Real Owners. Real Experience. Real Answers.

Is Charging to 100% Harmful?

I have a Kona electric, 2022.  Is it OK for me to charge it up to 100% when I go to Lincoln City? Will I be able to find charging stations in Lincoln City without being a member of any charging network?

Here is our answer:

Charging to 100% for an occasional road trip should not have any long-term negative impact on your battery.  When on a road trip, do what you need to do to comfortably make it to your next destination.  

Regarding finding public chargers, use an app like Plugshare or A Better Route Planner to see the available chargers.  You can check these out prior to your trip to determine if you need to join a charging network, but most of them do not require this.  

A quick look on Plugshare shows just a couple of DC fast chargers (CCS1, 50kW) at the Lincoln City Cultural Center plus some level 2 chargers scattered about.  These apps all work a bit differently, so it's best to spend some time with one or more of them to become familiar with it before you need to rely on it while on a trip.  Plugshare is available as an app and online at plugshare.com.  Hyundai EV's also have built-in route planning, but I find that I like the third party apps more than my OEM route planning.  I don't know anything about the Hyundai route planning specifically however (I drive a Ford).

Lastly, Hyundai has announced that access to Tesla superchargers will be available "sometime" in Q1 of this year, although I haven't seen a specific date.  When that is available, you will then be able to also use Tesla DC fast chargers / Superchargers (250kW, Version 3 or later) with the addition of a CCS1 to Tesla / NACS adapter, which will greatly expand the number of DC fast chargers available to you.

Have a great trip!

Charging Non-Tesla EVs on Tesla Superchargers

We have a Ford Lightning (all thanks to your big event last summer at the Portland Tesla dealership I might add!) and apparently Ford has partnered with Tesla to allow access to their network of superchargers—which is a good thing! But there’s a distinction of some sort between superchargers, and I’m not sure what that is... the Ford website says we can only use an “upgraded Tesla Supercharger” for charging a non-Tesla EV. What do they mean by that? What’s an “upgraded” Tesla Supercharger, and how do we determine which stations have them? I was told the Detroit OR supercharger is NOT an upgraded station (which we would need to use on our way to Sisters)... so apparently we’d need to stop in Salem to get a full charge before going over the Santiam Pass, which we can do—it’s just less convenient.

The second question I have is regarding the new supercharger they recently opened up in Sisters... is THAT ONE an “upgraded” charger? (I sure hope so!)

Here is our answer:

I'm glad to hear you got an EV, and the Lightning is quite a vehicle. I love how all the EV truck models are including AC power output. They can really help when there is a power outage, like we had last winter when the temperatures were in the teens and the power went out for days.

Tesla released their style of charging connector for others to use, calling it the North America Charging Standard, NACS. For vehicles using a CCS connector like yours, you must use an adapter (available for your truck from Ford) to connect between the Tesla cable on the supercharger to the CCS connector on your Lightning. So mechanically using an adapter your truck and a Tesla supercharger can connect. But for the truck and the supercharger to communicate with each other the supercharger has to understand the CCS communication protocol used by your truck. Not all superchargers are able to do that.

Tesla has gone through several generations of superchargers over the years. First and second generation superchargers max out at 150 kilowatts or less, and they don't have the ability to speak the CCS protocol. The most common generation of supercharger, Version 3, tops out at 250 kilowatts. The current production V3 superchargers all support both the original Tesla communication protocol and the CCS communication protocol that your Lightning uses. Tesla has also upgraded many early V3 superchargers to speak CCS protocol.

V4 superchargers are just starting to roll out. These are expected to support 400 to 1,000 volt charging at up to 500 kilowatts, and all of them support CCS communications. V4 supercharger pedestals also have longer cables, which make them easier to connect to brands which have their charge ports in different locations than Tesla, which all have their charge port in the driver's side back corner.

While a particular V3 or V4 supercharger may be capable of communicating with your Lightning, it doesn't mean that Tesla has opened it up for use by non-Tesla vehicles. Some supercharger sites are very busy, so Tesla has limited those to only Tesla cars. As they are able to add more supercharge stalls to those sites they may open them to other brands in the future.

A very few V3 superchargers have a Magic Dock that has a built-in detachable adapter for CCS, but those are quite rare and Tesla is going with the Tesla-style NACS plug for almost all new installations. The only Magic Dock supercharger in Oregon is in Boardman.

The Detroit supercharger is an older V2 unit, so it isn't compatible with the CCS communication upgrade. So topping up at a V3 supercharger in Salem before heading east, though a bit inconvenient, is your best option at this time. As far as I've seen, all of the new superchargers, except maybe for a few 72 kW "urban" superchargers, are the 250 kW versions. The newly opened Sisters supercharger is V3 with CCS communications, and is compatible with your Lightning when you use your NACS to CCS adapter.

Supercharge.info is a great resource for looking at existing and upcoming superchargers. They have added a new feature where they tell you which superchargers have support for non-Tesla vehicles like yours. The Tesla website also has a dedicated page to NACS charging for non-Tesla vehicles at www.tesla.com/NACS.

Just pop an email to Ask and we'll take it from there. We'll send you an answer (and our thanks for helping to contribute to building our FAQ).