Victron Charging Station NS stopped connecting to the car

Has anyone else run into connection issues between the Victron Charging Station NS and their EV?

I've got mine set up on my narrowboat's shore power hookup — using it to top up the van when we're moored somewhere with decent electrical infrastructure. It was working absolutely fine for the first couple of months, then one day it just... stopped handshaking with the car properly. The car sees the cable, but charging never initiates.

A few things I've already checked:

• Firmware is up to date on the charging station
• Tried a full power cycle (waited 5 mins before restarting)
• The CP signal looks fine on a basic multimeter check
• No other Victron kit in the loop that could be interfering

My suspicion is it might be something to do with how the NS handles the IEC 61851 communication — possibly a firmware edge case? I've seen similar threads on the Victron community forum but nothing conclusive.

For context, my setup doesn't include a GX device or VRM portal integration, so I can't pull detailed logs the way you could with a full Victron ecosystem. That's making diagnosis frustratingly difficult.

Anyone had this resolved through a settings reset rather than a hardware swap? And is there a way to force it back into a default charging profile without the full Victron app stack?

Would be particularly interested to hear from anyone running the NS as a standalone unit rather than integrated with a MultiPlus or Cerbo setup — wondering if that's where the limitation lies.

@DerekMoore89 interesting one — is it failing to handshake at all, or does it start connecting then drop out? I've been looking at the Charging Station NS for my shepherd's hut setup and I've read a few reports of the proximity pilot (PP) signal causing grief, particularly after firmware updates.

Worth checking in VictronConnect whether the unit is throwing any fault codes — sometimes it logs errors that don't show up obviously on the unit itself.

Also, which EV are you charging? Some cars are apparently fussier than others about the control pilot signal. A narrowboat's shore power setup could also introduce some earthing quirks that confuse the EVSE — is your boat's earth properly referenced to shore ground when you're moored up?

@DerekMoore89 had a similar issue charging my EV at the static caravan — turned out the EVSE was losing its CP pilot signal. Worth checking a few things methodically:

1. Is the LED on the NS showing any fault codes when it drops?
2. Have you checked the CP-to-PE resistance on the cable itself? A dodgy Type 2 lead can cause this
3. What firmware is the unit on? Victron pushed an update a while back specifically addressing handshake timeouts

Also worth looking in VictronConnect to see if there's anything logged under the device history — it's surprisingly useful for pinpointing when the dropout occurs.

@CornishBoater's question about whether it's a full handshake failure or a mid-session drop is the right one — the answer changes where you look first. Which is it, @DerekMoore89?

@BlownFuse raises a good point about the CP pilot signal — worth expanding on that. The NS model uses a Type 2 socket and the pilot circuit is very sensitive to earthing irregularities. On a narrowboat setup specifically, your PE (protective earth) path back through the shore power pedestal can be intermittent, especially with ageing marina bollards.

Before diving deeper into the EVSE firmware side, I'd check:

• Earth continuity from pedestal to your van's Type 2 inlet
• Pilot voltage — should sit at ±12V before handshake; anything below ±11V and some vehicles will refuse to negotiate
• Whether your RCD on the shore power is nuisance-tripping momentarily during the PWM duty-cycle negotiation

A cheap multimeter on the CP-to-PE pilot line during plug-in will tell you a lot quickly. The Victron Connect app logs won't always catch transient pilot faults either.

@BlownFuse and @BaySeeker have already nailed the CP pilot angle, so I won't retread that ground.

One thing I'd add from bitter experience on my own off-grid EV charging setup — check your earth continuity. The NS model has a PE detection circuit that'll refuse to handshake if it sniffs a dodgy earth, which on a narrowboat shore power hookup is exactly where earths go wobbly. Corroded connections, loose marina pillar terminals, the lot.

Grab a multimeter and verify you've got solid continuity from the EVSE earth pin back to your system earth. Should be well under 1Ω.

Also worth checking: is your supply voltage sagging under load? If you're running off an inverter, some EVs get very stroppy about voltage quality during the initial negotiation phase. The VRM portal should show you any voltage irregularities around the connection attempt — genuinely useful data there.