Inside ChargePoint’s Advanced Test Facility: Reliability, Stress Testing, and EV Charger Insights

As electric vehicle (EV) adoption accelerates, the performance and reliability of charging infrastructure play a pivotal role in the ownership experience. In this deep dive, we explore ChargePoint’s Advanced Test Facility—an engineering-driven hub where products are pushed to the limits through teardown insights, rigorous analysis, and accelerated lifecycle testing.

Through a guided tour led by ChargePoint’s reliability engineering team, Munro & Associates gained a firsthand look at their process. Specifically, we observed how ChargePoint builds dependable charging systems that meet the demands of diverse environments. For EV enthusiasts, automotive engineers, and investors alike, this facility exemplifies how lean design, expert analysis, and continuous improvement drive long-term performance.

Building Reliability from the Ground Up

Reliability is engineered into ChargePoint products long before mass production. As explained during the tour, the process starts early—at the product architecture phase. The engineering team actively applies lessons from predecessor designs, guiding material selection and printed circuit board assembly (PCBA) design.

By engaging at this early stage, they ensure operating conditions include built-in safety margins, which are essential for long-term reliability. Furthermore, through failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA), they systematically identify potential risks, apply cross-functional input, and develop a roadmap for rigorous validation.

A Comprehensive Testing Lifecycle

Once prototypes are developed, ChargePoint enters a structured validation cycle: Engineering Validation Testing (EVT), Design Validation Testing (DVT), and Production Validation Testing (PVT). Each stage subjects products to increasingly demanding scenarios:

EVT: Initial validation of design choices and early failure discovery
DVT: Testing production-intent designs for durability
PVT: Confirming mass production units meet long-term field expectations

Crucially, the process is iterative. When failures occur, they trigger immediate root cause analysis, followed by corrective actions and revalidation. Through this continuous feedback loop, ChargePoint helps ensure that products shipping today will maintain their reliability for years into deployment.

Simulating a Decade in Weeks

To accelerate learning, ChargePoint runs waterfall-style stress tests that simulate 10 to 14 years of field life in just 4 to 8 weeks. Testing spans multiple stress categories:

Mechanical stress: Impact, vibration, and connector cycling
Environmental stress: Temperature extremes, UV exposure, dust, water ingress, and salt spray
Operational stress: Continuous functional cycling under real-world use cases

Each test sample—whether a full system, sub-assembly, or PCBA—is subjected to sequences of 7 to 10 tests. Automated checkpoints ensure functionality remains intact at every stage.

Operational Testing: The Heart of Field Reliability

Operational stress testing is at the core of ChargePoint’s methodology. Systems operate 24/7 in an accelerated environment of up to 50°C, cycling through all key functions:

Charging output
Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity
Display performance
LED cycling

To simulate real-world charging events, sophisticated loads mimic vehicle interactions. As a result, testing continues for months, compressing years of operational cycles into a controlled window.

Preparing for Harsh Realities

Recognizing that chargers face diverse environments—from Arizona’s desert heat to coastal salt exposure—ChargePoint subjects its products to a gauntlet of additional tests:

Salt spray and salt fog: Combatting corrosion on external and internal components
Water ingress: Heavy rain, pressure washing, flooding scenarios, and aged seal testing
Impact resistance: IK10 impact-rated systems withstand 20-joule forces even at extreme temperatures
Hail simulation: High-impact tests for resilience against severe weather events
Vibration and drop: Simulating transport abuse and field handling
Dust storms: Arizona-certified desert dust used to stress airflow pathways and contacts

Extreme Temperatures and UV Exposure

With over a dozen environmental chambers capable of cycling from -70°C to +155°C, ChargePoint validates performance under the full range of possible conditions.

Thermal cycling, freezing condensation, and long-term UV exposure tests all play a key role in ensuring the durability of plastics, coatings, and electronic components. By addressing these environmental factors up front, ChargePoint builds resilience into every system.

Logical test sequences—such as UV aging followed by impact or drop testing—replicate real-world degradation pathways. External components like connectors and touch surfaces also undergo chemical resistance testing against artificial sweat, sunscreen, and common cleaning agents.

Addressing Real-World Scenarios

ChargePoint engineers are acutely aware that EV chargers share space with the realities of daily life. Stations positioned at convenience stops or restaurants may, in fact, encounter food contamination. To account for this, testing even includes exposure to condiments such as ketchup, mustard, and vinegar—combined with UV and temperature aging for realistic wear simulation.

Seismic Resilience

In earthquake-prone regions such as California, ChargePoint validates chargers to withstand seismic zone 2 earthquakes—simulating magnitude 6 quakes across multiple axes while the system remains operational.

Additionally, all packaging and shipping profiles are validated through vibration and rotational drop testing. Packages destined for commercial freight or small parcel networks each follow corresponding industry protocols.

In-House Failure Analysis: Closing the Loop

Key to ChargePoint’s lean manufacturing and reliability culture is its in-house failure analysis (FA) lab. Outfitted with:

Scanning electron microscope (SEM) with EDS capability
X-ray systems
Cross-sectioning tools
PCB debug stations

The FA lab provides rapid insights when failures occur—pinpointing whether issues stem from design, materials, or process. Learnings from the lab feed directly into iterative improvements, accelerating product maturity.

Preparing for a Rapidly Evolving Industry

The charging industry is still young. As new use cases and stresses emerge, ChargePoint’s advanced test facility provides the agility to adapt quickly.

Whether qualifying new standards such as the North American Charging Standard (NACS) cable or refining system resilience, this facility ensures ChargePoint’s products evolve alongside market needs.

All in all, for automotive engineers, the teardown insights and rigorous testing at this lab clearly highlight how expert-driven validation can differentiate EV infrastructure. Likewise, for EV enthusiasts and investors, it offers assurance that product reliability is engineered—not merely assumed.

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