Talk to me about EV chargers

shifty_uk said:
I’d be more concerned about safety than the looks tbh.

I don’t know much about EV’s, won’t be in the market for one anytime soon but I seen an indy car dealership set ablaze taking probably half a million worth of cars with it(RR’s and the like) because a Jag was left on charge(during working hours too!). Shocked me but I assume it was a poorly installed or inappropriate charger.
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The cause of fire from an EV charger are the same as any other electrical fire, improperly installed and/or faulty wiring in your house.
EV chargers are not that special, it's just a 32A socket, often connected to the internet so you can manage when it turns on from your phone.
 
shifty_uk said:
I’d be more concerned about safety than the looks tbh.

I don’t know much about EV’s, won’t be in the market for one anytime soon but I seen an indy car dealership set ablaze taking probably half a million worth of cars with it(RR’s and the like) because a Jag was left on charge(during working hours too!). Shocked me but I assume it was a poorly installed or inappropriate charger.
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please dont spread the FUD!.
sometimes cars fail and set on fire, sometimes electrical points fail and set on fire............................ but newsflash!..... sometimes petrol cars set on fire as well.

Hell ... in the UK most houses are connected to gas mains, they literally have a potential bomb in their living room and houses explode due to gas issues and yet you dont get fear mongering about that.

home charging points are incredibly safe regardless of which brand the OP chooses (safer than using a 3pin plug), there is nothing dangerous about leaving a car charging even during work hours!. There is nothing to be concerned about... but sure... they can fail.
 
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bigmike20vt said:
please dont spread the FUD!.
sometimes cars fail and set on fire, sometimes electrical points fail and set on fire............................ but newsflash!..... sometimes petrol cars set on fire as well.

Hell ... in the UK most houses are connected to gas mains, they literally have a potential bomb in their living room and houses explode due to gas issues and yet you dont get fear mongering about that.

home charging points are incredibly safe regardless of which brand the OP chooses (safer than using a 3pin plug), there is nothing dangerous about leaving a car charging even during work hours!. There is nothing to be concerned about... but sure... they can fail.
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My point was to prioritise safety and getting the right kit over aesthetics :) Agree with your comments though
 
Aesthetics and safety aren't mutually exclusive though. There is no requirement for these things to be made out of shiny white plastic with all the design aesthetic of a year 9 D&T project. The reason they are is because people accept it and it is cheap to fire them off the injection moulder by the hundreds.

To be fair I'm pretty sure any gas explosion would make at least the local news as would an electrical fire taking out a car dealership so I'm not sure what that comparison is meant to show.

TBH it is probably a good thing that there is a bit of fear, uncertainty and doubt in peoples minds about running an electrical load at high current for a prolonged period of time. It ensures that they will get the job done properly and not take a blasé "Its just a plug innit" approach. That isn't an EV specific thing, for example, I found in our old house that the oven was connected via a multiblock and 4 gang extension lead.
 
lordrobs said:
To be fair I'm pretty sure any gas explosion would make at least the local news as would an electrical fire taking out a car dealership so I'm not sure what that comparison is meant to show.
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I never said it should not be reported....... just that i do not think anyone needs to be concerned about the safety of any of the charge points currently on sale in the uk so long as professionally installed.

perhaps it was unintentional but a person posting "i would be concerned about the safety and then linking to a fire as well as commenting that the car was charging during work hours as if this was in some way not a safe thing to do'' indicates that they believe they are unsafe.

My point was, even after a gas explosion where a house explodes, no one seems to link to a concern that gas supplies are unsafe in general (because they are not... a rare and random failure is not indicative of something we should be concerned about)
 
Thanks all, leaning towards Andersen now. Mainly because it looks nice, the cable is hidden away (quite a few colleagues have said they would go tethered if they had the chance again) and as I will now likely stay with EON I just need to set a timer rather than anything smarter.
 
sandys said:
zappi
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^^ integrates with octopus smart tariffs.

Or hypervolt for Octopus and Ovo smart tariffs.

Edit: or Ohme for octopus smart tariffs.

The caveat with Ohme is that its solution for dealing with the cable is ‘not great’ and it runs off 4G not WiFi.
 
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Ohme? We’re with Octopus at the moment so will switch over to their EV tariff.

Charger will be hooked up via our garage consumer unit, which is fed from the house on 32A. I’m going to look at getting this increased. The cable is massive (not just the fact it’s a tough) so should just be a case of uprating both ends hopefully.
 
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Yaayuh! said:
Ohme? We’re with Octopus at the moment so will switch o er to their EV tariff.

Charger will be hooked up via our garage consumer unit, which is fed from the house on 32A. I’m going to look at getting this increased. The cable is massive (not just the fact it’s a tough) so should just be a case of uprating both ends hopefully.
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looks aside I don't think k you can go wrong with either Ohme or zappi tbh when it comes to Octopus integration. zappi edges it perhaps if you have solar and Ohme edges it if you don't want a toilet seat on your wall ;)

(I went for the toilet seat and no regrets yet, I would say maybe go black...... am not certain but I don't trust whitish plastic products to not go yellow after a few years in the sun)
 
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What is the deal if I want the cable between the fusebox and charging unit buried, rather than an unsightly cable running across the front of our house to the driveway?

I'm repaving our path in the spring and replacing it with sandstone and a plum slate edging.

I could bury some ducting under the plum slate with a rope through it, so when we get a charge point fitted the electrician could pull the cable through.

Is this allowed?
 
bainbridge said:
What is the deal if I want the cable between the fusebox and charging unit buried, rather than an unsightly cable running across the front of our house to the driveway?

I'm repaving our path in the spring and replacing it with sandstone and a plum slate edging.

I could bury some ducting under the plum slate with a rope through it, so when we get a charge point fitted the electrician could pull the cable through.

Is this allowed?
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don't see why not. make sure it has plenty of room so you can replace it if needed in the future.
 
bainbridge said:
What is the deal if I want the cable between the fusebox and charging unit buried, rather than an unsightly cable running across the front of our house to the driveway?

I'm repaving our path in the spring and replacing it with sandstone and a plum slate edging.

I could bury some ducting under the plum slate with a rope through it, so when we get a charge point fitted the electrician could pull the cable through.

Is this allowed?
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Yeah i think that's fine, i've got a duct going from my house out to my garage so that's what i'd need to use.

I think the regs say it needs to be red tubing with tape around it saying live electrics or similar when you bury it but just make sure you leave a draw string in it and im sure it'll be fine. There's different current carrying calculations for cable diameter when it's in a duct in the ground compared to clipped in the open air but it just means they'll size the new cable accordingly.

We did the same from the telegraph pole at the top of our garden into the house to bring in power and another for phone line/fibre and no one batted an eye lid on installation.
 
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Yaayuh! said:
Ohme? We’re with Octopus at the moment so will switch over to their EV tariff.

Charger will be hooked up via our garage consumer unit, which is fed from the house on 32A. I’m going to look at getting this increased. The cable is massive (not just the fact it’s a tough) so should just be a case of uprating both ends hopefully.
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So turns out my garage isn’t hooked up with enough juice. So I’m getting a fresh run from the meter cupboard specially for it. Added cost I don’t want but best to have it sorted fresh and proper.
 
Yaayuh! said:
If aesthetics isn’t top on the list, which tethered chargers should I look at for quality and functionality?
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I'm quite happy with my Zappi, integrates fine with my existing solar, batteries and eddi.

I got Octopus to install mine and they used a cable that had the wiring for the CT clamp built in (ultra ev I think I was called) so no need for a separate run of ethernet for example for CT Clamp purposes. Took quite a while for a fairly standard install and was a good few hundred cheaper than the local companies I tried. Very decent install job.
 
bigmike20vt said:
does it support intelligent octopus yet? I looked into getting it but with no IO support it was a show stopper for me
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Yarp. My V3 is working nicely on it.

It was out of this or the zappi for me however the zappi looks like a toilet seat stuck on the house wall so went hypervolt. It was risky as at the time they kept saying OI was coming…luckily paid off.
New interface on the app is nice too.
 
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