Charger station etiquette question

This is probably a str8 fwd question but just checking.
At public free charging station, when another EV is obviously done charging due to the charge led being extinguished on both the station and the EV, it is ok to detach and swing the cable to my cAr, right?
No windshield notes necessary bc EV users are not assholes, that's what I'm thinking.

Ask 1000 EV owners and you'll probably get 1000 answers.

In my mind, yes. If parked in a public EV space, and the charging has ceased, it's OK to disconnect the parasitic EV and charge yours up. For example if I roll into an L3 and the car is plugged in and not charging I will take the CHAdeMO charger and charge myself up. If there's an L2 there too, I'll connect that to the done charging car just in case they have a timer setup or something. If I am ready to leave and the owner still hasn't come back, then I will plug them back into the CHAdeMO charger and leave.

However be absolutely sure you know how the various EV's indicate charging or not.

Here's how to tell that they are DONE charging, i.e. OK to unplug.

BMW ActiveE
Blue light on bottom of center rear view mirror is not illuminated
A blinking blue light indicates charging is in progress.

Chevy Volt
Short flashing green light on top of dashboard
A solid green light indicates charging is in progress. A long flashing light indicates delayed charging

Fisker Karma
The charge level indicator on the instrument cluster will reach maximum and the charge indicator will turn off.
While the vehicle is charging, the charging indicator light on the instrument cluster will be illuminated and the battery charge level indicator will display the current charge level.

Ford CMAX Energi
Blue ring around charge port/plug is not illuminated. The blue ring lights up in four blue quartered segments while charging and will shut off when charging is complete.

Ford Focus Electric
Blue ring around charge port/plug is not illuminated. The blue ring lights up in four blue quartered segments while charging and will shut off when charging is complete.

Honda Fit EV
The green LED next to the port/plug turns off when it's done charging. If it's flashing, the charging rate has been reduced because of a problem.

Mitsubishi iMiEV
Red electric plug symbol on dashboard is not lit. Look through car windows at the dashboard to see if there is a red electric plug symbol lit. If it is lit then it is still charging. If it is off then it is not charging.

Nissan Leaf
All three blue lights on top of dashboard are all on or are all off.
Decoding Leaf's triple light set:
One flashing light - 0-33%
One solid, one flashing - 33% to 66%
Two solid, one flashing - 66% to 100%
Three solid - 100%
All lights off - 100%

Tesla Roadster
Solid green lighting around inside of charge port. While charging is in progress, the lighting inside the charge port area flashes amber.

Tesla Model S
The light around the charge port stops pulsing and the light turns solid green. If the Model S is locked during charging, the charge port light does not illuminate but the vehicle continues to charge.

Toyota Plug-In Prius
The amber electric plug icon next to the charging port is not illuminated.

Th!nk
When only one of the two green lights on top of the dash is lit. When both are lit and linked, charging is in progress. If only one is lit, charging is complete.

Toyota RAV4 EV
Both amber lights (at the bottom of the back side window above the charge port on the driver's side of the car) will be solid or off



So the Tesla S may be charging with no visible light indicated if the port is locked. The Th!nk shows 1 of 2 lights when charged, and 2 of 2 lights when charging... So many manufactures, no standard. So go for it, but be sure you know what you're doing. Imagine how you'd feel if a Th!nk owner unplugged your Leaf to charge because you had 1 charge bar flashing on the dash. To them that means you are full, to you it may mean you have almost no charge left!

Yes it is OK.

Of course there are a few wackos out there that may expect to hog the charging all day to cool his car as he is about to leave.

I too operate under the policy that if the car is done charging, it is OK to remove the handle, as that is technically not belonging to the person charging. I think it should be OK to then close the little plug cover, but not the body plate covering both charge ports, but my wife believes nobody should be touching somebody else's car.

There have been a couple of memorable moments anyway.

The first was with another LEAF, which was done charging. I unplugged her car and plugged my car in. I was in the process of leaving a note, when she walked up looking concerned. It seems that she had received a text because her car had been unplugged, but hadn't received the text that the car had finished charging. After speaking a few minutes she understood what had happened, and she turned out to be a great fellow LEAF driver.

Another time I got to the EVSE at about 4 a.m., only to find a Volt plugged in, but obviously not charging. It is incredible how loud the alarm sounds in an empty parking garage at 4 a.m.! I was getting ready to plug it back in when the alarm finally stopped. But it seemed that the Volt owner should have considered turning off the alarm before leaving it plugged in all night.

One time I pulled into the same parking garage, at about the same early morning time of 4 a.m., desperately low, only to see a Tesla parked there!! But, that Tesla owner was so considerate that they had left the car plugged into a 110V outlet instead of using the EVSE, and actually I was a bit worried because the 110V charger looked like somebody could just unhook it and walk off with it. But hopefully everything was OK, since it was still there when I left awhile later.

TY 2k1Toaster for the detailed response. And also to sub3marathonman.

Your two posts leave some loose threads - those cars which sound alarms if they are disconnected.

Are there other cars with this feature other than the Volt? Did they continue it onto Volt 2.0?

From sub's post, it sounds like the Volt will alarm even if it is done charging and has no business alarming. Is this the case? If so, then Chevy is basically asserting that once a Volt plugs in, that car owns the connection and no one, not even the owner of the plug has any business disconnecting it. Chevy can't seriously be that far off base, can they?

The Leaf seems to have the correct approach. If you are paying for the connection, you can set a lock, but then it unlocks once the charging is complete. If Volt continues to alarm past complete charging, I'd think that would cause some major problems including disturbing the peace citations.

If other cars behave this way, then it would be good to note that in the detail listing so someone doesn't see that it is done charging only to get shocked with a rude alarm.

It is programmable on the Gen 2. Also, the dash light pattern is different than with Gen 1... When the vehicle is plugged in and the battery is charging, the number of flashes indicates the percentage of battery charge. For example, one flash = 0–25% charged, two flashes = 25–50% charged, three flashes = 50–75%, etc. A solid light means the battery is fully charged.

DarthPuppy said:

Are there other cars with this feature other than the Volt? Did they continue it onto Volt 2.0?

Click to expand...

TomT said:

It is programmable on the Gen 2.

Click to expand...

So then if it alarms after the charging is done, the driver failed to program it correctly? Sounds like Chevy found a way to pass the buck to their customer while still being obnoxious. It will be interesting to see if these cars continue to alarm after they are done. The Volt has a lot of nice aspects going for it. Shame they didn't fully fix this by now. Or am I assuming incorrectly?

Let the stupid horn blow to infinity.

sub3marathonman said:

Another time I got to the EVSE at about 4 a.m., only to find a Volt plugged in, but obviously not charging. It is incredible how loud the alarm sounds in an empty parking garage at 4 a.m.! I was getting ready to plug it back in when the alarm finally stopped. But it seemed that the Volt owner should have considered turning off the alarm before leaving it plugged in all night.

Click to expand...

Some have no idea it can be turned off or how. See below.

DarthPuppy said:

TomT said:

It is programmable on the Gen 2.

Click to expand...

So then if it alarms after the charging is done, the driver failed to program it correctly? Sounds like Chevy found a way to pass the buck to their customer while still being obnoxious. It will be interesting to see if these cars continue to alarm after they are done. The Volt has a lot of nice aspects going for it. Shame they didn't fully fix this by now. Or am I assuming incorrectly?

Click to expand...

On the Gen 1 Volt, there are two stupid honk alarms which seem like they're on by default given what I've seen at public charging and sometimes when new mystery GM EVs/PHEVs show up at work.

They can be turned off by the user, but I heard (from a Volt enthusiast on Facebook) that for the '11 Volt, you must go to the dealer. (We have no '11 Volts at my work, probably because they didn't qualify for CA green HOV stickers due to emissions being too dirty.)

For the '12 to '15 Volts (which are Gen 1), they can be disabled via menus. The Spark EV also inherits this and yes, some people don't disable it or don't know how. We have brief instructions on our internal EV/PHEV page at work as to how to turn it off.

I've met Volt people who have no idea how to disable it or that it can be disabled.

Two recent examples for me:
- (very smart) high school classmate of mine (software engineer w/BS and MS from Stanford) who's had a Volt for years. He had no idea it can be disabled and sometimes accidentally sets it off
- encounter w/a Gen 1 Volt driver at free public charging. I believe I'd set it off when unplugging their completed car. I told them that they didn't have their honk alarms disabled. They claimed their car doesn't do that, so we tested it. Sure enough, made the darn honking within the ~10 seconds of unplugging. I didn't have the instructions in front of me. When I offered to help them shut it off, their response was "I'll have my husband look into that."

I've had other encounters at the above free public charging where the Volt drivers also didn't know how to disable.

I now carry notes w/a screenshots of the pages from the Volt manual on how to disable the 2 alarms and leave them on offending vehicles that scare me or someone else at public charging. (I know that if you unplug a GM EV/PHEV w/o the honk alarms disabled, expect to hear the honking in about 10 seconds... so I'm prepared.)

See page 5-57 (169) of https://www.chevrolet.com/content/dam/Chevrolet/northamerica/usa/nscwebsite/en/Home/Ownership/Manuals_and_Videos/02_pdf/2k12volt.pdf. Charge Cord Theft Alert and Charge Power Loss Alert both need to be turned off to disable the stupid honks.

The fact that they're on by default and that the Gen 2 Volt only has a lame 3.6 kW OBC (barely an upgrade from the Gen 1 Volt's 3.3 kW OBC) and still ships a Spark EV w/3.3 kW OBC only tells me that GM is still somewhat tone deaf when it comes to EVs. It's this along with stuff like http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1101774_gm-wont-fund-ccs-fast-charging-sites-for-2017-chevy-bolt-ev and the Frankenplug crap they've pulled + their current level of virtual non-support for it.

TomT said:

It is programmable on the Gen 2. Also, the dash light pattern is different than with Gen 1... When the vehicle is plugged in and the battery is charging, the number of flashes indicates the percentage of battery charge. For example, one flash = 0–25% charged, two flashes = 25–50% charged, three flashes = 50–75%, etc. A solid light means the battery is fully charged.

Click to expand...

Yep. Stupid that decided to make it totally the opposite of the Gen 1 Volt and Spark EV. This only adds to the confusion in public charging situations where some don't know the indicators of other vehicles.

Before Gen 2 Volt existed, I've spoken to Gen 1 Volt drivers at free public charging who were confused about Leaf's indicators, for instance.

Wow. Thanks for the details on the Chevy alarm. That is the complete wrong approach for Chevy to take and does further demonstrate a desire for EVs to not succeed. That is a shame as otherwise the Volt is a very tempting design and it sounds like most Volt owners have been very happy with it.

When I bought my Leaf, the Volt was a strong contender design wise but my distrust of GM tilted the decision. I was not happy with their 99 Blazer and was not interested in getting burned again. And buying completely new tech as an early adopter would increase that risk.

I'm rather surprised more Volt owners don't read their manuals. Or is it not explained in the manual? Given these cars are significantly different that previous cars, I would think it prudent to read the manual and adjust those options as they go. If you figure most Volt owners fall into the early adopter category, I'm surprised they weren't more inquisitive into how to properly operate their cars.

DarthPuppy said:

Wow. Thanks for the details on the Chevy alarm.
...
I'm rather surprised more Volt owners don't read their manuals. Or is it not explained in the manual? Given these cars are significantly different that previous cars, I would think it prudent to read the manual and adjust those options as they go. If you figure most Volt owners fall into the early adopter category, I'm surprised they weren't more inquisitive into how to properly operate their cars.

Click to expand...

Today, at the same free public L2 charging, I encountered another guy w/a Gen 1 Volt w/green HOV stickers who didn't know about the honk alarm and didn't know how to shut it off. He also believed his car wouldn't do the honking when unplugged. He said he was new to this so I assume he bought used.

So, we tested it out and sure enough, it did the honk alarm ~10 seconds after unplugging. I also explained to him w/these alerts set to on, the car fricking honks when unplugged even if it's totally done charging. :evil: So, I had him follow my directions and we turned off the 2 options, which were on.

About Volt owners not knowing, it's not that different from early Leafers not knowing about the capacity bars and how many they lost. I started http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=16446& to discuss surprising lack of knowledge at street encounters. It included a link to an encounter in 2014 at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=349448#p349448 of an '11 Leaf owner who bought it new and was down 2 capacity bars yet had no idea.

2k1Toaster said:

Ford CMAX Energi
Blue ring around charge port/plug is not illuminated. The blue ring lights up in four blue quartered segments while charging and will shut off when charging is complete.

Click to expand...

The light ring can be turned off from the infotainment system. Many people turn them off to avoid drawing attention to their car in public. Don't assume that no lights = not charging. Although personally, if I ever got unplugged while charging, I'd make sure that the lights were turned back on. Having a PHEV, being unplugged early means potentially burning more gas. Having a BEV, it means potentially getting stranded.

BMW i3 charging lights are off when the car is locked. The EV plug is locked while the charging and is unlocked when the charging is complete- if you can pull the plug off an i3, you can do it with almost no regrets. (I say almost, because the owner may want to remotely precondition the car before departure and it requires an external power).

GetOffYourGas said:

The light ring can be turned off from the infotainment system. Many people turn them off to avoid drawing attention to their car in public. .

Click to expand...

Errr..
They are parked in a charging spot hooked up..
Whether or not you have a light isn't going to draw much more (if any) attention...

Also, I'd be surprised if "many people" actually do turn them off... But I suppose that could depend on the definition of "many."
But willing to be surprised with stats... ;-)

desiv

desiv said:

GetOffYourGas said:

The light ring can be turned off from the infotainment system. Many people turn them off to avoid drawing attention to their car in public. .

Click to expand...

Errr..
They are parked in a charging spot hooked up..
Whether or not you have a light isn't going to draw much more (if any) attention...

Also, I'd be surprised if "many people" actually do turn them off... But I suppose that could depend on the definition of "many."
But willing to be surprised with stats... ;-)

desiv

Click to expand...

Ok, by "many" I mean there are a few vocal people on the CMax Energi forum that do so. I don't personally know (or care) about the statistics. I would be surprised if a large percentage of the owners even knew about the option to turn them off.

You live in Oregon, I see. I know that Oregon has a relatively high density of plug-in cars. Most places in the country, people don't even notice the cable plugged into the side of a car. Certainly true around here; most don't have a clue what the public EVSEs are. But if the car has a light ring around the cable that is glowing, it kinda catches your eye. Moreover, if you are charging via L1 in public (yes, people do that), then you are drawing attention to your own cable.