Delayed Charging issue FIXED by software update TSB 2040470

eGopher said:

I uploaded a video to YouTube and sent the URL to VW and ClipperCreek support.

Here's the URL: https://youtu.be/XkiwWCpU2ow
Please add your comments if you are experiencing similar or different issues.

For charging percentage, I normally try to charge to 90% unless I am planning on going somewhere where I know I'll need too eek out every mile. The only reason I would like the charging to start at the beginning of the off-peak period is so that I could troubleshoot the system before going to sleep. It is nuts to stay awake all night just to get this crazy thing working.

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I watched your video and I don't think what happens in the video itself indicates there is anything wrong with your car. Let's do some math.

SOC = 9 / 16 = 56%
kWh to charge = 24.2kWh * (100% - 56%) = 10.65kWh
time to charge = 10.65kWh / (240V * 32A * 85%) = 1.63h = 1hr 38min

2:57pm departure - 1:38 = 1:19pm

In the video, you said the current time was 12:45pm. According to my calculations, the car should have started charging at 1:19pm, so the car did the right thing by going to sleep to wait for the start time. You didn't say in the video how long you waited to see if it would actually charge before the departure time. Obviously, it's possible it would not charge, but it was not stated.

eGopher said:

More information about the eGolf / ClpperCreek L2 charger

I uploaded another video, this time focusing on the indicator lights of the HCS-40.

At time code 00:15, Insert J1772 to charging port, Click sound from HCS-40
- HCS-40, Yellow Power=ON, Green Charging=ON
- eGolf, Delayed Charge Yellow = ON, Status Light=Flashing Green

At time code 01:15, HCS-40 click sound from HCS-40
- HCS-40, Yellow Power=ON, Charging Light=OFF
- eGold, Delayed Charge Off, Status Light Off.

Apparently after 1 minute (exactly) the HCS-40 switched off and the eGolf went to sleep.

See the video Here:
https://youtu.be/NL9Odg-5BKg

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This is the normal behavior for the e-Golf when you plug in with delayed charging enabled. When the charging station indicates "Charging" it means that the car requested that the EVSE pass power to the car. It doesn't mean that the car is actually drawing any power. When the car actually starts charging, you will hear a dull clunk from the car. That is the high voltage contactor closing to allow energy to flow in and out of the high voltage traction battery. When the car asks the EVSE to pass power to the car, it can see the utility voltage. This is important information to have in order to calculate the starting time for Departure-based delayed charging. My RAV4 EV does not do this, so it has to guess what the utility voltage might be based solely on the pilot signal (amperage indication from the EVSE), resulting in notoriously inaccurate charging time estimates.

One more thing - if you want to know how long the car thinks it will take to charge, do the following:

1. Plug the car in.
2. If the car is not actively charging, push the upper button next to the charge port and it should start.
3. Walk around to the drivers door, open it and look at the small center screen in the instrument panel. It will show the estimated charging time.
4. If you want it to stop and wait for the proper start time based on departure time, go back to the charge port and push the lower button.

Yeah, if you're going to do experiments, do 1 a day and change only 1 thing at a time. Then let the hours go by and note what happens on whether it charges or not and when. Give the car a chance to run through the logic before running to the next experiment.

I say this as the one who's been the loudest about the HCS-40 not working with delayed charging. I've been documenting what works and what doesn't out the wazoo and providing that info to Clipper Creek for their troubleshooting.

I agree with miimura. In my experience, just over half is roughly a 1:45 charge @32A. The car would've fallen asleep anyway on the EVSEs that have been reported to work and woken up about 30 minutes later.

Does anyone know if there is a way we can check for the software version ourselves?

Jlo said:

Does anyone know if there is a way we can check for the software version ourselves?

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This particular TSB is not a software update, but a settings update.

And no, there's no way to check.

I had the update applied and it still isn't working for me. I didn't do the 12v disconnect...is that what is fixing it for people?

I would take it back to the dealer, insist on a loaner car and don't take it back until it's working properly. When I took mine in, I knew that a large part of the service was going to be educating the service department on these e-Golf issues. I presented them with an detailed list of what I thought wasn't working correctly and sent the same list to VW Customer Service. After 3 days in the shop it was all working correctly. This was Sunnyvale VW about 3-4 weeks ago.

Trying to read through all the noise in this post, but still not sure.

I have a Juicebox 40 with Wifi. I have used the Time of Use function to charge from 3AM in the morning with a MB electric B-Class for some time. Works perfectly every time I plug in. I have it timed to add about 60% charge to the car. So I wait until I am below 30% and plug in and it adds 60% charge in the middle of the night. There is an override on the Juicebox I use on weekends if I need to charge during the day.

Just purchased an eGolf, trying to use the same charger for delayed charging. The problem is the car sleeps before the charger activates...the car does not charge. I can charge easily if I deactivate the delay and charge immediately.

-Does anyone have the Juicebox charging an eGolf?
-Are you using the eGolf delayed charging or the Juicebox TOU function?
-Does the TSB discussed in this thread eliminate the sleep mode?
-Can you set a delay charge on the eGolf and override the TOU function on the Juicebox to get the departure charging to work.

I'm using a Juicebox-30(it's a very basic charger, no TOU function or cool wifi stuff) and confirm it works with e-Golf departure charge. I did take my car in to the dealer to have TSB done.

I had avoided the delay charging issue these past few months since getting the LE eGolf. Up to this point, I had no reason as we were on solar w/ no time-of-use metering. However, we are getting a second meter (through a state incentive program in MD) dedicated for EVSE and now I thought it time to tackle the delayed charging issue.

Happy to report that I have had no issues on my delayed charging. We have a Siemens 30-A Versicharger (VC30GRYU). I did the 12V reboot a few months ago. Got the eGolf in late April back east in MD.

Also happy to report that Car Net is working very well for me and the new website changes are helpful (although would be nice to set a 'full' charge level at a smaller increment than 10%). Sorry that so many folks appear to have had difficulties. Seems that the Clipper Creek units just are not compatible yet with Car Net. Hope that gets resolved for you all!

[edit] forgot to mention that I was initially quite tripped up on the delayed charging efforts by the default 'minimum charge' setting, which was at 60%...this was causing some serious head scratching and early starts, but then I changed that to 20% and unless I pull in with an empty charge, the delayed charging works great. [/edit]

Cheers,
Tim

TEConnor said:

forgot to mention that I was initially quite tripped up on the delayed charging efforts by the default 'minimum charge' setting, which was at 60%...this was causing some serious head scratching and early starts, but then I changed that to 20% and unless I pull in with an empty charge, the delayed charging works great.

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Just leased a 2015 eGolf last weekend. (So I would assume TSB/fixes were applied correctly.)

I am also having a problem getting delayed charging to take, but not knowing what the minimum charge setting meant, I had it set to 100% - which would explain why every time I plugged in the car started charging, regardless of pressing the delay button or not.

I am going to start over with the app/settings - removed my custom profile, turned off time of day, and set minimum to 20% (I normally have 50%-70% charge when I plug in), with a simple profile of 6am departure time daily. I have a Bosch 30A charger, so if the departure time works my time-of-day restriction is redundant anyway, since it shouldn't take long to charge. I suspect the "deep sleep" problem may get me. I'll let you all know if I've cracked the code!

As an aside, the app (iOS) seems REALLY flaky - about half the time there is some error saving settings, and when I press refresh it seems to ignore my 75% of the time and show me a "10 min ago" view. The website didn't seem much better. Curious if there is a simple step-by-step on what settings to use for delayed charging. If we could start there, at least we should eliminate the charger from the equation. If I can get things working, I'll post.

speedy99 said:

As an aside, the app (iOS) seems REALLY flaky - about half the time there is some error saving settings, and when I press refresh it seems to ignore my 75% of the time and show me a "10 min ago" view. The website didn't seem much better. Curious if there is a simple step-by-step on what settings to use for delayed charging. If we could start there, at least we should eliminate the charger from the equation. If I can get things working, I'll post.

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If you get errors when you are saving the schedule in the app, it is likely because it is having problems communicating with the car. This is what mine did before I had the charging TSB applied and the CarNet box in my car fixed. Do not assume because you have a recently delivered car that the TSBs have been applied.

Adjusting the minimum charge setting (set to 20%) did the trick for me. Now all the delayed functionality works great. Unfortunately, my Bosch charger was completely dead today when I plugged my car in. No green light, no relay clicks. Nothing. Amazon is sending a replacement unit, but after only 1 month of charging with the unit mounted in the garage, I am a bit concerned about quality. (Though compatibility with the e-Golf seems excellent!) I did a quick search here and didn't see Bosch singled out with high failure rates.

BTW - the Car Net app seems more stable now. It seemed to take about a week to stabilize. I suspect VW has a nightmare set of back-end software and systems (and kludges) running. After all the various systems started talking to each other, I seem to have much better luck.

Another update. I burned through two Bosch chargers in two months (though they worked flawlessly on delayed charging until they died completely), and now I am with a Clipper Creek unit because I'd rather have a charger that works than delayed charging. (Well, actually I'd rather have BOTH.)

Unfortunately, I am now seeing what others have seen - the CC unit does the initial boot-up/handshake with the car, then when the car "sleeps" it never actually woke up again to charge this morning. Pretty annoying. I suspect this is just "how it is" - I'd much rather have a reliable charger than keep returning Bosch units. I guess I'll do the dealer trip for the TSB soon. Ugh.

As a second aside the CC unit seems to actually be able to handle 30+ Amps - the relay "click" when it engages is impressive. The Bosch unit(s) seemed to have under-rated components. Not surprised they died. (And they died while NOT in charging mode!)

I think the Bosch units are probably completely outsourced to Delta, a Taiwanese maker of electrical equipment. I say this based on the nearly identical case between the Bosch, Blink HQ, and Delta. Here is the Delta site for that product.

I agree that the Clipper Creek units tend to have a very satisfying thunk when the contactor inside engages. This is especially true of the more commercial grade CS series units.

I've been unsuccessful in my first two attempts to use the delayed charging feature with my Leviton 160 charge station. Tonight I'm trying with the
EVSE provided with the car to see if it's my charge station that is the problem. Based on what I've read on this thread, I'm guessing that it's the car...

Delayed charging worked with the EVSE provided with the car, so I guess the Leviton 160 is not compatible with the e-Golf delayed charging feature.

I highly recommend the JuiceBox 30A EVSE. ~$480, will do up to 7.2kW charging, down to 120v level 1 charging. Relatively portable, lots of adapters available. I've been using it for delayed charging with my eGolf, and so far I've only woke up one morning where it failed to start charging at the prescribed time (but it was charging & the climate control was running, just late). All other times, worked fine, including this morning.

phr00t said:

I highly recommend the JuiceBox 30A EVSE. ~$480, will do up to 7.2kW charging, down to 120v level 1 charging. Relatively portable, lots of adapters available. I've been using it for delayed charging with my eGolf, and so far I've only woke up one morning where it failed to start charging at the prescribed time (but it was charging & the climate control was running, just late). All other times, worked fine, including this morning.

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In order to qualify for the LADWP up to $750 credit for installing a EVSE, I need to get a unit that is Underwriter Labratories listed. The Juice Box does not yet have the UL rating. Folks getting rebates might need to look into that before purchasing, if the agency issuing the rebate requires a UL listing on the device.