NHTSA Complaint #11426101 — 2019 CHEVROLET BOLT EV

The car’s electronics under the hood got very hot when charging at Level 2 (ChargePoint wall charger) at home at night in mild ambient conditions (low 70s deg F). The surface of the electronic component boxes on top of the engine compartment were very hot to the touch but not burning the skin. It is not clear whether the propulsion battery also got very hot or not, but later on car’s display showed that car consumed 10% of used electricity for “battery conditioning” since the last full charge, namely since the car was unplugged and started to use battery power to keep battery cooling system going. This implies that it is quite possible that the battery also got hot (>100 deg F, since this temperature is what I have had observed in the past was the trigger temperature for initiating battery conditioning/cooling, e.g. 30 minutes into fast charging - FCDC - when ambient temperature was in the low 90s). The temperature measured by electronic thermometer on the surface of one of the electronics boxes under the hood indicated 113 deg F one hour after the car was unplugged and moved out of the garage, while the ambient temperature was measured to be 72 deg F. This implies the temperature of car components was even higher an hour earlier during and right after charging. If the car continued to charge, it is possible it would be in danger of catching fire since it appears the cooling system was not able to stop electrical component temperatures from rising. As far as I am aware, this car is the only Bolt EV that has been observed to reach unexpectedly high temperatures when Level 2 charging (240V 32A = 7.6 kW) without actually catching on fire.