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I've been a model 3 owner for 4+ years and have cross country road tripped multiple times. The charging infrastructure for Tesla is just consistently reliable a

I've been a model 3 owner for 4+ years and have cross country road tripped multiple times. The charging infrastructure for Tesla is just consistently reliable and continually getting better. Sometimes we ran into a charger stall not working, but most stations had lots of stalls that we could retry at a different one. The consistency of non-Tesla chargers is pretty poor and really puts a damper in the potential growth of the EV market. We went through an annoying charging fiasco at a chargepoint station that I'm not sure how non-technical people would get past. Additionally, the next day the EA station we needed to goto ended up being completely down!

maherbeg 4y ago
Also, the Tesla connector is just so much better than the CCS connectors in North America. It feels so seamless to get it connected to the car and feel like you have a solid connection.
- panick21_ 4y ago
  Tesla made a big mistake by not making its charger open standard and open source. They could potentially have set the standard, that would have been good for everybody.
  - nicd 4y ago
    As a consumer, the Tesla charging network is a significant selling point over other electric vehicles. It's unclear to me that standardizing the charger would benefit their business position (although I agree it would benefit society!).
    - panick21_ 4y ago
      Just because you have the same charger, doesn't mean that you allow other vehicles to charge at Tesla Superchargers. Those are 2 different questions.
- kwhitefoot 4y ago
  What does the connector have to do with it? All new Tesla chargers in Europe are CCS and I haven't heard of anyone having any problems with it.
  - jp191919 4y ago
    Type1 CCS vs Type 2 CCS?
    - maherbeg 4y ago
      In North America, I believe it's the Type 1 connector.
  - micromacrofoot 4y ago
    Many people I've seen use a Type 1 CCS connector seems to feel the need to wiggle it in/out as I watch on in horror... and I've struggled to decouple the CCS connector on multiple occasions (imagine a gas pump nozzle getting stuck and how frustrating that would be with no staff around). Though take this with a grain of salt, as I have no firsthand experience with other connector types.
    - Arrath 4y ago
      > (imagine a gas pump nozzle getting stuck and how frustrating that would be with no staff around) I ran into this! Some recent MY's of Dodge Ram trucks had a weird angle with their filler neck and the pump nozzle[1] would get well and truly stuck. I had a 2018 Ram 1500 provided by work, and quickly learned what local gas stations were decent and which ones I had to avoid, lest I spend a few minutes really reefing on the nozzle to get it to come loose, worrying i'll break something the whole time. [1]Vapor reclamation style pump nozzles, that is. Plain old straight nozzles were fine. See: https://www.classaction.org/media/kingston-v-fca-us-llc.pdf https://www.classaction.org/media/kingston-v-fca-us-llc.pdf "Specifically, Defendant’s defective fuel tank filler necks1 (the “Filler Neck Defect”) cause standard gas-station nozzles—which work perfectly well with other vehicles—to become lodged in the opening to Dodge Ram fuel tanks, forcing Dodge Ram owners to either physically wrench the gas nozzle free, contact their roadside assistance provider (if they have one) to have the nozzle dislodged, or even call their local fire department for help."
realworldperson 4y ago
[dead]
m463 4y ago
from a few years ago, I found: - evgo is usually pretty reliable - chargepoint was ok too, but they seemed to be 99% level 2 chargers - Blink was the WORST. Everything was broken all the time. This might have been the business model. evgo had their own chargers. I'm uncertain, but chargepoint seemed to be a mix of public and private. blink seemed to manager private chargers, which might be why they were always broken - they might have had no agency in fixing the chargers. This is all significantly magnified by small battery size/range. Since then things have probably gotten a little better, but honestly telsa is SO much better - plentiful charger locations, seems to be a minimum of 8 chargers per locaion, well-integrated navigation, and very reliable.
throwaway22032 4y ago
Yeah, the infrastructure in the UK is hilariously bad as well. They just don't get UX. I want it to be like a petrol station - card reader, pre-authorise my card, plug in, walk off. If the charger is literally located at a petrol station then I should be able to pay cash inside and have them authorise the amount I paid. Instead it's like some endless web of bullshit apps and signing up and doing online payments or whatever. There is no reason at all to require a smartphone for this shit. I don't get the trend towards just making things less convenient for the end user. It feels like a gamble that people will just put up with it anyway, ignoring the fact that lots of us will just nope out. I would never buy a non-Tesla EV until this is fixed.

maherbeg 4y ago

Also, the Tesla connector is just so much better than the CCS connectors in North America. It feels so seamless to get it connected to the car and feel like you have a solid connection.

panick21_ 4y ago
Tesla made a big mistake by not making its charger open standard and open source. They could potentially have set the standard, that would have been good for everybody.
- nicd 4y ago
  As a consumer, the Tesla charging network is a significant selling point over other electric vehicles. It's unclear to me that standardizing the charger would benefit their business position (although I agree it would benefit society!).
  - panick21_ 4y ago
    Just because you have the same charger, doesn't mean that you allow other vehicles to charge at Tesla Superchargers. Those are 2 different questions.
kwhitefoot 4y ago
What does the connector have to do with it? All new Tesla chargers in Europe are CCS and I haven't heard of anyone having any problems with it.
- jp191919 4y ago
  Type1 CCS vs Type 2 CCS?
  - maherbeg 4y ago
    In North America, I believe it's the Type 1 connector.
- micromacrofoot 4y ago
  Many people I've seen use a Type 1 CCS connector seems to feel the need to wiggle it in/out as I watch on in horror... and I've struggled to decouple the CCS connector on multiple occasions (imagine a gas pump nozzle getting stuck and how frustrating that would be with no staff around). Though take this with a grain of salt, as I have no firsthand experience with other connector types.
  - Arrath 4y ago
    > (imagine a gas pump nozzle getting stuck and how frustrating that would be with no staff around) I ran into this! Some recent MY's of Dodge Ram trucks had a weird angle with their filler neck and the pump nozzle[1] would get well and truly stuck. I had a 2018 Ram 1500 provided by work, and quickly learned what local gas stations were decent and which ones I had to avoid, lest I spend a few minutes really reefing on the nozzle to get it to come loose, worrying i'll break something the whole time. [1]Vapor reclamation style pump nozzles, that is. Plain old straight nozzles were fine. See: https://www.classaction.org/media/kingston-v-fca-us-llc.pdf https://www.classaction.org/media/kingston-v-fca-us-llc.pdf "Specifically, Defendant’s defective fuel tank filler necks1 (the “Filler Neck Defect”) cause standard gas-station nozzles—which work perfectly well with other vehicles—to become lodged in the opening to Dodge Ram fuel tanks, forcing Dodge Ram owners to either physically wrench the gas nozzle free, contact their roadside assistance provider (if they have one) to have the nozzle dislodged, or even call their local fire department for help."

realworldperson 4y ago

[dead]

m463 4y ago

from a few years ago, I found: - evgo is usually pretty reliable - chargepoint was ok too, but they seemed to be 99% level 2 chargers - Blink was the WORST. Everything was broken all the time. This might have been the business model. evgo had their own chargers. I'm uncertain, but chargepoint seemed to be a mix of public and private. blink seemed to manager private chargers, which might be why they were always broken - they might have had no agency in fixing the chargers. This is all significantly magnified by small battery size/range. Since then things have probably gotten a little better, but honestly telsa is SO much better - plentiful charger locations, seems to be a minimum of 8 chargers per locaion, well-integrated navigation, and very reliable.

throwaway22032 4y ago

Yeah, the infrastructure in the UK is hilariously bad as well. They just don't get UX. I want it to be like a petrol station - card reader, pre-authorise my card, plug in, walk off. If the charger is literally located at a petrol station then I should be able to pay cash inside and have them authorise the amount I paid. Instead it's like some endless web of bullshit apps and signing up and doing online payments or whatever. There is no reason at all to require a smartphone for this shit. I don't get the trend towards just making things less convenient for the end user. It feels like a gamble that people will just put up with it anyway, ignoring the fact that lots of us will just nope out. I would never buy a non-Tesla EV until this is fixed.