New Member

[Geraldine Montoya]

Hi my name is Geri Montoya. I'm born and raised in San Diego, CA.
I reside in Tijuana, BC, Mexico. I'm a happy owner of a 2015 Chevy Spark EV
What prompted me to join is that my EV has been out of a charge for a couple of weeks.
Completely dead. My 120 volt portable charger doesn't work. It may be the cables need to be replaced from
overuse from the previous owner. Nice to be here and hope to solve my problem soon.

 

[MINITSLA]

Welcome, Geri. Have you managed to find a replacement charge cord yet?

If not, I would search Facebook Marketplace for "EV charger" and "EVSE" and maybe "J1772" which is the name for the charge port standard for our cars. (Most manufacturers are now moving to Tesla's "NACS" port configuration.)

You can also get one from eBay for about $160 (shipping to Mexico may cost a little more). Here's your baseline that you can compare a local purchase to...

https://www.ebay.com/itm/2961646297...vXDKDbETMi&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

 

[Infinion]

Hi Geri,

What prompted me to join is that my EV has been out of a charge for a couple of weeks.
Completely dead. My 120 volt portable charger doesn't work. It may be the cables need to be replaced from
overuse from the previous owner. Nice to be here and hope to solve my problem soon.

Completely dead. My 120 volt portable charger doesn't work.

When you say the EV is "completely dead", are you saying the car doesn't unlock by key fob, all the lighting in the vehicle cabin stays dark or does not illuminate brightly, and the screens in your dash, as well as the center console, do not turn on?

If this is the case, the 12V battery is dead. In order to charge your EV, your 12V AGM battery under the hood must not be fully discharged. The portable EVSE (charger) can not revive the 12V battery because it is locked out from the 12V system. You must charge the AGM battery yourself in this case, manually. The car needs sufficient power from the 12V battery to run computers and relay switches for 5-10 seconds until the LED light goes green on the dashboard near the middle of your front windshield, telling you the car has finished its handshake with the portable charger.

Under normal circumstances, the 12V battery is charged while the EV is charged, while waiting on standby during "departure" mode, or while you are driving. However, if this battery is old or degraded from dying more than a few times, it may lose a charge faster than expected.




If the 12V battery is NOT dead, can you confirm a few things about the condition of the portable charger?

• When you plug in the charger into a 120V outlet, do you see solid or flashing red indicator lights, yellow lights, or green lights on the body of the unit?
• Are you able to charge at a public station, or with a neighbor's J1772-style charger, anything besides the portable charger you got with the car?
• Is there any visible physical damage on either end of the connectors? Does the latch and button lever still function on the big J1772 connector that plugs into the car? When you press on it, does it feel springy and return to its original position? I ask because if the button stays pressed in, the portable charger (EVSE) will not allow charging, because it thinks a person is attempting to unplug.
  If the spring inside the button-latch is worn out or damaged, you can still use the portable charger as long as the button is pulled out of the body. It must not remain in the pressed-in state if you want to charge. You can pull it out with your fingers most of the time.
  It's common for the button latch mechanism to fail on this style of EV plug.
  

 

[zoom314]

Hi I own a Lime Green 2015 Chevy Spark 2LT EV that I bought used in late Nov 2023 and had delivered on Dec 5th 2023.

 

[Geri M.]

Hi and in response to your question. No. I still have my car sitting. Dead. Now the problem is that I'm moving in 30 days and have used up all my money for the new place I'm moving to so now I really can't afford to buy a new EVSE But during this time that I first posted I took it to an electrician who redid the cables on the EVSE battery charger and showed me on his graph that the current is running fine. But unfortunately it still doesn't work. I plug it in and the lights don't turn on. I plug in and nothing works. I may lose the car because the owner may have it towed if I don't do something with it sitting on his property where I live for 6 months. I wish I knew someone who would let me borrow theirs for a couple of hours. I wish there was a place like they have for contruction workers who can borrow machinery and take it back for a small fee instead of buying they're equipment. I'm just sad about this and don't know what to do.

 

[SparkE]

What part of "check 12V battery" did you not understand? Ask your neighbors to borrow a regular 12V battery charger. Your 12V battery is probably toast.

 

[Randy960]

Just to clarify, when you say the car is "dead", that can mean a few different things. Does the car turn on and drive, but the High Voltage battery is low and needs to charge? Do you mean that the car doesn't turn on at all? Or does the car turn on, but won't go into gear and there's an error message of some sort?

 

[Infinion]

You have shared an important piece of information.

I took it to an electrician who redid the cables on the EVSE battery charger and showed me on his graph that the current is running fine. But unfortunately it still doesn't work. I plug it in and the lights don't turn on. I plug in and nothing works.

It's clear, your 12V battery is dead. After 6 months it probably doesn't hold a charge.

You need to jumpstart or boost the car to get it out of there. Drive slow and carefully and keep the car running for a couple hours to try to add some energy to the 12V.

Then, you need to find a new 12V battery. Any 12V battery will work, but there is a specific type that the car supports the best.

The EVSE that you already own works fine. The electrician replaced the plug on your charger and showed you that it works, so you do not need a new EVSE.

Whenever you have problems like these please do not panic and carefully put together what you know, take a video and share it, read the owner's manual for troubleshooting. It's important to read the advice online carefully and communicate your problems clearly. Taking a video on your smartphone is the best when it feels very complicated, and you can upload it to https://streamable.com/ or www.youtube.com or even the "Upload Video" button right here on the forums.