I know the car will pre-condition the battery if you are using the built-in navigation to get to a specific charger. But what if you are driving off to a charger on your own? Is there a way to manually enter battery pre-conditioning, and how much difference does that make in charge rates? I cannot find anything in the users manual about doing this manually.

 

There is a gear icon on the right-top corner. Click it and you will see "Prepare for fast charging" or something alike, click the start button, all set!

 

Thanks! Found it.

 

A Better Route Planner is telling me that on a charging stop I can go from 27% to 68% charge in 20 minutes. Is this realistic or optimistic? The charger exceeds 205KWh, which is more than our car can ingest, so the charge rate will be battery-limited.

 

It is possible if everything goes well. For example, I have one session that went from 30%-69% in 21 minutes.

 

I have to agree with sonyfever based on my limited experience with commercial fast charging. That would be a very-good-case scenario.

John Swanson

 

Good stuff to know, so if I fast-charge-prep and temps aren't too low should be close to accurate on charging time. Just how slowly does it go from 80% to 90%? And 90% to 95%? There is a route I might have to take soon that just might require a 90% charge en route to make it, especially if it gets cold. Really leaning on taking the ICE car for this trip.

 

Charging from 80-90% takes 15-20 minutes on DCFC if I remember correctly, starting at 70kW but quickly drops to 40-50kW. 90-100% probably takes 30 minutes, with stable charging speed at ~20kW.

 

I just bought my new ZDX. I got the package A home charging system. Can anyone tell me if there is any difference between having the home charging station installed by Acura's referred electricians or can I have my neighbor who is an electrician install a dedicated 240 plug to plug the charging station into?
So basically, the home charger is 240 and my neighbor can install a 240 plug for a heck of a lot less. Will they both charge the same voltage and miles per hour time? And does the home charge plug into a 240 dry plug? Sorry so long but just trying to wrap my head around why they want so much to install (over $1100) when my neighbor can do it for $300.00. Any feedback or advice would be great. So far, I love this car.

 

billjay, there are so many facets to the transition to BEV's - from my point of view. One of those that I considered when replacing my TLX with the ZDX was that we have an RDX in the garage, so I felt I would not be forced to deal with charging on the road. Since owning the ZDX I'm beginning to learn the ropes, if you will, such as planning the trip to take advantage of food/bathroom/refueling stops, which are obviously somewhat different with the BEV. Recently I found a EVgo charger next door to an Applebee's, which allowed for some refreshments (it wasn't a convenient time for a meal). The friend who made the trip with me and I enjoyed a 20-minute snack while I got plenty of juice to get home. If it works, one can make an extra shorter stop and avoid that extra time it takes to go from 80 to 95%. BTW, I usually charge to 95% at home on my leased ZDX that has a 7-year Mfg.'s warranty on the battery. With more and more charging opportunities appearing all the time, I'm expecting that we'll get more comfortable with long distance travel in our BEV's.
John

 

Are you sure the two electricians are doing everything the same? Here was my setup. I have the Acura home charger as well. It is hard-wired (not plugged) on a dedicated 240V system with a 60A breaker. The wire run through the attic is in conduit to protect the wiring. This allows charging at 48A (by code, long term current draw needs to be at or below 80% of the breaker). (this particular charger is rated up to 50A). So which plug is your neighbor going to install? A 14-30 dryer plug is only 30A. The 14-50 plug, which is popular for portable chargers because the plug is common at places like RV parks, is 50A. Importantly, how much capacity does your electrical system have anyway?

 

Brandidog05, the only thing I can add to what billjay said is that you cannot get the installation "credit" from Acura unless you use their installers. Based on my calculations, and the fact that the company Acura contracted to do my install inadvertently sent me a copy of the invoice for Acura, I got a value of about half the credit. So, if you can get it installed for less than $250 (as in my example), it would be a better deal, meaning less out of pocket. Do make sure you end up with 60-amp breakers!
John

 

I had it done by a local electrician for $1300, but had to pull 50 feet of wire to my detached 2 car garage. The wire alone cost $300. The answer is yes you can have your friend do it for you. I had quotes from the Acura service for $3200. Even with their $500 coupon it was still more than double.

 

In the hopes Acura listens to these forums....

My recent (and first) road trip taught me some lessons about charging.
1. An Air BnB with on-site charger or 14-50 plug beats a hotel with L2. You will never be guaranteed to be able to charge at the hotel. Slots could be occupied by other EVs. Or occupied by a gas-powered car from an owner who doesn't care, or is even hostile towards EVs.
2. You always need a back-up charging plan on the road. For me it was a Cadillac dealer 3 miles away from the hotel with a 50kWh charger and 24/7 access. On the ride home it was a Buc-ees 33 miles south of my original charging destination. That was a nervous drive. While I knew of that Buc-ees, in hind-sight I should have found a closer charger via PlugShare app.
3. The fact that most chargers do not accept credit cards directly makes life a pain. You need an app and an account for every network. Some apps are just awful, like EVConnect, which was very clumsy and hard to use.
4. Chargers need to tell you how much they are going to charge you. While it may not have stopped me from using any of them, I hated finding out later just how much EVConnect price gouged me.
5. Everyone needs to adopt ISO 15118 properly (cough cough EVgo cough). The ZDX can plug and charge at EVgo, but not at Electrify America, because of a modified implementation of that standard by EVgo.
6. It would be ideal to be able to enroll my car for plug and charge ONCE, in a national database, and use ANY network at any time. Barring that, let me use a credit card for any network if I don't want to take the time to find the app and make an account.

 

I think most of these can be summed up to be: others charging networks need to be more like Tesla.

 

Looks like the EVConnect network (a small one) has plug-and-charge capability with GM vehicles, but not with ours even though they are Ultium based. This is just nuts. In fact, I think the only plug-and-charge compatible network option we have is EVgo. Fiatlux you are correct, other networks need to be more like the Tesla networks.

 

Credit to Acura customer service for very rapid responses to emails! Regarding to my Q's about plug-and-charge on various networks:

 

FWIW my experience on the west coast has been entirely different. I made a round trip from Sacramento to the Tacoma area and back again a couple of months ago, and for the most part used Electrify America for charging on the road. It happily took my credit card, and charging was quick and painless (if not cheap). Only once did I have to wait for an available charger. I also used a Level 2 charger at a motel in Grants Pass, Oregon, which is roughly the mid-point of the drive. It was free for guests, and I never had to compete with anyone else using the 2 available slots. I think this is the definition of a YMMV situation.

Before I hit the road I scoped out the available chargers at likely stops along the drive, and in each case Electrify America had the most chargers, and the highest-speed chargers, so I didn’t see any reason to try anybody else. [I intentionally avoided Tesla for this trip, since I didn’t want to experiment at that time.]

 

It's always easy and quick to reply that you don't have an answer...

 

I think a lot of that has to do with California versus rural Texas. The I-35 corridor has many options to charge, for example, even if the EA site I first went to was full (it had 6 chargers) with a small line. Our preferred route to Wichita Falls, however, is limited in charging options. As is the city itself. In fact the Cadillac dealer told me "we only sell our Lyrics to those out of town because this city does not like EVs". So scarce chargers throughout the city, with 50kWh being the fastest, and hotel guests who do not think twice to park a gas car in a charger spot. Etc.

 

I agree completely. The attitude in California could not be more supportive of EVs in general, although for obvious reasons Teslas are less favored than they used to be. That being said, sometimes it seems that Teslas are as common on the road here as Toyotas; not literally true, but they are EVERYWHERE.

The EA stations I used in northern California, Oregon, and Washington were either 150 or 350 kWh, so I was frequently able to charge at near the ZDX’s max speed. What really surprised me was how empty the charging stations mostly were. These were all at cities along I-5: Redding, Yreka, Salem, and Portland suburbs. The only exception was at my destination, near Bremerton, WA, which was in a Fred Meyer parking lot, and was pretty heavily used. This was also the only place I saw evidence of vandalism; someone had smeared mud into the end socket of one of the charging cables.

With a sample size of 1 I can’t claim that my motel experience is typical here, but it was certainly pleasant. This was a motel we had used before getting an EV, which I would likely have used in any case, but the free charging effectively took about $50 off my bill each time.

 

The hotel we used was a ChargePoint that charged $0.50 per kWh! And it was slow! That town isn't giving EV's anything for free. Next time we're using an Air BNB with a 14-50 plug and no additional fee for using it. There are two in that town like that.

 

EA usually charged me $0.56 per kWh, with one session at $0.64. I can live with that for the occasional road trip, but I’m really happy to have my Level 2 home charger for normal usage.

 

On our street there are a LOT more Teslas than Toyotas, probably Toyotas and Hondas combined. One of our next door neighbors has 3 EVs, none Teslas, though. The neighbor on the other side has a black Tesla. Then going a few homes up and down the street there are probably another half a dozen white Teslas, two Rivians, a VW ID4 and if I go a bit further even more Teslas and a Hummer EV. Sometimes there is a Porsche EV on the street. There are a couple of Toyota Priuses. I would say the ratio of gas powered cars to electric/hybrid cars is probably 1:1.

 

When I bought my ZDX last July I was told we'd have Tesla SuperCharger access by the end of 2024. GM's Ultium based products got it in September but that did not include Honda/Acura for some reason. But I was told not to worry, by end of year for us. Well, it did not happen, but the dealer told me in January by spring for sure. I had an email exchange with corporate on January 2 that said this:

​​​​​​​I am getting tired of waiting so I actually spoke to Acura on the phone today who told me nothing is in the works and no agreement signed. I mentioned the above email and they asked for me to forward it to them to judge its authenticity. Which I just did. Waiting to see how they dance around this.

At this point I should have bought the Lyric instead. I feel misled and lied to. And I'm losing hope we'll ever get official access, and that the loophole we have for charging might even get closed (as Tesla did for Kia).

 

Looks like I cannot edit my post above, but I just got a call-back from Acura. They verified my January 2 email from them was indeed accurate. An agreement is in place, the timeline is "spring 2025", work is in progress. The information on the phone earlier was in error and they apologized for that.

On a positive note I am impressed with how rapidly Acura responds to issues. Even calling me back to tell me they were wrong earlier.

 

Some things I wish were better about charging.

1. Official Tesla access. We can work-around and charge at a SuperCharger, but if access was official then the built-in nav and routing software would include SuperCharger stops. I've been told twice so far we get it "spring 2025". Fingers crossed. Course, we were told "end of 2024" before...
2. Give us Plug&Charge capability. We have autocharge+ capability, which works with EVgo. But everyone else (such as Electrify America) uses the Plug&Charge protocol. Give us both Acura.
3. Speaking of autocharge+, we can do it with EVgo, but for some reason cannot do it with EV Connect. Let's add that support as well. You would think this would be simple to add. I sometimes need to use EV Connect, the app is clumsy, and the chargers do not accept a credit card.

What else? I have notified Acura of my wishes. If more people do the same things might change. The Acura EV app has a link to email tech support. Thanks.

BTW, I talked with EV Connect tech support about this issue and that was a complete waste of time. Electrify America was a better experience with their tech support and said the ball for this is in Acura's court.

 

Update about Plug&Charge capability, also known as ISO 15118. This is the protocol Electrify America uses, and was also a requirement of NEVI-funded charging stations. Acura claims that they are working on a partnership with Electrify America, though nothing is firm, including a date. To me, though not stated to me, would mean we might be getting Plug&Charge capability, in addition to our current autocharge+ capability. This would be great if true. Another data point that leads me to believe this is that the EVgo and EV Connect networks are also working on supporting ISO 15118. Currently they do autocharge+ only (and is the only protocol our cars support). Lastly, I think the Lyric is already 15118 capable.

I'm pretty sure we will also get the ability to plug and charge on the Tesla SuperCharger network in June, when that becomes official. (which is a THIRD standard to handle identification, authorization and billing for charging! sheesh!)

Slowly I think the charging landscape is getting better for our cars, even if we lag Cadillac on an identical platform.

 

I just realized that Honda is a founding partner of Ionna, the new network out there (and looks very promising). Their webpage says that Honda/Acura will have plug and charge capability later this year on Ionna. And... Ionna supports ISO 15118. So I am getting more confident that we will also have Plug&Charge ISO 15118 support sometime this year.

 

Yeah, there were talks about GM implementing plug and share at one stage. Maybe GM will figure it all out when they release native NACS.

 

i am doing tesla... in 8-9, the charger creates miracles

 

Can you clarify or provide additional information?
John