ChargePoint fast charger / membership experience?

sciencegeek said:

Hello collective forum wisdom, I'm looking to go on a road trip and I'm wondering if anyone has any experience with the ChargePoint network ... any thoughts welcome, thanks!

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Not many of them. EVGo is your best bet.

I've only seen one 24 kW ChargePoint DCFC.
It was at the dealer, but was not working.
Level 2 seems most available, and not that fast (~20 miles/hr.)
unless you can use a destination overnight charge.

Have you looked at plugshare.com?

Depending on your destination (to Tahoe or Monterey, Evgo’s drive the arc system of Fast DC chargers (CHAdeMO & CCS) may be helpful. https://drivethearc.com/

I've used a few ChargePoint chargers, both L2 and fast-DC, free and paid, in the US and Canada. They seem to work fine with the I-Pace.

For finding chargers, PlugShare seems to be the big winner. Among other things, free ChargePoint chargers, e.g. in your employer's garage, don't show on the CP map.

Yeah I'm not leaving anything to chance .. EVGo, ChargePoint, Plugshare, EE, etc. Glad to hear ChargePoint is working for people, I just got the app and an account.

The one notable thing about ChargePoint:
Either BMW or VW or both set up corridors of 22kW simple CCS-only stations. They don't support Level 2 AC. Some are at hotels.

But they also have modern 50kW chargers with CHAdeMO and L2 stations.

Lots of the L2 public stations installed by cities or campuses are ChargePoint. Some are free or dirt cheap.

You might also look into having EV Connect. I ran into one of these at Costco in Goleta. You use it via the cellphone app. It was fast for a 50kW charger. Added like 50kW in an hour. ChargePoints get me about 43-44 in an hour.

OH!! If you are an I-Phone user, and your phone is plugged in, hold down the Voice button on the left side of wheel and say "Siri, find me an EV charger". I have figured out how to make it more discerning though. I want to say "EVgo Charger" or something, but it doesn't discern.

Whole foods use them - you just need to make sure you have an account set up even though its free to charge. Slow though.... I also used them while I parked o/n in a parking garage in DC. Again free and speed not an issue as I was charging o/n.

Thanks, good tips. I've scoured the web sites for CCS chargers that do at least 50kW and it seems I can get to the desert in a day. I want to see the bloom ... this year has got to be incredible given all the rain even for you guys in SoCal.

My favorite DC Fast Charger (until something better is found) had a "Fault: Emergency Stop (188)" message when I drove up today. Customer (driver) support says the owner must contact owner support. Owner support can walk the owner through a reset (if possible). There was nothing Driver Support or I could do about it.

Just thought I'd let you know in case you come across a Chargepoint charger with this message.

Sorry for digging this old one up. On the charger mentioned above, I was able to reset it myself a few days later than the post after doing an internet search. This model of charger has a red emergency shut off button on the front of it. You can reboot the charger by pushing in on the red button a little bit, then turning it clockwise about 1/4 turn and releasing it. The charger may work after that or show the fault again. I tried this on two chargers last week at a sight. One reset and one did not.

Speaking of Chargepoint chargers, I got an email from EVgo a couple of days ago stating the EVgo app can be used at Chargepoint chargers now. Your EVgo account will get billed at the Chargepoint rate for that charger. The agreements announced several months ago seem to be coming to reality. Thank you EVgo and Chargepoint.