Taycan charging question

[WasserGKuehlt]

And the profile minimum is just as it’s called. A minimum. It’s not a bug. [...] That’s the minimum. [...] Not a maximum.

Jeremy, on this "minimum is not maximum" thing: are you sure you don't need an English lesson, perhaps from a non-native speaker? I'd be happy to arrange.

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[Jhenson29]

Jeremy, on this "minimum is not maximum" thing: are you sure you don't need an English lesson, perhaps from a non-native speaker? I'd be happy to arrange.

I for sure do. Yes. Please arrange.

 

[Crick]

@Jhenson29

Wow. Best explanation of minimum charge meaning. Thank you. The use of "minimum" has hertofore confused me as a single-profile user.

Practical scenario:
One lives in an area with time-of-day rate changes. For example, charging after 2:00 a.m. is half the unit cost of daytime charging.

Driver gets home with 15% SOC. Doesn't want to pay daytime rates to charge to 80% BUT isn't comfortable with a 15% SOC and is willing to pay daytime rates to get the SOC to 30%.

So driver sets:

1. Minimum charge profile to 30%. When the driver arrives home and jacks in, the car will charge to that minimum, so the driver has some "gas in the tank" should it be needed. Driver pays the full rate from 15-30%
2. The time of day charge profile is 80%. When 2:00 a.m. rolls around, the car will start charging again. The driver pays the cheap rate of 30-80%.

Driver saves 25 price units (proof is left to the reader)

@Jhenson29, is that how it would work?

 

[Tooney]

Two forum classics:
Taycan Charging Quick Reference [Profiles and Timers]
Charging Profiles and Timers Graphic

 

[Jhenson29]

@Jhenson29

Wow. Best explanation of minimum charge meaning. Thank you. The use of "minimum" has hertofore confused me as a single-profile user.

Practical scenario:
One lives in an area with time-of-day rate changes. For example, charging after 2:00 a.m. is half the unit cost of daytime charging.

Driver gets home with 15% SOC. Doesn't want to pay daytime rates to charge to 80% BUT isn't comfortable with a 15% SOC and is willing to pay daytime rates to get the SOC to 30%.

So driver sets:

1. Minimum charge profile to 30%. When the driver arrives home and jacks in, the car will charge to that minimum, so the driver has some "gas in the tank" should it be needed. Driver pays the full rate from 15-30%
2. The time of day charge profile is 80%. When 2:00 a.m. rolls around, the car will start charging again. The driver pays the cheap rate of 30-80%.

Driver saves 25 price units (proof is left to the reader)

@Jhenson29, is that how it would work?

That’s the right general idea, but the charging details are a little more complicated.

To get the car to charge in the preferred times, you would have to set the profile to preferred times (e.g. 2am-6am).

During preferred times, the car will try to charge to 100%, because it has a new instruction for charging time, but no information about a limit. The actual value it charges to will depend on the SoC at the start of the preferred time*, the charge power, and the preferred time duration.

To fix this, we add a timer, which carries a new instruction that includes a target charge. So, now the car will stop at the target charge. But…it also includes a time. The departure time.

So, when will the car start charging since it now has multiple time instructions? It will try to use the preferred times as much as possible, but it will ultimately start whenever it needs to for reaching the target charge at the departure time. If that is before the preferred time, then the car will charge outside of the preferred times.

For this reason, preferred times actually have no effect if the timer departure time is at or before the end of the preferred time, because the timer will already be using the preferred time for charging (since the start time is calculated backwards from the departure time) and it won’t respect the preferred start time if it calculates that it needs to start earlier.

Preferred times only make sense if you have a lower time of use charge that ends significantly before what you would a timer departure time for.

*presumably 30% if that’s the min, but not necessarily, depending on when it was plugged in, the SoC when it was plugged in, and the charge power; e.g. a car plugged in at 1:30am with 5% charging at 3kW will not be at 30% at 2am.

 

[ShiftyWolf]

1. Minimum charge profile to 30%. When the driver arrives home and jacks in, the car will charge to that minimum, so the driver has some "gas in the tank" should it be needed. Driver pays the full rate from 15-30%
2. The time of day charge profile is 80%. When 2:00 a.m. rolls around, the car will start charging again. The driver pays the cheap rate of 30-80%.

I'll wade in, answering yes with some caveats. The thing that seems to get in the way is that you can't actually tell the Taycan when to start charging using a timer. It starts the charge session based on your departure time, regardless of what you enter for the preferred charging times.

In my case, I set a preferred charging from 10pm until 6am and a timer with departure at 5:30am at 75% SOC. Unless my beginning SOC is extremely low, the Taycan won't start charging at 10pm but will instead wait several hours, then charge at 40A so it reaches the 75% right near 5:30.

For the profile, mine is set ay 35% and the car did immediately charge to that and stop after plugging in, the one time I drove to a low SOC. The timer then took over the "second" charging session based on my settings.

 

[ShiftyWolf]

@Jhenson29 looks like we both posted about the same time

I've learned to work within the system Porsche provided with profiles and timers. One serious issue I have with the vehicle determining start time for the charging session is that a power outage during the charge session, common enough in Florida storms, will obviously cause you to miss hitting your target SOC. To combat this, I had to do a little simple math and then move my departure time up just far enough that the Taycan begins charging much earlier overnight, but never before 10pm.

Love the driving experience, would appreciate a bit more direct control over the charge settings.

 

[Jhenson29]

The thing that seems to get in the way is that you can't actually tell the Taycan when to start charging using a timer. It starts the charge session based on your departure time, regardless of what you enter for the preferred charging times.

Mostly true. With the exception that if the preferred times end before the departure times, the car will try to charge to your target charge within the preferred times.

In my case, I set a preferred charging from 10pm until 6am and a timer with departure at 5:30am at 75% SOC. Unless my beginning SOC is extremely low, the Taycan won't start charging at 10pm but will instead wait several hours, then charge at 40A so it reaches the 75% right near 5:30.

I believe that if you set your departure time to 7am, your car would be charged by 6, assuming it could reach the target charge within the preferred times.

However, your current settings are a perfect example of when preferred times aren’t doing anything.

 

[Jhenson29]

One serious issue I have with the vehicle determining start time for the charging session is that a power outage during the charge session, common enough in Florida storms, will obviously cause you to miss hitting your target SOC.

Yes, this has been other’s complaint also. There are ultimately no settings to control the exact start time (other than “immediately” ?)

 

[rim23]

I know how it works. That’s my graphic that I made posted above. For a while, I hosted a web app that calculated charging profiles by settings. I’ve done lots of testing on charging.

And the profile minimum is just as it’s called. A minimum. It’s not a bug. The best way I’ve found to think about the charging setup is as a set of instructions to charge to. If you have a profile minimum on optimized and no timer (and no direct charging), it will stop at the minimum. But not because it’s a maximum. It’s because it has no further instructions. If you add a timer with a higher target charge, change the profile to preferred times, or turn on direct charging, it will charge past the minimum. Basically anything except one very specific setup will charge past the minimum. Many people use that setup. Myself included. That doesn’t make the setting a maximum.

Another way I’ve explained it is this: imagine you’re at a restaurant and you asked the waiter to keep your water glass at least half full. That’s the minimum. You don’t want less than half a glass of water. If it goes below half, you want the waiter to refill it to at least half. Maybe the waiter stops at half, or maybe his boss gave him further instructions to always fill water glasses to 80%. He can fill your glass to 80% because your request for 50% was a minimum. Not a maximum.

As an engineer, I would explain it as “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature”. Though, they were lazy enough to make UI and functionality user-friendly. And given the size and the name of this company, it’s a complete shame to let that to production. What you explained is how the pipe works, which is what it is with this weird naming

 

[WasserGKuehlt]

As an engineer, I would explain it as “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature”. Though, they were lazy enough to make UI and functionality user-friendly. And given the size and the name of this company, it’s a complete shame to let that to production. What you explained is how the pipe works, which is what it is with this weird naming

How do you feel about, say, phone as a key?

 

[g00se]

So I wasn't exactly wrong

As delivered with General profile (factory default) when I set 60% (minimum) it will charge to and stop charging at 60%. In my simple brain that is both the minimum and the maximum.

Caveats - AC charging and not using direct charge.

I do not have tiered electrical costs so will mess around with an additional profile and timers. About the only one I will want is a charge to 100%, pre-heat/cool, for a set departure when road tripping. The goal being, especially in cold, that the charge completes within an hour of departure (maintain heat in the battery - heat cycle management).

 

[snoopy]

So I wasn't exactly wrong

As delivered with General profile (factory default) when I set 60% (minimum) it will charge to and stop charging at 60%. In my simple brain that is both the minimum and the maximum.

Caveats - AC charging and not using direct charge.

I do not have tiered electrical costs so will mess around with an additional profile and timers. About the only one I will want is a charge to 100%, pre-heat/cool, for a set departure when road tripping. The goal being, especially in cold, that the charge completes within an hour of departure (maintain heat in the battery - heat cycle management).

What?? So you are saying if I set MINIMAL to 60% it will act like MAX and it will not charge the battery more than 60%? What is the tipping percentage when it goes from min to max?

 

[W1NGE]

What?? So you are saying if I set MINIMAL to 60% it will act like MAX and it will not charge the battery more than 60%? What is the tipping percentage when it goes from min to max?

This only relates to the minimum charge the car should have when connected to AC (at home) EVSE. So if you connect at 55% then the car will charge immediately until it reaches 60% and the pause. If you connect when you already have 60% or more your charging session will pause after a few moments. It then takes another charging event (profile / timer) to control the level you want to ultimately charge to.

This is why some folk refer to 'Min' as 'Max'. It's a case of tomato tomata.

There is no tipping point or concept thereof.

This is the reason the default is normally set to 25% as most folk can manage at that level if they have an unplanned need to use the car and ordinarily can wait until their chosen charge level has been reached (typically overnight).

 

[g00se]

I don't have a daily commute and am trying to keep my car in the happy spot of 40-60% SoC. So I have my general profile set at 60% and "optimized charging" as I have no discounted pricing for off hours. So when I dip down towards 40% or lower SoC I plug in and it tops it back to 60% (in this instance, min is max).

Having the benefit of complimentary charging and a DCFC station not too far from home I will top it towards 80% maybe once a month and when doing a proper trip have no concerns charging to 100% at home and then utilize an additional profile with a timer.

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