DC Quick Charge Times?

[WattEV]

Saturday night I took a risk and drove from my house in Long Beach to Rancho Santa Margarita which was about 47 miles. I planned on the way back to stop at one of the two DC quick charge stations in Irvine so I could make it home. Fast forward to about 9:45pm that night to get home and I stopped at the Quail Hill station...I tried 4 times to get the station to charge my vehicle, but the light on my dash kept flashing amber and the station would say "unable to communicate with vehicle". With only 17 miles of range left, I was obviously concerned.

I hopped back in the car and drove down to the next DC quick charge station which is about 4 miles away at Woodbury...I now had about 13 miles of range left (15% battery) and connected my Spark. Thank goodness on the first try (it's now 10pm), the charger communicated and we were on our way to get some much needed electrons in my Spark.

Interestingly enough, the display on my Spark read 80% charge by 10:50. 50 minutes from a 15% battery to 80%? I dismissed it as sometimes the estimate is not always accurate. Well, it was spot on. It took 50 minutes to reach an 80% charge and I stopped the charge at 10:50pm. I just wanted to get home and almost disconnected earlier, but I really wanted to see how long it would take.

I know there are parameters for the time it takes to charge, but it was a nice evening, about 70 degrees and the charger was indicating 50 AMPS and 396 volts which I thought was optimal. What are others experiencing as a charge time with the DC quick charger? What conditions are necessary to obtain GM's claimed zero to 80% charge time of 20 minutes? It certainly isn't that quick. I'm just curious if anyone has any insight and what their charge times have been and if this is normal.

 

[nmikmik]

Saturday night I took a risk and drove from my house in Long Beach to Rancho Santa Margarita which was about 47 miles. I planned on the way back to stop at one of the two DC quick charge stations in Irvine so I could make it home. Fast forward to about 9:45pm that night to get home and I stopped at the Quail Hill station...I tried 4 times to get the station to charge my vehicle, but the light on my dash kept flashing amber and the station would say "unable to communicate with vehicle". With only 17 miles of range left, I was obviously concerned.

I hopped back in the car and drove down to the next DC quick charge station which is about 4 miles away at Woodbury...I now had about 13 miles of range left (15% battery) and connected my Spark. Thank goodness on the first try (it's now 10pm), the charger communicated and we were on our way to get some much needed electrons in my Spark.

Interestingly enough, the display on my Spark read 80% charge by 10:50. 50 minutes from a 15% battery to 80%? I dismissed it as sometimes the estimate is not always accurate. Well, it was spot on. It took 50 minutes to reach an 80% charge and I stopped the charge at 10:50pm. I just wanted to get home and almost disconnected earlier, but I really wanted to see how long it would take.

I know there are parameters for the time it takes to charge, but it was a nice evening, about 70 degrees and the charger was indicating 50 AMPS and 396 volts which I thought was optimal. What are others experiencing as a charge time with the DC quick charger? What conditions are necessary to obtain GM's claimed zero to 80% charge time of 20 minutes? It certainly isn't that quick. I'm just curious if anyone has any insight and what their charge times have been and if this is normal.

I had only one opportunity to use the QC at the Quail Hill on my way home when I bought the car in Costa Mesa. It took me awhile i.e. fiddling with the plug, completely disconnecting, trying the L2 charge next to the QC and then going back to QC. Finally two systems were able to recognize each other and what I was asking them to do... I believe I had 41 miles to go on my battery at the moment I started charging and in about 20 minutes it was 80% charged.
I think our cars have some kind of "unadvertised" battery saving (longevity wise) features. Like disregarding the charging settings and starting to charge immediately as is is plugged in with close to 20 miles left on the battery.
This prolonged charging could be similar in nature?

 

[amndrin]

I used the Sacramento SMUD one and it took me from 30% to 96% in about 25 mins. It was odd because it seemed to quick charge almost to 85-90% before it really started slowing down and even then it didn't just drop to L2 speeds it kind of slowly lost speed until it hit around 95%. I thought it was supposed to drop to L2 speeds somewhere around 80% full so it was a surprise to me. Anyone else getting experiences like this?

 

[OneSpark]

Not sure if it's the car or the charger, but I've also tried out the DCQC at Woodbury and found the charge times to be a touch slower than advertised on my Spark. Nice to know I'm not alone (and that the Quail Hill charger might be tricky to get going).

 

[xylhim]

I got the same speeds charging at Woodbury. I don't know if this was just a fluke, but I got the same amber light but no charge on my first attempt. The second time, I made sure the combo plug was plugged in before pressing any buttons on the charging unit, and it worked fine after that. As for speeds, I think the amperage is about half of what a full spec DCQC is capable of; I assume up to 100amps is supported.

 

[TonyWilliams]

the charger was indicating 50 AMPS and 396 volts which I thought was optimal.

It has been answered previously and determined that this is only a 20kW station.

A Nissan LEAF will take 48kW at 120 amps (of the 125 amps maximum from a CHAdeMO charger), and it is therefore likely that a Spark EV will accept something similar from a CCS Combo1 charger.

The problem is that the charger is limited to only 50 amps, of about 20kW. For the record, a Tesla Model S can charge at up to 20kW with its onboard charger(s) and a 100 amp circuit that it is plugged into.

Also, the Renault EV's with the Chameleon AC quick charge can pull 22kW or 43kW with just three phase AC power.

 

[gra]

the charger was indicating 50 AMPS and 396 volts which I thought was optimal.

It has been answered previously and determined that this is only a 20kW station.

A Nissan LEAF will take 48kW at 120 amps (of the 125 amps maximum from a CHAdeMO charger), and it is therefore likely that a Spark EV will accept something similar from a CCS Combo1 charger.

Spark, 50kW max per the owner's manual.

 

[WattEV]

Thanks for all of the great replies! I now know that the chargers in Irvine are not running at a full capacity to provide the 20 minute advertised charge time. I'm also glad I'm not the only one experiencing some of the issues with the DCQC at Quail Hill. It was the first time I ran into the no-charge issue there.

Well, I just finished installing a Kenwood self-powered subwoofer in my Spark that is under the driver's seat. I took lots of pictures since I took out the driver seat, rear seat and all rear trim/side airbags to do it. I wanted a clean install since I love cars and work in the industry. Once I figure out how to post the pics, I'll get them out here.

 

[xylhim]

Thanks for all of the great replies! I now know that the chargers in Irvine are not running at a full capacity to provide the 20 minute advertised charge time. I'm also glad I'm not the only one experiencing some of the issues with the DCQC at Quail Hill. It was the first time I ran into the no-charge issue there.

Well, I just finished installing a Kenwood self-powered subwoofer in my Spark that is under the driver's seat. I took lots of pictures since I took out the driver seat, rear seat and all rear trim/side airbags to do it. I wanted a clean install since I love cars and work in the industry. Once I figure out how to post the pics, I'll get them out here.

That sounds awesome! What model is the Kenwood subwoofer? I've been thinking of getting one of those and installing it in the cargo space, not sure if I could do it without lots of modification though (can't dabble too much because I'm leasing).

 

[OneSpark]

I just finished installing a Kenwood self-powered subwoofer in my Spark that is under the driver's seat. ... Once I figure out how to post the pics, I'll get them out here.

Please do! Boosting up the audio is high on my to-do list for my new Spark EV (just 2 weeks old).

 

[WattEV]

That sounds awesome! What model is the Kenwood subwoofer? I've been thinking of getting one of those and installing it in the cargo space, not sure if I could do it without lots of modification though (can't dabble too much because I'm leasing).

Just added some pics and a link to the album in the Modification forum.

 

[cwerdna]

Thanks for all of the great replies! I now know that the chargers in Irvine are not running at a full capacity to provide the 20 minute advertised charge time. I'm also glad I'm not the only one experiencing some of the issues with the DCQC at Quail Hill. It was the first time I ran into the no-charge issue there.

Uhh... let's just be clear here. The DC fast charger (the large external unit) can be the bottleneck here. If it's is capable of 20 kW output max and 20 kW are making into the car (at least when the battery is low enough), that is its "full capacity".

20 and 25 kW DC FCs are cheaper (than 40+ kW ones) for the hardware, installation and ongoing costs. See http://www.mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3753&start=0.

 

[WattEV]

Thanks for all of the great replies! I now know that the chargers in Irvine are not running at a full capacity to provide the 20 minute advertised charge time. I'm also glad I'm not the only one experiencing some of the issues with the DCQC at Quail Hill. It was the first time I ran into the no-charge issue there.

Uhh... let's just be clear here. The DC fast charger (the large external unit) can be the bottleneck here. If it's is capable of 20 kW output max and 20 kW are making into the car (at least when the battery is low enough), that is its "full capacity".

20 and 25 kW DC FCs are cheaper (than 40+ kW ones) for the hardware, installation and ongoing costs. See http://www.mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3753&start=0.

I'm clear, I just didn't word it correctly. Clearly they are running at their full capacity, but not the capacity to provide an 80% charge in 20 minutes.

 

[Nashco]

Just to clarify, I have charged my Spark EV at 50 kW and it works exactly as advertised. The Efacec charger at Portland's Electric Avenue has a 50 kW service, which results in something like 48 kW into the car, according to the display on the charger. I have charged from <20% to ~90% in less than 20 minutes. The charging is awesome compared to my Leaf, with significantly less throttling at higher state of charge. I've written down the charge rates related to SOC, but haven't put it into a chart yet.

Bryce

 

[amndrin]

The Sacramento smud qc works as advertised as well. We've taken it from around 10% to 80% in under 20 and it takes less than 10 mins to get from 80 - 100 as well.

 

[jay5729]

I used the Sacramento SMUD one and it took me from 30% to 96% in about 25 mins. It was odd because it seemed to quick charge almost to 85-90% before it really started slowing down and even then it didn't just drop to L2 speeds it kind of slowly lost speed until it hit around 95%. I thought it was supposed to drop to L2 speeds somewhere around 80% full so it was a surprise to me. Anyone else getting experiences like this?

Hey amndrin, I find the dcqc at smud to be exceptionally fast as well. I've gone from 20% to full in around 40 minutes, hitting 80% easily under 20. If I could only make it home on 80%.

 

[buickanddeere]

It would be interesting to know the battery temperature when the vehicle rolls into the charging station after being discharged for 1/2 an hours driving? Then pour 40KW of power into the battery pack for 20 minutes?
I appreciate there is a battery cooling system but that is a lot of heat deep inside the battery packs.That using L1 or L2 charging would avoid such heating.

 

[TonyWilliams]

It would be interesting to know the battery temperature when the vehicle rolls into the charging station after being discharged for 1/2 an hours driving? Then pour 40KW of power into the battery pack for 20 minutes?
I appreciate there is a battery cooling system but that is a lot of heat deep inside the battery packs.That using L1 or L2 charging would avoid such heating.

You would have to dig that info out of the CAN bus. The LEAF CAN bus has been fully cracked open, so we can see all that data.

 

[FutureFolly]

It would be interesting to know the battery temperature when the vehicle rolls into the charging station after being discharged for 1/2 an hours driving? Then pour 40KW of power into the battery pack for 20 minutes?
I appreciate there is a battery cooling system but that is a lot of heat deep inside the battery packs.That using L1 or L2 charging would avoid such heating.

The battery cooling system is quite advanced. It was specifically designed around DC-FC cooling needs. They advertise being able to handle multiple fast charges in the same day. I still wouldn't do it every day.