charging stopped due to system malfunction

have had rav 4 ev 2 days. charged twice with no issues. yesterday after short 15 mile drive, charged car...appeared to be charging
correctly. this am went to car, it was fully charged but had error message
that said Charing stopped due to system malfunction.

Unplugged drove away...error went away. Came back after about 1 mile, plugged in. WEnt back 15 minutes later, same
message.

Any one have this issue?

What kind of charger do you have?

Leviton 40 amp...you think it's related to the EVSE or "system malfunction" on board the vehicle?
Drove it abot 50 miles this AM and it is charging now...so far uneventfully.

You might try the supplied 120V charge cord if the problem persists. If no problems with that unit I would look at the Leviton as to possibly the culprit. If still present you can at least go to Toyota and tell them it happens with both. You also might find a dealership in your area with a L2 charger (quite possibly a Leviton as I think they have some sort of partnership) for the PiP and see if the same error shows up with their charger. Just some thoughts...

I had this problem yesterday, too. I was using a ChargePoint station at work.
Today I used the 110 charger and it did not get the error. I'm trying the ChargePoint again tomorrow,
though maybe not the same exact unit. We'll see what happens...

The OP's issue is a little disturbing. One would think that the Toyota approved Leviton 40A EVSE should work very well w/the Rav4 EV.

http://www.myrav4ev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=74 is a running thread about EVSE compatibility.

Hope the OP doesn't become the first test case of needing the Tesla bits serviced outside CA...

cwerdna said:

Hope the OP doesn't become the first test case of needing the Tesla bits serviced outside CA...

Click to expand...

There is a service center in Norristown....not sure how far that is from the poster.

http://www.teslamotors.com/service/philadelphia

If it is driving distance, they guys there might get a kick out of seeing the RAV4 with the Tesla internals. Might get some help, but might also just turn you away at the door, but my experience in meeting Tesla folks is that they would welcome you just to chat about your car and if it is an easy check, they might do it. Provided they are not swamped detailing cars for delivery like most of these sites have been for the past 4-6 months. Things should be smoothing out for them now, so you might get lucky.

Yeah, I am about 50 miles from the Philly Tesla store. Have charged 4 times on Leviton
since then with no problems. It was raining outside then...and the car parked outside..
with Leviton inside but cord coming outside to outside car...Would that matter?

I also have the Leviton 40A unit, but I have not had the issue you report. My entire unit is mounted outside and gets rained on with no issues. It is designed for that. If you get a charging issue that the Leviton can detect (such as a ground fault), the Leviton will go into fault mode (the fault light comes on) and it can only get out of that mode by removing all power to the unit. It will not charge until you de-power it. So unless you have something, such as a timer, that powers down the Leviton, it will tell you if it has seen an error. The Leviton should detect a ground fault before the car ever could.

To me (what do I know) this smells like an issue with the car, not the charger. However, as others have said, your best bet is to try other chargers and try to find more info to narrow that down. I highly recommend keeping a log. I have been working a very different charging issue with Toyota for quite some time and the logs have been crucial in getting them to first, even acknowledge they had a problem, and then to narrow their scope so they could actually understand what was going on.

I'd love to hear if Tesla techs would even look at the car. That would be really interesting.

SeaMonster said:

To me (what do I know) this smells like an issue with the car, not the charger. However, as others have said, your best bet is to try other chargers and try to find more info to narrow that down. I highly recommend keeping a log. I have been working a very different charging issue with Toyota for quite some time and the logs have been crucial in getting them to first, even acknowledge they had a problem, and then to narrow their scope so they could actually understand what was going on.

I'd love to hear if Tesla techs would even look at the car. That would be really interesting.

Click to expand...

I don't want to sound nitpicky, but when using J1772 you are ALWAYS using the same charger. The charger is onboard the car. You are using different EVSE (or for a better term "charge station"). It bugs me because there are a lot of new folks who think that the EVSE is a charger and it is because of this use. I prefer charge station because it is much better than the official term EVSE (electric vehicle service equipment).

Anyhow, I agree with everything you said. I believe the issue is with the onboard charger, but it could also be a defective EVSE. If you are seeing the problem on multiple charge stations then it points to the onboard charger. The fact that the error message is in the car also points to the onboard charger. It is the exact same charger as the Tesla Model S, so if you make it over to their service center, they should be able to diagnose (assuming they are willing to help on a Toyota vehicle...see my previous post).

Have charged 8 times now since then with no issues. We'll see. Lancaster Toyota (Lancaster, PA) told me today that
they have an EV-certified technician there. He did safety inspection on car today and also switched short pin fuse
to delivery position so that my interior lights/keyless entry, etc. now work. If I have the issue again, I'll start with
Lancaster Toyota. They said today they had no problem servicing the car. Tesla being 50 miles down the road
could be a plus.

What is interesting is that it DID do a full charge, but still gave me the error message. Is it possible I was too close
to full when I charged and that this caused the problem. I think the car was only 1 or 2 ticks down when I charged...
all other times since it's been 75% charged or less when I've charged and had no problems with it that way....

Not supposed to try to charge when 90% full? (of course that's 90% of 80% which is actually 72%).....still, is
that a problem?

Heating is the issue with charging at high SOC. In a LEAF, it can be a big deal, even from a low SOC with a DC CHAdeMO quick charger, but with the Tesla at a relatively low charge rate (and it does ramp down from 40 amps to about 20 amps at the top of the charge) and the liquid temperature control battery, I wouldn't hesitate to charge to 100%.

Just please don't leave the car sitting at 100%, and the worst thing you could do is leave it at 100% on a hot day.

I likewise experienced this for the first time last night. Well, actually my wife did, and woke me up saying she's going to drive the ICE car cause the RAV didn't charge.

Error message on the display was 'Charging: Stopped by System Malfunction'

This was a timed charge, and the SOC was ~56 miles left, which means it didn't charge at all as that's how much was left previously. I likewise am using a Leviton 40amp EVSE solely, which I have successfully used since we purchased the car in January. It has failed to charge before but due to the flakey timer issue and not a 'System Malfunction'.

I'll see what happens again tonight to see if it was only a fluke.

Tony,

Any issues with leaving the car fairly regulary at "full" (80% ) SOC. My wife drives the car only about 2 or 3 times a week
and it sits "fully charged" (80% or regular mode) for a fair amount of time. We've actually never even done or needed the
extended (true 100%) charge rate yet.

Any problem with leaving sit fairly regularly at 80%?

Thanks.

Wanted to update...

So we removed the charging handle and plugged it back in. I successfully did a charge last night so it was a fluke.

Anyone know where or how I can look to see more specifics on what the specific malfunction might of been?

Pennsylvania RAV said:

Any problem with leaving sit fairly regularly at 80%?

Click to expand...

No. It's not ideal, but these are cars to be used and driven.