Two EVs with X1 Charger (British Gas)?

[AudiSport]

Hi all,

I’m looking for some advice, guidance or perhaps just reassurance.

We purchased our first EV 6-months ago, for my wife to drive, an Audi Q4 etron, and, it’s been a revelation. Lovely to drive, cheap to run and easy to keep charged at home with our Ohme charger.

I don’t do many miles myself, and based on the deals to be had, I’m tempted to replace my 3.0 TDI Cayenne with one of the early etron 55s, as while the range is well documented as being poor at around 180 - 200 miles, this should more than cover my needs.

My question is, how does this work with British Gas, and family charging logistics? I work from home, so I can easily charge during the day, but does this not make sense due to the high daytime charging rates? We currently have cheap nighttime charging, and I recall the daytime rate being close to 30p per KwH.

I’m sure we can aim to charge on each car on alternate nights, but what are the options for when this isn’t possible? Quick trip to the nearest charging station garage, or leave one of the cars charging via a mains socket?

Any input, suggestions or experiences would be greatly appreciated.

[B5mike]

What's your electricity supply? Single phase 100A? If you don't have 3 phase, you can install 2 single phase chargers that "share" a 32A supply. If both cars are charging, the power is shared 50/50 (i.e. 16A each). If only one car is charging, it gets the full 32A.
Tesla Wall Charger supports this configuration - the comms between the chargers that controls the total current draw is via local wi-fi, so the two chargers can be some distance apart. Not sure which other home chargers can do the same.
Obviously this set-up still has limitations when both cars are charging, but more convenient than sharing a single charger in my experience.

[ashenfie]

B5mike said:

What's your electricity supply? Single phase 100A? If you don't have 3 phase, you can install 2 single phase chargers that "share" a 32A supply. If both cars are charging, the power is shared 50/50 (i.e. 16A each). If only one car is charging, it gets the full 32A.
Tesla Wall Charger supports this configuration - the comms between the chargers that controls the total current draw is via local wi-fi, so the two chargers can be some distance apart. Not sure which other home chargers can do the same.
Obviously this set-up still has limitations when both cars are charging, but more convenient than sharing a single charger in my experience.

Pretty much any charger, you simply need one with a clamp which will limit the charger and avoid overloading. If you work from home I am surprised you would need to charge that often.

[JQ]

Does your wife need to charge every night, if not just share the charger overnight.

My wife and I shared a charger for 2 years and said charger was probably used 3 times a week in total. It really wasn’t an issue.

[Hans_Gruber]

We have 2 EVs, a Model Y and a Renault 5. 100 amp fuse, single phase, and each have their own 32amp charger. Both charge at the same time - but only scheduled to charge 12.30 to 5.30 so no risk of overloading. Far more convenient than sharing a charger.

[Liamjrhodes]

We have a Model Y and a leaf, One charger with Octopus intelligent Go

Tesla is linked to octopus so is plugged in anytime and octopus schedules the charging
Leaf uses its inbuilt timer to only charge in the cheap hours when plugged in

Leaf only goes to work and back for the wife Tesla covers me for work and all other family trips

Just takes a little bit of communication to make sure they are both not dead at the same time

[Benny Saltstein]

We have an ID Buzz and Hyundai Inster with a Hypervolt being controlled by the Octopus app. On the rare instances where both needed charging I've stuck the Inster on the granny charger overnight. You still get the benefit of the cheap rate and as the Inster has a fairly small battery even at 3kwh, six hours adds enough.

[gruntmonster]

Me and the wife share and alternate the sessions whoever has the least percentage in charge gets priority no issues whatsoever

[B5mike]

ashenfie said:

B5mike said:

What's your electricity supply? Single phase 100A? If you don't have 3 phase, you can install 2 single phase chargers that "share" a 32A supply. If both cars are charging, the power is shared 50/50 (i.e. 16A each). If only one car is charging, it gets the full 32A.
Tesla Wall Charger supports this configuration - the comms between the chargers that controls the total current draw is via local wi-fi, so the two chargers can be some distance apart. Not sure which other home chargers can do the same.
Obviously this set-up still has limitations when both cars are charging, but more convenient than sharing a single charger in my experience.

Pretty much any charger, you simply need one with a clamp which will limit the charger and avoid overloading. If you work from home I am surprised you would need to charge that often.

That's a different solution to what I outlined. Your suggestion would require 64A total wiring capacity back to the consumer unit and one of the chargers would be sacrificed when the load was too high (Vs current being balanced between the 2 chargers). But it would have the advantage of supporting 2 x 32A when available.

Back to the original post, a Tesla Model 3 would be approx twice as efficient as an early Audi etron - i.e charging a Tesla 3 at 16A would be equivalent to charging the etron at 32A.