Advice on charger location in garage

[sidewinder]

lol ask 10 people and get 10 different answers. that said, sophias dad suggestion of a 2x4 across the rail is a good idea. you could just use some zip ties in an x to secure them to the rails. same with the charging cable. one benefit of the balancer is that you won't need a holster as the connector will retract up and stay out of the way when disconnected from the car.

as to your question above this is the one i'm referring to. 3/4 inch should be enough to hold 2 x #6 thhn and 1 x #10 thhn for ground.

Southwire 3/4 in. x 6 ft. Ultratite Liquidtight Flexible Non-Metallic PVC Conduit Whip 58004607 - The Home Depot

Southwire's NM Whip Kits are for connecting air conditioners, pumps, motors, compressors, swimming pool devices and other similar equipment. Used for electrical applications complete assembly, ready to

www.homedepot.com

also home depot or lowes sells them by the foot so should be cheaper if you need shorter length.

 

[qdeathstar]

With a MPY on order to replace my wife's car, my homework assignment is to look into installing a charger. I was hoping you all could recommend the best location in the garage given our specific situation.

We have a three car garage with the breaker panels on the wall nearest the single garage door. I park on that side since it is a tight fit with the wall close to the driver's side door and the water heater (with pole) in front. My wife prefers to park on the other side and still wants to park and charge the MYP - essentially she parks in the middle of the three car garage as we have storage shelves all along the wall on the opposite side. Here are some photos of that panel side of the garage to give some context:

View attachment 908021
The silver car is mine and you can see the pole protecting the water heater with some pool noodle on it acting as a bumper. My kids did that after someone bumped their leg on it.


View attachment 908018

View attachment 908020
There is room to add breakers in the larger panel on the right. The smaller one is full. The panels are mounted to wood along the sides but the bottoms of the panels are covered only by drywall so that should be easier to access from below.

View attachment 908017


View attachment 908019
From the photo above, you can see how tight it is on that side. I can get out of the car OK but my wife and kids had trouble before so we added matching pool noodles where the doors make contact.

While I would love the look of EMT for the install, a horizontal run alongside the car would be problematic down this wall. With concrete block walls, it's recommended to use hangers (or minnies) to keep the pipe off the wall to avoid corrosion. So EMT would stick out 2 inches from the wall which would not be good for opening my driver's door, and those hanger clips would scrape you if you walked by too close. Plastic conduit would allow the conduit to hug the wall and be kinder to the doors and not stick out more than the noodles. The charger would have to be closer to the rear bumper of my car so I could still walk down the side without having to shimmy or bump into it.

View attachment 908022
The space between the garage doors would be ideal but we hang our shop vac there so it could reach one side of either car. Plus this would increase the install costs for sure getting the wire up and over.

So far we've come up with two possible mounting locations for the charger and would appreciate your feedback on these and any other suggestions:

• Place the charger one or two feet to the right of the panels near the front wheel/bumper of the silver car in the photo. This would be about 15 feet in from the garage door.
  • Would the charging cable be able to reach the MYP which will be parked on the other side (where the black SUV is to the left of the shop vac). We could route the cable in front of the silver car and down the side to reach the Tesla assuming the cord is long enough. Also, this would avoid me driving over the cable while she is charging.
• Place the charger closer to the garage door down the wall which would be about 9-10 feet to the left of the panels.
  • One concern is the conduit run down that wall which I mentioned above. We'd need to make sure there is clearance for the car doors.
  • Another concern is that the silver car would be driving over the charging cable while in use. Not sure if wall connector cables are heavy duty enough for that.
  • One positive is that this would allow more range for charging cars outside of the garage where the first option would only leave 6 or so feet of cable reaching outside if needed.

Thanks in advance for your feedback.

I would run EMT. There isn’t a code violation with running it right against the concrete and you won’t rot through the emt in 20 years. If you are real worried about you could run IMC….

 

[thefisch]

lol ask 10 people and get 10 different answers. that said, sophias dad suggestion of a 2x4 across the rail is a good idea. you could just use some zip ties in an x to secure them to the rails. same with the charging cable. one benefit of the balancer is that you won't need a holster as the connector will retract up and stay out of the way when disconnected from the car.

as to your question above this is the one i'm referring to. 3/4 inch should be enough to hold 2 x #6 thhn and 1 x #10 thhn for ground.

Southwire 3/4 in. x 6 ft. Ultratite Liquidtight Flexible Non-Metallic PVC Conduit Whip 58004607 - The Home Depot

Southwire's NM Whip Kits are for connecting air conditioners, pumps, motors, compressors, swimming pool devices and other similar equipment. Used for electrical applications complete assembly, ready to

www.homedepot.com

also home depot or lowes sells them by the foot so should be cheaper if you need shorter length.

Yeah that's the stuff I thought you meant. I am not sure that meets code in areas where it could be subject to physical damage which could include a garage. I think you can use that at the end like whip to AC compressors or pool pumps. But in the garage, if the conduit is on the wall I think you have to use something solid like PCV, EMT or rigid.

 

[thefisch]

My charging installation

How about that... Note that its a Gen2 charger, and if you go this route you should use JP75W-L20 hangers since the Gen3 cable is smaller. You'd need to cross the garage above the torsion spring assembly.

The small width of the handle holster allows me to hang an air compressor(removed for the picture) in between the doors.

In your situation you could go across the ceiling as well. That wasn't an option for my installation because my ceiling joists are 12' off the floor and the cord would likely be too short.

@Sophias_dad Looking back at your install, made me wonder if one could install the wall connector sideways or upside down.

Just a random thought. Folks with the mobile charger install them in different orientations and even on ceilings. I realize that you'd lose the benefit of storing the cable on the charger itself but if one were running the cables to another cable organizer or across a ceiling then it wouldn't matter. And we are not talking about an outdoor installation where you'd worry about water intrusion.

Just thinking that using a sideways or upside down orientation might put less strain on the charging cable depending on the direction the cable is routed.

 

[Sophias_dad]

@Sophias_dad Looking back at your install, made me wonder if one could install the wall connector sideways or upside down.

Just a random thought. Folks with the mobile charger install them in different orientations and even on ceilings. I realize that you'd lose the benefit of storing the cable on the charger itself but if one were running the cables to another cable organizer or across a ceiling then it wouldn't matter. And we are not talking about an outdoor installation where you'd worry about water intrusion.

Just thinking that using a sideways or upside down orientation might put less strain on the charging cable depending on the direction the cable is routed.

There is no restriction on orientation of the charger. I'd probably avoid literally upside down outside in the rain.

 

[davewill]

@Sophias_dad Looking back at your install, made me wonder if one could install the wall connector sideways or upside down.

Just a random thought. Folks with the mobile charger install them in different orientations and even on ceilings. I realize that you'd lose the benefit of storing the cable on the charger itself but if one were running the cables to another cable organizer or across a ceiling then it wouldn't matter. And we are not talking about an outdoor installation where you'd worry about water intrusion.

Just thinking that using a sideways or upside down orientation might put less strain on the charging cable depending on the direction the cable is routed.

I'd be afraid that the weight of the cord at a 90 or 180 degree angle would damage it over time. If you do mount it like that, maybe support it or tack it to the wall.

 

[Hippo25]

Another thing to consider which is not obvious until you park your MY in your garage is that if you drive-in into the garage, you won't be able to fully open the rear hatch as it will hit the overhead garage door opener rail. Be sure to set the opening height of the rear hatch before you try this else you will damage the rear hatch (many have done this on this). If you back into your garage, you will be able to fully open the hatch so now this may affect your decision on where to place the wall connector.

 

[thefisch]

Another thing to consider which is not obvious until you park your MY in your garage is that if you drive-in into the garage, you won't be able to fully open the rear hatch as it will hit the overhead garage door opener rail. Be sure to set the opening height of the rear hatch before you try this else you will damage the rear hatch (many have done this on this). If you back into your garage, you will be able to fully open the hatch so now this may affect your decision on where to place the wall connector.

Thanks for the reminder about that. Does anyone know the max height for the hatch when it opens?

 

[Sophias_dad]

Thanks for the reminder about that. Does anyone know the max height for the hatch when it opens?

I don't have a Y, but it can't be anything like 8 feet.

BTW, I notice you could reset the up-limit of your garage door to be a bit higher, it looks like its being left 4-6" below its true maximum.

 

[thefisch]

I'd be afraid that the weight of the cord at a 90 or 180 degree angle would damage it over time. If you do mount it like that, maybe support it or tack it to the wall.

Yes, I would want to make sure there is adequate support so that the charger isn't bearing more weight than when the cable is hanging. When hanging the cable above to cross over, how far apart should the supports be?

The post from another forum and the Etsy product shared by @sidewinder show examples where the cable is spanning about 6 to 8 feet between supports but those are not wall connector cables. Maybe the support should be every 3-4 feet?

 

[thefisch]

I don't have a Y, but it can't be anything like 8 feet.

BTW, I notice you could reset the up-limit of your garage door to be a bit higher, it looks like its being left 4-6" below its true maximum.

Yeah, I see that. It could probably open another 3 inches before the release brackets hits the light on the opener.

 

[thefisch]

For supporting the cable, I could use 2" PCV schedule 40 conduit fittings and hanger straps. The charging handle easily passes through 2" pipe. Maybe two 90 or 45 elbows at each end and then a short support in the middle so there is support every 4 feet. Alternatively, I could run 8-10 feet straight PCV schedule 40 conduit to fully support the cable overhead, but I would think that's overkill and could trap some heat coming off the cable even though it would be 2" diameter.

 

[Hippo25]

Does anyone know the max height for the hatch when it opens?

With the MY hatch fully open, the highest point is the lip of the spoiler and it's ~90 inches from the ground.

but it can't be anything like 8 feet.

It's almost 8 ft which is quite high. My previous car, Honda Odyssey can fully open the rear hatch without hitting anything above in my garage. The MY cannot and I've set the MY rear hatch open limit to ~7ft since day 1.

 

[exxxviii]

Why not on the wall by the nose of the cars? If you put it there, it would avoid the conduit beside the car and you could preserve your shop vac location. Unless you have a very deep garage, it should easily reach the Tesla’s port.

 

[howardnj]

Another thing to consider which is not obvious until you park your MY in your garage is that if you drive-in into the garage, you won't be able to fully open the rear hatch as it will hit the overhead garage door opener rail. Be sure to set the opening height of the rear hatch before you try this else you will damage the rear hatch (many have done this on this). If you back into your garage, you will be able to fully open the hatch so now this may affect your decision on where to place the wall connector.

Yes! It happened to me on the second day of ownership. I now close the garage door prior to opening the lift gate

 

[tangible1]

Thanks for the reminder about that. Does anyone know the max height for the hatch when it opens?

just open the hatch when in the garage and stop it by hand when it gets to the appropriate height.
then save that height using the hatch button.
instructions are in Owners Manual;

Model Y Owner's Manual | Tesla

Learn how to open and close the rear trunk and access the cargo area.

www.tesla.com

 

[thefisch]

Why not on the wall by the nose of the cars? If you put it there, it would avoid the conduit beside the car and you could preserve your shop vac location. Unless you have a very deep garage, it should easily reach the Tesla’s port.

True that would reach both spots. But now that I've shown my wife the overhead examples, she likes that option the most since she won't have to roll up the cable.

 

[bhzmark]

Far and away the best place is where the shop vac is. From that point it can charge four car locations Including the 2 spaces just outside the garage door which you may not think is useful now but absolutely will be useful when you wanna park your own car outside and charge it or friends come over and want to charge.

Just put it where the shop vac is and figure out something else for the shop Vac maybe higher or lower. Any other location will be less useful.

The cable practically rolls itself up when you just hang a couple loops off the charger itself. She won't mind at all. Hanging over head is more trouble than its worth, and likely denies ability to charge outside with door down.

 

[thefisch]

Far and away the best place is where the shop vac is. From that point it can charge four car locations Including the 2 spaces just outside the garage door which you may not think is useful now but absolutely will be useful when you wanna park your own car outside and charge it or friends come over and want to charge.

Just put it where the shop vac is and figure out something else for the shop Vac maybe higher or lower. Any other location will be less useful.

The cable practically rolls itself up when you just hang a couple loops off the charger itself. She won't mind at all. Hanging over head is more trouble than its worth, and likely denies ability to charge outside with door down.

Wife is adamant that the shop vac stays there. Looked at moving up or down but there isn't enough clearance to wrap the hoses around each of them.

 

[jcanoe]

Wife is adamant that the shop vac stays there. Looked at moving up or down but there isn't enough clearance to wrap the hoses around each of them.

Get a smaller shop vac.