slower charging due to warm plug

[kyunam]

I started getting this message from 2 weeks ago (right around 19.04 update but I don’t know if it’s related).
Rivian Charger, cable and plug are all inside my garage in SoCal. 94F outside Sunday 3:30 pm. Yeah cable and plug are warm as expected.

I plugged at 9 pm, 20% last night and it was still charging this morning at 65%. 8:30 am.

I did not see this warning last year and first time seeing it this year.

Normal?
or start Rivian service route..?

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[MidnightRivian]

I get this all the time during summer when my garage is 95 degrees or 100 degrees or higher after Rivian released an update last summer.

I have this warm plug message on my OEM Rivian charger.

This is perfectly normal during summer. I don’t have this issue once temps are no longer triple digits.

https://www.rivianforums.com/forum/threads/drop-charging.29993

 

[VSG]

Yes, that's a perfectly normal warning. You didn't see it last year because this is something that was put into the vehicle software only last fall (? I forget the actual release where they introduced this).

As this could be an indication of problems other than the weather, make sure your charger plug is free of debris and clean. If you're using an adapter to charge from a Tesla home charger, that's another potential source of problems.

 

[RivAW]

I was getting this same thing recently and assumed it was due to the warm weather. I’ve been using a lectron adapter because I already had a Tesla home charger. On a whim I purchased a new (A2Z) home NACs adapter and now I’m back to 11kW for my full time charging (where it had been dropping to about 7 after an hour)….

 

[VSG]

Yeah, check your Lectron adapter. Corrosion (age), debris (spiders?) etc. will affect any adapter. A new one shouldn't have any problem of course. But anything that adds electrical resistance to the connection can cause an issue. You're trying to push 48A of current through that plug, so even 1 Ohm of resistance will cause a voltage drop of 48V. (V = IR).

To put it in perspective, the full power of the charger is 11.5kW, so if the resistance at the plug is 1% above the ideal, then you're going to generate more heat than a 100W light bulb at the plug. And as you probably know, those can get hot enough to burn.

 

[Electrified Outdoors]

I get this with my Tesla wall connectors. They also blink red three times. It's normal if your in a non climate controlled garage and it's really hot.

What I did was set a charging schedule to charge at night after the hottest part of the day. You can also try reducing charging amperage at the start to 40 amps.

 

[1stPlace]

People have been reporting this is "normal". I'm not sure I want to normalize/accept it. Do 2nd Generation or newer R1's have this issue? is it related to the material type of the pins in the charge port? It's a valid question/concern if Rivian says it accepts 48 amp L2 charging but in reality it does not. I live in Michigan and have a garage that is not climate controlled, but I've been getting this issue since Spring when temperatures in the garage were low-70's F. Charging slows within an hour.

I went as far as to claim a warranty issue with the wall charger, which Rivian eventually obliged after my documentation. I just had the new wall charger put in a couple days ago and the issue is still present. As a work around that at least extends the time I can charge at 48amps, I have placed a fan within 2 feet directly pointed at the charger plug and port.

Reducing to 40 amps on the vehicle is not a fair solution in my mind, if the vehicle was advertised to accept 48 amps. I did a major electrical upgrade to my home. 200 amp panel, 100 amp sub panel in garage...none of this would probably have been done, if I had known my vehicle would not get 48 amps continuous. I would have still purchased this vehicle because it's obviously amazing, but I may have just charged at 32 amps with my existing electrical and saved several thousand dollars. The vehicle was expensive enough. Luckily, the handful of times I needed more range mid-day for an hour or two of charging at home was in the Winter because of course my range was reduced.

If it is related to the pins and there are better material pins in the new vehicles, I'd like to know. I would also like to know if my vehicle warranty will cover replacement. I'm considering making the appointment with the service center and trying to find out. If anyone has information re: this, please share.

 

[madhat]

People have been reporting this is "normal". I'm not sure I want to normalize/accept it. Do 2nd Generation or newer R1's have this issue? is it related to the material type of the pins in the charge port? It's a valid question/concern if Rivian says it accepts 48 amp L2 charging but in reality it does not. I live in Michigan and have a garage that is not climate controlled, but I've been getting this issue since Spring when temperatures in the garage were low-70's F. Charging slows within an hour.

I went as far as to claim a warranty issue with the wall charger, which Rivian eventually obliged after my documentation. I just had the new wall charger put in a couple days ago and the issue is still present. As a work around that at least extends the time I can charge at 48amps, I have placed a fan within 2 feet directly pointed at the charger plug and port.

Reducing to 40 amps on the vehicle is not a fair solution in my mind, if the vehicle was advertised to accept 48 amps. I did a major electrical upgrade to my home. 200 amp panel, 100 amp sub panel in garage...none of this would probably have been done, if I had known my vehicle would not get 48 amps continuous. I would have still purchased this vehicle because it's obviously amazing, but I may have just charged at 32 amps with my existing electrical and saved several thousand dollars. The vehicle was expensive enough. Luckily, the handful of times I needed more range mid-day for an hour or two of charging at home was in the Winter because of course my range was reduced.

If it is related to the pins and there are better material pins in the new vehicles, I'd like to know. I would also like to know if my vehicle warranty will cover replacement. I'm considering making the appointment with the service center and trying to find out. If anyone has information re: this, please share.

It’s related to physics. This isn’t a rivian only issue. In Phoenix our garages can get 110, and a coworker with an Ioniq warned me about this before I got my rivian. Now if this proves to be something other than heat, that’s a different issue that might be charger related as mentioned above.

I’m installing a 1600cfm purge fan to turn on when outside air is lower than my (insulated) garage temps. This will help me see 80F when I wake up rather than 100F in the garage and my Tesla charger flashing red. Yes, I am an HVAC engineer!

 

[Ddowns2050]

I thought it was normal but it isn't. I have a 2 1/2 year old R1T and a little over a year R1S. The T was bad getting progressively worse and the S was giving the warm plug notice also but it would charge a few hours before it would start and I use about 6 different chargers and it did it on all of them, the T doing it within about 30 minutes when it was hot. The service center checked them both and changed the charge ports on both stating they both were bad. Now in 100 degree temps. neither slow down at all on the same chargers. I get 10.7 to 11 kw for the entire charge.

 

[1stPlace]

I thought it was normal but it isn't. I have a 2 1/2 year old R1T and a little over a year R1S. The T was bad getting progressively worse and the S was giving the warm plug notice also but it would charge a few hours before it would start and I use about 6 different chargers and it did it on all of them, the T doing it within about 30 minutes when it was hot. The service center checked them both and changed the charge ports on both stating they both were bad. Now in 100 degree temps. neither slow down at all on the same chargers. I get 10.7 to 11 kw for the entire charge.

This is good to hear, thanks. I will make an appointment. I guess I've now officially had an issue with my vehicle. 45,000 miles--it was a good run. Still very happy. I would probably make a bunch of more compromises, if I had to for this vehicle. I was never really inconvenienced by this aside from the troubleshooting. It was just the principle of the thing. And also trying to make sure its figured out before bumper-to-bumper warranty runs out.

 

[Ddowns2050]

This is good to hear, thanks. I will make an appointment. I guess I've now officially had an issue with my vehicle. 45,000 miles--it was a good run. Still very happy. I would probably make a bunch of more compromises, if I had to for this vehicle. I was never really inconvenienced by this aside from the troubleshooting. It was just the principle of the thing. And also trying to make sure its figured out before bumper-to-bumper warranty runs out.

You need to plug it in and make note of the time when it slows. They will check the logs to confirm. My T had about 53k miles on it but since I had them check it last year with this same problem they fixed it under warranty. The mobile service checked it a year ago and wanted me to wait for a software update that was coming out and the update did help. But the problem kept getting worse. Anyway hope this helps.

I've had an electric car (Teslas) since 2013 so I’m not new to this. I will say if it is super hot this can be normal. But mine was like you. It would do it when it was 70 degrees out. It shouldn’t do it under normal circumstances and mine would do it every time. I also had the S to compare to. And there was a big discrepancy between the two even though the S wasn’t right either.

 

[KubotaTed]

I too have this issue and it started roughly 8 weeks ago (+/- a few weeks). Brings my charging speed down from 22 miles per hour on charger to 14/15 miles per hour on the charger. I don't remember the Amp reduction. (I think it brought it down to 7 instead of 11).

 

[tplociniak]

I'm getting this charging speed reduction as well, even in mid 60's over night. This is my second summer with the R1T and I did not get any charger speed reductions in the 80's previously.

 

[beatle]

It seems that this affects users of both Rivian and 3rd party EVSEs, but only at 48A. If you charge at 40A or below, it does not seem to occur. Are there any exceptions to that?

 

[evguy]

I started getting this message from 2 weeks ago (right around 19.04 update but I don’t know if it’s related).
Rivian Charger, cable and plug are all inside my garage in SoCal. 94F outside Sunday 3:30 pm. Yeah cable and plug are warm as expected.

I plugged at 9 pm, 20% last night and it was still charging this morning at 65%. 8:30 am.

I did not see this warning last year and first time seeing it this year.

Normal?
or start Rivian service route..?

I started seeing this around the same time as you, same situation - Rivian Charger, SoCal, charging in the garage. Got the vehicle in late 2022 and this never happened last summer. Going to report it to Rivian.

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