Tesla has began to open some Supercharger stations to non-Tesla EV drivers within the US. EV boosters and influencers have been converging on the half-dozen or so “open” stations within the state of New York to check out the system and share a number of the good and dangerous factors.

In a latest video, Marques Brownlee walks us by the method of charging a non-Tesla at a Supercharger. He’s the primary one to reach on the station, and issues begin off easily—he chooses a charging stall utilizing the Tesla app, a nifty little adapter referred to as the Magic Dock is robotically unlocked, and he plugs in and fortunately begins charging.

As soon as an assortment of non-Tesla EVs present up, nevertheless, issues get bizarre. Supercharger websites have been designed for Teslas, which all have their charging ports within the aft port nook. Different EVs have charging ports far and wide—some on the left, some on the proper, some on the entrance grill, some just a few toes again on the ahead quarter panel.

Fellow EV advocate Tom Moloughney reveals up in a Ford F-150 Lightning, and getting the plug to click on in requires stretching it to its restrict. Different EVs can’t get the cable to achieve except they park throughout multiple area—I for one don’t wish to see how that works out at a crowded Supercharger web site at rush hour.

Within the weeks to return, we’ll certainly see an avalanche of tales about twine size troubles. The apparent resolution—making the cables longer—is already within the works, however this can be a bit extra complicated than it sounds, because of the Superchargers’ fashionable design. Tesla has had some months of expertise doing this in Europe, so hopefully a sublime resolution will probably be discovered earlier than too many street rage incidents erupt.

Some commenters have identified one other potential subject— Tesla’s requirement that drivers use its branded app is an excellent advertising alternative, nevertheless it might run afoul of state and federal rules that mandate open entry. A controversial California rule seems to require that new public EV chargers present bank card readers (which Superchargers don’t have), and particularly prohibits suppliers from requiring “a subscription or membership.” (See additionally CARB’s EVSE Requirements Regulation.)

Teslarati experiences that Tesla at the moment requires outsiders to pay $12.99 per 30 days for a Supercharging membership.

The Bipartisan Infrastructure Regulation mandates various consumer-protection requirements for federally-funded EV chargers. Certainly one of these is that drivers should not be required to make use of a number of apps and accounts to cost—a single methodology of identification should work throughout all chargers.

Certainly one of Tesla’s causes for opening up the Superchargers was certainly to make future installations eligible for federal funding, so it’ll finally have to determine a option to adjust to the letter of those and different state and native rules.

Sources: Auto Focus (YouTube), State Of Cost (YouTube), Electrek, Teslarati