Electric Vehicles EVs

What charge rate were you using? AIUI most OEM EVSEs are limited to 10A to reduce the risk of the plug melting.

1.5mm2 might get warm but not dangerously so. The weak point is the quality of the cable connections and especially the fuse.

That question shot over my head... I plug it in and it charges.

The smart meter I have shows a 2.7Kw draw during charging.

and especially the fuse.

Interesting, that's definitely the side of the plug that melted.

Use the cable you have... don't run an extension.

Not sure what this means?

The cable I have as in the one supplied with the car? That isn't long enough and won't go through a letter box.

Or the one that I have bought that is an extension?

I can change the charge current using the intelligent box that is part of the EV supplied cable.

I think it is set to 10A

You get a cable with the car that has a UK 3-pin and then the car connector (i.e. Type 2 or something). This is probably what... 2.5m in length? 5m?

And then you've purchased an extension to get the UK 3-pin even further... extending another distance so you can make this work.

The thick cable that charges the car... this is good.

The extension cable to provide length... this is not good.

Do not use extension cables! Our leaf has always been charged with the granny lead in the garage (didn't bother to get the free charger Nissan offered as it is type 1 and I thought I'd have the car for 3 years; a mistake as it turns out). I experimented with an extension cable once and it was very hot within 5 minutes.

Your topic on that electricians forum has a reply in it that links to the manufacturer of my EV specific extension cable, saying that they have "addressed the problem of extension cables". :

https://www.electriciansforums.net/threads/3kw-constant-load-on-a-standard-plug-socket.196136/post-1727484

Also, as previously mentioned, I set my EV granny charger to only pull 10A.

Makes me significantly less worried.

Conflicting information as a DM chat there said the other guy was wrong.

Then again, I am trying the flippantly made comment to use a MK 2747 socket with a MK 646 plug. I clearly want this to work... If it doesn't I'll have to use BP Pulse a couple of miles from home as Haringey are shit and there's very little infrastructure and I don't have off street parking.

I'm pretty lucky: got a lamp post ubitricity on my street, BP Pulse 1 min walk away and about 7 Source London within a 10 min walk. Also quite a few 50kw options within a 5 - 10 min drive if I get desperate.

Ha, I'm in Haringey and have a couple of chargers across the road from me. They're really annoying though, make a high pitched whining noise 24/7.

Heading to mid Wales today where there are fewer chargers within a 25 mile radius of where we’re staying than a 25 metre radius of where we are in London.

First long trip. Wish me luck.

Yes charging at an ESB rapid charger is like having tinnitus, I can only tolerate charging at them with the windows fully up and music on. They are however the only rapid chargers I'm aware of that have 3 chargers at some locations, so the chances of actually finding it free are greatly increased.

There is however nowhere near enough of them. The only 3x rapid ESB charger bays I know are at Scrubbs Lane, Freight Lane and under the A4 at Hammersmith....And don't get me started on the fact some of the single chargers are located in 1 way streets such that if your charger point on the car is at the rear (like they are on lots of cars) you can't actually connect because the cable is not long enough, and the only way to do it is to park facing the wrong way up a one way street, which is against the Highway code anyway. I sent a pissy email to ESB saying what the actual fuck are they playing at doing this, and they mumbled something back about the cables not allowed to be any longer coz of trip hazard regulations, and that they don't decide where the chargers go, they given spaces by TFL. Regardless that is still piss poor planning and a half hearted approach.

Bloody brave, good luck!

Whereabouts are you going? I know the area, it is proper back-waters-ville, there are still places around there with no broadband and zero mobile phone signal, so I'd be surprised if some locals even knew what a rapid charger was.

I was there recently (the hills outside Newtown) and out of curiosity had a look and couldn't find a rapid charger within 80 miles of where I was, so make sure you remember to plug into the slow overnight chargers or you going to have some long waits!

Speaking of charging… I’ll be doing this in a single day on August 4th. Then back again on the 24th.

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That's a good old distance on 3 charges tho, fair play.

I was speaking to an electric black cab driver this week, those things cost £75,000 when they first came out, now down to 50 or 60 I think with some grant, but still... and they only have a range of 60-80 miles he said, proper shit, so they can barely get to do half a day driving around London before needing a recharge, meaning lunchtime charging is choc full of e-cabs on the vapours. And I know from experience they get proper pissy if you charge a regular e-car in their taxi only bays ;)

And as they often don't fancy going south of the river, don't think they'd fancy a trip to southern France.

And what's the deal in France on toll roads with electric cars, do you still have to pay or is it free/reduced rate?

Not as far as I’m aware. We’ve got an emovis tag so we just get charged automatically at the end of the trip

😧

share your irl experience esp if with baby

They all have range extender petrol engines, so France should be fine.

I'm surprised they bother with charging the battery at all except for cheapskatery. It's not like they've ever cared about emissions.

Will do. She will have just turned 1 when we leave.

Reckoning a 13h trip door to door, including about 90 mins of total charging.

That’s an impressive ratio of driving:charging time. I wish I could use my Leaf for longer trips, but even if I could cope with 40 mins charging every 100 miles it would probably overheat on the third charge. So my trip to North Yorkshire tomorrow will be fossil fuel powered.

Superchargers FTW. All charger locations I’m using are 150Kw+ so individual charge times for a couple of hours continuous drive are minimal.

Given we’ve got the little one, I imagine we’ll actually end up charging a bit longer than needed at each stop because everything takes longer with a tiny human.

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/electric-cars/tesla-supercharger-network-be-opened-rival-evs

Mr Musk has said that they'll be usable by other EV manufacturers before the end of the year.

Superb news.

He's also announced tesla are expecting to restart accepting bitcoin.
#cryptocurrencymanipulation

As a Tesla owner, it feels like shit news.

I obviously want more EV adoption but there would need to be a rapid expansion of Tesla superchargers in order to support all EVs.

Hoping this is because they’re running up against regulatory issues in expanding the network because it’s only for their vehicles and that this will unlock more sites.