CHAdeMO Terra 53 Fast Charger in Northern Ca

[bernie82]

Are there any CHAdeMO Terra 53 Fast Chargers in Northern Ca? Is it worth paying the extra $750 to get the LT2 Spark with DC?

 

[Nashco]

http://www.mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=3643&start=8

Only you know if it's worth the money to you, but here are some instructions to clarify what type of DC charger standard is used on the Spark EV, how you can find compatible stations near you, and how to be sure you get the right car if you want the DC charging capability.

Bryce

 

[bernie82]

Bryce, the point of my question is to determine if there are any DC chargers that are compatible with the Spark in Northern Ca. If there are, I would opt for the DC upgrade. If there aren't any, I would pass on the upgrade. Having clarified that, do know of any compatible DC charging stations in Northern Ca.?

 

[Nashco]

The link above shows how you can use PlugShare to see exactly where SAE Combo chargers are. Northern California is a pretty big area and your profile doesn't say where you are located, so I suggest checking with PlugShare. SAE Combo is a new standard that isn't compatible with existing Chademo plugs, so the infrastructure is changing rapidly (therefore any locations posted in this thread would be quickly outdated).

Again, only you can know if the extra cost is worth it to you. If you only care about stations in existence this moment then there are extremely few. If you care about two years or ten years from now, that's a completely different story. If resale value or future proofing are a concern, this should be considered. If you have other cars you prefer for driving outside of your battery range or not, this is a factor. Etc. Just depends on your priorities.

Bryce

 

[cwerdna]

Bryce, the point of my question is to determine if there are any DC chargers that are compatible with the Spark in Northern Ca. If there are, I would opt for the DC upgrade. If there aren't any, I would pass on the upgrade. Having clarified that, do know of any compatible DC charging stations in Northern Ca.?

Ditto on the comments re: Nor Cal being a huge area. Use Nashco's directions to find SAE Combo (J1772 CCS) DC FC stations. CHAdeMO is NOT compatiable w/J1772 CCS. There's currently no point in looking for CHAdeMO stations in determining whether to pay for the J1772 CCS DC FC capability on a Spark EV. If an adapter existed, that'd be a different story.

If you want to find the CHAdeMO stations (out of curiosity), you'll need to follow his directions but instead only have Quick Charge checked. I've sent Plugshare a mail to have them clarify that Quick Charge on their web site should be labeled Quick Charge (CHAdeMO) or something to that effect, since that's what they mean and to be consistent w/their iOS app.

 

[bernie82]

Apparently I'm not making my question clear, so I'll take my best shot. Has anyone on this site ever used A DC charger in Northern Ca.?If so can you tell me where it is?

 

[TonyWilliams]

Apparently I'm not making my question clear, so I'll take my best shot. Has anyone on this site ever used A DC charger in Northern Ca.?If so can you tell me where it is?

I'll try and answer in a way that is clear, also. I have done plenty of DC charging in Northern California, but it wasn't with any DC charger that could plug into your Chevy Spark. Northern California is a big place, but I do know there is at least one Spark EV compatible charge station near San Francisco:

http://www.mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5307#p5307


USA DC Quick Charge data, sometimes colloquially referred to as "L3"


1. SAE CCS Combo1 "Frankenplug" or "J1772 DC" - approximately 20 in the USA
http://standards.sae.org/j1772_201210/
up to 100kW eventually, probably limited to 62.5kW
EVs compatible with Frankenplug include:

*GM Spark EV - less than 100 with Frankenplug capability
*BMW i3 (coming 2014)
*VW eGolf (coming 2014)


2. CHAdeMO - 3605 worldwide, 554 in the USA
http://www.chademo.com
up to 100kW eventually, currently limited to 62.5kW
EVs compatible with CHAdeMO include:

*Nissan LEAF - over 45,000 in the USA and over 100,000 worldwide
*Nissan e-NV200 (coming 2014)
*Citroen C-Zero - not sold in USA
*Mitsubishi i-MiEV - over 30,000 worldwide with its variants C-Zero & iON
*Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV (coming 2015)
*Mitsubishi Fuso Canter truck
*Peugeot iON - not sold in USA
*Kia Soul EV (coming 2014)
*ZERO motorcycles
*Tesla except Roadster with adaptor


3. Supercharger - 73 stations in the USA, each with 4-8 stalls
http://www.teslamotors.com/supercharger
up to 150kW eventually, currently limited to 120kW
EVs compatible with Supercharger include:

*Tesla only, except Roadster - 30,000 cars worldwide

 

[gra]

Apparently I'm not making my question clear, so I'll take my best shot. Has anyone on this site ever used A DC charger in Northern Ca.?If so can you tell me where it is?

You are asking two separate and mutually exclusive questions in your original post. There are plenty of CHAdeMO QCs in parts of Northern California, but Sparks can't use them, only the currently much less common SAE-Combo. Again, see this thread for a full explanation:

http://www.mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=3643

 

[cwerdna]

Apparently I'm not making my question clear, so I'll take my best shot. Has anyone on this site ever used A DC charger in Northern Ca.?If so can you tell me where it is?

Yes, I have. 4x (once today) w/my Leaf, but it was a CHAdeMO DC FC at a Nissan dealer. And, it doesn't help anyone w/a Spark EV since it isn't compatible w/CHAdeMO.

Please see all the earlier replies.

 

[ecilopaveht]

bernie82 I get what you are asking, You want to know if there are any QC available in northern California that are compatible with the Spark. You just gave one example of a Quick Charger like the ABB Tera 53 CJ that is dual standard, It has a SAE and a CHAdeMO plug.

If you look at Plugshare, it does not list a SAE QC station in Northern California, but the infrastructure is quickly changing.

As for it being worth it? Like some said that is up to you. I own a spark EV and do not have the QC option, I wish that there were more infrastructure for it and if there was then the option would have been worth the extra wait and money for me at least.

 

[gra]

bernie82 I get what you are asking, You want to know if there are any QC available in northern California that are compatible with the Spark. You just gave one example of a Quick Charger like the ABB Tera 53 CJ that is dual standard, It has a SAE and a CHAdeMO plug.

If you look at Plugshare, it does not list a SAE QC station in Northern California, but the infrastructure is quickly changing.

As for it being worth it? Like some said that is up to you. I own a spark EV and do not have the QC option, I wish that there were more infrastructure for it and if there was then the option would have been worth the extra wait and money for me at least.

Plugshare has a problem at the moment. To view SAE Combo stations you have to deselect "High Power Stations" and view "Public Stations" with "SAE combo" selected on the "Settings" page. Doing so, you'll see that there is currently one Combo station in the Bay area at VW ERL in Belmont. And per jay5729 in the SAE Combo stations thread, "According to the Sacramento EV association, the new SAE combo quick charger at the SMUD building on 6th off of hwy 50 (see plug share map) is up and running as of 3-14-14. It is a Semacharge station and costs $.20 a kWh."

Once the 'trigger' is reached, the NRG stations will be converted or installed ab initio with dual or dual mode QCs.

 

[cwerdna]

bernie82 I get what you are asking, You want to know if there are any QC available in northern California that are compatible with the Spark. You just gave one example of a Quick Charger like the ABB Tera 53 CJ that is dual standard, It has a SAE and a CHAdeMO plug.

If you look at Plugshare, it does not list a SAE QC station in Northern California, but the infrastructure is quickly changing.

As for it being worth it? Like some said that is up to you. I own a spark EV and do not have the QC option, I wish that there were more infrastructure for it and if there was then the option would have been worth the extra wait and money for me at least.

Plugshare has a problem at the moment. To view SAE Combo stations you have to deselect "High Power Stations" and view "Public Stations" with "SAE combo" selected on the "Settings" page. Doing so, you'll see that there is currently one Combo station in the Bay area at VW ERL in Belmont. And per jay5729 in the SAE Combo stations thread, "According to the Sacramento EV association, the new SAE combo quick charger at the SMUD building on 6th off of hwy 50 (see plug share map) is up and running as of 3-14-14. It is a Semacharge station and costs $.20 a kWh."

Once the 'trigger' is reached, the NRG stations will be converted or installed ab initio with dual or dual mode QCs.

The OP shouldn't bother looking for ABB Terra 53 combo (CHAdeMO with SAE J1772 CCS) DC FCs only. That's unnecessarily restrictive.

The single (or one of two) operational J1772 CCS DC FC in Nor Cal (which happens to also support CHAdeMO) at http://api.plugshare.com/view/location/8428 (with efacec labeling) sure doesn't look like any unit made by ABB.

 

[corwin]

Apparently I'm not making my question clear, so I'll take my best shot. Has anyone on this site ever used A DC charger in Northern Ca.?If so can you tell me where it is?

There is a Spark compatible DC QC in Belmont. Its at the VW Research facility and I've used it about a dozen times with my Spark. Its the only CCS charger in N. CA I'm aware of. One is shortly to come online in Sacramento.

Be aware the charger in Belmont is fairly unreliable, but I know the folks there are working on making it better.
-Corwin

 

[jay5729]

According to saceva fb page, the SMUD combo quick charger rollout is delayed because of "legal issues".

 

[cwerdna]

SAE Combo is a new standard that isn't compatible with existing Chademo plugs, so the infrastructure is changing rapidly (therefore any locations posted in this thread would be quickly outdated).

The above was posted March 15, 2014. Any numbers on how rapidly this infrastructure is changing? Plugshare shows only 7 SAE Combo DC FCs in the US, 3 are in states where no J1772 CCS compatible cars are even sold.

 

[TonyWilliams]

SAE Combo is a new standard that isn't compatible with existing Chademo plugs, so the infrastructure is changing rapidly (therefore any locations posted in this thread would be quickly outdated).

The above was posted March 15, 2014. Any numbers on how rapidly this infrastructure is changing? Plugshare shows only 7 SAE Combo DC FCs in the US, 3 are in states where no J1772 CCS compatible cars are even sold.

Things are changing, but not in favor of GM's CCS Combo1 that is and will always be in only one country; USA.

Tesla just installed their 100th Supercharger station, each with an average of 5.5 plugs per station.

CHAdeMO keeps growing, a lot !!!

The number of CHAdeMO DC Quick chargers installed up to today is 3688.
-- (Japan 1,967 Europe 1117 USA 592 Others 12) last update 2014.04.22
-- Evolution of the number of CHAdeMO fast charging station:

http://www.chademo.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/changeinchargingstation.pdf

 

[xylhim]

So according to the link, CCS is ahead of CHADeMO since it took over a year and a half for that standard to get over 7 chargers outside Japan (and how many CHADeMO chargers were in the US specifically in the first year and a half). CCS already has 7 and its only been out six months. This doesn't mean that CCS is going to take off, but if you want to play the numbers game, its ahead in growth rate in the US.

 

[TonyWilliams]

So according to the link, CCS is ahead of CHADeMO since it took over a year and a half for that standard to get over 7 chargers outside Japan (and how many CHADeMO chargers were in the US specifically in the first year and a half). CCS already has 7 and its only been out six months. This doesn't mean that CCS is going to take off, but if you want to play the numbers game, its ahead in growth rate in the US.

I have to hand it to you, that's a good spin !!!

Let's make a graph based on the 7 current CCS-Combo1 charge stations in the world versus the 3700 CHAdeMO and 550 Tesla Superchargers that shows CCS taking over by next month!!! It could happen!!!!

 

[cwerdna]

Tesla just installed their 100th Supercharger station, each with an average of 6 or 7 plugs per station.

Yep. They posted about it at https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10152357080047801.1073741832.18790602800&type=1.

And as, I re-posted at http://www.mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=6843#p6843, that makes for 548 Supercharger stalls in the US across 29 states.

 

[cwerdna]

So according to the link, CCS is ahead of CHADeMO since it took over a year and a half for that standard to get over 7 chargers outside Japan (and how many CHADeMO chargers were in the US specifically in the first year and a half). CCS already has 7 and its only been out six months. This doesn't mean that CCS is going to take off, but if you want to play the numbers game, its ahead in growth rate in the US.

I have to hand it to you, that's a good spin !!!

Spin indeed. The first Leaf didn't go on sale in the world until December 11, 2010. So, by the 1.5 year mark of the Leaf's debut, per that chart, there were 1236 CHAdeMO DC FCs in Japan and 258 overseas.

There was usage in October 2011: http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=6572 and at least 9 in the US at the 1 year mark: http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=7167.

Oh yes, and for 2011 and the partial month of 2010, there were 9,674 Leafs sold in the US (http://insideevs.com/monthly-plug-in-sales-scorecard/). The Spark EV has yet to break 1000 units.