Charging pin melt

[muddyfun]

Hi,

I've got an MG4 Trophy and left it on a 7kW charger or a couple of hours the other evening. Returned in the dark and noticed some resistance when I unplugged the charger. A closer look showed the base of one of the charging pins had melted and was coming out attached to the charging cable. Unsure if it's the charging port, charger or charging cable at fault. I think the charging cable looks intact and has picked up some melted plastic I've spoken to the dealer and taking it in but wondered if anyone else had seen something like this ? I've attached a few photos.

I tested (tentatively) with the three pin charger and that was ok but obviously I'm wary of pushing more current through it at the moment.

 

[Bricktop X PWR]

Technical term for that is 'Fooked'

Definitely a problem there.

Some electrical resistance resulting in heat, resulting in melted plastic.

Dealer investigation for sure.

 

[Edd Beesley]

Please don't use the AC charging on that car until the port is replaced (DC might be ok as doesn't use the L1 L2 or L3 pins to carry current, but I wouldn't use that either).

If I had to guess the pin in the car socket was not crimped correctly to it's cable, and has been getting worse over time before this incident. Manufacturing defect, dealer must replace it.

 

[Alb]

Dealer problem for sure although they'll probably follow the party line of admitting nothing until it's stripped down so you are entirely in their hands

 

[muddyfun]

Please don't use the AC charging on that car until the port is replaced (DC might be ok as doesn't use the L1 L2 or L3 pins to carry current, but I wouldn't use that either).

If I had to guess the pin in the car socket was not crimped correctly to it's cable, and has been getting worse over time before this incident. Manufacturing defect, dealer must replace it.

Thanks - yes, the three pin was mainly plugged in as a test to try to get a bit more info as to whether the car would detect or report a fault. There's enough distorted plastic around the other pins so I will heed the advice on the DC side too - it's all close together and there's no way of knowing what's going behind the port in terms of melting and other damage. It's going to the dealer on Thursday.

 

[Bam Bam]

View attachment 30115

Am I right in thinking that this fault has damaged your cable?

Is it tethered or is it one you got with the car? Hope that MG will replace this as well.

 

[muddyfun]

There's some blackening of the internal connector and melted plastic attached to my cable. Put it this way, regardless of where the fault lies, I am not about to test that on anyone else's (nor my own) vehicle. So yes, I'm out a charging cable whatever happens.

It's not an MG one - I received just the three pin charger with the car.

 

[tsedge]

There's some blackening of the internal connector and melted plastic attached to my cable. Put it this way, regardless of where the fault lies, I am not about to test that on anyone else's (nor my own) vehicle. So yes, I'm out a charging cable whatever happens.

It's not an MG one - I received just the three pin charger with the car.

Unfortunately you may find MG blames your cable / home charger.

I would expect the charge port will need replacing and the car will need to be thoroughly checked for damage to the CCU and associated systems.

I would also never trust the home charger again.

 

[Bam Bam]

There's some blackening of the internal connector and melted plastic attached to my cable. Put it this way, regardless of where the fault lies, I am not about to test that on anyone else's (nor my own) vehicle. So yes, I'm out a charging cable whatever happens.

It's not an MG one - I received just the three pin charger with the car.

Does your charger have a separate electrical isolation unit? Or internal isolation (I think it is called PEN fault protection but others will know more about the electrics)?

If it does then you might have a stronger case to blame the car if MG tries to blame your charger.

 

[muddyfun]

It was on charge in a supermarket car park, rather than home.

 

[Bam Bam]

It was on charge in a supermarket car park, rather than home.

Ahh I see, so it is possible that the Charging Unit caused the problem.

Worrying if there is a fault with the unit if it might do this to lots of other cars as well.

 

[muddyfun]

I’m not really knowledgeable about the ways charging units go wrong but I’ve been charging there without an issue for 15 months, around once or twice a week and sometimes throughout the working day. Having said that two of the three posts were out of order that evening (and have been for about a month now)

 

[kiwi]

High resistance contact with subsequent heating and burning can be caused by the male or female contact so it is certainly possible it’s your cable that was at fault.

I’m assuming you used your own cable to connect to the supermarket AC charger?

Also, overcurrent or leakage fault protection in the charger isn’t going to help protect against overheating. In New Zealand we get these sorts of burn faults regularly when heaters or other large devices that use the full quid (10 amps) run through worn wall outlets. Continuous loads are suppose to be restricted to 80% or 8A in our case (just over 10A in the UK). But it’s not enforced other than in EVSE devices.

PS Can you post the brand of the plug (actually socket) on the end of your cable please?

 

[muddyfun]

The charging cable was from the brand VonHaus and they do seem to still be in business. Not that price is necessarily a guide to quality but it was about the same price and spec as cables from evcables.com but bought via Amazon (because I had a free Prime sub).

 

[Diggsy]

Think they’re something of a jack of all trades type business. Not sure I’d trust one of their EV cables myself to be honest. The reviews for their granny charger wouldn’t fill me with any confidence either!

 

[tsedge]

This is one area when I would also pay top dollar (or pounds) to get a quality product. I bought a relatively expensive EVSE (the Zappi) with a tethered cable and a super-expensive 3 phase Type 2 cable.

I didn't want to risk issues with cheap gear.

 

[Ian Key]

This is one area when I would also pay top dollar (or pounds) to get a quality product. I bought a relatively expensive EVSE (the Zappi) with a tethered cable and a super-expensive 3 phase Type 2 cable.

I didn't want to risk issues with cheap gear.

I agree. I've got an untethered Zappi as I didn't want the cable hanging up outside and bought the Tesla 3 phase type 2 cable when they were available 19 months ago.

 

[Rolfe]

As this isn't an upgrade or an accessory, I've moved it to the main forum.

 

[VAG]

In my opinion, this seems to be due to a poor quality charging cable

 

[tsedge]

Not everything fits into a neat category though - we can't be sure if the problem was charging socket, cable or something to do with the charger.