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A Smart EV owner gets stuck after “accidentally” plugging his car in a Tesla Supercharger

A Smart EV owner traveling in Germany claims that he “accidentally” plugged his electric Smart at a Tesla Supercharger and couldn’t unplug it. The owner sent the picture seen above to German publication Electrive.

While Tesla uses a proprietary connector in the US, in Europe the company uses the standard Mennekes Type 2 connectors, which explains how the owner of the Smart was able to plug his vehicle to a charging station meant solely for Tesla vehicles.

Once you plug it in, the connector locks to the port for safety reasons and performs a “handshake” before starting the charging session. The Smart owner presumably couldn’t unplug the connector because his car couldn’t perform the handshake.

In a post on Facebook, he claims that he wasn’t able to reach Tesla with the phone number listed at the Supercharger, so he resorted to taking a room at a nearby motel until his car could be unplugged.

Here’s the Facebook post:

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that the company was in discussion with “some auto manufacturers” about sharing the Supercharger network, but in the meantime, you need a Tesla to use the charging stations.

Hat tip to phomb for the Facebook post.

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Comments

  1. MorinMoss - 9 years ago

    When did he “accidentally” forget how to read? Is the brightly glowing TESLA sign on the SC as small IRL as it is on the page?

  2. Stephen Davies - 9 years ago

    I’ve seen Tesla Charging points right alongside other ones at Motorway(freeway) Service stations. If the plug fits as it clearly did here then it would be easy to use the wrong one.
    My concern (as a PHEV) owner is the rapid charging on a Tesla Station could overload the circuits on some other vehicles. Then? Boom! Don’t know really but it won’t end well.
    I know from my Car that using a rapid charger decreases the lifespan of the batteries quite a lot.

    • Fred Lambert - 9 years ago

      Like I said in the article, a handshake between the car and the supercharger needs to happen before any charging. Electrons will flow only if the car can support the supercharger.

    • WalksOnDirt - 9 years ago

      At this particular charging point I only see Tesla chargers. I’m sure he was thinking “It’s free and it uses the same port, what could it hurt to try?”.

  3. Roy - 9 years ago

    I guess he was not so “SMART” after all

  4. kijijigod - 9 years ago

    I wouldn’t be posting this blunder online if I did it.mm

  5. František Kubiš Jr. - 9 years ago

    I don’t understand it… Smart cars don’t have button inside to open/unlock the charge port? I think every EV has it no? How else do you want to stop charging before you have the full battery?

  6. Haryono - 9 years ago

    small car.. 😀

  7. 311sie - 9 years ago

    How in the world was this poor soul supposed to know this was a Tesla charging station??

Author

Avatar for Fred Lambert Fred Lambert

Fred is the Editor in Chief and Main Writer at Electrek.

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