactor clicks.

After that, I connected the real car again, still measuring the CP line and found out, that nothing changes at CP line at all. Further investigtion showed, that the CP line in the socket did not had the required contact to the CP line in the plug.

Root cause was: plug was not plugged in sufficiently. But: the final millimeters required extensive force. I didn’t expect that. ( I already plugged in a lot of EVs.)

From my perspective, that the CP line doesn’t have a connection at all, could be easily detected during CP calibration. In this case a warning could be shown, instead of silently succeed.

Could this be considered as a feature request for the next FW version?

Thanks for your support.