Accraine / Electway CCS1 -> CHAdeMo adapter

[Chad E. Mo]

Encouraged by the reports by Nomadic Hippie on YouTube and those here by duncan-s, I placed an order for an adapter on Tuesday 7/2 via the accraine.co.uk website.

My attempt to use Gpay failed, probably due to Gpay being discontinued in the US. The buttons are present on the Accraine site for US visitors, but they do nothing.

I proceeded to place an order using a debit card, which initially failed due to my credit union blocking it as suspicious.

After confirming with my credit union that the transaction was legitimately placed by me, I placed another order and the Accraine site returned a successful confirmation page, but no automatic email confirmation was received. The Accraine site does still have my account info and the record of the transaction.




I used the website contact form on Friday 7/5 to ask Accraine for order confirmation and tracking info. Today, Tuesday 7/9, I received an email from Patrick with a DHL tracking number showing a shipment originating in Hong Kong and destination (so far) as Detroit. It should arrive at my office on Friday 7/12.




Everything looks pretty legit at this point. If all goes as expected, I'll be able to test on a wide variety of chargers and networks. As I posted on Dala's dischord, near and on the route to my office, there are Shell, EA, CP, EVgo, EVgo-Ultium, Tesla-MagicDock, EVconnect, Red E, Blink, Zef.




Stay tuned...

 

[BillAinCT]

Although the Accraine site claims 50kW CHAdeMO 1.0 the link to the other topic show 74kW being delivered. This is good!

What were the shipping charges?

 

[Chad E. Mo]

What were the shipping charges?

The price included shipping.

 

[MikeinPA]

Are there tariffs on that? If so, better get in touch with DHL.

 

[Chad E. Mo]

Better call the tariff sheriff!

 

[Bombastinator2]

I look forward to it

 

[Chad E. Mo]

I just checked the tracking and the package has arrived at my office a day early!





Unfortunately, I'm out of the office today.

Gonna have to wait until tomorrow!

(It might be a box of bricks...)

 

[Chad E. Mo]

Well, I got one for realzz.





The device is beefy and solid feeling. Might weigh 4lbs.


It was late, so I only tested two chargers. Note that I first test the chademo connection to ensure the stations and apps are working as expected. (both stations had chademo and ccs1)

First, the ChargePoint worked after one misfire. Not sure if some internal battery needed to be charged, but it worked on the second try. It does take about a minute to initialize the charge, it seems first it establishes the handshake on the supply side, then on the car side.

There was a ginormous EV9 charging on the adjacent station, so low output from my station.

https://www.plugshare.com/location/210792



Only after I was back on the street did I notice the EV System problem icon on my cluster. (Yellow car outline with exclamation point.)

But I was rolling and everything seemed ok otherwise, so I headed to another charger.

When I got to the next station, I power cycled the car and the icon was gone. Maybe the first misfire threw a temporary error code).

On my way to the next store/station, I plugged the included 12v cord into the adapter, thinking it might charge any existing internal battery. It was plugged in for maybe 5 min.


A Tritium charger on the Shell network pretty much worked. Again, it does take longer than a typical chademo connection.

I say pretty much worked, only because I rarely DCFC and usually have to reset my password, in the meantime the session times-out. I then needed to return the cable to the station and start over.

https://www.plugshare.com/location/251352



Power delivery was in the expected range for a Leaf with 75% SoC... 30kW and tapering.

I'll declare categorically that the Shell Recharge app is utter ****. the map frequently won't work in portrait mode, and tells you to turn your device. It gets confused about what screen it should display, has dead ends, and does not display all the session information on the page .






More testing to follow. I'll run the battery down into the mid SoC range to see the max power I can pass through the adapter.

CEM

 

[duncan-s]

The adventure begins! So far I haven't noticed it taking much longer to connect than without an adapter, so I wonder if you are looking at a couple of anomalous examples. Anyway mine's worked everywhere I have tried it so far. There was one ABB pump that wouldn't deliver juice, but the one next to it did, so I think that one had nothing to do with the adapter or the car.

(Yes yes, they are chargers not pumps, but you knew what I meant, and I like that as a convention or metaphor or whatever it is. Consider that when we want someone in a car to lower their window so we can talk, most of us still mime a cranking motion even though it's probably been a long time since cars have been built with manual crank windows.)

I use the Shell Recharge app quite a bit because a lot of the stations around here are theirs, and I agree it's a crummy app. One of my peeves: it's supposedly configured to automatically charge me a few bucks when my balance runs low, but instead it emails a nag message saying I need to make a payment to ensure I can charge again. So I end up doing that manually every time.

 

[Chad E. Mo]

I'm very optimistic (to the tune of a kilobuck), that this adapter is a lasting solution. Granted, charger companies may object, software may change, who knows... I'll enjoy it while it lasts.

Next challenge will be battery cooling, but first we'll play mystery-date with more DCFC chargers.

 

[Chad E. Mo]

Caveat: only after I saw the EV error icon on my dash did I recall that hooking unsanctioned devices to the car could brick it. I guess now I'm feeling lucky.

 

[Chad E. Mo]

Electrify America, newer chargers (350kW claimed). No Problemo. 41kW, but I was already at 70%.

https://www.plugshare.com/location/186536





I'll test the older charger that has the Chademo, when it's not busy. Three of these six pumps are inop.

 

[Chad E. Mo]

This old EVgo did NOT seem to work, even with the Chademo nozzle, so we will call that a non-test, and try again later.
(No manufacturer nameplate visible.)

https://www.plugshare.com/location/76727

 

[Chad E. Mo]

The new Delta charger on the EVgo network failed 4 out of five tries. When it did connect successfully, it delivered a blazing 9kW. Yes, nine.

https://www.plugshare.com/location/541298

 

[Chad E. Mo]

The Blink chargers successfully delivered the goods at 60kW.

https://www.plugshare.com/location/569773

 

[Chad E. Mo]

On the systems that failed (both EVgo), I tried with and without the 12v external power, but that may need a re-test... it seems the dispensers prefer to have the car OFF to initiate a charge. If the car is off, the 12v is off also.

 

[duncan-s]

That's a lot of testing! Sounds like you're going to be able to trust the adapter when you need it.

I haven't used the 12v supply yet, and suspect it just won't ever be needed -- unless maybe months go by between CCS charge episodes and it wants a little something to wake up the internal electronics before snapping the big connectors together.

Do you have thoughts about physical stress on the CHAdeMO connector, with the CCS plug's weight displaced that far outward? Maybe the car's connector is sturdy enough to do this long term, but I wonder if I should be sticking a rolled-up dish towel under the adapter.

 

[Chad E. Mo]

Do you have thoughts about physical stress on the CHAdeMO connector, with the CCS plug's weight displaced that far outward? Maybe the car's connector is sturdy enough to do this long term, but I wonder if I should be sticking a rolled-up dish towel under the adapter.

That's a pretty good idea. The adapter is heavy and the CCS cables can be massive.

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

Thank you for all of the testing. Curious if you can get a full 250 amps through the adapter when at a low SOH.

Exciting days. I am going to try the ice pack solution on my next 600 mile drive in August

 

[BillAinCT]

What are your thoughts about security? Not that this adapter is highly desirable, but would you leave the car charging unattended? Would you be worried about the adapter possibly being stolen? The value to us is quite real, while it might look like an inexpensive device to others. Does the adapter's CHAdeMO lock to the car even after charging so that the CCS cable could be removed?