EU Model 3: AC charging speed?

[rollo.martins]

Now as we know CCS speed is at 117 kW (see other threads), could please someone try a 22 kW Type 2 AC charger and tell us how fast the EU Model 3 charges there?

Some rumors say 11 kW, some 16.5 kW. For people without their own charging infrastructure this could make an important difference.

Kind regards and thank you very much

R.

 

[rollo.martins]

Would anyone of the new European Model 3 owners mind doing a quick test, please? (Or are all of you busy grinning behind the wheel? )

Thank you very much!

 

[sjokomelk]

Charger in the car is max 3x16A 400V - so 11kW.

 

[rollo.martins]

Thank you for your answer. Did you test this or do you have a reliable source (not:Tesla employees)? There are various sources that say 16.5 kW. That is why I ask.

 

[sjokomelk]

It's the official info on the tesla.com website.
This is the Swiss one in German for you: Installation der Lademöglichkeiten zu Hause

 

[rollo.martins]

Ok thanks, this is finally a clear answer. (A pity, though...)

 

[Rocky_H]

Ok thanks, this is finally a clear answer. (A pity, though...)

That seems to be the trend that Tesla is going toward: medium speed capability in the cars for AC charging, but relying on more locations of fast DC charging. This makes decent sense so they don't need to keep including such expensive high power chargers in every single car.

 

[Tommi]

Anyone know if EU Model 3 is able to charge using 32A single phase? For example using Tesla Wall Connector connected only single phase?

 

[rollo.martins]

That seems to be the trend that Tesla is going toward: medium speed capability in the cars for AC charging, but relying on more locations of fast DC charging. This makes decent sense so they don't need to keep including such expensive high power chargers in every single car.

If you consider that in Europe the vast majority of Type 2 charging points delivers 22 kW, and if you take the position of someone who cannot charge at home and has to use every opportunity he can get to top up I would not say 11 kW makes perfect sense. It is much more a missed opportunity to cover the needs of these people. Supercharging is not acceptable for this use case because it does not scale; if you have 500 Model 3's in a city you cant supercharge all of them. If home charging is not an option you charge at the supermarket, you charge at the train station, you charge near someones house you visit. Each time you don't have 7 hours, but only one, or possibly three. This is sufficient with 22 kW. It is not worth connecting the cable with 11 kW for an hour. 16.5 would still have been a nice compromise.

But we will see. The problem might disappear once cities learn that widespread charging infrastructure in the streets is important, so you can "home charge" near to your house. There 3 kW is enough.

 

[rollo.martins]

Anyone know if EU Model 3 is able to charge using 32A single phase? For example using Tesla Wall Connector connected only single phase?

This seems very unlikely to me. Not even Model S and X support it, and you hardly see 32 A single phase connectors, at least here in Switzerland.

 

[eprosenx]

FWIW, my guess would be that Tesla designed the M3 with three 16a chargers. In the US, they are all paralleled across the single phase for 48a. In Europe they are each on their own phase. Then in the MR they just only populate two of the three units (or disable in software?)

 

[widodh]

If you consider that in Europe the vast majority of Type 2 charging points delivers 22 kW, and if you take the position of someone who cannot charge at home and has to use every opportunity he can get to top up I would not say 11 kW makes perfect sense. It is much more a missed opportunity to cover the needs of these people. Supercharging is not acceptable for this use case because it does not scale; if you have 500 Model 3's in a city you cant supercharge all of them. If home charging is not an option you charge at the supermarket, you charge at the train station, you charge near someones house you visit. Each time you don't have 7 hours, but only one, or possibly three. This is sufficient with 22 kW. It is not worth connecting the cable with 11 kW for an hour. 16.5 would still have been a nice compromise.

But we will see. The problem might disappear once cities learn that widespread charging infrastructure in the streets is important, so you can "home charge" near to your house. There 3 kW is enough.

But they need to cut costs on Model 3. So they choose that 11kW is sufficient for Model 3 and 16.5kW for S/X.

 

[Tommi]

This seems very unlikely to me. Not even Model S and X support it, and you hardly see 32 A single phase connectors, at least here in Switzerland.

Please check following page or your country equivalent:

Charging Connectors

At least with UMC above page lists a 32A blue adapter for the new UMC and is referring to a charge rate of 46 km/h (assuming model 3).
New UMC seems to be limited to single phase charging. Would it also supply Model 3 with 32A on single phase conductor of the mennekes plug?
If yes, Model 3 charger would support 32A charging in single charge unit (supporting one of the phases) or it would combine two or even three charge units to single feed in phase.

 

[Big Earl]

It is not worth connecting the cable with 11 kW for an hour.

11 kW for an hour is enough to provide about 44 miles of range, which is more than an average day's drive for most people. Don't get me wrong; I think 22 kW charging would be fantastic ... I just wouldn't go so far as to say it isn't worth plugging in for an hour at 11 kW. Here in the US, most public level 2 charging stations are only 30 amps at 208 volts split phase (6.2 kW).

 

[Rocky_H]

I would not say 11 kW makes perfect sense.

Well, I didn't say "perfect" sense. I said "decent" sense. Sure, everyone would like the fastest AC charging they can get, but Tesla was making what they thought was a reasonable compromise on practical use versus cost.

Supercharging is not acceptable for this use case because it does not scale; if you have 500 Model 3's in a city you cant supercharge all of them.

I said "fast DC charging". Why did you assume that means only Tesla Superchargers? Sure, that would be very restrictive, but the Model 3s in Europe support CCS fast DC charging by default, with a different charge port than the older Model S and X have. CCS is becoming rather widespread through a lot of Europe. So that does give a lot more opportunities and locations for quick charging than just being limited to Tesla Supercharger locations.

 

[miimura]

Please check following page or your country equivalent:

Charging Connectors

At least with UMC above page lists a 32A blue adapter for the new UMC and is referring to a charge rate of 46 km/h (assuming model 3).
New UMC seems to be limited to single phase charging. Would it also supply Model 3 with 32A on single phase conductor of the mennekes plug?
If yes, Model 3 charger would support 32A charging in single charge unit (supporting one of the phases) or it would combine two or even three charge units to single feed in phase.

That page on the en_GB Tesla site indicates that they cut over to the Second Generation Mobile Connector in December 2018. The first generation Mobile Connector supported 16A 3-phase with a Red Industrial Socket adapter. It appears that the second gen unit only supports single phase. In addition, the first generation Mobile Connector 32A Blue Industrial Adapter internally routed the hot line to all three phases inside the Mobile Connector so that the power would be distributed among the three phases of the on-board charger.

If you need 3-phase charging support from Red industrial sockets, there are many available from 3rd party EVSE suppliers in Europe. However, most of them are more expensive than the Tesla first gen Mobile connector was.

 

[EfficientWatts]

That page on the en_GB Tesla site indicates that they cut over to the Second Generation Mobile Connector in December 2018. The first generation Mobile Connector supported 16A 3-phase with a Red Industrial Socket adapter. It appears that the second gen unit only supports single phase. In addition, the first generation Mobile Connector 32A Blue Industrial Adapter internally routed the hot line to all three phases inside the Mobile Connector so that the power would be distributed among the three phases of the on-board charger.

If you need 3-phase charging support from Red industrial sockets, there are many available from 3rd party EVSE suppliers in Europe. However, most of them are more expensive than the Tesla first gen Mobile connector was.

It looks like they just took the North America UMC and stuck the Type 2 connector on (vs the Tesla connector). I would have thought they may have support 3-phase still due to the pin-out of the adapter side having the space for such a connector, but I guess they didn't (or maybe it's reserved?). It does make me wonder if you could take the blue 16/32A adapter and use it with a NA UMC. This assumes that there isn't any distribution of power across all 3 phases like how it seems to be done with the 1st gen european umc.

 

[rollo.martins]

Distribution of one 32 A phase to three 32 A phases cannot be done without an incredible amount of tech. This would not fit into an UMC case. (You cannot just sync all three phases, they have to be rotated 120 degrees). Ok maybe, it they have specifically prepared the car for this special situation, and prevent the umc from activating when connected to any other car itw might work. But this would be significantly more effort than just adding an three phase umc.

So: Very unlikely.

 

[Tommi]

Distribution of one 32 A phase to three 32 A phases cannot be done without an incredible amount of tech. This would not fit into an UMC case. (You cannot just sync all three phases, they have to be rotated 120 degrees). Ok maybe, it they have specifically prepared the car for this special situation, and prevent the umc from activating when connected to any other car itw might work. But this would be significantly more effort than just adding an three phase umc.

So: Very unlikely.

EU Tesla chargers are most likely connected in star, not delta, so they shouldn't care individual charger waveform phase separation unless they are specifically programmed to do so. This is the reason why EU UMC Gen1 works with single phase 32A at least with Model S/X since 32A blue adapter is connected to all phases of UMC Gen1.

If the Gen2 UMC aka Tesla Mobile Connector is only single phase capable and supports 32A charging, then individual phase specific charger should be capable to handle 32A or the charger array would connect two or three charge modules to the supplying phase when it receives indication of single phase and 32A current available from the UMC (32A blue adapter).

If above is true, could it be extrapolated to any EVSE supplying EU Model 3?

 

[miimura]

EU Tesla chargers are most likely connected in star, not delta, so they shouldn't care individual charger waveform phase separation unless they are specifically programmed to do so. This is the reason why EU UMC Gen1 works with single phase 32A at least with Model S/X since 32A blue adapter is connected to all phases of UMC Gen1.

If the Gen2 UMC aka Tesla Mobile Connector is only single phase capable and supports 32A charging, then individual phase specific charger should be capable to handle 32A or the charger array would connect two or three charge modules to the supplying phase when it receives indication of single phase and 32A current available from the UMC (32A blue adapter).

If above is true, could it be extrapolated to any EVSE supplying EU Model 3?

Someone will have to try a public 7.4kW single phase Type-2 charging station on the Model 3. Some older versions of the Model S with single charger would only take 3.7kW from a standard single phase public charging point. Tesla could have put the single phase / three phase switching in the "penthouse" hump on the battery pack where the on-board charger is. I haven't seen anyone definitively say if or how the Model 3 three phase charging system is different than S & X.