Stuck in Charging Loop - 2013 SV Using Charging Timers

[swaltner]

As has been suggested here, I've configured my 2013 Leaf SV charging settings as follows:

- Zero Emissions -> Settings -> Disable Long-Life Battery Mode

- Charging timers -> Enable Timer 2 to start/stop at 12:00 PM every day and limit the charging to 80%.

I've had the Leaf for a month and this has worked great on the included L1 EVSE. I plug the car in and it immediately starts charging. If I need the extra range of a full charge, I can press the charge timer override button or the "charge now" button on the iPhone app. However, I got my L2 EVSE (ClipperCreek LCS-25) installed yesterday and ran into a problem.

The car starts charging immediately as expected and stops charging when it reaches 80% charge. However, after 1-2 seconds, the relays in the EVSE and Leaf close and it starts a new charge cycle, another couple seconds and the charge cycle finishes (car beeps, relays open). After another couple seconds, the relays close for a couple seconds on another charge cycle that lasts for a couple seconds. This will repeat "as long" as you leave the car plugged in. I let it run through a dozen such cycles before pulling the cable from the car.

Disabling the charging timer and simply setting the long-life battery mode has the car charge to 80% and stop, as you would expect.

I called the local dealer this afternoon to have them see if a Leaf they have on the lot exhibits similar behavior. They'll get back to me in a day or two. I also might try swinging by there to test out my Leaf on their EVSE, but I'll need to hang out for about an hour to wait for the thing to charge up. There really aren't many public EVSEs around town to test out the behavior with other equipment. I'll also try calling ClipperCreek in the morning to see if they have any ideas about this.

Just curious if others have encountered this before....

 

[swaltner]

I called ClipperCreek today and tested it some more this evening at their suggestion. I set the Timer to have a start time in the near future (and no end time) and plugged in the car. While waiting for the start time to arrive, the car/EVSE did the same thing of closing/opening relays every couple seconds. The dash lights were flashing 1, 2, 3 in sequence signaling that the charging timer was active.

Now that I can replicate this (at home) without waiting 1-2 hours for a charge cycle to complete, I'll stop by the dealer tomorrow to see if it behaves the same way on their L2 EVSE.

 

[swaltner]

I wanted to follow up and say this was resolved, just in case someone else encounters the same issue.

I went to the Nissan dealer the next day and tested out plugging into an EVSE with a charging timer enabled for a delayed start. My Leaf behaved as desired with this EVSE. With that information, I contacted ClipperCreek again and they did an advance replacement on my LCS-25, shipping me a replacement unit and return shipping label. The replacement unit worked just fine, so there was some defect in the original unit that didn't let it work properly with the Leaf charging timers.

So, with just a little bit of work to replace, I'm back in business. I'm very happy with how both the local Nissan dealer and ClipperCreek were in diagnose and fix this issue.