Another public charging station (Irschenberg)

Deutsche Version
Last weekend I made a trip to the area south of Munich. As I passed a gas station near the autobahn exit of Irschenberg, I noticed a sign advertising a charging station for electric cars. I turned round and drove to the gas station to make a test charge.
There was a charging station from the power suplier e.on similar to the one I used in Starnberg. But it was a newer version with the new standard power plugs that I need for 32A charging.

Charging station at a OMV gas station at Wendling/Irschenberg.

At the cash desk I got an identification card to get access to the charging station. I spent 20 Euros deposit for the card, but electricity was free.
After identification via the card the flaps unlocked, I plugged in and the car started to charge.

MINI E #014 charging.

I took a coffee at the shop to give the car a couple of minutes to get some energy. Suddenly I remembered that there was a sticker on the charging stations power plug that said: max. 16A. And I reminded that the charging selector of the MINI E was set to 32A!

So, as I returned to the car the charging had stopped. Even worse, as I tried to end the charging operation by using the identification card once again the charging station aborted the ending procedure.It looked like the system software crashed. No reaction. This really means trouble because the Mennekes plug on the one side of the car's charging cord was still mechanically locked to the charging station and so the charging cord could not be removed. I remembered a former incident at a different charging station where I had to leave the cord at the station.

Locked charging cord plug. The symbol above on the flap illustrates an IEC 62196-2 Type II plug.

Fortunately an employee and the owner of the gas station came by to have a look on the MINI E. I explained the situation (and the MINI E) and after some more failed attempts with the card the owner opened the station with his key.
The circuit breaker of the power plug I connected the car was turned off. After the circuit breaker was turned on again the system still didn't release the charging cord. So the charging station needed a complete shut down via the main switch to restart the system software. Finally the locking mechanism released the plug.
In the meantime I set the charging rate of the MINI to 13A to make another try. The system software still was so confused that it did not recognize the identification card properly. So we tried a different card from the shop and then all worked well.

The problem was that the charging station was converted to the new IEC 62196-2 Type II plugs, but an additional module to detect the power connectors pilot contact was not installed immediately and planned to be done later. IEC 62196-1 regulates that a plug without pilot contact is limited to 16A. So with the missing module to detect the pilot contact there was a gap of #014's demand on 32A and the allowed 16A. As a result the circuit breaker got in action and the system software could not handle this incident.
At the gas station manned 24h a day this is not a big problem, but at a charging station located anywhere an unreleaseable charging cord would cause serious trouble.

In summary it was an informative experience. I had a pleasant conversation with the owner of the gas station. A few electric cars already had used the station (once a Tesla Roadster spent an overnight charge). With the station located at a distance of 50km from Munich at an Autobahn exit it is an opportunity when going to the south by an EV.

MINI E meets Mae West

 Deutsche Version
The MINI E is a prototype car which is BMW's  first step of introducing electric cars to the market.
Based on the actual BMW MINI the MINI E has a conventional steel body frame. Due to the additional weight of the heavy batteries the car is quite heavy for it's size.

To compensate the batteries weight on future electric cars, weight reduction by using leightweight materials is inevitable.

The all electric BMW i3 features a new car body concept existing of an aluminium chassis containing the batteries and the drivetrain - the drive-module- and a CFRP (Carbon Fibre Reinforced Plastic) module which shapes the passengers cabin - the life module.

The use of CFRP in the automotive industrie is limited at present to high performance cars with very low production output due to high cost and the production process based on manual work.
For the i3 BMW develops new automated production processes for CFRP to reduce the cost and make the material available for mass production.

So the i3 will be the first automobile with high output mostly consisting of CFRP.

BMW i3 life module of CFRP

At architecture and building industrie CFRP is not a very common material.

In the northeast of Munich, at the Effner place, a new work of art claims to be the first major architectural structure made primarily of carbon fibre.
The "Mae West" of artist Rita McBride consists of 32 tubes forming a 52m tall hyperboloid with a diameter of 32m at the ground, 19,5m at the top and 7,50m at the narrowest situation.

At the base the construction is made of steel tubes due to some structural specifications. For an optical reason the steel tubes have a carbon fibre cover. But above the first ring at a height of 15,5m the tubes are completely made of CFRP. Every tube has a lenght of 42m and a weight of 550kg (compared to 3500kg if made of steel).
Here you can find some pictures of the production of these carbon fibre tubes.

So maybe this is the beginning of a wider use of CFRP at building industry.

Skyline of Munich's northeast with  Westin Grand Hotel - Sheraton Arabellapark Hotel / Mae West /  Hypo Vereinsbank-Building

All steel MINI E in front of Mae West with steel basement and CFRP superstructures 

I admit that a BMW i3 and the Mae West would have been a better couple for the photos. Due to the lack of an i3 I took the MINI E ;)

Charging at TÜV Starnberg public station

Deutsche Version
Yesterday we made a short trip to Lake Starnberg near Munich. I found out, that at the TÜV-office (technical inspection agency) in Starnberg the power supplier e.on operates a public charging station.
I tried out my charging station identifaction card which we were told that this card is planned to be accepted by e.on-powered charging stations. But it failed.

I walked inside the TÜV-office and asked the friendly employee how to deal with the charging station. It seemed clear to be a very unusual request. After consulting his boss he gave me their own card for free.

Unfortunately the charging station was an older model with two 32A CEE plugs and two 13A common Schuko plugs. There were no 32A IEC 62196 Type-II plugs.
So I had to charge via the adapter at 230V/13A.

Charging via the adapter due to the lack of a new standard power plug

We had lunch at a near restaurant  for about 1.5 hours. In the meantime #014 draw about 4.5kWh of sun generated energy provided by the solar roof panels installed at the top of the TÜV-building.
 

MINI E charging at TÜV Starnberg