EV general discussion

First drive into the office this morning, hooked it up to one of the 11kWh chargers just to see how it all works.

Came back an hour later and it had added...2.4kWh. Seems it doesn't quite work how I assumed :cry:
 
First drive into the office this morning, hooked it up to one of the 11kWh chargers just to see how it all works.

Came back an hour later and it had added...2.4kWh. Seems it doesn't quite work how I assumed :cry:
Can't remember what car you have but a lot of cars won't work at more than 7kW anyway but 2.4 is quite slow and might be limited by the fuse so they don't give everyone loads of free leccy :D
 
Had my best ever efficiency on a long drive to Inverness and back (124 miles) yesterday in my Leaf, 4.46 miles per kwh although that's about the maximum range for the Leaf and I was getting rather twitchy for the last ten minutes or so, eventually getting home with 6% remaining. That did include some overtaking and a lot of 50-60mph driving, the A96 is just as infuriating as ever!! The car was due it's annual service, a major this time and they also did a battery test on it which came back with no degredation so far. Something I didn't know when I bought the car was that they also threw in Nissan breakdown cover which renews at every service. The range while nowhere near as much as most of your cars can do is more than enough for us as the furthest we ever go is Inverness or Aberdeen every now and then, otherwise it's just local trips.

I asked them if they knew when the new Leaf was being launched and they still don't know. The girl I asked tried talking up the new Micra and she showed me a picture to which I replied that is ugly and looks like a Citroen which didn't go down well!!
 
First drive into the office this morning, hooked it up to one of the 11kWh chargers just to see how it all works.

Came back an hour later and it had added...2.4kWh. Seems it doesn't quite work how I assumed :cry:
Presumably the car has an 11kw onboard charger? If it’s only got a 7kw single phase charger it will only charge at 3.6kw on an 11kw charger which is 3 x 3.6kw
 
Presumably the car has an 11kw onboard charger? If it’s only got a 7kw single phase charger it will only charge at 3.6kw on an 11kw charger which is 3 x 3.6kw
After some research this morning it appears this is it, it's only got 7kw AC onboard. So all makes sense now (ish).
Not a major issue as it's only really a stop gap until we get the charger at home installed.
 
Presumably the car has an 11kw onboard charger? If it’s only got a 7kw single phase charger it will only charge at 3.6kw on an 11kw charger which is 3 x 3.6kw
Seems a bit pointless to have 11kw 3 phase chargers surely? Very few cars are capable (some have them as an option, but does anyone actually take it?).

The vast majority of people are going to charge at home on a standard single phase 7kw charger, so that's all they'll ever need.
 
Seems a bit pointless to have 11kw 3 phase chargers surely? Very few cars are capable (some have them as an option, but does anyone actually take it?).

The vast majority of people are going to charge at home on a standard single phase 7kw charger, so that's all they'll ever need.

Uk grid is on a phase per street to balance to load typically. Also the reason most on street chargers are 7kW. Only businesses or people with swimming pools tend to have three phase.

You are right though. Most people don’t need 11kW at home. But it’s useful on the car if you find a destination charger that’s 11kW
 
Uk grid is on a phase per street to balance to load typically. Also the reason most on street chargers are 7kW. Only businesses or people with swimming pools tend to have three phase.

You are right though. Most people don’t need 11kW at home. But it’s useful on the car if you find a destination charger that’s 11kW

But surely it would make more sense to have a 22kw charger then? 11kw is half of the maximum 3 phase can deliver, whilst also handicapping anyone with only single phase charger. I'm sure there's some technical reason for it, but just seems to be the worst possible option!

Its way more common in EU

Fair enough, although as above, why not 22kw?
 
I guess the 11kW vs 22kW thing is probably down to the simple fact 11kW is cheaper and easier to provide, people aren't typically expecting to fast charge from such chargers (if they want that, then 50kW+ DC is usually available anyway) so why bother with the added expense on either side of the equation for a relatively niche use case?

It only unravels a little when you get the combo of an 11kW charger and a car without 11kW capability - judging by the available filters on EV Database, the vast majority of EV models do actually seem to be 11kW (or better) compatible, accounting for 893 models of the 978 they have on their list.

Stuff that only has 7kW onboard is relatively uncommon (and they seem to be older or more value oriented cars).
 
Some cars do have 22kw AC but it’s all cost at the end of the day. Most cars do have 11kw capability, it only tends to be cheaper budget stuff that doesn’t.

Despite having 3 phase, they’ll not have 80 or 100A on each phase like we would have in single phase. They’ll have 63A x3 for a large home and as lossy as 35A or 25A for an apartment.

even on a 63A per phase, if you take 32A of that, it doesn’t give you much left for things like heat pumps etc which are much more common in the EU.

Edit: large household appliances will still be single phase also e.g. my induction hob can draw 32A at full tilt.
 
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I guess the 11kW vs 22kW thing is probably down to the simple fact 11kW is cheaper and easier to provide, people aren't typically expecting to fast charge from such chargers (if they want that, then 50kW+ DC is usually available anyway) so why bother with the added expense on either side of the equation for a relatively niche use case?

It only unravels a little when you get the combo of an 11kW charger and a car without 11kW capability - judging by the available filters on EV Database, the vast majority of EV models do actually seem to be 11kW (or better) compatible, accounting for 893 models of the 978 they have on their list.

Stuff that only has 7kW onboard is relatively uncommon (and they seem to be older or more value oriented cars).

It’s surprising how few people do their homework on such potentially non trivial matters. I was looking at an MG4 until I saw it only charged at 3.7 kWh on a lot of destination AC chargers. Hotels and such. Also even 22kWh chargers max out at 6.7kWh instead of 11kWh. While that was not the only reason I rejected one (offset steering wheel), it would have been enough for me to reject.

I would do fairly frequent driving holidays to various parts of Ireland and have in many of these only used destination chargers. The difference between getting 10kWh vs 30kWh while doing tourist stuff for 3 hours is substantial.
 
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How many miles does it have?

Mine had advisories for rear upper control arms which were replaced recently under warranty. Kinda hoping the front ones go within the next 6000 miles…

26k - Bascially had full front end suspension rebuild under warranty about 3 weeks ago. Ball joints, upper and lower control arms all under warranty. Had Cleevley EV do a pre-inspection, they found that stuff plus some other things (replace steering wheel etc) needing done.

Gave me a report with it all on - uploaded to service appointment and Tesla did it all under warranty.
 
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