At this point, the rate at which automakers NACS support is a good proxy for corporate malaise. Everyone sees the writing on the wall for CCS, and if an automaker takes another couple months to announce a migration it simply means the executive leadership has no clue what they are doing with regards to EVs.
And/or, since automakers evidently need some sort of agreement with Tesla[1], if it takes a while, it could be due to negotiations.
For example, if there are fees for using the connector (not sure), an automaker might hold out to get the best price. There may be terms related to the rates that will be paid for using Tesla's charging stations.
There might be other issues. Maybe Tesla wants to qualify automakers' designs so cars don't cause problems with their charging network, or vice versa. The automaker might want access to Tesla engineers or facilities for help with designing or testing stuff.
Also, I don't know who's supplying the connectors (that will be built into the cars), but if it's Tesla, the automaker may want commitments about how many will be delivered by what date and at what cost.
There could also be some sort of IT integration, like charging location map data or maybe allowing customers a different way to pay for charging (through the automaker's app or something).
> Maybe Tesla wants to qualify automakers' designs so cars don't cause problems with their charging network, or vice versa.
I shouldn't need Exxon and Shell and Phillips and Wawa and Sheetz and whoever to qualify my car to get gas. I shouldn't need Tesla and EA and whoever to qualify my car to get electricity.
I don't see how anyone can see that and think its a good thing.
They all need to agree how it's done though. And gas cars were the same - did you think the size and shape of the gas pump nozzle were handed down from God or something? Everyone had to agree on that at some point. Apparently that was in 1930, or around 30 years after cars were invented.
https://www.cspdailynews.com/csp-magazine/industry-views-all...
We are at that point right now. That is the process happening in front of us. Eventually it will all be settled enough that nobody will have to check that devices work with each other, but we aren't there yet.
> did you think the size and shape of the gas pump nozzle were handed down from God or something?
No, but you'd just have the fuel tank opening large enough that you can put in any particular handle. And in the end you didn't need Gulf saying this brand or that brand could buy gas, but not that brand. So while there were a lot of different handles before U842, they usually all actually worked with all the different brands and the gas stations didn't have to pre-approve the different cars to get gas there.
I've had a few gas tools and gas tanks which didn't have a gas port that was shaped for a U842 handle and yet I've still managed to fuel them just fine. I didn't need to get Shell's authorization every time I wanted to fuel a Toro.
I'm kind of amazed people think its a good thing for Shell to have the ability to say "no, that brand of car isn't allowed to buy gas here anymore". Imagine if Ford operated most of the pumps in the US and could just decide Toyotas could no longer get gas at the majority of pumps. Sound like a good idea?
Imagine if Tesla operated most of the DCFC dispensers and could just decide Toyotas could no longer get gas at the majority of dispensers? Oh wait, they already made that decision. Despite the majority of Tesla dispensers technically supporting CCS communications a Toyota couldn't possibly charge on most of those dispensers even if they had an adapter, because Toyota and Tesla don't have an agreement.
I don't like that a single private company is in charge of this standard, but I think this sort of thing is pretty common and necessary when two companies integrate technologies.
For example, look at how USB C compatibility worked at first. There was a standard, but there were still lots of problems. In practice, implementers may not correctly understand certain parts of the standard, may not grasp the importance of doing something a specific way, or may try to cut corners. Also, the standard may have omissions or errors.
All of this should theoretically be fed back into a future version of the standard, but with evolving technologies, it takes time to get there.
Yeah but Google doesn't need to certify Anker or whoever to make a charger and there's no on-going agreement to make this charging brick work with my phone. Anker can't just later decide to not work with Samsung devices and suddenly not work. They all just speak USB-PD and it works.
Tesla chargers shouldn't care if the car is a Tesla or Rivian or GM or VW or whatever, if it plugs in and it speaks CCS it should charge.
Hopefully government funding of any type will be withheld from Tesla until this happens. I don't care about the port as much as I care about anything with the right connector should be able to charge anywhere. Having to have the proper "agreement" between your car manufacturer and the charging company seems ridiculous. Especially with how mercurial some of the leaders of these companies can be.
maybe google should've, i remember it was basically "buyer beware" with cables. there was this benson something guy who was testing cables and found that a bunch of them would blow up your phone, until he literally had his test equipment blown up by a bad cable. compared to the usb-c situation, apple mfi is a godsend.
I’d say that’s the case for Stellantis (Dodge etc), but I suspect the big European automakers will be slower to get onboard due to the greater investment in CCS in the EU. It’ll require a bigger mental shift, as their leadership may not have as strong a grasp on the North American situation, and will probably have a greater bias toward “standards”. (Yes I realize we’re talking about CCS1 vs CCS2, but it doesn’t practically matter).
Nah, Stellantis is just bad. Their EV tech is poor. They have no dedicated EV platform, and they struggle to make profit on EVs. They're not invested in CCS at all — they're still hoping EVs are a fad.
Stellantis has dedicated EVs in Europe. That largely why Stellantis was created in the first place. So FCA would not be totally lost on EVs. The PSA group does have EVs.
But you are correct, they are not much invested in CCS in the US. Unlike say Volkswagen.
By lack of a dedicated platform I mean that all of their EVs share the platform with ICE/hybrid versions of vehicles. They're either available with an engine of your choice (like Peugeot and DS), or are only a new body on an older ICE+EV shared platform (like Jeep Avenger is built on Opel/Vauxhall Astra).
Contrast this with VW MEB, Hyundai/Kia eGMP, Porsche J1, Mercedes EVA, etc. that were all ground-up EV skateboards without ICE support.
NACS is dramatically easier to maneuver into the port on the car, and supports higher amperage. CSS requires an extra internal flap on the car side that you have to open and close manually, as well. It’s a seriously underwhelming design.
By combining DC and AC onto the same pins, it reduces the part count and weight of bus bars / conductors which run from a car's charging socket and the battery.
NACS is a better user experience for people and significantly so for people with mobility issues, disabilities, etc.
The pre-eminent NACS fast charging network is markedly better than the totality of all CCS1 charging networks.
I've used both and while from a technical standpoint CCS might be superior (I have no idea), in practice NACS is sleeker and feels less clunky.
Is that a good reason to adopt a standard that isn't open? Probably not. Does the average customer cares and will it have an impact on their day to day? Probably not.
EDIT: Seems like NACS is open after all so I don't really understand why we would bother with CCS.
It's open in every respect that matters, but pedants will rightly point out that it hasn't been submitted to a classic standards body (like SAE) to formalise in the way that satisfies middle management and expensive consultants.
The form factor is significantly smaller, which means it’s easier to use. But more importantly the charging connector has no moving parts. A common failure on CCS chargers is that the locking pin breaks and the charger will no longer stay firmly attached to the vehicle causing charging issues. On the NACS adapter the locking pin is on the vehicle.
Charging infrastructure sees significantly more duty cycles than an individual car so it makes sense to move the wear part to the vehicle.
Even with CCS1 the US was out of sync with "the rest of the world", which uses a few different connectors.
And in the end it doesn't really matter. I'm not driving my car across the ocean very often. Import processes already tend to make taking a car from one continent to the other a huge hassle, so to the vast majority of people its probably easier to just sell the car in one place and buy another on the other shore.
