Electric car home charging points



Had a right chew on with mine. The company doing the installation insisted that the main fuse coming into the house be upgraded. They told me to contact my energy supplier which I did. They were useless. So I contacted Northern Power networks who after several
Emails sent me an approval to upgrade the supply. When I called them they said i needed to contact my energy supplier 🤷‍♂️
 
EchoMan said:
Had a right chew on with mine. The company doing the installation insisted that the main fuse coming into the house be upgraded. They told me to contact my energy supplier which I did. They were useless. So I contacted Northern Power networks who after several
Emails sent me an approval to upgrade the supply. When I called them they said i needed to contact my energy supplier 🤷‍♂️
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Energy supplier shouldn’t need to be involved, I had same issue they had to come and put a limiter in the incoming supply but NPG did it.
 
Although the main fuse belongs to the distribution company, provided it is ONLY the main fuse itself that needs upgrading then the supplier is allowed to do it.
Get in touch with your supplier.
 
Gonna get one installed next to my home petrol station.

Just charge up at the supermarket when you do your weekly shop

The biggest problem, and I mean a massive problem I have with using the electric van at work is the lack of any indication I am slowing down when I take my foot off the accelerator. And it slows down a lot quicker when you do this compared to if you were in a normal car or van. It catches loads out who are behind me and I can see they havent got a clue I`m slowing down because I havent physically pressed the brake for the lights to come on.

The technology of these things changes every year. Personally I wouldnt bother with one for a few years until they've perfected them and normal petrol stations are replaced with rapid charger points. They`ll probably have the rapid charge (up to 80% full ) down to 10-15 mins in a few years. In the future, the need for having a home charging point should be absolutely negligible I would think. They opened a massive forecourt down in essex before christmas, loads of charge points, a f ew shops / coffee shops etc. Thats the future imo, its not like everyone has an oil refinery in their back garden nowadays is it.
 
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Crook Mackem said:
Gonna get one installed next to my home petrol station.

Just charge up at the supermarket when you do your weekly shop

The biggest problem, and I mean a massive problem I have with using the electric van at work is the lack of any indication I am slowing down when I take my foot off the accelerator. And it slows down a lot quicker when you do this compared to if you were in a normal car or van. It catches loads out who are behind me and I can see they havent got a clue I`m slowing down because I havent physically pressed the brake for the lights to come on.

The technology of these things changes every year. Personally I wouldnt bother with one for a few years until they've perfected them and normal petrol stations are replaced with rapid charger points. They`ll probably have the rapid charge (up to 80% full ) down to 10-15 mins in a few years. In the future, the need for having a home charging point should be absolutely negligible I would think. They opened a massive forecourt down in essex before christmas, loads of charge points, a f ew shops / coffee shops etc. Thats the future imo, its not like everyone has an oil refinery in their back garden nowadays is it.
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My house is like pedestrianised with parking bays on the side of the block, I don't have a drive or a garage. This is the main reason I havnt seriously looked at electric yet, there is no way I couldn't have home charging installed. It's a bit of a problem.
 
Crook Mackem said:
Gonna get one installed next to my home petrol station.

Just charge up at the supermarket when you do your weekly shop

The biggest problem, and I mean a massive problem I have with using the electric van at work is the lack of any indication I am slowing down when I take my foot off the accelerator. And it slows down a lot quicker when you do this compared to if you were in a normal car or van. It catches loads out who are behind me and I can see they havent got a clue I`m slowing down because I havent physically pressed the brake for the lights to come on.

The technology of these things changes every year. Personally I wouldnt bother with one for a few years until they've perfected them and normal petrol stations are replaced with rapid charger points. They`ll probably have the rapid charge (up to 80% full ) down to 10-15 mins in a few years. In the future, the need for having a home charging point should be absolutely negligible I would think. They opened a massive forecourt down in essex before christmas, loads of charge points, a f ew shops / coffee shops etc. Thats the future imo, its not like everyone has an oil refinery in their back garden nowadays is it.
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Bit strange that you can’t get used to regenerative breaking, it took me less than the journey home from the place I picked it up from to get used to it.

rapid charging should only really be used infrequently, as charging at high capacity DC takes its toll on the battery and reducesits life quicker. It’s also usually between 36 and 55p per kWh to do so (a bit cheaper at the Tesla ones) so no, rapid charging isn’t the future. Fast AC charging through a 7kw home charger is an absolute must have for an EV owner, it becomes very difficult without one.
 
Joe Public said:
Bit strange that you can’t get used to regenerative breaking, it took me less than the journey home from the place I picked it up from to get used to it.

rapid charging should only really be used infrequently, as charging at high capacity DC takes its toll on the battery and reducesits life quicker. It’s also usually between 36 and 55p per kWh to do so (a bit cheaper at the Tesla ones) so no, rapid charging isn’t the future. Fast AC charging through a 7kw home charger is an absolute must have for an EV owner, it becomes very difficult without one.
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I`m not on about the regenerative breaking, I`m on about the fact that 99% of the cars on the road would take Xm to coast up to a right turn for example whereas the electric motor powering this van (its a crap van btw) pretty much takes a quarter of that and the vehicle gives no indication its slowing down. Youve basically got to have the accelerator pressed for a lot longer than you would in a normal car.

Your second point (if true) highlights the reason why electric vehicles would be totally impracticle for a large number of this country. We arent going to have a line of chargers / pop up chargers / them pad things in every single terraced street. Its beyond ridiculous but that being said I do believe the charging / battery infrastructure will change massively in the next 10 years and home charging will not be required for most people. I had some rep trying to flog a load of them pop up ones before christmas and I can tell you now they simply wont work, things that move up and down on a highway break, they just do, water gets in, grit etc and they break. I have more hope for the pad ones (cant remember their proper name) and the thought of every house dragging a wire across the path doesnt even bare thinking about.
 
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Crook Mackem said:
I`m not on about the regenerative breaking, I`m on about the fact that 99% of the cars on the road would take Xm to coast up to a right turn for example whereas the electric motor powering this van (its a crap van btw) pretty much takes a quarter of that and the vehicle gives no indication its slowing down. Youve basically got to have the accelerator pressed for a lot longer than you would in a normal car.

Your second point (if true) highlights the reason why electric vehicles would be totally impracticle for a large number of this country. We arent going to have a line of chargers / pop up chargers / them pad things in every single terraced street. Its beyond ridiculous but that being said I do believe the charging / battery infrastructure will change massively in the next 10 years and home charging will not be required for most people. I had some rep trying to flog a load of them pop up ones before christmas and I can tell you now they simply wont work, things that move up and down on a highway break, they just do, water gets in, grit etc and they break. I have more hope for the pad ones (cant remember their proper name) and the thought of every house dragging a wire across the path doesnt even bare thinking about.
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Are you sure it gives no indication of slowing down? On mine brake lights come on at a certain "rate of deceleration", it will come on even if you are touching the accelerator, but not fully off. I can see on the car visualisation on the in car display when the break light is illuminated.

Some people have managed fine without a home charger, I had the car before i had home charging sorted and found it very inconvenient. Eventually these issues will be resolved but if i couldnt have home charging i wouldnt have an EV just yet. For it to work for you it has to be practical and has to offer you something as coparable as you already have for it to be an acceptable change. For me, with home charging, it is much more convenient than a petrol car. Takes 10 seconds to put on charge, which i only do twice a week, and is loads more convenient than going to petrol stations, but i'm luckly, like tommasi mentions above, i wouldnt get one if i was in his position, it just wouldnt be practical and offer the benefits i would need, charging anxiety would be through the roof. My experience of public charging network other than the tesla superchargers is terrible.

As you mention, it will change dramatically over the next decade, it has no option but to do so.
 
Joe Public said:
Are you sure it gives no indication of slowing down? On mine brake lights come on at a certain "rate of deceleration", it will come on even if you are touching the accelerator, but not fully off. I can see on the car visualisation on the in car display when the break light is illuminated.

Some people have managed fine without a home charger, I had the car before i had home charging sorted and found it very inconvenient. Eventually these issues will be resolved but if i couldnt have home charging i wouldnt have an EV just yet. For it to work for you it has to be practical and has to offer you something as coparable as you already have for it to be an acceptable change. For me, with home charging, it is much more convenient than a petrol car. Takes 10 seconds to put on charge, which i only do twice a week, and is loads more convenient than going to petrol stations, but i'm luckly, like tommasi mentions above, i wouldnt get one if i was in his position, it just wouldnt be practical and offer the benefits i would need, charging anxiety would be through the roof. My experience of public charging network other than the tesla superchargers is terrible.

As you mention, it will change dramatically over the next decade, it has no option but to do so.
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They gave us a renault kangoo to trial a year or so ago, it was the top of the range model and to be fair we were all impressed with it. It had all the bells and whistles inside, all the display stuff which would go green / red depending on how it was being driven. Think the range on it was 200 mile or so depending on how it was being used. Trial ended, unanimous decision made "yes we`ll have that type". What we actually got was the most basic, lowest electric model kangoo possible, honestly mate its got nothing on it. No digital displays, no rear view camera, range is 118 mile on a full charge and this normally drops to 98 upon leaving the car park. The intervening lockdown hasnt helped matters but Fleet arent playing ball so it looks like we`re stuck with it.

Then as part of my day job, i`ve got to try and work out how best to put all the kit that we can onto the highway for people to use. All suppliers generally want a long term lease where they can recoup their initial outlay but i`m wary because some of the stuff we put in only 2 or 3 year ago is completely outdated now and spends more time broken than in use. I`ve been bombarded with reps sales pitches, been to various conferences and a lot of the stuff does seem good / progressive / impressive etc but i`m all about the future maintenance and looking after the highway which means its bloody difficult to make a decision when looking at how things have changed in the last 2 or 3 years to see what the picture will be like in next 5 or 10. I suspect it`ll predominantly be service stations / wireless chargers in office car parks / supermarket car parks but i dont know really its just a half educated guess. The last thing i want to do though is litter street after street with technology that will be outdated and useless in a few years time.
 

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