How to verify trickle charge? Dealer is not helpful

Hi there,

I just purchased a 2012 Leaf and the dealer I bought it from is not helpful in answering my question and is making me make an appointment 2 weeks out so I wondered if someone could help me.

I am trying to trickle charge from a 110v outlet using the provided EVS cable. when I plug it in, the green lights up next to Ready, when I plug it into the car charge port, I hear one beep. And thats it. I see no indications thats its charging. The Charge light on the EVS does not light up. The 3 blue lights on the dash don't light up. Right now the battery range is 30 miles remaining. Is there some indicator I need to see that shows that its actually charging? Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks so much

Something isn't right. You should see the 'charge' light on the EVSE "brick" light up, AND one of the blue lights on the dash should be blinking on and off. (Very roughly the first light represents the first third of the battery capacity is being "filled". Once that third is "full", it turns solid blue and the middle light starts flashing on and off blue, etc. With 30 miles, you may be in the first or second "third", so either just the far left light should be blinking (blue), or it would be solid and the middle light would be blinking.) Additionally, if you turn the car on in "accessory mode" (two pushes to the on/off switch), the main console of the dashboard should have an icon dead center which indicates that the car is charging.

Are you sure you're plugging into a properly grounded three-prong outlet? I think it would indicate on the brick though if there were a problem in that regard, so I doubt that's it.

Perhaps someone else will know of something simple that might be the cause of this, but you may have to take it back to the dealer to have them see, explain and hopefully fix it. Good luck, and sorry your EV experience had to start like this. :-\

Sounds like the cable is not functional since the orange charge light is not on. One way to figure out is to charge another car.

I would take the car back to dealer and use their charging station to charge the car to ensure that car battery is Ok.

Then use another cable to charge the car to make sure that cable is functioning.

Good luck to you and sorry to hear about this. Hopefully all is taken care later this week.

This is what happens with my 2013 L1 EVSE when plugged into a poor extension cord. Plugged into the garage outlet, it charges. Plugged into a cheap extension cord, I get a beep and no other warnings.

Since this is your outlet, have you tried another outlet somewhere else? Neighbour's house, park, etc?

It may sound simple but make sure car is completely off and not in run or accessory mode. But I would bet it is your cord or outlet not grounded or not heavy enough cord. I like a 50 foot 10 gauge from harbor freight tools. Good luck!

I'll try to find another outlet and report back. Thanks guys for your input. I really appreciate it.

xfan10 said:

I'll try to find another outlet and report back. Thanks guys for your input. I really appreciate it.

Click to expand...

Also if you are worried about range, I would now in the middle of the night when you have time go find a public charger and hang out there for a couple hours to fill up. While there, there might even be a regular outlet to try your EVSE.

There is a possibility that the previous owner set up a charge timer for the middle of the night. Plug the EVSE in again, then press the Charge Timer Override button. It's the top middle button of the row of black buttons to the left of the steering wheel. If the car immediately starts charging, it was due to the charge timer being activated.

If the timer was set, the 3 dash lights would be blinking in sequence when plugged in.

I just went through something similar when trying to get an old Avcon going that a colleague retrofitted with a J1172 cable but was unable to get working. Turned out that it was miswired. One beep with no relays clicking in the car was a miswire. Once I sorted that out, one beep with relays clicking was inproper/incomplete grounding. When both these issues were corrected the Avcon worked as desired.

If you are near Disneyland in Anaheim I would be happy to test it on my load tester for free.