Which home charging point?

[theboss]

enk-79 said:

would it not be better to look at a DC rather than an AC charger? Cars that can cope with 22kw AC are getting rarer, and if on 3 phase why not go for 50kw DC?

What makes you think 22kW cars are getting rarer?

It’s standard on few but a cost option on loads more cars than was the case when I first started driving them 4 years ago.

DC would require significantly more expensive hardware and its doubtful a DNO would grant the capacity for residential units.

[RyanDD]

enk-79 said:

would it not be better to look at a DC rather than an AC charger? Cars that can cope with 22kw AC are getting rarer, and if on 3 phase why not go for 50kw DC?

You don't need the 50kW DC as that would mean a serious upgrade to the supply. Using the 3phase supply you can happily run a 20kW CCS2 DC EVSE.

The reason why people don't often have a DC EVSE at home is cost!

[CivicDuties]

Genuinely, hardly anybody needs fast charging at home. Someone doing 250 miles a day, every day, maybe needs something which can recharge a 64kwh car in 10 hours or so. But other than that? It's totally overblown. Most people are home by 7pm, and out no earlier than 6am. 10-11 hours charging, whilst you eat, sleep, defecate, shower, eat and dress, at 7kw, will suffice for most people.

I've been driving EV and charging at home for 7 years now, I've got a 3kw charger and it's fine. In fact, I'd probably have been fine off a 3-pin.

Some others will need better than I've got, but 50kw at home? Absolutely unnecessary in the vast majority of cases, overly expensive, and detrimental to your car's battery.

[5s Alive]

CivicDuties said:

Genuinely, hardly anybody needs fast charging at home. Someone doing 250 miles a day, every day, maybe needs something which can recharge a 64kwh car in 10 hours or so. But other than that? It's totally overblown. Most people are home by 7pm, and out no earlier than 6am. 10-11 hours charging, whilst you eat, sleep, defecate, shower, eat and dress, at 7kw, will suffice for most people.

I've been driving EV and charging at home for 7 years now, I've got a 3kw charger and it's fine. In fact, I'd probably have been fine off a 3-pin.

Some others will need better than I've got, but 50kw at home? Absolutely unnecessary in the vast majority of cases, overly expensive, and detrimental to your car's battery.

I have 7kW at home but usually charge at 4kW. Our neighbour called Kia to ask where the hell his included rapid charging cable was. "Why can't I charge in 40 minutes?" I explained this to him but I'm sure he thinks the garage is taking the piss.

Also had to explain the function of his evse's load limiter when his car failed to start a charge. His house is all electric, heating, showers cooker etc and all were in use at the time. "It worked fine all through the summer!" Err well, yes. Looks like I'm crap at explaining things.

[df76]

Just had the Powerverse “deal” vchrgd unit fitted. Looks good and slots nicely into a gap on the wall, much smaller than I expected. Ready for solar if needed and all managed over WiFi, with app seeming to be ok. Will probably just sit there in a “dumb mode” whilst OI is used, but all connected and running ok without too much fuss.

[No ideas for a name]

df76 said:

Just had the Powerverse “deal” vchrgd unit fitted. Looks good and slots nicely into a gap on the wall, much smaller than I expected. Ready for solar if needed and all managed over WiFi, with app seeming to be ok. Will probably just sit there in a “dumb mode” whilst OI is used, but all connected and running ok without too much fuss.

Approval from me - looks a reasonable install an the installer hasn't put 'stuff' in the meter enclosure.

[105.4]

Could anyone share their recommendations for which twin EV charger to go for please? Just bought my first EV today, so i appreciate that I’m doing things a bit back-to-front.

As there will likely be a second EV on the driveway by the end of the year, a twin charger is a must. Untethered would be my preference, and the longer the warranty period the better.

We are currently with Octopus, but the maths doesn’t work in our favour switching to their EV tariff as most of our electrical usage is during the day.

In advance, many thanks

edited to add;
7.3kw dual charger. Untethered. Five year warranty.

https://www.electricpoint.com/project-ev-eva-07d-s...

What are your thoughts on the above please?

Edited by 105.4 on Sunday 21st April 22:50

[fatjon]

105.4 said:

Could anyone share their recommendations for which twin EV charger to go for please? Just bought my first EV today, so i appreciate that I’m doing things a bit back-to-front.

As there will likely be a second EV on the driveway by the end of the year, a twin charger is a must. Untethered would be my preference, and the longer the warranty period the better.

We are currently with Octopus, but the maths doesn’t work in our favour switching to their EV tariff as most of our electrical usage is during the day.

In advance, many thanks

edited to add;
7.3kw dual charger. Untethered. Five year warranty.

https://www.electricpoint.com/project-ev-eva-07d-s...

What are your thoughts on the above please?

Edited by 105.4 on Sunday 21st April 22:50

My advice, don’t go near the Project EV one.
Mine was temperamental as hell. Had to get rid and replace at my expense after weeks of waiting for them to come out and fix it. Wifi and network crashing, rebooting itself, app a bit flaky too.

[andburg]

Look at all the Ev tariffs around and fine one that works with them.

I’ve had no issues with my hypervolt but it’s not supported on any of the reduced cost tariffs.

[105.4]

fatjon said:

My advice, don’t go near the Project EV one.
Mine was temperamental as hell. Had to get rid and replace at my expense after weeks of waiting for them to come out and fix it. Wifi and network crashing, rebooting itself, app a bit flaky too.

Thanks John. Appreciated

[mikeiow]

105.4 said:

Could anyone share their recommendations for which twin EV charger to go for please? Just bought my first EV today, so i appreciate that I’m doing things a bit back-to-front.

As there will likely be a second EV on the driveway by the end of the year, a twin charger is a must. Untethered would be my preference, and the longer the warranty period the better.

We are currently with Octopus, but the maths doesn’t work in our favour switching to their EV tariff as most of our electrical usage is during the day.

In advance, many thanks

edited to add;
7.3kw dual charger. Untethered. Five year warranty.

https://www.electricpoint.com/project-ev-eva-07d-s...

What are your thoughts on the above please?

So this is your first foray into EV.

Why untethered?
Getting cables out of the boot every few days, through rain and snow in winter, would be a proper faff, IMHO.

Just spinning two turns on our Zappi adds almost zero time in comparison.

I guess it depends on your house/driveway, but I would always go tethered. Can look tidy, minimise faff!



No idea if you can even get a tethered twin unit for home use, but how often would you need both plugged in?
I guess https://www.electricpoint.com/hydra-jovi-ev-charge... might look a bit “petrol station”, but if I really had to have two, I’d look at that.

I feel that most people could easily get by with a single tethered port and a quality granny plug (3-pin).
3-pin might average 2.3kWh charge rate, so if you have 10+ hours overnight, you should get 23kWh filled up, which would add perhaps 60-100miles of range. If you regularly (ie, most days’ need a ‘full tank’ with 250-300 miles, I would keep an ICE on the driveway for now…
Could that work for you?

[clockworks]

105.4 said:

Could anyone share their recommendations for which twin EV charger to go for please? Just bought my first EV today, so i appreciate that I’m doing things a bit back-to-front.

As there will likely be a second EV on the driveway by the end of the year, a twin charger is a must. Untethered would be my preference, and the longer the warranty period the better.

We are currently with Octopus, but the maths doesn’t work in our favour switching to their EV tariff as most of our electrical usage is during the day.

In advance, many thanks

edited to add;
7.3kw dual charger. Untethered. Five year warranty.

https://www.electricpoint.com/project-ev-eva-07d-s...

What are your thoughts on the above please?

Edited by 105.4 on Sunday 21st April 22:50

Do the maths carefully.

I'm on Octopus Go, and with a bit of load shifting (washing, dishwasher, immersion heater) it works out a few pennies a day cheaper than their standard tariff.
On days when I charge my plug-in hybrid, I save about £1.50.

With a BEV that's used daily, I'd be surprised if Go or Intelligent Go didn't work out cheaper

[105.4]

mikeiow said:

So this is your first foray into EV.

Why untethered?
Getting cables out of the boot every few days, through rain and snow in winter, would be a proper faff, IMHO.

Just spinning two turns on our Zappi adds almost zero time in comparison.

I guess it depends on your house/driveway, but I would always go tethered. Can look tidy, minimise faff!



No idea if you can even get a tethered twin unit for home use, but how often would you need both plugged in?
I guess https://www.electricpoint.com/hydra-jovi-ev-charge... might look a bit “petrol station”, but if I really had to have two, I’d look at that.

I feel that most people could easily get by with a single tethered port and a quality granny plug (3-pin).
3-pin might average 2.3kWh charge rate, so if you have 10+ hours overnight, you should get 23kWh filled up, which would add perhaps 60-100miles of range. If you regularly (ie, most days’ need a ‘full tank’ with 250-300 miles, I would keep an ICE on the driveway for now…
Could that work for you?

Thanks for your reply Mike.

Yes, this is our first EV, (a Kangoo Maxi van), although we expect an additional EV, (Maxus e-Deliver 3), to be on our driveway before the end of the year. Both vehicles use the Type-2 plugs. The Kangoo is slow charge only and we are looking for dual chargers.

The Kangoo has a max range of 120 miles, whilst the Maxus has a range of 190 miles. This would mean that the Kangoo would require charging every day, with the Maxus needing charging every other day. During Nov / Dec / Jan, my Wife and I wouldn’t be getting back home from work until 21:00, (or later), and both leaving for work again at 06:30. Hence the requirement to have both vehicles on charge at the same, (short) timescale.

Untethered would be our preference due to what we have read about UV light degrading tethered charging cables.

We live in an old dairy milking shed. Unfortunately we have little faith in the quality of the electrical works carried out by the cowboy developers, plus the Kangoo takes up to 16 hours to charge via a granny charger. These two factors combined result in our reluctance to charge via a granny charger.


Do any of you chaps have any thoughts or experiences of these EVEC chargers please?

https://chargepointev.co.uk/shop/evec

[Buzz84]

fatjon said:

105.4 said:

Could anyone share their recommendations for which twin EV charger to go for please? Just bought my first EV today, so i appreciate that I’m doing things a bit back-to-front.

As there will likely be a second EV on the driveway by the end of the year, a twin charger is a must. Untethered would be my preference, and the longer the warranty period the better.

We are currently with Octopus, but the maths doesn’t work in our favour switching to their EV tariff as most of our electrical usage is during the day.

In advance, many thanks

edited to add;
7.3kw dual charger. Untethered. Five year warranty.

https://www.electricpoint.com/project-ev-eva-07d-s...

What are your thoughts on the above please?

Edited by 105.4 on Sunday 21st April 22:50

My advice, don’t go near the Project EV one.
Mine was temperamental as hell. Had to get rid and replace at my expense after weeks of waiting for them to come out and fix it. Wifi and network crashing, rebooting itself, app a bit flaky too.

And on the other hand, we have the three phase dual 22kw version of that projectEV charger at work, telephone support when installing it was quick and useful. It's used daily by multiple cars without issue at all.
Only time we had an issue was when we had a power cut that tripped the internal breakers of the charger, flicked them back on and away it went.

---

But for any charger that you may look at that has dual 7kw outlets, it would be wise to bear in mind that the full load will be 63amps, which would take up a considerable chunk of the domestic supply.
It would be advisable to make sure whatever charger you get can be used with a current coil to monitor the usage in the hose and then load balance to not overload the supply.

Alternatively, some single chargers have the ability to be linked so that two can talk to each other and a energy monitor. That way you can have the two placed separately so it's potentially more convenient to where the vehicles are parked. Or fit one now and then add the second later

We dont have an EV or PHEV but I have thought about the what it's for the future, we have a drive that wraps around meaning one car is out front and the others more down the side of the house so two physically separated chargers that communicate would suit us as they would be at point of use and would avoid trailing leads.

[theboss]

Re tethered or untethered, if you buy two chargers instead of a dual, just get one of each.

[105.4]

theboss said:

Re tethered or untethered, if you buy two chargers instead of a dual, just get one of each.

We had given that some consideration, but two single chargers, including installation costs, is practically double the cost of having one dual charger fitted.

[105.4]

Buzz84 said:

And on the other hand, we have the three phase dual 22kw version of that projectEV charger at work, telephone support when installing it was quick and useful. It's used daily by multiple cars without issue at all.
Only time we had an issue was when we had a power cut that tripped the internal breakers of the charger, flicked them back on and away it went.

---

But for any charger that you may look at that has dual 7kw outlets, it would be wise to bear in mind that the full load will be 63amps, which would take up a considerable chunk of the domestic supply.
It would be advisable to make sure whatever charger you get can be used with a current coil to monitor the usage in the hose and then load balance to not overload the supply.

Alternatively, some single chargers have the ability to be linked so that two can talk to each other and a energy monitor. That way you can have the two placed separately so it's potentially more convenient to where the vehicles are parked. Or fit one now and then add the second later

We dont have an EV or PHEV but I have thought about the what it's for the future, we have a drive that wraps around meaning one car is out front and the others more down the side of the house so two physically separated chargers that communicate would suit us as they would be at point of use and would avoid trailing leads.

Thank you for that Buzz

My apologies, but I’m not an electrician, Ohms Law confuses me, and I am a bit thick.

Let me see if I understand the gist of what you are saying?

Is your concern that if one vehicle is plugged in and charging at 7kw/h, and then a second vehicle is plugged in and charging at 7kw/h, such a high flow rate of electricity could overload (trip?) the rest of the house now that 14kw/h is running through the charger?

Or have I missed your point here?


If I have understood you correctly, then the tech specs of the EVEC charger state that if a second vehicle is plugged in, the 7kw/h ‘flow’ is then split between both vehicles, so that they are each receiving 3.5kw/h.

[Buzz84]

105.4 said:

Thank you for that Buzz

My apologies, but I’m not an electrician, Ohms Law confuses me, and I am a bit thick.

Let me see if I understand the gist of what you are saying?

Is your concern that if one vehicle is plugged in and charging at 7kw/h, and then a second vehicle is plugged in and charging at 7kw/h, such a high flow rate of electricity could overload (trip?) the rest of the house now that 14kw/h is running through the charger?

Or have I missed your point here?

If I have understood you correctly, then the tech specs of the EVEC charger state that if a second vehicle is plugged in, the 7kw/h ‘flow’ is then split between both vehicles, so that they are each receiving 3.5kw/h.

No your not thick in any way, you follow exactly right.

I didn't check the specs of the EVEC charger to see that it shares the 7kw between the outlets, so in reality if you are going to select that charger you can probably ignore all of what I have said!
I did check and saw that the dual outlet ProjectEV charger is capable of charging two vehicles at 7kw each, so has a total requirement for 14Kw. (that's where it it important to research and check the specs!)

But to just build on it anyway as a form of explanation:

If we use an example of a 100A supply that means there is 23Kw of power incoming to the house, the Project EV dual charger example, that can take 14Kw, which leaves 9kw left to run the house.
Imagine the scene - you get home, you could do all sorts over the course of the evening. Stick the kettle on (3kw), stick the oven (3kw +), use the electric shower (3kw), put on the washing machine (1.5kw), it gets dark so the lights go on (less significant these days due to LEDs), tv and whatever else may go on.
While its not enough to trip the individual RCB's in the board it could all accumulate to over 100A and blow the main incoming fuse. and that's with an example of the 100A fuse, some properties can have 60A or 80A main fuses depending on the configuration of the power supply to the house.

Because of this some manufactures are including the ability for their chargers to connect to an energy monitor and can tell what the house is using so that it ramp back down and only uses the "spare" capacity to keep the total household use within the limits of the incoming supply.

Obviously now you have pointed out the EVEC charger splits the load 3.5/3.5 for dual charging and only ever totals 7kw its not going to be likely,

But with more and more cars being EV/PHEV, them getting bigger batteries requiring longer charge times, households having multiple cars converting over to them, etc etc. I can see that the demand for dual or multiple separate charger installs will increase and mean things like above will need to be considerations.

[blank]

I really like the idea of a 7kW dual charger that can balance 7kW between 2 vehicles.

Unfortunately I would not buy anything ProjectEV as they're very much a case of "buy cheap buy twice". They're rebranded ATESS units from China and the UK team know virtually nothing about how anything works.

If I was getting a charger now it would probably be an Ohme as they're most widely supported on smart tariffs.

[Evanivitch]

CivicDuties said:

Genuinely, hardly anybody needs fast charging at home.

7kW is fast charging.

You mean Rapid.