Chicago-area Tesla charging stations lined with dead cars in freezing cold | Hacker News Reader

Chicago-area Tesla charging stations lined with dead cars in freezing cold

foxbusiness.com

32 pointsMilnerRoute79 comments

My sister lives in Chicago and her ICE car also won't start due to the extreme low temperatures. The Canadians solved this problem by having resistive heat elements installed in their engine, I think EVs probably need the same.

heat lamp under the car and a tarp over the hood.

I learned to drive on a 1976 VW Rabbit diesel. We had a block heater for it, and in the winter, we had to plug it in to warm it up. You'd think there'd be some way to do that for EVs.

> You'd think there'd be some way to do that for EVs.

You would, and you'd be correct. Many or most EVs do have this.

There is.

In Europe, most Euro 6 diesel engines have have heaters as they are so efficient, they do not heat up fast enough for the coolant to flow properly.

They do, there are resistive elements on older Teslas and heat pumps on newer ones. The trouble is - they require electricity to operate and so they suck the battery dry. In this case it sounds like charging stations also bombed out...

The ICE cars also need electricity for their resistive heating blocks, so the EVs aren't worse off in that regard.

> The trouble is - they require electricity to operate

If only the charger could supply elecricity. Oh wait...

Even in Canada the gas pumps froze over and ICE cars are unable to fill gas.

https://calgary.citynews.ca/video/2024/01/12/gas-pumps-freez...

Same in Illinois but the article doesn't mention it https://www.wcia.com/news/local-news/cold-weather-causes-fro...

Tesla replaced the resistive heaters in their vehicles with a heat pump. When it's super cold they run (essentially) DC power through their AC motors so the motors don't spin, they just heat up. The heat pumps then scavenge heat from the motors.

It's resistive heat, but not a resistive heat element.

*Not a "dedicated" resistive heating element (obviously the motor doubles as a resistive heating element). Also below a certain ambient temperature, heat pumps with heating elements run at approximate the same efficiency as the heating element itself. None of this is bad design though, if the ambient temperature is a bit higher than the minimum temperature, you would then get additional COP from the heat pump.

Block heaters are extremely common in colder climates - upper midwest of the USA, Alaska, central Canada, etc. You can identify them when you see a vehicle with an electrical cord stub dangling just below the front bumper or in front of the grille. In fact, during my road trips through Alaska and Canada I frequently saw power outlets in front of parking stalls at hotels so that guests could plug in the heaters overnight.

Its been -10F in the upper midwest the last few days. Lots BEV and ICE vehicles are dead. Its not just an EV issue.

Easier to get a jumper boost or a new 12V battery than to recharge a high voltage one away from home.

I drove to the UP and back the last few days with a 2019 Model 3 SR+ (mentioning this so people understand the range I was working with) with no issues besides increased charging stops because of road and weather conditions. This issue is a specific issue with this charger and the location. This sucks for all the drivers with dead cars, but I feel like the situation is being mischaracterized by this shallow news article. There were failures on Tesla the company to mark this charger as inoperable so the route planner would not use it and for them to not repair the location in a timely manner. There has been a lot of discussion in the Tesla and Chicago subreddit about what is happening in the area to cause this situation with these chargers, so it would be nice to get more information from Tesla itself.

Oh and yes this is not just an EV issue. Just sharing my experience of my car being totally fine traveling in this weather.

> This issue is a specific issue with this charger and this location

This is contradicted by the article.

I should have said "specific chargers around the area" probably since there were other locations with issues. But still, I had no issues charging in the Chicago area though.

In both cases, it's the batteries in the cars that died. The ICE engines work just fine once you warm them up and jump them.

This! I’ve boosted cars in -30 and it takes a bit of extra crank because the fluids are all thick in the cold. But it works. It’s not a bad idea in really cold weather (-40) to start your car every 4 hours or so to keep it warm.

Edit: the gas cars failing to start are almost always having old batteries that need replacing. In a really cold climate you don’t want to push 7 beyond years. Some batteries are in rough shape after 5.

Would removing your car battery and taking it in over night help? (Gas car)

If you have a garage, your best bet is a battery tender, which keeps the battery charged overnight and warm enough not to freeze.

A lot of people also use engine block heaters. There's different types and they all work a bit differently. Usually you would start the engine warmer a few hours before you use the car instead of overnight.

A friend hypothesized that a lot of Tesla drivers charge the same way they refilled their gas cars, by waiting until the last minute and supercharging back up to "full". This doesn't work when it's so cold so people need to learn to charge a little at a time.

The bottom half of the battery charges a lot faster than the top half, so that behaviour is rewarded. In the winter, better to put up with longer charging times and never let your battery go below 25-50%. If you get stranded turn off cabin heat and rely on seat heaters -- a full Tesla battery should be able to run just the seat heaters for a month, so by ensuring your battery is above 25% you should have a few days of seat heat.

From personal experience there is a similarity with people who charge their phone when they can and people who charge it when it is about to die. My SO and I are on opposite sides of this spectrum and the dichotomy is quite stark. This also applies to charging vehicles as I take every opportunity to top off and she waits until it's about to hit 0%.

I charge my phone while I sleep.

If I owned an EV, I would charge it like I charge my phone.

It's clear that most of the people having issues in Chicago do not live somewhere where they can charge overnight. Not so easy to charge at night when you park on the street or in a public garage.

People that don't charge at home do certainly charge this way. And they will continue doing that, at least until they can charge at most stops.

IMO, more people have brought electrical cars than who can make practical use of them right now. We will have lots of impractical issues on the news on the next few years.

Growth pains, I guess.

tbf going out to top up the car is a nice way to get out of the house

parents had a free municipal charger which meant walking a whole mile every few days

> This doesn't work when it's so cold so people need to learn

EVs need to learn.

My "favorite" thing about these stories is all the anti-EV'rs coming out and going "hahaha, stupid EV drivers". Except they don't realize their ICE car is part of the problem. These extremely unusual storms and cold snaps are part of climate change and their pointing and laughing is only going to make things worse.

At the end of the day, the real story is that EV's are having teething problems in unusual cold conditions. It's still relatively new technology (on the scale of cars in general), and we need to learn how to handle these different scenarios properly. My grandparents in Northern Minnesota had an engine block heater that they'd leave plugged in anytime their ICE car (decades ago) was home. Why? Because it'd get so cold you couldn't start the car. But this wasn't laughed about on the news because it wasn't new. We as a society had learned how to deal with it and it wasn't a big deal. EV's will get there one day.

Seems like a huge reach. Chicago, specifically seemed to have some extremely cold weather in the 80s[1] and basically nothing since then until now. From my personal anecdata, winters up in Canada seem milder than when I was a kid - some 30 years ago.

Politically, attributing every instance of bad weather to climate change with no evidence plays into climate change denier narratives and seems like a bad move.

[1] https://www.weather.gov/lot/Chicago_Temperature_Records

> the real story is that EV's are having teething problems in unusual cold conditions.

So unusual that EV manufacturers could not test?

Illinois area gas stations are also lined with ICE vehicles unable to fill gas because gas pumps are frozen.

https://www.wcia.com/news/local-news/cold-weather-causes-fro...

I wonder why the Fox Business article does not mention that?

This is where a hybrid powertrain / PHEV is superior to EV. In an ideal system you want redundancies, especially redundancies that cover for each other's weaknesses.

Not just a hybrid but a series-type hybrid. Electric motors drive the wheels and the gas engine is just there to generate electricity.

At every level of society I see products being designed for the "best case" only. For example, unlocking your car with electronic keys.

I am afraid a generation will have to live through "hard times" in order to get us thinking about resilience again and planning for the "worst case".

When looking at vehicles, it's a fun thought experiment to ask yourself if you would want this vehicle during a "zombie apocalypse"

> When looking at vehicles, it's a fun thought experiment to ask yourself if you would want this vehicle during a "zombie apocalypse"

It's fun, but not useful. I want a solar powered Humvee in a zombie apocalypse.

I think GP was referring more to aspects of a zombie apocalypse like servers being shutdown or power grid not working. Things that can happen for relatively short periods today.

I don't know why these aren't the default.

It electrifies the 99% use case of commuting, driving around cities etc. and allows for road trips without range anxiety.

And expands the operating temperature significantly over electric.

I can't see a situation in an apocalypse where gasoline isn't consumed immediately, and then rationed to only government authorities. My bet would be 100% EV, and if you want redundancy, buy a generator capable of outputting to an inverter that charges the EV (then stockpile a reasonable amount of fuel for the generator).

Or just get an ICE car and stockpile the fuel.. Way fewer steps required.

gasoline has a shelf life of 3 to 6 months. and diesel 12 months in low temps.

might want a battery EV with ability to plug deployable solar module amd/or hydropower module and/or wood burning stove thermoelectric generator.

If you have a truly off-grid capable EV with solar, that would be superior to an ICE (assuming rule-of-law still held).

why series-type? (from a bit of research, seems these are also called EREV (extended-range electric vehicles, in the context of autos)

simpler engine since you can have an electric engine only and not have an ICE engine with more points of failure/maintenance?

Strap a generator to the roof?

> At every level of society I see products being designed for the "best case" only.

Indeed. And then being sold with caveats concealed.

Redundancies are only ideal when cost-free.

It's a charger issue, did any one read the damn article?

That's not what the article says. The article doesn't even state the problem.

The actual problem is that cold batteries have higher resistance, so these cold cars aren't charging. The owners need to run the heaters in their car for 30-45 minutes before they try to charge to be able to effectively charge at all.

Right if everybody's range is reduced (due to cold) and charging takes longer (to warm up the battery, if it wasn't warmed before arriving, which could either be user error or due to a car that was parked nearby outdoors before being taken to the charger), then the effective capacity of the chargers is reduced by a large factor and quite possibly people are running out of battery waiting for a spot. I suspect a large fraction are Uber drivers who may not have a spot available ti charge at home.

> if it wasn't warmed before arriving, which could either be user error

How could that conceivably be user error?

based on what I've read (I have never driven an EV...) you're "supposed" to "precondition" (i.e. warm?) your battery before charging if it's cold.

Am I blind or is there only one sentence that could possibly imply that?

> He was forced to hire a flatbed tow truck to haul the vehicle to a working charging station.

The rest of the article is talking about other issues.

Indeed, it's not a good article. It is low on actual information about causes, just one sentence, it is low on context and comparison, and spends time talking about other issues.

It is IMHO pushing a point of view that it hopes to confirm readers' current opinions.

The article says nothing about the charger. (Maybe you can quote it?)

In general, Teslas won't supercharge until the battery reaches a specific temperature. It's well-known that a Tesla will sit at a Supercharger and heat the battery until it's warm enough to charge, sometimes for 20+ minutes.

As far as why this incident happened, I have no idea, and nor does the article speculate.

No and yes.

" One expert told the news outlet that cold weather can impact the ability of electric vehicles to charge properly.

"It’s not plug and go. You have to precondition the battery, meaning that you have to get the battery up to the optimal temperature to accept a fast charge," said Mark Bilek of the Chicago Auto Trade Association. "

I'm surprised since I've never had any problems at -40C and it happened several times. I Neve had to supercharge the car under these conditions however.

Fun fact: -40C is equal to -40F! So you can just say -40 and it means the same to everyone.

Imperial is weird.

Do you have a decent charger in a decent garage?

If you park outdoors and have a slow charger (say 2kw) and depending on battery type - the charge might never even start as there's simply not enough heating power for battery to warm up.

I'm parked outdoors but I do have a good 40A charger, I also make sure I never get under 20% when it's that cold.

For cold climates, ev's have a built block heater, and it takes power.

The problem is refueling, a sitting ev needs to power its own heater running down the battery, and to make it worse, batteries already have lower power in winter.

Thus the cars are all waiting to refuel and ran out of power.

A Hybrid is a better option until refueling EV's are not an issue.

> A Hybrid is a better option until refueling EV's are not an issue.

When ever will refuelling EVs not be an issue?

ICE cars are superior in this scenario. You can jump start the battery and your car good to go unless your fuel tank also freeze up. EVs you can't do that. There are portable batteries to jump start ICE cars. I have not seen similar devices for EVs.

"Like any new technology, there’s a learning curve for people," said Mark Bilek of the Chicago Auto Trade Association.

Yup. Learn not to trust EVs.

Chicago skill issue

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatoon/electric-cars-best-...

That article fails the corroborate your claim.

"You know, there's no starting of the car. It's always just kind of on, right?"

Except when it won't charge, of course.

>Learn not to trust EVs.

This is a specific issue with the charging station these people were trying to charge at. The article makes very clear that the cars were towed to a functional charging station. Edit: As pointed out by someone else, this is functionally no different than a gas station's pumps freezing themselves out of operation.

Take this for what it's worth, but it feels like your comment was written flippantly and with a deep-seated bias.

The Chicago media is reporting these problems at many area charging stations. I don't know how many in total, but it's more than just one.

Also, for the stations that are working, there are many reports of charging taking way longer than normal and range on full charge being seriously diminished (due to having the electric heater cranked full blast I assume, plus the obvious inefficiencies of batteries in low temperatures).

People with gas powered cars are not experiencing these kinds of issues.

> This is a specific issue with the charging station these people were trying to charge at

No. "Beard and several other Tesla owners were trying to charge their cars amid long lines and abandoned cars at other Tesla charging stations in the Chicago area, the news station reported."

> this is functionally no different than a gas station's pumps freezing themselves out of operation

No. Frozen pumps don't get "lined with dead cars" and are not due to a concealed vehicle limitation like ""It’s not plug and go. You have to precondition the battery, meaning that you have to get the battery up to the optimal temperature to accept a fast charge," said Mark Bilek of the Chicago Auto Trade Association."

Frozen gas station pumps is also relatively common, and a similar situation.

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