ESB eCars

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117928648#Comment_117928648

Yeah I'll confess I charged there for the handy parking one time as well. It seems like the units on Level 1 get a lot of use whereas the ones on Level 3 aren't as busy

Having said that, when I came back, all 4 chargers on level 3 were in use. An outlander, E-Niro, ID.3 and my ID.4 all charging

One other thing to note, those spaces are a total PITA when you've a buggy and trying to get around the charging cables strewn across the ground. I really wish VW had gone with the charging port on the front

mfceiling

Had to go up north this morning to an appointment in Armagh.

Stopped at castlebellingham Tesla charger. Reverse in, plug in and the car is charging in seconds.

Got to Armagh and did my thing. Arranged to meet the mother for some lunch. I'll park at the linenhall car park and use the new ESB 22kw unit...may as well take on an hour's free charge.

Tapped the card and it says plug A is available. Plug into that and nothing. Screen says "show card to cancel". Put card up and it says plug A is available. Unplug and replug...nothing. Tap card again and "plug A is available". Try again and nothing. Try plug B and nothing. Unplug and plug in and eventually B starts working. Around 5 minutes dicking around to get a charge on a new machine.

Black_Knight

Weird stuff with ESB. A load of units got "downgraded" in the API from a "FAST" chargingSpeedId to "SEMI_FAST". "SEMI_FAST" has always been up to 22kW AC, and "FAST" has always been DC units <= 150kW. Mayfield was "ULTRA_FAST" for a while, but they rated that down to 150kW now. (slow clap ESB).

It's weird though. Old Efacec - QC45 units like at Frankfield, Cashel, Lucan, Blanchardstown are all "SEMI_FAST" now, but the newer Circontrol Raption 50 units are still "FAST". Messes with my metrics now. Only "67" "FAST" units in Ireland now. It should be more like 143. Stupid ESB

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117928589#Comment_117928589

Pavilions went in December 2020. They are on multiple Floors, all ESB with fees. Bad position next to entrance mean people block and plug in when they don't need it. See details on plugshare app, but leave the nearby free charger to me! Pay parking after first free 2 hours I think.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117929169#Comment_117929169

On the 150kW at J14 the most common battery size that accepts CCS at the moment I think is 62kW, charging that from 10%-80% at 150kW takes less than 18 minutes... By the time I've used the bathroom, grabbed a coffee and had a few sips taken that's most of the charging time done

Still I almost constantly see Nissans parked at the HPC paying an extra 6.5c/kWh on chademo despite a cheaper chademo plug 2 bays down the way

Black_Knight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117945073#Comment_117945073

Battery size and charging speed aren't that related. A model 3 charges much much faster than an id3. Both have similar sized batteries, but because Mayfield is limited to 150kW the model 3 has to waste time (ESB didn't confirm to me whether it's limited to 150kW or they just advertise it as 150kW because that's more representative of what uses can expect). 150kW is slow for the new ioniq5!

Laviski

done some recent fast charging, don't know when but glad they updated the OS on these points. found the interface extremely responsive they way it should have been from the get go.

AndyBoBandy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117953055#Comment_117953055

Which units? Mayfield? or just regular 150kW or 50kW units?

Laviski

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117953092#Comment_117953092

the new 50kw versions with white and deep blue colours. when they first came out out the interface and connecting up was alot slower

Haven't used the old green/white fast charging units in a while.

AndyBoBandy

Top 15 BEV sales for September;

CCS: 648

CHAdeMO: 50

Yet only 1 eCars hub has more CCS than CHAdeMO plugs. Every other multi unit site is split 50/50 between CCS/CHAdeMO

Enjoy the queues.....

slave1

It's not about Sept sales, it's legacy EVs on the road and like it or not CHAdeMO was here first and way higher proportion than 50:648

AndyBoBandy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117963798#Comment_117963798

I agree about CHAdeMO being here first, and that's fine, but at last count were were up to a total of something like 6,500 Leaf's on Irish roads (including ones that are no longer on the road), and so far in 2021 alone there's been north of 7,000 CCS cars sold.

Theres something like 30,000 EV's on the roads here, and at least 23,000 of them have CCS plugs.

AndyBoBandy

Another new Tier 3 hub gone into Ballacolla.

why in the name of fcuk are they putting a CHAdeMO plug on the 150kW unit????????

at least this site won’t be clogged by Tesla’s…..

Anyone can park in that middle spot, and plug into AC, and leave the car there for 3-4 hours........

in fact, fcuk it, might pop down the next time I'm bored, and plug into the AC for a few hours and watch a few movies in my Tesla, having some lovely Papa John's pizza along the way..... just because I can.

MightyMunster

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117963954#Comment_117963954

Yeah 2 CCS on the 150kw would make much more sense

slave1

Interesting to see the eCars vacant and at least two Tesla’s charging at the SuC hub in the background. I’ve used Ballacolla a lot this year

Black_Knight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117963798#Comment_117963798

It's not far off on the 150kW units. CHAdeMO to CCS usage is 1:9 in terms of minutes spent charging.

Laviski

For every fast charge site there should be one chademo, if a site has more plugs then yes to be fair they should only be CCS. To be clear a chademo plug should be able to charge a chademo car at any time which isn't the case at present and failure in ecars design. Which is why they pointlessly put chademo on 150 sites.

Anyone simply stating there shouldn't be any chademo is simply selfish.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117966795#Comment_117966795

Ideally the should be 2 Chademo plugs shared with CCS, but then every fast charging site would ideally be 8x150kW chargers

So we're far from an ideal world 😭

TitianGerm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117966795#Comment_117966795

They should be suppling chargers to meet demand. There's no reason what so ever to match Chandmo and CCS install anymore when CCS demand is far in excess of Chadmo.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117966895#Comment_117966895

Yes but there's still the inconvenient truth that there's a lot of Leafs on the road which do long journeys, and they aren't going anywhere soon

And in a hub (a real hub, not the joke posted earlier) if there's only 1 Chademo then that's a single point of failure for a car which may not have enough charge to reach another charger

If ESB or anyone was being really clever they'd have a pair of those twin plug units to cover the Leafs without taking any chargers away from the CCS cars.

Plus another 6 CCS HPCs to cover the main demand

Laviski

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117966895#Comment_117966895

I said there should be at least one dedicated chademo point, not a 1:1 ratio. If there is a 50 kw station that should be chademo only, then all of the 150 kw points should be CCS only. Because the 50 is shared, so too is the 150HPC.

Every fast charge point should be able to charge 1 chademo and 2 CCS at one time at minimum. (With the CCS getting full draw, not throttled). If there is allowance for more HPC's then they too should be ccs.

slave1

Real issue is these “hubs” are simply too small, to move from one to two chargers (regardless) of number of cars that can charge as that’s boll1x when you see cable config) is not the increment needed, 1 to 5 is what’s required

AndyBoBandy

I would have thought Ballacolla would have been an ideal spot for a Tier 1 (8 car) Hub given it’s location between Dublin & Cork, yet we end up with a Tier 3 (3 car) hub……

so genuinely where else will get a Tier 1 hub?? As most places you’d think they would be suited already have a Tier 3 hub……. Unless of course they’ll go back and rework all the existing sites to upgrade them from Tier 3 to Tier 1….. (Ballacolla/Kilcullen/Galway Plaza).

Laviski

With the galway plaza they will just get ICE'd if they expand in it current location.

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117966928#Comment_117966928

Should Nissan not install a charger network for their customers? Or provide an option to convert them to CCS

Busman Paddy Lasty

Oranmore, Mullingar and Lahey are named on the ESB website as hub locations without stating whether they are 3 or 8 car hub. Mullingar appears to be off motorway and a 3 car 'hub' only.

slave1

That map has been discussed before, it’s just indicative, chargers may not end up in those locations, neither hubs

cannco253

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117967787#Comment_117967787

Very true, ESB responded to my local councillor in Galway that they are in negotiation with property owners regarding new eCars sites but nothing has been agreed.

There is no Oranmore site decided upon at the moment, and from the absolute stonewalling I've received from Galway CoCo, ESB eCars, and FG (all the way up to the Dept of Transport) regarding future plans I wouldn't be expecting anything in 2022 never mind 2023.

Rollout is too slow, no real transparency around the plans, no explanations for the site layouts/units, and all happening with the significant increase in BEVs/PHEVs on the road this year. Whoever eCars is accountable to is not pushing them hard enough, hopefully the new regulator/dept mentioned in the recent Government report will highlight the issues but I haven't heard of a timeline as to when that will be set up.

Something has to give next year - a new entrant into the market, EasyGo expanding faster (what happened to the phone box story from a long time ago), Tesla opening the SUC, Ionity opening up new sites, whatever....

just do it

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117967389#Comment_117967389

They should, but good luck getting them to agree to that 😬

I think some of the original fast chargers installed by ESB were Chademo only. If I were to guess they consulted Nissan beforehand since they were the only EV game in town at the time and Nissan said Chademo was the future, guaranteed

AndyBoBandy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117968582#Comment_117968582

It seems like eCars still feel that way about CHAdoMO…..

Mayfield and it’s unusually odd configuration of having more CCS plugs than CHAdeMO is probably just there to be pointed at by eCars when someone raises the blatantly obvious fact that CCS cars now hugely outnumber CHAdeMO cars….. but deep down they still believe CHAdeMO is the way it will go….. desperately hoping that when Toyota finally get their arses in gear they’ll back the CHAdeMO horse (they are a founding member after all).