Charging questions

When I finish charging the car it show about 62 mile.
Today, left it charge over night, and it show 73 mile.
My understanding is that I should not plug it when it is fully charged? It is correct?

But I got 73 mile, that is a good thing? Will it damage the battery if it plug in too long.

Is there a setting to turn off when it is fully charged?

camiev, the RR display after a full recharge provides a good indication of how efficiently you drove the car before plugging it in. In your examples, 73 miles is pretty good whereas 62 miles is so-so (even though the EPA says that's what our car should average). Many iMiEV owners routinely show RR in the 80's and 90's after a full charge, with RR=103 miles being the current record. With summer coming and the energy-robbing heater use diminishing, we'll all be seeing higher numbers soon.

There is no problem in simply letting the car charge up fully, as its internal battery management system turns off the charger and ensures that the batteries will be safely protected and not overcharged; however, once you've fully charged the car, you don't want to plug it in again, as it will unnecessarily add a little more energy to an already-full battery. In what we think will help battery longevity, some of us -
1) Stop the charging at around 13 bars, and only fully charge the car just before taking a longer trip.
2) Do not fully charge the car and then let it sit there unused fully charged for a long time (days), especially in hot weather.

good advice.

Thanks JoeS for the good advice.

What option do we have for level 2. Can we do the ESVE upgrade without installing the acctually charger?

camiev said:

... What option do we have for level 2. Can we do the ESVE upgrade without installing the acctually charger?

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If you already have a 240vac outlet in your garage (e.g., for a dryer), then you lowest-cost option is to have the EVSEUpgrade done and then simply make an adapter to match the EVSE Upgrade NEMA L6-20 plug and your dryer. BTW, where are you located? - you might consider updating your profile to show this in your posts, as it is always interesting to know from which part of the world the iMiEV discussions are originating.

I am seriously considering the upgrade option. But on the web site they says:

"Can you upgrade my Mitsubishi i-MiEV EVSE?
The i-MiEV unit is also manufactured by Panasonic, (same as the Nissan unit) however it is not built the same. It is rated for 8A at 120v, and the wiring is only good for up to 13a. We can upgrade this to 120/240v 8A (rev1) or 120/240v 13A (rev2). The prices are the same as for the Nissan unit, $239 for rev1, and $287 for rev2. At 240v 13a you are charging well over twice as fast as the original unit! Unfortunately, Due to the fact that we do not stock this unit, Our Advance Replacement Service is not available for it. You can of course still purchase a new upgraded Nissan unit which will work perfectly with your i-MiEV."

So I can looking for an upgraded Nissan Leaf charger, it will work with the Miev, right?
Thanks

JoeS said:

camiev said:

... What option do we have for level 2. Can we do the ESVE upgrade without installing the acctually charger?

Click to expand...

If you already have a 240vac outlet in your garage (e.g., for a dryer), then you lowest-cost option is to have the EVSEUpgrade done and then simply make an adapter to match the EVSE Upgrade NEMA L6-20 plug and your dryer. BTW, where are you located? - you might consider updating your profile to show this in your posts, as it is always interesting to know from which part of the world the iMiEV discussions are originating.

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What they're saying is . . . . they don't have any iMiEV units to swap out with you, so you'll have to send them yours and wait a few days until you get it back - Usually takes less than a week, but since you're so close to them, it will likely be even quicker . . . . lucky you!

Yes, an upgraded Nissan unit will work just fine with our iMiEV's . . . . but you really don't need one. When you upgrade your stock EVSE and plug it into 240 volts, you'll be recharging almost a fast as is possible. The onboard charger is limited to about 3300 watts and the upgraded unit will do 240 volts at 13 amps, which is 3100 watts, or about 95% of what the charger is capable of

Do you really want to spend the extra just to get that last 5%?

Don

I have bought a Voltec 230V/10A for some 350 Euros. I have cut the 5 wired cable close to the EVSE and installed a plug and coupling. I have reconnected Ground, Neutral and L1, that might be Ground, L1 and L2 for you. The other two cables are thinner. I have found the 12V ??? for the torchlight and reconnected that too. The remaining must be the pilot.

Now I am playing with an Arduino and RS232 to read and trigger the pilot from the EVSE. Next I'll fake the Pilot towards the EV, RS232 again. never thought it was that easy - but it is still work in progress :lol:

Any EVSE should do. The Voltec (Opel Ampera) was the cheapest I could get. I thought it cheaper and easier than a fully grown OpenEVSE but the idea is mostly the same. My idea is to get the blackbox inside the i-MiEV and connect either mains or EVSE to the J1772 port. Let the i-MiEV decide how much to charge probably between 8A and 14A .

Oh and one other thing about the NEMA 10-30R

It may not be the right connector for the charging station. The NEMA 10-30R does not typically have a ground.

Any thoughts on that?

Thanks

Charge electric car by towing with pickup truck

http://jalopnik.com/5805407/crazy-geniuses-charge-electric-car-by-towing-with-pickup-truck
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-05-26/lifestyle/30037496_1_nissan-leaf-tow-charge-electric-car

Imagine the scene: You’re out in your 2011 Nissan Leaf only to discover you have 6 miles of available range left but need to travel 26 miles to reach your youngest daughter’s birthday party. Oh, and there’s no-where to charge.
At least, that’s the crazy premise which lead the team over at Leafplan.nl to tow an almost-empty 2011 Nissan Leaf behind a pickup truck in order to fast-charge its battery pack.
DISCLAIMER: Before we go further, while we think it’s fun thing to do in a crazy-kind of way we do NOT suggest you copy them.
Nissan specifically recommends you DO NOT tow your Leaf in any circumstances, since the car’s motor is mechanically connected to the wheels at all times, and does not have a true ‘neutral’ gear. In short, towing your Nissan Leaf (or most electric cars) can result in serious damage to your car. Pulling this stunt is most likely going to invalidate your warranty in the case of things going wrong.
'Peugeot iOn

camiev said:

Oh and one other thing about the NEMA 10-30R

It may not be the right connector for the charging station.

Click to expand...

If it wasn't the perfect connector for the job, the knowledgeable folks at EVSE Upgrade wouldn't have used it on every unit they've upgraded

The NEMA 10-30R does not typically have a ground.

Any thoughts on that?

Click to expand...

Sure it does. It's a 3 wire plug, which is really handy because the input cable to the EVSE is also 3 wires - If you had a 4 wire plug, one of the lugs wouldn't have a wire on it.

In 120 volt operation you have a hot, a neutral and a ground. In 240 volt operation, you have two hots and a neutral/ground. If you look inside your power panel, you'll see that the neutral wires and the ground wires are both connected to bus bars . . . . and those two bus bars are connected together

The NEMA twistlock is perfect because in normal operation, you'll have some sort of pigtail used which adapts your EVSE to plug into whatever outlet you want to use, and using a twistlock to connect the pigtail ensures that it will never come disconnected

In my garage, I just installed one 120 volt twistlock socket and one 240 volt twistlock socket, side by side, so I can connect the Upgraded EVSE to either 120 or 240 without use of a pigtail . . . .

Don

Perhaps a bit of clarification.

The EVSEUpgraded EVSE comes with a NEMA L6-20P three-prong twistlock plug. Strictly speaking it is hot-hot-ground.

Older-style dryer connectors are NEMA 10-30R three-prong straight blade receptacle (hot-hot-neutral).

You simply need to make or buy an adapter between the two, consisting of a L6-20R and 10-30P.

Safety is not an issue because the EVSE (car charger) draws less current than the dryer outlet can provide and the neutral blade was considered a legal grounding method under the National Electrical Code for electric ranges up to 1996. Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NEMA_connector#NEMA_10

More significantly, RV parks use NEMA 14-50R outlets and have been the traditional 240vac recharging stations for years and it's good to have an adapter for them as well.