Making it quick and easy to recharge a drained battery is paramount in the switch to all-electric vehicles. Unfortunately for one Chevy Bolt EV driver, their car was totaled after attempting to charge back up at an Electrify America station in Florida.
In a recent post to Chevy Bolt EV forum chevybolt.org, user Tippit83 states that they plugged their recently purchased 2017 Chevy Bolt EV into an Electrify America station in Chipley, Florida on January 22nd, 2023. The user states that, at the time, their vehicle was at a 28-percent charge level. However, about 15 minutes later, the charger “went completely black,” while the car read 4-percent battery charge and wouldn’t shift out of park.
Apparently, the charging station itself was sparking and smoking while the Chevy Bolt EV was plugged in. After attempting to plug into another nearby charger, the Chevy Bolt EV owner says their vehicle would not take a charge and was “completely bricked.” After talking to Electrify America, the Chevy Bolt EV owner was told to tow their vehicle to a Chevy dealer and send them an email on what the technicians had to say.
Later, in a follow-up post to Twitter, user Malicious Compliance (@Burn_This_App), who appears to be the same individual as Tippit83, states that the dealer came back with the news that the “car is completely fried” as a result of excess electricity from the Electrify America charger. The damages amount to $20,000, and the owner’s insurance has elected to total the vehicle.
BREAKING 🚨Dealer just said car is completely fried. @ElectrifyAm Charger sent so much power through car that it fried ever wire in my @chevrolet bolt battery and rendering over $20,000 in damages. https://t.co/AYjTlQcWHD
— Malicious Compliance (@Burn_This_App) January 31, 2023
For now, GM says it won’t cover the damages as the car is out of warranty, while Electrify America appears to be investigating the situation. At this point, it’s still unclear exactly what happened and who’s at fault, not to mention who will end up paying for the damages.
Nevertheless, the situation is similar to what happened to a Ford F-150 Lightning owner who recently had his vehicle bricked after plugging into an Electrify America station in Oregon, per coverage from our sister publication, Ford Authority.
We’ll keep an eye on this and provide an update with any new information as we get it. In the meantime, subscribe to GM Authority for more Chevy Bolt EV news, Chevy news, GM electric vehicle news, GM technology news, and around-the-clock GM news coverage.
Comments
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!!!!!!
Not entirely surprised. Nobody talks about the Fast chargers and the damage it does to the Batteries with regard to life cycle recharging either.
Tesla vehicles have charged manybtimes on the Super Charger Network. Their batteries get over 300,000 miles. News are rated to go 1 million mile on the same barteries. You must not own a great electric vehicle like i do. They are great.
Fords recalling, I don’t remember how many thousands of cars because of faulty injectors that can crack at any time and that can cause fires and also for an oil leak that also has the ability to cause fires. I don’t see anyone talking about the life span of those vehicles, which reminds me of a refrigerator repair man who was fixing ours, saying he wouldn’t consider an EV until it could go 1,000 miles on a charge, I reminded him that ICE vehicles can’t even go that far. It just goes to show you how prejudice some people are that will not even learn about a subject to be able to talk about it with knowledge and understanding. Some people only open their mouths to change feet.
EXACTLY. So many politically driven & emotional anti-EV Americans with such huge opinions on electric vehicles but know nothing about them. Want them to be able to do all things under the sun, and MORE but for less money than the ICE products that catch fire and malfunction on a regular basis. They repeat whatever talking points they hear because they have no knowledge of EVs for themselves, it’s what someone else has said around them.
I’m sure the idiot laughing at this is a full grown adult man who feels better after reading this article simply because he/she prefers ICE vehicles. People are so weird and so childish. Not sure what’s funny about that. So many GM TROLLS here on this website too. GM must be doing something correct because the haters come FLOCKING to every post to cry in the comments.
you can infact increase your total mileage per tank by adding additional larger tanks that even mount in the factory location. evs arent worthy until they recharge as fast as it takes to fill up a car with fuel
That’s because it doesn’t happen very often. Seems like someone should look into ICE vehicle recalls. Or maybe read all the problems they have and what their owners have to say. You do know there is a Lemon law for a reason. I don’t believe it’s because of them being perfect.
Same thing happened to a Rivian R1T recently too. This all looks to be an EA issue at this point.
https://www.thedrive.com/news/rivian-r1t-bricked-after-loud-explosion-at-electrify-america-charger
https://fordauthority.com/2022/11/ford-f-150-lightning-bricked-after-charging-at-electrify-america-station/
This is the next generation version of excessive water in the gas at the gas station, or fuel detonation by a static charge while refueling. Power surges, faulty chargers, software issues, cold weather bricking, etc. will be the new concern as more and more drivers switch to EVs. This shouldn’t be surprising.
If it can be proven that the EA charger caused the problem, then EA should pay for the repairs/reimburse the insurance company. The more payouts EA has to do, the more apt they will be to improve their equipment. If they aren’t held accountable they will never make any improvements.
The thing is it’s more complicated than gas. There’s clear standards for gasoline, and you can drain the tank and send the fuel to a lab.
For EVs, there’s communication between the car and the charger, as well as on-board vehicle electronics. Maybe GM has a software bug or a different interpretation of standards that causes an issue with the EA charger? Like software crashes, it’s often very hard to replicate the problem.
A gas station is more complicated than plugging in at home 99% of the time for pennies on the dollar.
Except a large percentage of the population live in apartments and don’t have their own garage with a home charger. This is going to be the reality as they mandate these vehicles unless they perfect the technology.
We are retired so that has an effect on our usage. We only drive about 4 to 500 miles a month and we don’t even notice the cost in our bill.
Why are you speaking for the folks who live in apartments and willingly make the conscious decision to go purchase an EV? They must have somewhere to charge it. Also if a EV isn’t convenient for you then why on earth would you be buying one in the first place? You’d have to have a system of some sort to charge it because that’s how they operate. You’re making it sound so much more complicated than what it actually is, per usual. I’m beginning to think that’s y’all’s game.
There’s been numerous other articles covering various EV’s that have been plugged into the same company’s charging station that reported similar issues. Insurance companies totalling cars for the same issue of being fried by the charging station. It’ll be interesting to see an investigation done on the faulty chargers and if the insurance companies go after electrify america to recoup their losses. Also if this trend continues, will insurance companies follow the trend of jacking the premiums up to offset their liability in coverage.
It has happened to other brands of vihicles like Rivian. Chargers send a short 500 volt burst to check for shorts befor charging. Maybecth EA equipment sent it and didn’t release it. It could be software or hardware. . We will see after they examine the chargers.
EVs are going through the same problems that smartphones did. There are many stories of low-grade chargers damaging the phone’s battery, mostly due to being out of spec or lacking basic safety standards. But get this – a faulty charger may not simply brick the device. It can also damage the battery and shave years off of its lifespan without you knowing. Now imagine discovering the problem a week later and nobody wants to accept responsibility.
That’s another reason why I’m waiting on the sidelines when it comes to EVs. Too many companies are rushing and making basic mistakes in the process.
It’s a good idea, then, to save your charging receipts. It could make a difference at lawsuit time.
Same thing happened to a Rivian R1T at a EA charger recently. Apparently I can’t share the article here but you can easily Google it. Basically it seems there is something very wrong with some EA chargers.
more evidence why gm needs their own superchargers, like ELONgated MUSKrat
I hate electric vehicles. Just drive less.
Blessing in disguise. Time for a NEW EV. The Bolt is a dinosaur.
Makes me want one, NOT!
I’m dumbfounded that GM would refuse to cover this under the 8 year, 100,000 mile warranty…
If Electrify America’s Chargers don’t have complete failure protection, then it should be included at ALL gm vehicle charging ports. – Namely overvoltage, reverse polarity detection, overcurrent (fusing), etc.
I once “overcharged” a car. Cleaned it up with some paper towels.
Oops…
I’d like to know why this is happening all of a sudden with Electrify America charging stations. It does not seem to matter what manufacturer’s EV it is, which is extremely scarry. Electrify America better find out quickly what is wrong and fix it or no one will be using their charger stations!!! And their stations are the most prolific of all the charging stations manufacturers out there, which makes essebtial for the proliferation of EVs nationwide. This looks like another lawsuit against VW who owns Electrify America.
I suspect it has to do with recent upgrades, maybe someone cheaped out? Either way, doesn’t help EA’s already poor reputation.
Should change the name to Electrocute America. Old sparky french fried the Bolt.
Wasn’t Electrify America the Volkswagen of America penance for cheating on diesel emissions? That could explain why they’ve cheapened the process. Meanwhile, EA’s GiG Ride Share is leaving Sacramento. Decline and fall.
Working in the RC industry and having seen numerous battery technologies come and go (NiCad, MiMH, Li-ION, LiPo) I’ve learned it is never good to hard charge Lithium batteries. Charge them slow. Never run them under 10% and never store them at full charge. Perhaps car companies are using voodoo on their battery packs?
Give me gas,give me liberty and keep your ev’s
I will start taking a picture of my car at each charging station just in case there is a problem.
We only charge our Tesla at home. Don’t trust public chargers.
Very similar to purchasing water-contaminated gasoline.
I have been aware of the problems with EA with plenty of nightmares posted online, and avoided buying a car that was not a Tesla. I did not want to get stuck having to use a unrelyabel brand x charging station. It is simple that VW has not done us any favors after dieselgate and their punishment of building out the EA network.
The same gasoline nozzle that fills my 2022 Silverado High Country will also fill my 1973 VW Bug safely and reliably.
EV’S 25.1 fires per 100,000 sales. That’s compared to 3,474 hybrid fires and 1,529 ICE fires per 100,000 sales respectively.
You might want to consider these figures the next time you stick that nozzle you know where. It also might be reason to reconsider your purchasing habits. Since my statement below is a new recall, I wonder how much that might increase the totals for ICE?
FORD CRACKED FUEL INJECTOR RECALL ISSUED AFTER FIRES
Ford recalls 634,000 Bronco Sports and Escapes following 20 fires and four injuries.
Who’s giving up on Ford’s!
Waiting to see electricity rates in the West when the Glen Canyon and Lake Mead dams no longer produce electricity because of low water. They will go up but how high?
Are there people in the tRump cult that would stoop to sabotage these public chargers?