Charging interrupted (Charge Amps Aura)
If charging is interrupted, the most common problems are the following:
- Other consumption in the installation is too high
- Rotated from power meter to charging box
- Connectivity
- Minimum current is too low
Other consumption in the installation is too high
As a partner, you can see this if you go to power meters under the menu item "power meters". There you can see the consumption graphs for the last 24h and the last 7 days.Take the time of the charging session when the customer experienced problems and see what the consumption was at the time. As an end user, you can ask your partner to access the graphs from your power meter and see the consumption in your facility.
Rotated from power meter to charging box
It is common that something has been rotated either in the plant or during installation. You can troubleshoot this by disabling the load balancing, and then go into the charging box and set it to 1-phase. Then start a charge on L1. Then look under the power meter at the 24h graph and see that the graph for L1 rises in line with the charge. Repeat the procedure for L2 and L3. If the correct graph rises in comparison with the phase you have chosen where charging should take place, everything is correct. However, should another phase rise than the one where charging takes place, it is rotated somewhere.
Then check that incoming L1, L2 and L3 match the incoming L1, L2 and L3 in the charging box.
Also check that the current transformers for the current meter are on the correct phase and that they are correctly placed in the terminal block.
Connectivity
When the charging box is load balanced and loses connection, the charging will be interrupted and restart the charging in an "offline mode". This is because the charging box and the load balancer can no longer communicate - Check the signal strength to the charging box and power meter. It should be at worst around -80 dBm where -60 dBm is very good signal strength and -90 is very poor.
- If the charging box is connected to an extender/repeater, make sure it has a good signal to its AP (access point).
- If you have a mesh system, it can mean that devices have difficulty focusing on the AP with the best signal strength. The easiest way to circumvent this problem is to install an extender/repeater with a different SSID that only the charging box is connected to. The charging box will then stay fixed to one and the same AP.
- Charge Amps Aura is only capable of 2.4 GHz. Therefore, networks transmitting both 2.4 and 5 GHz with the same SSID can cause problems. It can connect to both but only get internet access on the 2.4 GHz network.
Also in this case, an extender/repeater is a remedy for this. Install an extender/repeater with a different SSID than the rest of the network and set it to only 2.4 GHz. Alternatively, remove the 5 Ghz frequency from the network if you feel you can do without it. 5G can handle higher speeds but has a shorter range. However, most people can cope with the speed of the 2.4 GHz frequency.
Minimum current is too low
All cars have a minimum current they can charge at the lowest. This differs between car models. If the load balancing is set to a lower limit than the car can handle, charging will be interrupted when the car is allocated too little power.