[JNealCox]

Apparently Audi's engineers are sadly mistaken. It's a shame they didn't consult you guys before they issued the recall. BTW, my buddy dove with sharks for years and never had a problem...

In case I haven't said it enough times, there are lots of other options to charge these EVs. Why screw around with a freebie portable charger that's really intended to live in the trunk as an emergency on-the-road source? Even Audi says that, if you choose to ignore the sales idiots and marketeers.

This comes up on the Acura forums when people ask "Do I really have to use premium fuel?". The usual consensus is that it performs best with premium, and you paid for an Acura, so why not get what you paid for? I'm sure it's the same for Porsche/Audi ICE vehicles.

By analogy, if you can afford a fancy Audi EV, can you really not afford to invest in a decent wall-mounted EVSE? If you lack a permanent site to install one, my condolences, but there are still other options. Like a Grizzl-e Classic brick. ( I have NO association with any EVSE manufacturer, except as a customer ).

A wall mounted charger will charge faster ( especially if it's hardwired ), be safer, and many of them give internet updates on charging status ( in case Audi-web is kaputt, noch wieder ). What's not to like?

< end rant >

The Audi EVSE is fully UL rated for use as an EV charger....not "sort of rated" as an EV charger, not "rated as a charger for occasional use"--the equivalent of "almost being pregnant." It meets the same UL requirements that all charger must meet. No EVSE has "failed". Failure occurs at the sub-standard house circuits. Maybe the UL standards or electrical codes for residences in the US may need to be updated. Possibly the problem with the Audi engineers is that they were coming from the perspective of the EU 240V residential electrical infrastructure, where everything has to be more robust.

Why go with the Audi EVSE, instead of getting a brand charging unit? Why let a perfectly good EV charger rot in your trunk? I've never had a problem with the Audi EVSE communicating with the car, while complaints about brand wall-chargers abound.

 

[whitex]

Hmmm. A lot of chatter here. I used the Audi EVSE as my regular charger for almost 4 years. Never had a problem.

Maybe you rarely charged for many hours when it was hot outside. Maybe you have a good quality NEMA 14-50. Maybe it doesn't get very hot where you park. Just out if curiosity, have checked your NEMA 14-50 outlet recently and see if it has any signs of melting? It doesn't all melt at once, usually it happens over time and people on Porsche forum have reported partially melted outlets after checking.

 

[JNealCox]

Maybe you rarely charged for many hours when it was hot outside. Maybe you have a good quality NEMA 14-50. Maybe it doesn't get very hot where you park. Just out if curiosity, have checked your NEMA 14-50 outlet recently and see if it has any signs of melting? It doesn't all melt at once, usually it happens over time and people on Porsche forum have reported partially melted outlets after checking.

I must admit, it does not get super hot here in the PNW (one of the reasons i am here). Have all UL devices been tested for ambient temperature sensitivity? I guess that would really be something to consider when installing a house circuit....wiring and plugs are not only guaged, but also certified for thermal tolerance.

The outlet and plug looked fine when I last unplugged it back in July. I returned my EVSE along with my 2019 etron quattro when my lease expired. The Q8 came with its own EVSE. First thing I noticed was that the cable to the car was shorter and lighter, but still has never given me any issues. For my Q8, though, I rarely charge at home, but rather at an EA station a couple of miles away. On my 2019, the deal with EA was that your got fixed number of kWh you could use over 3 years. With the Q8 it is 2 years unlimited charging. So, with the 2019, I charged pretty much at home all the time (maybe 2 or 3 times a week from 50% to 80%) and used the EA miles on the road. With the Q8, I pretty much charge at EA station. I must say, I can not guarantee that my Q8 Audi EVSE will not explode and destroy my entire neighborhood after extended use; however, it is UL rated!

 

[getmoving]

UL inspectors are human and they can’t explore every use case. You talk about that certification like it was passed down from the mount on stone tablets! The darn thing has been recalled. Care to guess how many other UL approved gizmos have been recalled over the years? It’s just a hunk of plastic and wire, move on!

 

[JNealCox]

UL inspectors are human and they can’t explore every use case. You talk about that certification like it was passed down from the mount on stone tablets! The darn thing has been recalled. Care to guess how many other UL approved gizmos have been recalled over the years? It’s just a hunk of plastic and wire, move on!

But the failure is still at the wall circuit, not with the unit. Audi constantly gets dinged for "overengineering" things. May be that this is one time when they should have. And, correct, UL can't be expected to test a device with it hooked up to substandard house circuits.

 

[Q3 to e-tron]

I guess I should be glad I never got around to installing a 240 outlet in my garage. Still using 120. 🤪

Luckily there is a 5kW charger at work and EA if I need fast DC.

And I also live in the PNW so I doesn’t get too hot in the garage.

 

[getmoving]

If we’re being sticklers about certifications, the wall outlets in question also satisfy electrical codes. So they aren’t really defective. They are just inadequate for this use that wasn’t really anticipated in a home environment when the codes were written and the outlets were designed and certified by whomever certifies such things ( UL again? )

So under engineered ( cheap ) outlet meets under engineered ( cheap ) appliance and chaos ensues. This is probably the kind of thing that keeps engineers up at night. And the kind of thing that keeps lawyers busy.

 

[Mozz]

You can try to blame the home or customers
But when making a product, you need to design it for an idiot, in this case so he wont burn his house down, thats why Tesla who seems to be ahead of the others no longer gives a 210 240 charger, and BMW (I’ve only owned i3’s since 2015, not sure on the rest of there line)only gives you a 110 charger, Audi is just a bit behind the game, and will learn not to give its customers a loaded gun. For someone to say well it hasn’t failed for me yet is the kind of thinking they have to learn to protect themselves from.
Bottom line the unit gets hot after extended use and they have done 2 recalls on it to date to try to solve the problem, there are those who want to be in a test group, I just don’t want to participate in there r and d , and don’t want my house to burn down to help them figure it out and fix it properly and quit putting bandaids on a dead horse.
Take that free boat anchor and toss it and get a well tested and safe unit and have it professionally installed is what works for me. there are somethings you don’t try to save a few bucks on. if your on another page thats great.

 

[getmoving]

[...] when making a product, you need to design it for an idiot,

The problem with trying to make things idiot proof is that they keep making a better idiot.

The definitive work on the subject is the movie Idiocracy. It's intended as satire, but it's disturbingly prescient.

 

[Q3 to e-tron]

It’s got electrolytes.

 

[getmoving]

It’s got electrolytes.

Water... like out of the toilet?

 

[whitex]

But when making a product, you need to design it for an idiot,

The problem with trying to make things idiot proof is that they keep making a better idiot.

In this case it's not customer ignorance or idiocy that needs to be designed around. It's existing residential electrical installations, installed many many years before Audi even dreamed of making an EV. Imagine Audi designed their cars to only work safely on Autobahns, then claim "it's not our fault the ADAS system slammed on your car's brakes when someone tried passing you on the right - it is illegal to pass on the right and should have never happened".

If you're going to make a product which plugs into existing infrastructure, you must make it work with existing infrastructure. Audi could have just required hardwiring for their EVSEs and this would have never been a problem. They could have even sold EVSEs with removable cables (J1772 supports that), so the EVSE becomes a very safe outlet - designed for EV's from the start.

 

[mmmzon]

Put it differently, in order to charge safely, the owner of the house needs to be make sure their wiring is safe and appropriate, since the charger has not way to detect what the wiring rating and condition is. Wiring is a "dump" component in here, requiring the owner / user to be smarter than just plug&forget. In a way, I wish the plugs were incompatible with existing outlets and kind of required installation of a dedicated circuit for EV use. Some of the problems would be gone. However, that would also invalidate the option of charging for people who have no dedicated circuits and option to install them, so I understand the need to support standard non-dedicated outlets as well.
There is no simple solution there, either way. The safest way is to inspect installation and/or have a dedicated circuit. And we all know it will mostly NOT be the way people choose to charge at home.

 

[getmoving]

I wasn’t really trying to blame victims here, I was just a bit punchy and I played off a snarky remark about “idiot-proofing” to invoke a darkly hilarious movie most people have probably never seen.

Fortunately there don’t appear to have been any real “victims” so far, at least in the case of the VAG portable EVSE. Just some toasty outlets.

I agree completely that this is yet another example of infrastructure not keeping up with the demands of this rapid transition in vehicle fueling. Trying to force-fit high power electrical equipment to residential electrical infrastructure is bound to cause problems one way or another.

I’m shocked we don’t hear about more calamities than we do. So to speak. 😜

 

[mmmzon]

I’m shocked we don’t hear about more calamities than we do.

I am sure in many cases, the fuse / wiring blows and people are forced to contact an electrician to get the things fixed. The few cases of things barely working is where problems lie - circuits overloaded because someone upped the fuses without adapting wire gauge (why would I, right?), etc. Older houses with outdated wiring will always fall victim here, eventually.

It’s got electrolytes.

 

[whitex]

Put it differently, in order to charge safely, the owner of the house needs to be make sure their wiring is safe and appropriate, since the charger has not way to detect what the wiring rating and condition is. Wiring is a "dump" component in here, requiring the owner / user to be smarter than just plug&forget. In a way, I wish the plugs were incompatible with existing outlets and kind of required installation of a dedicated circuit for EV use. Some of the problems would be gone. However, that would also invalidate the option of charging for people who have no dedicated circuits and option to install them, so I understand the need to support standard non-dedicated outlets as well.
There is no simple solution there, either way. The safest way is to inspect installation and/or have a dedicated circuit. And we all know it will mostly NOT be the way people choose to charge at home.

I think what you're missing is that the plug-in EVSE's are actually meant to be mobile "chargers", meaning to be plugged into outlets you find in the wild while traveling. EV manufacturers cannot require that all EV owners and outlet owners be electricians able to inspect circuits (or even know . That is the point of standardization - plug and forget, the system will protect you if something goes wrong. The problem here is the residential protection system (electrical code, outlet specs, etc) was not designed with EV usage in mind, so anyone designing EVSE's intended for residential usage should be designing to these inferior specs, rather than an industrial spec that is not required in residential installations.

 

[mmmzon]

I think what you're missing is that the plug-in EVSE's are actually meant to be mobile "chargers", meaning to be plugged into outlets you find in the wild while traveling.

Good point, but in that case, there should be a truly mobile unit available with limited charging rate to be "safe" under all conditions, and a more powerful unit to be used when the wiring is known to be able to hold the load. However, that will put again the onus on the user / owner to be able to recognize different conditions and that is never going to happen. (Almost) Anybody can fuel up the car, and (almost) nobody can properly recognize wiring gauge and its condition without stripping walls and doing deep inspection.
A terrible problem to have and it will remain a massive barrier for this technology as long as the wiring remains dumb.

 

[whitex]

I’m shocked we don’t hear about more calamities than we do. So to speak. 😜

There have been melted outlets with the Porsche version (same EVSE). I'm guessing the latest recall was probably triggered by some lawsuit which was quietly settled. Here are some measured temperatures achieved with 40A charging, such as this (which is the more expensive version of the Audi one, but uses the exact same cable):

The above picture from https://www.taycanforum.com/forum/threads/nema-14-50-supply-cable-heat-data.1940/page-11#post-30039

 

[mmmzon]

That photo makes me really comfy - I am limiting my charging to 24A, so my cabling should be ambient temperature.

 

[JNealCox]

I think what you're missing is that the plug-in EVSE's are actually meant to be mobile "chargers", meaning to be plugged into outlets you find in the wild while traveling. EV manufacturers cannot require that all EV owners and outlet owners be electricians able to inspect circuits (or even know . That is the point of standardization - plug and forget, the system will protect you if something goes wrong. The problem here is the residential protection system (electrical code, outlet specs, etc) was not designed with EV usage in mind, so anyone designing EVSE's intended for residential usage should be designing to these inferior specs, rather than an industrial spec that is not required in residential installations.

And this is where Audi's solution makes sense. While you can make the effort to check your house circuit to ensure it works properly overheating (the EVSE at least seems to be VERY selective when it comes to proper grounding), if you are on the road you will not know if the circuit you use was built "as advertised". The thermal sensor in the cable makes sense. Lesson learned!