What will happen to CCS?

CCS will go the way of CHAdeMO however adapters will be available.
It will speed up adoption as people who wanted an Ev but not a Tesla will now feel they can access a reliable charger network with their choice of car.
I for one will feel comfortable making longer trips in the Mini if I can use Tesla Superchargers whereas currently it’s a Russian roulette relying on 4 dispenser sites of which 50% won’t work and I have no buffer to reach another,
With Tesla I know the chargers will be working which is why I road trip without any concern or planning in our Y, even over ruling the built in Nav and happily arriving on 2%. No way I’d do that in a CCS car. Heck, I once saw 2 non working dispensers at a 24 unit Supercharger site and was shocked. But on the return trip they’d already been repaired.
The only concerns we have for Supercharger sites is what amenities do they have, which restaurants etc. yes, we’re spoiled vs CCS folk…

 

That huge black cloud sweeping in has a silver lining, but it's not getting here for a few years.

Many cars could be converted to NACS with a suitable charge port and firmware upgrade. $1000 fitted would be an estimate for a low profit conversion by dealers if the port isn't too hard to change. Some cars may need a L2 charger swap too. Some manufacturers will likely not bother and will give ChaDeMo a new, even uglier, orphan brother. I can see CCS sales falling off a cliff in the near future until there is some idea of how this will all pan out.
For single phase, I personally think the NACS is superior. Tesla has done better with charging than anyone else. Part of why they are King. I may love my Mini, but it has a J-plugged UMC2 in the boot...

It would be great to have 3 phase, though. That one extra pin gives 73% more AC power.
I think that the NEC is opposed to 480V charging. It is just a bit too violent when stuff goes wrong.

 

I've already seen Tesla connectors at two EvGo sites. Yes, 4 chargers with different combinations of standards available. Maybe one that suits your port and side of the car is available, maybe you gotta wait for that F150 to charge, then finish lunch...
Enough of this nonsense!

 

Ok, I'll be the contrarian... I don't think CCS is going away any time soon. It's already a de-facto standard in Europe, and has a large enough footprint both on the ground and in the vehicle market here in the states to survive for quite some time. Tesla is making a play for government aide with these deals, and it remains to be seen how good a partner they will be with Ford and GM going forward (both in the near term, and when the GovBucks go away). There's also still a usability challenge at Tesla superchargers for many vehicles where the cable isn't long enough to reach the charge port, or the port is on the "wrong" side and you have to park taking up an adjacent space.

 

Near term: nothing.

Long term: possibly CCS-TESLA adapter installed to all charging stations just like what Tesla did to their supercharging stations so non Tesla EV can use them and they work seamlessly as I have been using the Tesla supercharger since they opened to non Tesla evs

 

We still don't know how expensive it was for Ford and GM to step under the Tesla umbrella. Did GM pay the same as Ford or did Elon cut them a better deal to achieve more of a stranglehold? Will subsequent NACS converts pay more or less? Even if there's no charge to install an NACS port, how much are the royalty payments to gain access to the Tesla Supercharger network? Are the royalties the same for all adopters?

What's up with poor (literally) early NACS-adopter Aptera? They can't afford to pay royalties, so does that mean Aptera drivers will have to cart around CCS adapters and look on with envy as Ford and GM EVs get to plug into Tesla's Superchargers?

 

At least for now the federal government is insisting CCS be part of charging infrastucture: White House throws some cold water on Tesla’s NACS victory

 

Does anyone have information on the charging data connection protocols for DC fast charging?
CHAdeMO - CANBUS protocol
CCS - Power Line Communication via control pilot & proximity pilot pulse width modulation (similar to J1772)
Tesla - TCP/IP connection to Telsa Mothership (with approved VIN & MAC address on their tesladex database)

 

I had a look last year. I couldn't find solid details without paying for the standards.

 

The NACS thing will have a couple of effects.
CCS chargers will be designed so that a cable and holster change is all that is needed to swap between CCS, Chademo and NACS. There is a high chance that most already are. Big stations can adjust the number of each connector according to demand.

I suspect this may also encourage them to get their **** together to attract more NACS customers. Right now, they are definitely a second choice for the few who have the CCS adaptor.

 

Most of the details are trade secrets but you can look at some of their patents for DC charging.

Essentially Tesla mothership relays the information to the Supercharger site system monitor which then had a predetermined set of rules/priorities for EV charging. Mothership has all the information of the vehicle including SoC%, GPS navigation route, LFP vs. NCA vs. NCM battery packs, etc. so that the energy distribution is seamlessly managed. With that level of detail it would require some form of TCP/IP (wifi, 4/5G cellular, starlink). A basic pulse width modulation won't provide enough information.

This is what people don't understand. It's not just simply changing to NACS for legacy OEMs, it requires a complete backend overhaul of the modules, semiconductors and microprocessors combined with a unified code (BOSCH code doesn't communicate with Magna's).

 

Ok, so one detail that I didn't realize until I saw it pointed out in an overly-long and rambling youtube video is that NACS isn't just a new label on the Tesla connector. A significant change is that NACS will use the CCS communications protocol (ISO 15118, DIN 70121), not Tesla's proprietary comms used on the supercharger network today.

Maybe everyone already knows this and I've just been living under a rock... but that's a huge part of the story, and great news for everyone, regardless of which connector is on their car.

 

I thought that tesla already used the iso/din protocols, but with extra chatter about whether Elon deems you fit to use his electrons.
The L2 Tesla destination chargers can be set to Tesla only, using digital communication, or PWM so that any car can use them.

 

Honestly I think Tesla was using an insecure method for their supercharging and kept things in-house until they could resolve the issues. When they were ready, they released NACS.

If you look at Open Charge Alliance for OCPP 2.0.1, it's based on JSON. Still crossing my fingers that the new MINI SE will have ISO 15118-20 for V2G.

Also on the side note, this must be the first time in history that the least endowed dongle is celebrated. This is a win for humanity!

 

No, it doesn't. Tesla didn't come up with their own communications protocols, they used the same ones as we do.
CCS already uses digital communication to negotiate charge rate. Notice how they know how much charge your car has and when it thinks it will be fully charged.
Tesla uses the same AC/DC communications. It's just they do secret squirrel account negotiations on top of what is required for CCS.
A dumb physical adaptor and a supercharger recode is all that is needed. No hardware other than a dumb adaptor would be needed, if Tesla would let us.
Without the recode, a smart adaptor could pretend to be a Tesla. Once the spoofing is worked out, the tricky part about that would be having reliable access to a valid Tesla account. If Tesla gets wind if it, they can disable an account. If that is your Tesla, you just lost supercharger access, likely for good.

 

The biggest part of NACS is how it'll use ISO 15118 and DIN 70121 (same as CCS) for DC fast charging. That's as opposed to the Tesla-specific protocol their superchargers have been using all these years (in North America, anyway), which are most certainly not what everyone else uses.

 

There seems to be a lot of theory here and in various YouTube videos on how the Supercharger protocols works….
I’m not convinced any of them are correct as not all Tesla’s can charge on CCS even with an adapter. And for those which can, eg 2020 on 3 and Y, there were some that could not, due to a parts shortage in summer 2021 which resulted in some missing chip on the charge port ECU. Mine was one of them.
So I swapped the board out for the correct revision number and only then was I able to use the CCs adapter.
I find it unlikely to be a firmware revision on the board as all Tesla boards are firmware upgradable as far as I know, and that wouldn’t explain a parts shortage. So there is some missing chip on those boards that is needed for CCS that does not stop the cars using Tesla Superchargers.
So I’m not convinced the comms are purely CCS.
I suspect the cars speak Teslas own protocol but those that can charge on CCS are able to recognize and switch to CCS when they need to. Again, not quite sure what the chip does…
The reverse is not currently true (Superchargers recognizing a non Tesla and speaking CCS) on anything but those with a magic dock so while they probably only needed the dock, there might be more to the software change they must have had too, and maybe even some board change?

 

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/hyundai-consider-joining-teslas-north-american-charging-standard-alliance-2023-06-20/

Jaehoon Chang, who is also Hyundai's president, said the company would consider joining the alliance of automakers shifting to Tesla's standard, but that it would have to determine that was in the interest of its customers.

One issue, he said, is that Tesla's current network of Superchargers does not allow for the faster charging Hyundai's electric vehicles can achieve on other chargers.

"That's what we will look into from the customer's perspective," Chang told analysts at the automaker's investor day.

Chang said Hyundai would consult with Tesla to see whether it could make adjustments to its charging system for Hyundai customers so they could charge faster.