Friends Ford Focus refuses to charge with 120v charger

[vikramb92]

I have a friend that has encountered a problem that I have no idea about. His Ford focus electric stopped charging from the wall outlet one day. The only sign of problem is the light on the 120 v charger next to the picture of a car blinks red instead of the normal green. I have never experienced this and mostly use a 240v station so what does this mean.

 

[WattsUp]

I have a friend that has encountered a problem that I have no idea about. His Ford focus electric stopped charging from the wall outlet one day. The only sign of problem is the light on the 120 v charger next to the picture of a car blinks red instead of the normal green. I have never experienced this and mostly use a 240v station so what does this mean.

I assume a red light indicates some kind of fault with the car or socket. Have you checked the manual for the meaning?

Try charging the same car with the same 120v charger at a different location. If it works, your friend's house has a wiring fault or other power issue.

Try charging the same car at the same location with a different 120v charger (yours? as I take it you also have an FFE). If it works, your friend's charger may be defective.

If neither if these tests work, your friend's FFE may have an issue, at least at 120v. Does it charge at 240v?

 

[davideos]

If I had to guess, I'd say that the wall socket is underpowered. The charger probably detected a voltage drop. As mentioned, try a different socket that is rated for 15A. One close to the circuit breaker would be best. If you know the wiring is sound and the charger works in another socket, it could just be the socket.

 

[Pace Charging]

If I had to guess, I'd say that the wall socket is underpowered. The charger probably detected a voltage drop. As mentioned, try a different socket that is rated for 15A. One close to the circuit breaker would be best. If you know the wiring is sound and the charger works in another socket, it could just be the socket.

Home wall sockets are not the best for charging EVs - kind of a last resort.

 

[jeffand]

Could be a low voltage condition. Or the power socket is not wired correctly. Impropperly grounding could also be an issue.
The hot wire is connected to the wrong slot on the socket. (Brass screw or smaller slot)

 

[az erik]

Figure the charger crapped out. Have him try your's and vise versa. As it was working previously I'd expect something has failed somewhere.

The Ford charger blinks red if there is a fault. (I don't have a car on mine just red and green light)

 

[emil]

I've had the focus ev do the same thing. With the car turned off, I tried charging with the 240 v home charger. It wouldn't charge. I tried the 110 v charger and it still wouldn't charge. This happened about a month ago. I then tried an experiment and just turned on the car (not the driving condition) and then hooked up the 240 v charger. It charged beautifully. After that I was able to charge the car normally with the car turned off. Then last Saturday, the car wouldn't charge again. It wouldn't charge in the off position and now it wouldn't charge with the car just turned on (not the driving condition). I tried one further experiment. I turned on the car completely (the green car icon was lit). After this hookup the car charged well. After that the car charged normally with the car turned off. That is until last night. It didn't charge again. I've just turned on the car completely and inserted the charger. I don't know whether the car will charge. By the way, there are no warning messages. I will let you all know later. Meanwhile, I wonder how prevalent this problem is. Also,does anyone have a solution because this is something the dealer's service doesn't know about. I hate to take the car in and not have the problem repeat. Good luck to all of you.

 

[davideos]

Sounds like an odd problem. I wouldn't take it to the dealer until it is 100% reproduceable. Your experiments are good, just be sure to write them all down and it will help you see the pattern if there is one.

One thing you can try when it does this, and provided that your link with myfordmobile is working...after plugging it in and seeing that it doesn't charge, go to myfordmobile and see what the status is. It will say something like "MY EV is at home, plugged in waiting to charge" or "MY EV is at home, unplugged". Be sure to do an "update" to get the current status. This could tell you if the car knows it is plugged in; then it might be just an issue with "value charge" and could tell you what it is waiting for.

Also, when you plug it in, does the blue ring around the socket light up? If it doesn't, try removing the plug and re-inserting. I've had this happen to me where it just didn't quite seat correctly and it didn't charge. I do know that it does get confused sometimes. With value charge, I plug it in, the blue ring lights up and then no charge. The lights remain static and eventually go out and wait. I have had it charge regardless of value charge because I was below 10% charge, so it charged up a little and then waited for the value time. However, the other day, after I plugged in, it started charging...although I didn't check the meter to be sure. The blue ring quadrant was pulsing. I popped back in the car and checked the charging time; it was set to charge at 12:00am. My battery was at 57% so I couldn't figure out why it seemed to be charging. So I unplugged and then re plugged and it went back to normal.

Anyway, I haven't had any issues like yours, but I think if you check the myfordmobile site to see what the car sees, at least that might narrow down the problem...and make sure the blue ring flashes when you plug it in.

 

[EVA]

Check to be certain Value Charging isn't turned on.

I had that silly problem when I first got the car and my son drove it. He drives the ICE Focus, the radio volume buttons on that car are in the same spot as the menu buttons on the FFE. He turned on Value Charging instead of changing the radio volume. He doesn't get to drive the FFE much anymore.