How to maintain your electric vehicle charger in 2024

You’re a freshly minted EV owner. You’ve got that sleek and silent beauty sitting in the driveway and the licensed electrician just finished installing a top-tier, super smart Level 2 charger in your garage. Life is good, only now there’s a creeping doubt in the back of your mind that at some point, you’ll have to maintain that charger that’s now blinking away menacingly. Panic sets in.

Thankfully, keeping your L2 charger functioning at peak performance is ridiculously easy. Since most people have their L2 chargers installed either in a garage, a carport or on an exterior wall of their home, the biggest maintenance task you’ll have is keeping it clean.

When you're thinking about a maintenance schedule for your home EV charger, it’s always best to follow manufacturer’s guidelines. In the absence of those guidelines, we’d recommend you check out and tidy up your charger weekly. It should only take a few minutes and can save you considerable amounts of time and money down the road.

Other times that it’s worth looking in on your wall-mounted charger would include after any extreme weather events. Did you just have a massive windstorm? If your charger is mounted to an exterior wall, then it would be wise to check for damage once things calm down. Huge rainstorm? If you’re not 100% confident that your garage is waterproof, maybe check in on your charger to make sure a massive leak didn’t happen directly above it.

Keeping your charger clean

Making sure your charger is regularly wiped down to remove any accumulation of dust and dirt or, if outside, things like pine needles, pollen or bird poop will not only keep it looking good, but will ensure that any cooling vents are clear. Clear vents make for a cool charger and a cool charger is a happy, efficient and long-lived charger.

Visual inspection

The other benefit that regularly wiping down your L2 charger has is that it puts you in an excellent position to inspect for any wear or damage to the visible components. For example, if a critter has decided to chew on your charging cable, or one of your kids knocked a bowling ball off of a shelf and it hit your charge handle, you can address these concerns before they can do damage to your car, your home or you.

Modern electric vehicle chargers from reputable manufacturers are extremely robust. They can operate for years without interruption in service or noticeable degradation of their charging performance, but, like all tech, sometimes things just go wrong and repairs have to be made. While we love DIY projects as much as anyone else, you absolutely should not attempt to open or repair your charger yourself.

Physical damage

Examples of when you should call a repair technician would include finding any physical damage to any part of your charger, which is pretty much a no-brainer. If you see a frayed cord or damage insulation, stop using the charger and ideally turn off the circuit breaker that the charger is on. The same is true for damaged or broken charging handles.

Reduced performance

If you notice that your charger can no longer fully charge your vehicle in its normal timeframe – between 4 and 10 hours, typically – or if it’s stopped charging altogether, then it’s time to bring someone in. Keep in mind that other factors outside of your charger’s control could be limiting its performance. For example, if your vehicle has a malfunction or if it’s just particularly old, it may not be able to accept a charge as efficiently as specs say it should.

Weather-related damages

Other factors that limit performance include extreme heat or extreme cold, both of which are becoming increasingly common all across the country. If your outside thermometer reads 120 degrees or negative 15 degrees, it’s not reasonable to expect the same performance that you’d get if it was 72 degrees outside.

Software glitches

Something else to be aware of, especially if you have a fairly new charger with smart features like bidirectional charging or energy price monitoring, are software and firmware issues. These features are often added or tweaked via software and firmware updates and sometimes these go awry.

It’s not dissimilar to a software update causing your laptop to not work, only because charger software is a much more closed ecosystem, it’s unlikely you’ll be able to fix a problem without help from your charger manufacturer’s customer service department.

Unlike you, your Level 2 charger shouldn’t require a yearly check-up, but there are a few things you can do to help keep the repair tech away. A big one is to make sure to properly coil your charging cable after use and hang it up off the ground and out of the way. Driving over your cable, letting it sit on hot pavement or get chewed by animals will dramatically shorten equipment’s lifespan.

Another easy thing to do is avoid storing chemicals or other liquids where they can potentially spill onto your charger. Some chemicals can be corrosive to plastic or electrical components in the worst case, and will attract other dirt and debris in the best case.

If you’re a business owner or property manager, then you might be considering having some electric vehicle chargers installed for your employees or clients to use. Something you should be aware of is that because commercial chargers often see considerably more use than home chargers which get plugged in once a day, they will require more maintenance from a licensed professional. The good news is that this often only amounts to a few hundred dollars per charger, per year so you likely won’t break the bank by going down this road.