[RESPONDED] Diagnosing flaky charging

Framework Laptop 13 Linux
1

I’ve been running into an issue where charging will stop. When I first noticed this it was when I’d left the charger connected as it reached 100%, so I figured it was some firmware shutoff. But today this happened at 70% or so.

Running a 12th-gen DIY that shipped back in August, running Ubuntu Jammy (w/ 5.15.0-60 kernel). At this point I strongly suspect the charger itself is dodgy, but before I shell out for a new one I want to see if folks have other diagnostics I can check.

Things I’ve looked at:

  1. Unplug the charger from the extension port, and plug it back in (doesn’t work).
  2. Switch which extension port I’m using (doesn’t work).
  3. Unplug my charger from the power source and then plug it back in (works!).
  4. Using a different USB-C charger (works, but it’s not the same power specs so that’s not a permanent solution).
  5. dmesg/journald shows nothing when the charger is plugged/unplugged
  6. upower doesn’t show anything interesting
upower output 
$ upower -i /org/freedesktop/UPower/devices/battery_BAT1
  native-path:          BAT1
  vendor:               NVT
  model:                Framewo
  serial:               00B9
  power supply:         yes
  updated:              Sat 11 Feb 2023 03:52:18 PM EST (33 seconds ago)
  has history:          yes
  has statistics:       yes
  battery
    present:             yes
    rechargeable:        yes
    state:               charging
    warning-level:       none
    energy:              46.0614 Wh
    energy-empty:        0 Wh
    energy-full:         55.055 Wh
    energy-full-design:  55.0088 Wh
    energy-rate:         30.1686 W
    voltage:             17.525 V
    charge-cycles:       70
    time to full:        17.9 minutes
    percentage:          83%
    capacity:            100%
    technology:          lithium-ion
    icon-name:          'battery-full-charging-symbolic'
  History (charge):
    1676148738  83.000  charging
  History (rate):
    1676148738  30.169  charging
    1676148675  25.472  charging

Without (3) I’d say “sure, this is just a dodgy charger” but (3) makes me worry there’s some sort of spooky firmware issue here and I’m a little out of my expertise in diagnosing that kind of thing.

2

Hello and welcome!

Please contact the framework support, they’ll assist you!

3

Probably the way to go. I’ve done so and will report back here.

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4

I’d say that 3 also points in the direction of a dodgy charger. Looks like the charger is shutting down its output at some point (maybe due to an internal error or short circuit) and cutting the power from the charger resets it. This theory would also agree with all your other results.

5

My non-fw charger btw also does this, you can see this in the kernel logs.

It does this when the fw laptop does not charge and thus disconnects automatically.

It will automatically resume charging once needed though.

6

Support is your best bet here. Also be sure to indicate if you are using one of our chargers or an aftermarket charger.

7

Yup, thanks. I’ve got a support issue open. I’m using the charger that came with the laptop direct from Framework. Support had me take a video to walk them thru it and hopefully we’ll get it fixed one way or another :grinning:

1 Like