Second car charger

alan kelly

Am purchasing a Phev ,will prob need a second car charger and obviously won't get a grant.

Was looking at installing a standard 16amp commando socket along with a cable like this https://evonestop.co.uk/products/type-2-portable-mode-2-16amp-commando-3pin-evse-charger-10a-16a-5m.

Anyone done anything similar or am I crazy for going down this route ?

Buffman

That would work fine but it's an expensive way just to get another 3 amps over the granny charger. Do you charge the BEV every night? Personally I'd see how you get on with using your current charger and the granny charger as backup if needed before putting money into another charger.

slave1

We are a two EV household for over two years. One Charge Point and an external socket is fine, I think we’ve used the socket twice in two years, another charge point is not worth it IMHO as a socket gives 2.2kW and it’s likely your PHEV will only take 3.3kWh via a Charge Point

alan kelly

Thanks guys, We have 2 Phevs on order and have just ordered a Zappi. I suppose I wanted to charge both cars together on the night rate.

The idea of charging the car for 8 hours every night on a domestic outside socket sounded a bit wild,

slave1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118749207#Comment_118749207

I charged my Leaf for 4 months via external socket, I know other early EV adoptors who did not get the grant charged off the Granny for years without issue

loopymum

I've been charging my leaf off the granny for well over 2 years. It's a good quality socket with its own rcd protection.

There's a few other posts about similar & a few people have said the most wear is from plugging in & out the granny from the wall socket. I leave mine plugged in

Gael23

Are electric Ireland selling home chargers any more? Doesn’t seem to be on their website

the_amazing_raisin

If you want to have a second charger off the same circuit then it's doable, you'll just need a charger with load balancing like the Zappi, Wallbox or EO Mini

Here's my setup

The idolator switch is wired back to a 40A breaker in the house. After the isolator switch the circuit is split between the Zappi and EO Mini chargers

There's a CT clamp on the input to both chargers which is monitored by the Zappi. I've set a current limit on that clamp to 32A on the Zappi to ensure the combined charging current never goes above 32A

So when the Leaf is plugged into the EO Mini and pulling 16A then the Zappi will restrict the ID.4 to 16A as well. Once the Leaf finishes charging then the Zappi will give the ID.4 full power from the charger

We've charged both cars overnight on several occasions without any problems using this setup

alan kelly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118750384#Comment_118750384

Nice set up 👌

handpref

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118750384#Comment_118750384

Good post man - I’ve a similar set up but with a dumb charger and triple priority switch. The i3 charges from 11-2.50am and Zoe charges from 3-7am every night. I will eventually upgrade to something with load balancing and have a couple of questions if that’s ok 👍🏻

So you have one feed in.

1 ct clamp on the common feed ?

You have a standard dumb EO 32amp and a zappi? But the EO can only pull 16amps Because the leaf has a 3.3 charger, it’s only pulling 16amps and allows you to also put 16amps in to the id4 ?

When the leaf is charged it will give the full power to the zappi/id4 ?

The only problem you could run into is if you changed the leaf for say an id3 that doesn’t have a working timed charger. You’d end up with one car charging potentially for 10hrs whilst the other gets nothing - or you could dial down the charging rate in the new car to 16a which could be a work around ?

Im going to end up in this position myself but with no load balancing - id3 on order but because I’m using priority switches it’s either on or off, you have utilised the zappi to make the dumb EO smart (with the help of the car selecting say a 3kw charge rate).

At present il have to plug in the i3 before the night rate because that has to have 100% for my commute- it may not work out as bad as I think as the 77kwh battery in the id3 won’t need to be charged every night, still a rookie error not having timed charging.

I could potentially look at your approach for the future, it was a great idea and thanks for sharing it.

Picked this lad up on eBay in 2016 for €220, replaced an rcbo for €20 and individualised the charger feeds. Good solid unit with every part replaceable.

Dual 7kw- two separate single phase 32a supplies going in the top from the priority unit.

Coddle4dinner

I've 2 zappies.

one at the house and one at the garage.

the_amazing_raisin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118755292#Comment_118755292

Thanks, well spotted that the clamp is on the common feed

You're correct that I've got a dumb 32A EO Mini, it's the older model that can't be load balanced

It works well now because the Leaf only charges at 3.3kW, so there's always some leftover for the ID.4

But the EO in effect has priority so if it pulled the full 7kW (say with an ID.3) then the Zappi will have nothing

What I'll probably do is swap the EO out for another Zappi when the missus gets around to replacing her car. The Zappi has more advanced load sharing with other Zappis, you can set one to have prioirty or they can split the available power evenly

I think the newer EO Mini Pro can do the same load sharing as well, so the Zappi isn't the only option

I could also increase the power available to both chargers, since the circuit is on a 40A limit I could raise the total limit on the chargers so they'd have a little more power available

There's also a degree of planning involved. At the moment my wife needs to charge every time she goes into the office, wherase I charge the ID.4 about twice a week (I'm WFH). If she switch over to something like an ID.3 Pro, then she'd only be charging every second day max, so we could just take turns on the charger to ensure we get all the available power

Or one of us just starts the charging early and sucks it up with the more expensive electricity

It is nice having the option of charging both cars at once in case we need to

The one thing I'll say against a double outlet charger is that if it breaks, you're down to granny leads which might not work for everyone. At least if one of my chargers packs up I've got a backup 😄

handpref

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118755641#Comment_118755641

It’s gas, to some this thread must be like some sort of code, I remember how they laughed in work when we got the Leaf in 2014 and again when I retrofitted insulation to the house and went with solar….the very same lad with the smart comments is now car sharing with his wife because he claims he can’t afford the diesel bill…”it’ll never catch on he said “ 🤣

Thanks for the info 👍🏻