Change charge rate from app please!

[kuruma]

This is THE most tedious aspect of having our Tesla. Please Elon, allow us to change the amps remotely rather than having to head out to the car.

Please pile in to lend support so that this somehow makes its way onto Elon's radar. Cheers.

 

[OfficialMark_H]

Never been an issue for me, perhaps I’m in the minority?

 

[Blokie]

Never been an issue for me, perhaps I’m in the minority?

I've never changed that setting in 4500 miles of ownership. Why would you want to modify it?

 

[leewillis77]

I believe allowing people to remotely change the charge current isn't supported in part for safety reasons (e.g. not being in situ to monitor the safety of the attached connection). As others have said though, there's very little reason to every change this - it should pick the best rate automatically. The only use case (IIRC) is solar, but really you're better off getting a chargepoint that will manage this for you rather than manually tweaking it via the app.

 

[Tattersky]

This would come in really handy if you have solar panels and no Zappi.
I have to keep going in the car to change the charging rate from nighttime fast charge to daytime low and vice-versa.

 

[kuruma]

If you charge at home via solar and have to balance the amount the car takes vs. what you want to go to the house, Powerwall, etc. then you will want to vary the charge rate to minimise your draw from the grid to zero. As more people realise that there are megawatts of free energy being poured on their properties each year and EV ownership takes off, managing EV charging via solar will become increasingly common.

Take today, for example, which is overcast here. I'm generating 1.2kW of solar and the house is taking a negligible amount. 5A means that I draw all my car charge from the solar leaving a trickle into the Powerwall/house. Later, it's forecast to be sunny and I'll want to up the car charge to, say, 10A or even more to make the most of it.

Yes, there are charge points which manage the load for you automatically, but Tesla don't manufacture them. In retrospect, I would have got one. If you already have a charge point installed it's hard to see how you're "better off" goind through the hassle of getting a completely new charge point fitted. Instead, my Tesla charge point was installed along with the Powerwall, and it would be great if my array of Tesla products allowed those of us who have solar this functionality.

I'm not conviced it's a safety issue. Anyone can set any charge rate manually and then, say, leave for a flight to the Algarve.

 

[Llama.]

Even with my Zappi, I can see the value of being able adjust the charge rate from my Tesla app. Particularly if my goal is to prevent any excess solar production going to the grid and limiting grid use entirely.

Even the Zappi doesn’t do this perfectly, so being able to dial down the charge rate from the App a bit would be handy.

The Tesla home charger is useless in comparison though. Seems to have very limited functionality benefits, except for the very important button to open charge port!

 

[Dilly]

Even with my Zappi, I can see the value of being able adjust the charge rate from my Tesla app. Particularly if my goal is to prevent any excess solar production going to the grid and limiting grid use entirely.

Even the Zappi doesn’t do this perfectly, so being able to dial down the charge rate from the App a bit would be handy.

The Tesla home charger is useless in comparison though. Seems to have very limited functionality benefits, except for the very important button to open charge port!

Wouldn’t disagree at all. There are few occasions where I would do it but one is balancing the load between two cars and hot water diverter is one.
The Zappi does a very fair job but it would be handy to be able to drop a 7Kw charge down to 3 or 4Kw without nipping out to the garage.

 

[Adopado]

Wouldn’t disagree at all. There are few occasions where I would do it but one is balancing the load between two cars and hot water diverter is one.
The Zappi does a very fair job but it would be handy to be able to drop a 7Kw charge down to 3 or 4Kw without nipping out to the garage.

Yes, and given that it's just replicating what you can do on the car's screen it should be straightforward to implement. The safety aspect is covered by the fact that you would only be able to reduce the rate, not increase it beyond the level it would be charging at anyway. The app generally could have a few more features ... like setting the car's timer/scheduler for example.

 

[Epico]

This is something I would vote for. I would find it very useful...and I'm also sure Elon reads every message on here...so...must be the next update

 

[exlatccatsa]

If you charge at home via solar and have to balance the amount the car takes vs. what you want to go to the house, Powerwall, etc. then you will want to vary the charge rate to minimise your draw from the grid to zero. As more people realise that there are megawatts of free energy being poured on their properties each year and EV ownership takes off, managing EV charging via solar will become increasingly common.

Take today, for example, which is overcast here. I'm generating 1.2kW of solar and the house is taking a negligible amount. 5A means that I draw all my car charge from the solar leaving a trickle into the Powerwall/house. Later, it's forecast to be sunny and I'll want to up the car charge to, say, 10A or even more to make the most of it.

Yes, there are charge points which manage the load for you automatically, but Tesla don't manufacture them. In retrospect, I would have got one. If you already have a charge point installed it's hard to see how you're "better off" goind through the hassle of getting a completely new charge point fitted. Instead, my Tesla charge point was installed along with the Powerwall, and it would be great if my array of Tesla products allowed those of us who have solar this functionality.

I'm not conviced it's a safety issue. Anyone can set any charge rate manually and then, say, leave for a flight to the Algarve.

Exactly!! Well said. The time wasted having to go out to the car and change the rate or the energy wasted by having to leave the car charging at 5a whilst away from home in this day and age seems crazy with all the other automation and remote control about.

 

[Traguar]

I Would like to be able to change the charge rate from the app. Live in an apartment with underground c/p so it takes a while to go and change the rate.

 

[e.vanboekel]

Hi kuruma, what are you trying to achieve?Avoid costly hours and take more energy from solar? Although it's not possible to change the amps you could consider a smart charging app. This will start / stop the charge process based on solar pv production or utility prices.

Alternatively any charger supporting OCPP would allow you to set a charge profile in amps. What kind of charger do you have?

 

[exlatccatsa]

He could be like me trying to balance power usage between heat pump washing machine dishwasher etc. Or even when solar increases and decreases as the sun (the earth) moves the light off the panels. I like to achieve maximum use of the solar electricity and minimum use of grid electricity. In other words balance the use so i pay as little as possible for electricity. I could do this much better if I could control the amperage the car is receiving via the app.. especially like now when I am away from home.

 

[kuruma]

Hi kuruma, what are you trying to achieve?... What kind of charger do you have?

all in the thread mate

 

[jimbo_hippo]

+1 for when using excess solar.

That said, I have a Tesla gateway accepting solar to feed to a PowerWall with a Tesla Wall Connector which is connected to the gateway at one end and a Tesla car at the other, all on the same network. i monitor how much solar I’m getting in a Tesla app which gives me stats on all my house energy and when I scroll left there are the controls for the two cars. You’d think with that much Tesla action going on it would be able to ‘do a Zappi’ amd get the car to request a charge rate proportional to the excess solar I have kicking around! But alas no…… dumb as a bag of rocks when it comes to that idea.

 

[Llama.]

+1 for when using excess solar.

That said, I have a Tesla gateway accepting solar to feed to a PowerWall with a Tesla Wall Connector which is connected to the gateway at one end and a Tesla car at the other, all on the same network. i monitor how much solar I’m getting in a Tesla app which gives me stats on all my house energy and when I scroll left there are the controls for the two cars. You’d think with that much Tesla action going on it would be able to ‘do a Zappi’ amd get the car to request a charge rate proportional to the excess solar I have kicking around! But alas no…… dumb as a bag of rocks when it comes to that idea.

I think with a full Tesla PV system you will likely be getting very good efficiency of solar PV production, storage and discharge. Perhaps a more durable long-lived setup too. Plus software updates, right?

The only thing you are missing is the ability to automatically begin a charge with excess solar that would otherwise go to the grid. I’m sure you can still do this manually

I think the reason the Tesla hasn’t provided the features that a Zappi does, is because the Tesla solar and wall charger systems were designed for the US solar PV arrangements.

My understanding is that many people with solar PV on the roof in America basically export all of their excess solar and build up a surplus or credit with their energy supplier in the summer and then draw down this ‘banked’ solar production in darker months. They just credit your account and bill you the difference annually.

I can imagine in a place like California there would be no demand for a Zappi because of this.

This is so much simpler and cheaper to implement than my battery storage / Zappi set up, which is why I think Tesla ignore the need for this feature.

 

[Outlaw Warrior]

This is THE most tedious aspect of having our Tesla. Please Elon, allow us to change the amps remotely rather than having to head out to the car.

Please pile in to lend support so that this somehow makes its way onto Elon's radar. Cheers.

I have solar and have to change my charge rate many times to get the best out of the Solar and charging the car, [moderator removed comments that some may find objectionable (5a)], the car know what the charger can supply when plugged in hence why the car says 32 or even 30 on the older type two chargers, use the travel charger and max is 10 amps so there’s no safety problems, charge rate can be set from the car, adding this to the amp would make a massive difference to people who have solar and battery’s Please Please consider this option !!! It’s the only thing that lets my Tesla experience down.

 

[Drew57]

I can imagine in a place like California there would be no demand for a Zappi because of this.

I've spent three full October-Novembers, also March 2020 in Santa Barbara or LA & believe me grey skies can be quite common (sometimes with added smoke & ash). That last trip saw very little sun.

 

[Llama.]

I've spent three full October-Novembers, also March 2020 in Santa Barbara or LA & believe me grey skies can be quite common (sometimes with added smoke & ash). That last trip saw very little sun.

I didn’t mean about the lack of solar on a grey day. I meant that the energy market in the US just offers credit for surplus solar. So there is no need for smart EV chargers to try and maximise excess solar in most of the US.

The company Myenergi that makes the Zappi is based in the U.K. where feed in tarrifs and variable tarrifs etc are a key aspect of the energy market.

I like my Zappi / roof PV/ storage battery set up. But it is expensive and complex. It would be cheaper investment for me to just send excess to the grid and draw it back as a credit with the supplier when needed.

The point being with all this is that we shouldn’t expect Tesla to spend the time introducing this functionality to its home chargers when it doesn’t make sense for the energy market in the US.