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[ESokoloff]

Which end? Or the whole cable?

My employer allows me to charge at work & I can get home with 60%+ left in the battery so only charge at home to insure I'm above the alleged 60% minimum battery level.
At work I use a 6' 14awg Nema 5-15 IEC 60320 C13 & find it gets hot at both ends.
At home I use the cord that came with the (used) bike. It's 10' 14awg.
The last time I used it I noticed that the plug was showing heat damage so I don't stoped using it until I could replace the plug. 
I needed to top off so I thought it would be a good time to use the stubby adapter. I used a 50' 12awg cord as it was handy. After several hrs I noticed that the adapter was alarmingly hot. 
Both ends were quite warm but the rest of the cord was not appreciably warm.

[togo]

If the ends are getting warm, you have poor contact (high resistance) at the ends.

Clean the contacts.

If you are running low voltage, to keep constant watts, your amps will go up, which is bad.

Measure the voltage.

[quixotic]

I notice that the conductors within the female plug seem to be quite recessed.  There is what looks and feels like a teflon shield in the upper part of the holes (I had a peek with a dissecting microscope).  And even they are somewhat hidden from view.  So perhaps in the past, I may have occasionally not fully plugged the cord into the bike, with the result of some arcing (?)

In any event, a new cord arrived, and so at a 90% charge, I plugged her in fully, taking careful note for the future as to where certain markings were on the plug, relative to the bike's receptacle.  It didn't take long to get fully charged, but at least during that time, I noticed no heat build-up, either at the cord ends, or on the back of the receptacle, where the heat shrink cover is.   So far, so good.

Well, I finally had a chance to do a full charge, from 50% to 100% (I don't do a lot of motorcycle commuting in Alberta in October).  Cord and plug ends were mildly warm, but nothing hot or melting.  So I suspect, as I hypothesized above, that maybe I just wasn't being very careful when plugging the cord into the bike.  All's well that ends well.

[togo]

Glad to hear it!  Don't burn anything down!

[KrazyEd]

I try to use 220 v whenever possible, never an issue with heat on cord.
I have the standard cord from Zero and a y cord of similar length that I
use. The Original cord seems to get warmer to touch than the aftermarket
one. Both seem to be 14 gauge.  The aftermarket cable seems to be thinner
than the Stock cable. Strange that it consistently feels cooler

[quixotic]

Well, I toasted another cord.  A contractor was cutting tile in the garage, so I'm wondering if the dust might've got into the female plug end.  Anyway I've got another new cord and will cross my fingers.

Wondering if it would make sense to apply a bit of dielectric grease to the contacts as a preventative measure?

[dukecola]

Your issue is your outlet. Replace it with a hospital grade and your melting problem will go away.  The HG outlets are less than $10.

[Doug S]

I'd agree with changing the outlet, not that a cheap outlet shouldn't be able to handle 12 amps (they're rated for 15 continuously), but you might have some corrosion on the internal contacts. As dukecola suggests, you might as well replace it with a quality unit while you're at it.

But even more likely than corrosion is just plain loose contacts. Outlets and plugs are designed to provide a fair amount of tension between the contacting parts, to ensure good contact and help scrub things clean when you plug and unplug, but the contacts in an older outlet have often lost a lot of their tension and don't provide a nice low-resistance connection. A new outlet will solve that, but just in case, bend the prongs of the new cable inward just a tad. Too much bend and you won't be able to plug it in, but a small amount of bend can help put some tension on the contacts in an older outlet. If the cable plugs in and out too easily, you've probably got loose contacts and are liable to build up some heat.

[BamBam]

So if a 12 AWG power cord is not available in the C13 - Nema5-15P configuration, then what is a poor Zero owner to do?  I guess you could put these two parts together and make your own cord as suggested in an earlier post, but that gets rather expensive.  There are cheaper C13 plug ends, but this one seemed to be pretty good quality.  Yes, charging from 240V would be preferred, but that is rarely available.

https://www.amazon.com/Extension-Power-Conductor-Outdoor-Entertainment/dp/B008DIYCS2/ref=sr_1_9?s=lamps-light&ie=UTF8&qid=1528319735&sr=1-9&refinements=p_n_feature_keywords_browse-bin%3A4459667011

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00917ZAEE/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

[quixotic]

Your issue is your outlet. Replace it with a hospital grade and your melting problem will go away.  The HG outlets are less than $10.

Is hospital grade the same as 20 amp?   If so, that'd be fairly easy to replace.  But I don't understand why a melting problem at the female end of the cord would be related to conductivity at the wall outlet. 

I also have a high amperage power bar between the cord and the wall, since I think that was mentioned earlier in the thread. 

Anyways, with my new cord, I guess I'll try the dielectric paste the next time I need to plug in, unless I hear something different. 

[KrazyEd]

Your shortest path might be to get a 10 AWG or 12 AWG cord and put your own ends on it. The shortest cord that will work for your situation would also help. If you don't wish to make your own cords,
It is difficult to find a standard 120 plug in something greater than 14 AWG.


https://smile.amazon.com/Superior-Electric-EC123-Feet-Electrical/dp/B002S9J5I4/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1528347953&sr=8-3&keywords=12+awg+power+cord

https://smile.amazon.com/Heavy-Rewireable-Female-Inline-Socket/dp/B00X8F8M3G/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1528350719&sr=1-2&keywords=c13+connector+-16+-18++-16awg+-18awg+%22heavy+duty%22

[quixotic]

I can easily splice in some heavier cord and change the wall outlet.  But I still don't understand how that will help things if the problem (ie, melting female plug end) is at the interface of the cord plug and the bike plug.

[Doug S]

I can easily splice in some heavier cord and change the wall outlet.  But I still don't understand how that will help things if the problem (ie, melting female plug end) is at the interface of the cord plug and the bike plug.

Oooooooh, I didn't get that it was on the bike end of the cord. Then yeah, it sounds like the outlet is fine and the cord is fine too, if those aren't heating up.

Sounds like the jack on the bike itself is failing. There have been a couple of reported problems with that -- it seems to me maybe Ben had a problem on one of his summer trips? If I remember correctly, the earlier bikes had some issues with sparking when they were plugged in, and the solution seemed to be to plug in the bike end of the cord before the outlet end. But to solve your immediate problem, I'd either have the dealer look at the jack on the bike or see if it's easily removable. It might be a fairly standard piece of hardware you could replace yourself.

[quixotic]

Unfortunately, the bike's male plug end doesn't seem to be easily removable, and unfortunately, my nearest dealer is about 1,000 kms away.  So I think I'll try the dielectric grease and then check every hour or so for plug warmth while the bike is charging. 

[Doug S]

Dielectric grease probably won't help much, it won't improve the contact resistance. It's actually an electrical insulator (that's what "dielectric" means); its job is really just to keep moisture out. It's a long-term preventative, not a cure.

If you can't replace that plug easily, clean the contacts as well as you can using a small file, pencil eraser, scraper of some sort, even a small piece of fine-grit sandpaper. Nice shiny bright copper/brass contacts should be your goal. The male contacts should have some sort of bulge or projection to create some spring force to ensure good contact with the female contact in the cord; check if these have been smashed flat, and if so, try to bend them back again to restore some spring force. Spray some contact cleaner in there, then insert the cord end in and out (with the cord not energized!) several times, hopefully helping to scrub the contacts cleaner. Also make sure you get the cord plugged in ALL THE WAY when you start charging. Maybe it's backing off a bit and you're losing contact.

If none of that helps, if the contacts are bright and shiny and you're sure you've got a good connection, but you still get heat, the contacts probably aren't the problem. It's probably the connections TO the bike plug, which are probably crimp joints. If you have a bad crimp, it'll need to be fixed. Maybe you're got a friend who's an electrician who can help you out?