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Help! Really slow charging at fast chargers

29K views 110 replies 28 participants last post by  ogakul 
#1 ·
I’m on a road trip, at the moment in Austria.
Yesterday I drove through Germany and I noticed on 3 out of 4 charging stops the car charged as half speed of what it normally does.
I arrived with less than 10% for each stop and charged up to 60-80%.
<20% barley reaching 100kW
50% 50kW and slowing down more
These where all on IONITY stations , I switched stalls but nothing helped

Currently at a Salzburg AG 150kW charger doing 43kW at 62%

This is really frustrating, called bmw road assistance but they couldn’t do anything, regular bmw support is closed since it’s Sunday.

It doesn’t seem to have anything to do with heat because at the last stop yesterday I noticed that the battery temperature went down from 50 to 40 Celsius during charge.
the ambient temperature was between 25-30 Celsius yesterday.
Here outside of Zall em see it’s 15 Celsius and battery wasn’t higher than 30 Celsius

Im using the bmw charging card provided when I got the car.

Anyone got any idea?
Can I do a reset or something?
 
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#3 ·
Yes but I have never seen it make any difference, I’ve turned up at chargers with 25-50 degrees, never the same temperature it only seems to make a difference how I drive.
I haven’t been in any real cold weather so it’s hard to test

Currently at an IONITy plugged in at 20% and doesn’t go over 100kW with 2/4 stalls being used
 
#13 ·
The car still charges slowly! Tried different stalls at IONITY , one of which was charging another car with faster speeds before me.
The car has been sitting for the last 15-20 hours, what the hell is going on!?

This might be TMI but for those who want to know.
the car had been sitting , off, for the last 15-20 hours.
the weather has been mixed sun and rain, highest temperature 24 and lowest maybe 15 Celsius.
When I left home I hadn’t don’t any preconditioning and the temp was 19-20 outside and I set the built in nav for the charger, I drove half way in eco and half comfort , about 20km from home with about 15km on motorway (110km/h) rest was on 40-80 km/h.

I plugged in at IONITY , did not exceed 100kW.
Charged 3-9% 3 min according to bmw app
Drove slowly about 5km to an AC charger 3.7kW and charged there for 7 min, stay at 9% obviously

Drove back to IONITY slowly and plugged in, again not exceeding 100kW (94-100kW)
Changed stall same speeds

Went for a rip on the motorway about 15km

Plugged in to the same stalls at IONITY , same slow speeds.
Called the bmw dealer but the one with high voltage knowledge was on vacation so I’ll have to wait for 10 days for them to do a diagnostic…
 
#88 ·
The car still charges slowly! Tried different stalls at IONITY , one of which was charging another car with faster speeds before me.
The car has been sitting for the last 15-20 hours, what the hell is going on!?

This might be TMI but for those who want to know.
the car had been sitting , off, for the last 15-20 hours.
the weather has been mixed sun and rain, highest temperature 24 and lowest maybe 15 Celsius.
When I left home I hadn’t don’t any preconditioning and the temp was 19-20 outside and I set the built in nav for the charger, I drove half way in eco and half comfort , about 20km from home with about 15km on motorway (110km/h) rest was on 40-80 km/h.

I plugged in at IONITY , did not exceed 100kW.
Charged 3-9% 3 min according to bmw app
Drove slowly about 5km to an AC charger 3.7kW and charged there for 7 min, stay at 9% obviously

Drove back to IONITY slowly and plugged in, again not exceeding 100kW (94-100kW)
Changed stall same speeds

Went for a rip on the motorway about 15km

Plugged in to the same stalls at IONITY , same slow speeds.
Called the bmw dealer but the one with high voltage knowledge was on vacation so I’ll have to wait for 10 days for them to do a diagnostic…
just reading this I want to rent a gas car for road trips.........ugg
 
#15 ·
Starting to think something is actually wrong with the car 😕
AC charged up to 50%, went on a drive , navigated to an IONITY and arrived with 8% , had to wait for a few minutes because the station was full , plugged in and still I have the same issues.
Charged for a few minutes and decided to go to another 300kW charger nearby which isn’t connected to bmw charge subscription , just so it didn’t have anything to do with IONITY or my bmw charge card.
Plugged in and same issue…

From what I can see is that the Amperage doesn’t exceed 250.
I don’t know electricity so not sure if that is something, or is amp connected to the amount of kWh that is input to the car ?
 
#16 ·
Starting to think something is actually wrong with the car 😕
AC charged up to 50%, went on a drive , navigated to an IONITY and arrived with 8% , had to wait for a few minutes because the station was full , plugged in and still I have the same issues.
Charged for a few minutes and decided to go to another 300kW charger nearby which isn’t connected to bmw charge subscription , just so it didn’t have anything to do with IONITY or my bmw charge card.
Plugged in and same issue…

From what I can see is that the Amperage doesn’t exceed 250.
I don’t know electricity so not sure if that is something, or is amp connected to the amount of kWh that is input to the car ?
It would be a good idea to take it in instead of wondering what is wrong. It might be a quick fix or something more serious, the only way to tell is to get an expert to look at it, not us on the forum.
 
#18 · (Edited)
I had this exact problem on my eurotrip two weeks ago. I also saw the posts on bimmers.no i4 thread.

My conclusion was that this is software and "intended". I got zero EV experience on roadtrips pre i4 so i have no idea how other cars would handle it.

On my first day i drove 100% to 35ish charged to 80% early in the day then drove down to 20% before taking the ferry to Denmark landing there at 2130 on 20%, charged some at the tesla charger close by just to have enough range, and went on to jump Ionity chargers all the way down to Osnabruck. On my last charge it "rapidgated" at 5 or 6 in the morning. Total distance driven that day was 1400km pretty much non stop from 10 in the morning except 45min dropping of kid, the ferry 4hr and 2 hours at the tesla charger due to 150 Norwegians at some fotball cup charging and 3feet tesla cable enabling me to use just one of the stalls when i finally got to the front of the queue.

I didnt drive much the next day but i plugged into a slow charger and got 100% SOC. Drove 400km day after that no problem. Went to the Nurburgring and did some slow charging there about 20kwh then started a 2day Ionity jump back home. Day one it rapidgated again south of Hamburg. Day two it rapidgated on second charge north of Malmø.

My solution was same as yours charge to 50ish% and keep driving. My guess is that the battery does not like this kind of pump and dump driving without rest so the software limits it. My knowledge of electronics is 0 in regard to understanding why though.. Maybe BMW is doing the second or third owner a favor that Porsche is not? Who knows.. Its not hardware IMO.. Way to "programmed" for that. The car still has 100% power, regens 100% etc, its the charging from a cable it limits.

Plug in at 20% preconditioned and get 100kw, 43-44% drop down to 50kw, post 65 going as low as 35kw..
 
#20 ·
Charged mine yesterday at the same IONITY station I used when I got home and it seems to be back to normal, it took 20 minutes 5-56%. I was having lunch and was on the phone so couldn’t monitor
In July I charged at that same station , before I’ve ever had these issues, and 9-61% took 20 minutes.
It’s going to be interesting to see Tuesday when I have my appointment at the dealer
 
#24 · (Edited)
In Germany i was holding abit back, but still 180ish when possible with some 200runs. 135-150 in the other 130/120 zones in dk/se etc. Nothing crazy but i have the 20" 868m wheels, so the consumption is higher overall. I pretty much end up at 25kwh/100km when cruising at 125 in Norway. I would say the total figure is low considering speeds compared to what i get normally under 130 on highway driving. 😄 Overall i was trying to drive like i would without being in an EV except holding back on going above 180 in Germany.

On the trip down i was doing all night driving and set up ABRP app to make the Ionity route with pretty short intervals 100-140km etc. That was probably hard on the battery as i basically went 70-20% then charge almost every hour from 2330 to 6 in the morning.
 
#25 ·
In Germany i was holding abit back, but still 180ish when possible with some 200runs. 135-150 in the other 130/120 zones in dk/se etc. Nothing crazy but i have the 20" 868m wheels, so the consumption is higher overall. I pretty much end up at 25kwh/100km when cruising at 125 in Norway. I would say the total figure is low considering speeds compared to what i get normally under 130 on highway driving. 😄

On the trip down i was doing all night driving and set up ABRP app to make the Ionity route with pretty short intervals 100-140km etc. That was probably hard on the battery as i basically went 70-20% then charge almost every hour from 2330 to 6 in the morning.
Of course , I didn't think about wheel sizes , I'm on 18" and I would say that I was doing pretty much the exact same speeds as you. Wow, what a difference!
Doing around 130km/h in sweden I'm usually inbetween 20-22kwh/100km

I use ABRP, Chargefinder and the BMW app to plan my trips along with google maps and waze because I don't like driving on the main roads to much when i'm out exploring on roadtrips

BTW I was doing more 180km/h when roads opened up instead of 200+ because cruise control only works up to 180km/h i noticed :p
 
#32 ·
It probably doesn't help that the service techs at BMW Germany, a lot of them are on "holiday" for the month of August. Might be reduced staff right now. 😐
 
#43 ·
Same problem with my car. It reduced the amperage requested from the charger to exactly half what it should do according to charging curve. First time it did it after fast charging prior 261 kWh, second time just after 287. First time it was IONITY having a problem. Second time I solved it by charging to 50% and having 100 kWh
 
#44 ·
Have you tried interspersing AC charging? Seems that DCFCs back-to-back cause the car to protect itself.
 
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#45 ·
I discussed this issue with the i4 Genius line, explaining that dealers are not aware of this 'design characteristic" and cannot provide any useful information. The person I spoke with indicated they have bi-weekly conference calls with Germany. He promised to ask what the parameters of invoking and lifting the charging throttling and get back to me. Not going to hold my breath.

Looking at the comments, it seems as throttling occurs in the area of the 5th DC charging in a row, or somewhere over 250KWH contiguous DC charging. With enough data points, we can figure this out ourselves. There is one data point to suggest you get back 100KWH of full speed DC charging for every day of time, unless it's related to using AC charging in between.
 
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#49 ·
Apparently it is written somewhere in the manual. I can't find it just yet, but it's in there. Says its to protect the batteries.
 
#55 ·
This is troubling for trips. I have taken my Tesla on a 6 day journey, and we supercharged at least twice every day, and some days 5 times. No AC in between. Never an issue.

I sincerely hope that this is something that changes, or it could be a big negative for some people. (It wouldn’t affect me often, but it would be extremely annoying to have it happen).
 
#57 · (Edited)
Twice is not a problem. It starts when you reach 5-6.

One question we have to ask ourself again is if BMW does something smart here that will pay of in the long run.
My impression with Tesla is that they stretch it as far as possible as long as it does not become their problem. In other words, if they figure out the car wont break within warranty they patch the car and give it 50 more horsepower etc..
Same for this kind of thing. Its annoying that there is no warning even as it occours, but if it stops us from destroying our batteries by making us spend more time charging on those few roadtrips its ok. They just need to be clear about when, and why. Some pop up message would br nice.. 😄

There is a discharge and regen factor here aswell. When i had this issue i was consuming 35kwh/h and charging back 35-45kwh/h almost.

I guess we finally have an actual argument for bigger batteries. Atleast with the current tech. Having 120kwh eould probably help if it did not mean the car would be 2600kg without driver.. 😂
 
#56 ·
BMW's electrical engineers just want us to stop and smell the roses. Take in the sights, and not drive too many hours in a day, for safety.

While I understand the urge to protect the battery...

Wait.
Isn't there a legally required 8-year battery-specific warranty on all EVs in the US right now?
What if this "bug" is really a design feature only on US-spec cars.

Protect the battery well enough, and they do a lot less battery-related service under warranty.
Which certainly would protect someone's bottom line.

Or am I mis-remembering what the deal is with the battery warranties
?

Dangit. I forgot the OP on this was a car in Europe.
 
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#61 ·
It’s not the battery temperature !
It’s the motor temperature !
This, I think is because much of iDrive is originally developed for cars with an Internal Combustion Engine, where you are really monitoring the motor, in the EV, the Battery and Motor temperature is interesting. A simple SW upgrade can/will add this.

This video has been available for some time now, even if it is in German, it is probably something for everybody. And when this driver says that the i4M50 handles well, I think we can forget what others youtubers says about the handling (He has a competition license - and has driven Nurburgring 24 Hour race in a BMW M2)

Also interesting to see the speed he is getting when the i4 is in Battery/Engine protection with limited power.

 
#68 ·
Had the car at the dealer today to get looked at.
I explained the issues I've experienced before they started working on the car and I sat down in the waiting area,

After a while the guy came back to me and said : "There was no fault codes but you had the car charge limit set to 70%, the technichan have now set that to 100% for you"
I almost started laughing but managed not to , and then I explained to them that you/BMW recomends no more than 80% charging and that it's not the amount of charge the battery charges to , it's the speed of the charge.
This was news to them.... BMW must have made the worst job at educating the service people

He then told me that they've ran a "charging test" and they couldn't find any issues with that.
He was going to talk to one of the service people who knows most about EVs who unfortunately was out sick.

I know that the car will limit the charge , according to the manual, but it's so vague how it actually works and since it happend for me 2 times in the span of 6 days and it took different amount of times to resolve itself.
So not sure what to do about this, who can one turn to to get answers about the charging limit functionallity ?
 
#69 ·
Had the car at the dealer today to get looked at.
I explained the issues I've experienced before they started working on the car and I sat down in the waiting area,

After a while the guy came back to me and said : "There was no fault codes but you had the car charge limit set to 70%, the technichan have now set that to 100% for you"
I almost started laughing but managed not to , and then I explained to them that you/BMW recomends no more than 80% charging and that it's not the amount of charge the battery charges to , it's the speed of the charge.
This was news to them.... BMW must have made the worst job at educating the service people

He then told me that they've ran a "charging test" and they couldn't find any issues with that.
He was going to talk to one of the service people who knows most about EVs who unfortunately was out sick.

I know that the car will limit the charge , according to the manual, but it's so vague how it actually works and since it happend for me 2 times in the span of 6 days and it took different amount of times to resolve itself.
So not sure what to do about this, who can one turn to to get answers about the charging limit functionallity ?
I would think that when you’re on a longer trip, you should charge to as close to 100% as possible before departure. When charging on your trip, the % charge when done at a charger has more to do with where the next charger will be than anything else. I’m not sure why you’d limit to 70%.
 
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#76 ·
In the video above, Tesla Bjørn thinks that the reason for reduced charging (Rapidgate) is the same on i4M50, i3 and EV6:

When you do fast charging, If it is hot outside (30 degrees celsius), dont use cabin HVAC in the start of the charging, because then the batteries dont get the needed cooling, but when the charging speed gets reduced (40 - 50 %) you can turn on cabin HVAC. He also says that you should continue charging to 65 - 75 percent (dont stop at 40 - 50), because the batteries will be cooled down further during the slower charging.

I am not sure if this is an answer to all the issues - but it is something to think about.
 
#78 ·
hmm, maybe that could be a way to mitigate this issue.
For me though, I didn't have any issue running the AC in the cabin during charge and this happened below 30 celcius as well and the charging fans was never running even though I had them set to unlimited
 
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