P0D3C: Battery Charger A Input Current Sensor Circuit Intermittent/Erratic
What to do
The car will normally still drive. Charging may fail, or may trip the charge point. If it repeatedly trips a breaker, stop using that supply and have the car checked — do not fit a larger breaker.
What this code means
The circuit for the sensor measuring the alternating current the charger draws from the supply is faulty.
This sensor is how the charger obeys the charge point. The Control Pilot states a maximum current (P0CF3), and the only way the charger can honour it is by measuring what it is actually drawing and backing off. Remove the measurement and the limit becomes a suggestion.
Which is why a fault here has an effect out of proportion to the part. A sensor reading low tells the charger it has headroom it does not have, so the charger pushes further — and the charge point trips, or worse, does not. That is the mechanism behind P0D2A, and behind charge connectors that arrive at a shop discoloured by heat.
The tell is a car that trips one charge point and not another. A supply close to its rating will trip; a generous one will simply deliver more current than it should, silently. So a car that charges fine at a public rapid point and repeatedly trips a domestic socket has not proved the socket is faulty.
The signal comes and goes. Found by moving the harness and connector with the reading live, not by a static resistance measurement — an intermittent that can be measured at rest is not intermittent any more.
Likely causes
Start here
- Faulty on-board charger · specialist
- Corroded or loose connector · specialist
Less common
- Open circuit in sensor wiring · specialist
- Damaged wiring harness · specialist
- Failed sensor reference voltage supply · specialist
Symptoms
Components involved
Information, not instruction
CarGeek is a reference, not a service manual. Its pages are written from public sources and from what other people have found, never from a manufacturer's own service information, so they can be wrong or incomplete for your particular vehicle. Some of what they describe carries real risk: high voltage, fuel under pressure, stored energy, hot and moving parts.
Have anything you intend to act on checked by a trained person against the manufacturer's own procedure for your vehicle. Nothing here replaces that procedure.
Community experience
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