L-1 charging questions

[mkhuffman]

I've only looked at a few of these in real life and the wires were #12AWG which are thick enough for 16amp continuous., with a 20Amp breaker. But, yes, I suppose it might be common for the wires to be #14AWG then you'd have to size the breaker to 15Amps and run 12Amps max continuous.

The OP lives in a retirement community with a shared garage. I don't think it is a good idea for him to try to play around with the circuits even if he has access to the breaker box. Which he probably doesn't.

On a side note, L1 charging is not enough power to precondition the HVB or precondition the cabin in winter. Just good to know since sometimes people want to do that on shore power to save HVB SoC.

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[RobbH]

The OP lives in a retirement community with a shared garage. I don't think it is a good idea for him to try to play around with the circuits even if he has access to the breaker box. Which he probably doesn't.

On a side note, L1 charging is not enough power to precondition the HVB or precondition the cabin in winter. Just good to know since sometimes people want to do that on shore power to save HVB SoC.

I used 110v for a few years before I put Level 2 in my garage and the preconditioning (mentioned above) is really the only drawback I noticed if range is not an issue. For the OP; I got 1% charge per hour on 110v if that gives you a good planning factor to work with. Also, it might be worth talking to whatever association/management you have to look into installing Level 2 for your community. Depending on the State there may be power company or state programs they can use to defray the costs.

 

[DYohn]

I love how this forum works. OP asks a question. 147 replies, including one member correcting another and then being corrected, and the OP is long gone. Then some ass jumps in to make light of the whole thing. Oh wait, that ass is me....

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

I love how this forum works. OP asks a question. 147 replies, including one member correcting another and then being corrected, and the OP is long gone. Then some ass jumps in to make light of the whole thing. Oh wait, that ass is me....

Correction (): There have only been 19 replies so far.

 

[Elmst-e]

I love how this forum works. OP asks a question. 147 replies, including one member correcting another and then being corrected, and the OP is long gone. Then some ass jumps in to make light of the whole thing. Oh wait, that ass is me....

You’re right, ask a question and you get 2 answers to it and everyone else off somewhere else, but that’s the fun part of the forum. I don’t really care how fast the car charges, it will be ok. I thought those Chargepoint slow chargers were 120v, but I guess their 220v, just ac and not dc. So it’s good to know the lv battery is better with the slow charging.
Thanks to all for the on and off topic replys. We absolutely love this new community we just moved to!

 

[music_cities]

The OP lives in a retirement community with a shared garage. I don't think it is a good idea for him to try to play around with the circuits even if he has access to the breaker box. Which he probably doesn't.

Pretty sure if I lived in a retirement community I'd invite an electrician friend over for a beer, buy him a meal from the retirement community's chef, bribe the maintenance lady with a bottle of scotch, and make a simple plan. Then I'd probably run the idea by my son who's an electric engineer and he'd probably over engineer it to the point of being non-workable.

Side note: in my mom's retirement community, there is *hardly any* power in the shared garage! A few plugs here and there. But there is an open ceiling with lots of room for conduit, so I'm sure they could add a few L2s easily enough. The parking is assigned, so they'd probably want to wire up some stalls closest to the supply, and then offer those stalls to anyone with an EV.

There are block heater plugs in the outdoor (shared) parking, it might be easy to remove a few of the block heater receptacles and reuse the wiring for some 12amps L2s at double the voltage, for shared use.

 

[RickMachE]

You’re right, ask a question and you get 2 answers to it and everyone else off somewhere else, but that’s the fun part of the forum. I don’t really care how fast the car charges, it will be ok. I thought those Chargepoint slow chargers were 120v, but I guess their 220v, just ac and not dc. So it’s good to know the lv battery is better with the slow charging.
Thanks to all for the on and off topic replys. We absolutely love this new community we just moved to!

Correct on the ChargePoint chargers. In short, a DC fast charger is basically 20kW or higher, below that is AC.

80amps x 240v = 19.2kW. There are no AC chargers faster than 80amps to my knowledge.

One thing to keep in mind. In a retirement community, as you noted, everything is close. You might drive 2 or 3 miles. During that short drive, you're not really charging the 12v. Then, you plug in, and it gains that back in less than an hour. Great.

If you instead decide to go say 2 weeks without charging, because you don't need to, you're basically draining the 12v down with your driving, and then letting it sit, waiting for it to get low enough that the car says "charge it up". So, ideally you should plug in every day when you park it.

Of course with the new update, leaving the 12v system active for 12 minutes after you park, that may all be out of the window now...

 

[mkhuffman]

Pretty sure if I lived in a retirement community I'd invite an electrician friend over for a beer, buy him a meal from the retirement community's chef, bribe the maintenance lady with a bottle of scotch, and make a simple plan. Then I'd probably run the idea by my son who's an electric engineer and he'd probably over engineer it to the point of being non-workable.

Side note: in my mom's retirement community, there is *hardly any* power in the shared garage! A few plugs here and there. But there is an open ceiling with lots of room for conduit, so I'm sure they could add a few L2s easily enough. The parking is assigned, so they'd probably want to wire up some stalls closest to the supply, and then offer those stalls to anyone with an EV.

There are block heater plugs in the outdoor (shared) parking, it might be easy to remove a few of the block heater receptacles and reuse the wiring for some 12amps L2s at double the voltage, for shared use.

If there is a will, there is often a way.

Lobbying the board that runs the community to put in some L2 EVSEs is a good idea. BEVs are slowing growing in popularity, and I expect many who live there will appreciate the ability to charge faster than L1.

 

[kootinlok]

If... I mean if you get 5kw from a 110v outlet, the current would need to be more than 45A. A standard 110v outlet would not support 45A, your 110v charger connector neither.
Physical laws don't lie.
I have a '22 Mach E too. I've been using my Ford portable charger on 240v outlet for 3 and half years and started charging a Model y with it as well a month ago, it still works pretty well.

 

[tminter4]

Loaded? It's factual. Buy a ChargePoint, or Grizzl-E, or any other name brand charger. The % of failures is very tiny. Ford's Mobile Charger, and GM's, and ... are all "prone to failure", meaning a huge number of them fail.

definition - "likely to or liable to suffer from, do, or experience something"

I've been using the one that came with my car for almost 2 years now. No issues and it is used twice a week minimum. If it goes out tomorrow, I will say I got my money's worth out of it.

 

[RickMachE]

I've been using the one that came with my car for almost 2 years now. No issues and it is used twice a week minimum. If it goes out tomorrow, I will say I got my money's worth out of it.

That's great. But, the fact is, that these units fail at a very high rate. OP specifically asked about reliability.

 

[Tampamike]

That's great. But, the fact is, that these units fail at a very high rate. OP specifically asked about reliability.

They’re reliable for at least two years.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

They’re reliable for at least two years.

Got ours in 2022 and still use it regularly. We used it every day for 18 months straight as I was too busy to install the L2. We use it on almost every road trip that involves visiting family.

People don't understand negative reporting bias.

 

[OH2AZ2OH]

Got ours in 2022 and still use it regularly. We used it every day for 18 months straight as I was too busy to install the L2. We use it on almost every road trip that involves visiting family.

People don't understand negative reporting bias.

You've been using the Ford Mobile Charger for 120V charging, right? It is probably fine for that. If you use it for L2 charging, that's when they start overheating.

 

[Tampamike]

Got ours in 2022 and still use it regularly. We used it every day for 18 months straight as I was too busy to install the L2. We use it on almost every road trip that involves visiting family.

People don't understand negative reporting bias.

You’ll notice that 18 months is < 2 years … But, Level 1, it’ll probably last much longer. Just remember the three year warranty window - in case.

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