Got my free charging station fitted yesterday

[misterbleepy]

Got my free charging station fitted yesterday. 240V up to 16A - should speed up my charging a little (previously been using the standard 240V 10A EVSE)

 

[aarond12]

Congrats! That's a nice looking, compact EVSE. And you can't beat free! Care to fill us in on how you got it for free? Government subsidies? Power company subsidies? Theft? :lol:

 

[acensor]

Got my free charging station fitted yesterday. 240V up to 16A - should speed up my charging a little (previously been using the standard 240V 10A EVSE)
/

Very nice!
But don't forget that if time isn't an issue on some particular occasion your batteries will like it better if you charge them at the much slower 10amp 120volt rate.

Alex

 

[camiev]

Got my free charging station fitted yesterday. 240V up to 16A - should speed up my charging a little (previously been using the standard 240V 10A EVSE)

Many of us would love to have our slow charging at 240V 10A EVSE. I think the acceptance rate is at 240 V at 13A. So you will only about 30% faster. Am I correct?

 

[camiev]

Very nice!
But din't forget that if time isn't an issue on some particular occasion your batteries will like it better if you charge them at the much slower 10amp 120volt rate.

Alex

I don't think it matter. Our car is built to charge at 240V 13A every day.

Charging at 120V will cost you more electricity becasue it will take longer and your charger has to work more hours to fill up the car.
You will save electricty if you charge at 240V.

 

[misterbleepy]

Congrats! That's a nice looking, compact EVSE. And you can't beat free! Care to fill us in on how you got it for free? Government subsidies? Power company subsidies? Theft? :lol:

It was free because of a government subsidy. The trade off is it has a mobile phone sim card in it, and phones home to log usage statistics for the government.

It makes charging much more convenient, and safer too when it's raining, as I don't have to fiddle with plugging the supplied EVSE charging cable into a potentially wet socket.

 

[misterbleepy]

Very nice!
But din't forget that if time isn't an issue on some particular occasion your batteries will like it better if you charge them at the much slower 10amp 120volt rate.

Alex

I have no way of charging at 110V/120V - that voltage is not available in my country, nor is an EVSE charger that would work with it as far as I know...

 

[JoeS]

Charging at 120V will cost you more electricity becasue it will take longer and your charger has to work more hours to fill up the car. You will save electricty if you charge at 240V.

camiev, as we had discussed previously, the difference in energy consumed by the charger+EVSE is minimal between 120v and 240v - although I usually turn off power to my EVSE after charging is complete to eliminate its phantom power draw.

Back on topic, misterbleepy - that is certainly a conveniently-located EVSE. Here in California our wiring codes would require that all that wiring be encased in conduit. I would be tempted to enclose the EVSE + charging cable in a cabinet to protect it from the elements, especially the sun.

 

[Don]

Charging at 120V will cost you more electricity becasue it will take longer and your charger has to work more hours to fill up the car.
You will save electricty if you charge at 240V.

While it's true that an L1 EVSE charging at 12 amps will take twice as long to charge as an L2 EVSE at 12 amps does, the amount of electricity consumed is the same - 10 hours @ 120/12 amps is 14,400 watts and so is 5 hours @ 240/12 amps

Don

 

[misterbleepy]

[Back on topic, misterbleepy - that is certainly a conveniently-located EVSE. Here in California our wiring codes would require that all that wiring be encased in conduit. I would be tempted to enclose the EVSE + charging cable in a cabinet to protect it from the elements, especially the sun.

The cable is fully armoured, and is attached to its own dedicated MCB, and has its own independent earth - all done to what the installers thought was a paranoid level of safety - but that's what the UK wiring regulations require for this kind of installation.

Good idea re. the cabinet to protect the EVSE & cable from the sun - I'll have to look into that.

 

[acensor]

I have no way of charging at 110V/120V - that voltage is not available in my country, nor is an EVSE charger that would work with it as far as I know...

Didn't catch that you were in the UK.
Know well about UK voltage.
Was born there.
One of my earliest childhood scientific experiments at age 5 when parents were out of the room was to stick a hairpin into a wall socket. Fortunately I was not well grounded (earthed) so rather than becoming a statistic from the significant shock just learned SOMEthing about the interesting energy in those holes.

That said... Time permitting slower IS better for the batteries.

Alex

 

[misterbleepy]

That said... Time permitting slower IS better for the batteries.

maybe I should build myself an OpenEVSE thing, so I could have full control over the charging current - has anyone on here built one?

 

[acensor]

[

maybe I should build myself an OpenEVSE thing, so I could have full control over the charging current - has anyone on here built one?

http://Www.evseupgrade.com
See
http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=1497

They Can modify your stock Mitsubishi supplied charger to be fully controllable 8 to 12.5 amps.
They're easy to communicate with and likely would tell you if they see any issues with you being in the UK.

Since you have a new separate charger should be ok for you to ship to the slow/ cheap way and wait for them for ship upgraded unit back.

Alex

 

[Don]

maybe I should build myself an OpenEVSE thing, so I could have full control over the charging current - has anyone on here built one?

Several of us here have

Here's a thread about the one I built.
http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=654&hilit=open+evse

I use it regularly. Charge levels can be set at 6, 8, 10, 12, 14 and 16 amps on both L1 120 volts and L2 240 volts. It's mounted in my garage, just 3 or 4 feet from the charge door on the car when it's parked

Don

 

[misterbleepy]

Thanks for those links - some interesting options for me to think about.

I'm uneasy about sending the stock EVSE on such a long journey, plus where I live most of the few charging points have standard UK sockets (or "blue commando" sockets), there are only a couple that have "proper" EVSE's and Type 2 sockets or captive J1772 cables, so for the time being the stock EVSE is very important to have in the car.

Building an OpenEVSE does appeal to me, but so does putting together something that gives me more info about the car through the CAN bus thing, so I'll probably be exploring that route first.