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AnonymousVery excited to say that I collected my new ZOE this week and am very pleased.
It’s a ZOE intens, black with armrest and DAB.One issue has I had not been aware off was the charging noise.
On plugging in and after the checks there is a very loud high pitched electric noise. The sort that could scare off cats…
I took it back to my local dealer, first to a Nissan charger and the same noise was present then to Renault and Ditto. On plugging in the Demo car a similar noise was present but a lot quieter.
They advised me that it may just because it is new and needs time to settle in. Has anyone had a similar problem or is this normal?sounds normal to me!
This has been a recurring complaint over the Zoe charger.
It ‘sounds’ (as in, the complaints I have read) awful. I could not stand that. Other car chargers, eg my Fluence, are entirely silent. It may have been signed off by an aged Renault engineer with high-pitched deafness.
I think it should be regarded as an unacceptable design fault if it falls within the audible range of folks with good hearing.
I too was concerned about this having read about it prior to getting our Zoe, but thankfully ours is virtually silent when changing. I would reject it as faulty.
Part of the problem with these sorts of things is people respond to noise differently. Some folks are, clearly, capable of ignoring noises or ‘writing them off’ as trivial, and do so routinely and very easily (this seems to include vehicle technicians – it is probably in the job description!!). At the other extreme, I find almost all noises a tiresome intrusion and having hearing to 25kHz most can’t even hear the noises I hear, let alone get annoyed by them.
[I used to cruise around the large open-plan office space at work when I could hear a CRT monitor starting to whistle. People had no idea why I went around occasionally punching the odd monitor here and there, which seemed to stop them for a while. A combination of LCD monitors coming in, together with an age related high pitch deafness creeping in, have seen an end to that particular habit of mine!]
It is difficult to explain and justify to someone to act to replace a noisy and irritating motor, for example, when it doesn’t bother them personally. By a strange co-incidence the noisiest of devices/motors/etc. always seem to find their way to me. I always seem to end up with noisier kit than others with the same products!!
My ZOE has quite a noisy high pitched whine while charging, but it’s in the garage at home so not really a problem (interestingly, you can hear the same high pitched sound by the consumer unit at the other end of the house while it’s charging). I charged it at another EV owners home – and he couldn’t hear it at all.
When away from home I use it as a very clear indication (to me anyway) that charging is actually happening.
I do think our Zoe has got quieter when charging. Initially I found it quite loud, actually more noticeable than loud, but now it’s fine. I have to stop and listen to hear it when charging, so there is some merit in what the dealer is saying – in my case anyway.
Conversely, I think the car is noisier when driving – I hear the whine of the motor more – but perhaps that’s because I’m driving it harder!
I had my dealer bring there demo car to check all was ok with my home charger before delivery and found that it also made quite a loud noise while charging. I’ll need to wait till the end of the month to find out if my zoe will be the same i hope not as i don’t think my neighbours will be too impressed!
Steve
Steve, I’m not sure if it helps but the noise seems to be proportional to the power of charging. Fast charging can be very loud. Conversely, slow charging can be quite quiet. It’s obviously not an ideal solution, but if you had a 16A charge point, or even better the 10A charge cable, it would be quieter for your neighbours (if it turns out to really be a problem).
Our Zoe is virtually silent when charging at 7kW with some fan/inverter noise at 22kw, but not excessive. Maybe some cars have different types of electronics?
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