European Charging Info

[Eikrokei]

The following documents were published on the web forum of the Norwegain Electric Vehicle Association last night. Since I haven't seen them mentioned here I thought I should post them.

The documents include confirmation of a Chademo adapter, apparently this will be released later this year. Pricing is still TBD.

Regarding the discussion about the european charge port it is interesting to note that the documents refer to superchargers as 90kW, not 120kW. I don't know if this is significant or just old text that hasn't been updated.

View attachment EU_CHARGING_EN_MAY13 (1).pdf
View attachment EU_Utility_Outlet_Charging_EN_070813 (1).pdf

 

[Fuzzylogic]

Thanks!

A bit silly that we have to get this information from a third party, and not from Tesla directly...
i'm almost getting used to it by now.

 

[Cosmacelf]

Great find. Looks like the docs are still drafts as there are incomplete sentences, etc. Not knowing anything about European electricity, I don't know if this is what people we looking for, but it looks like it covers all the bases.

 

[mkuendig]

I have bought the Kabe KEContact P20 Wall Charger Box:

KeContact

Anyone has a good recommendation for a type2 to type2 cable from KEContact P20 Box straight to Car ?

 

[Johan]

I have bought the Kabe KEContact P20 Wall Charger Box:

KeContact

Anyone has a good recommendation for a type2 to type2 cable from KEContact P20 Box straight to Car ?

May I ask how much you paid for it? Thanks.

 

[widodh]

Great find. Looks like the docs are still drafts as there are incomplete sentences, etc. Not knowing anything about European electricity, I don't know if this is what people we looking for, but it looks like it covers all the bases.

They seem to be correct, but somewhat outdated and some small glitches.

But overall it seems to cover everything we thought would happen.

 

[mkuendig]

May I ask how much you paid for it? Thanks.

KEBA 86.875 Elektroauto Heimladestation KeContact P20 Typ2 32 A Ausführung Typ 2, Buchse, 22 KW, 32 A Silber, Grau im Conrad Online Shop | 431393

999 Euro

 

[dtich]

I have bought the Kabe KEContact P20 Wall Charger Box:

KeContact

Anyone has a good recommendation for a type2 to type2 cable from KEContact P20 Box straight to Car ?

i'm not sure which connector your specific model KeContact is fitted with, but something like this i'd assume:

62196-2 Male to Female 16A Plugs
62196-2 Male to Female 32A Plugs

it could also be wired-in as a pig-tail, so with a female type 2 on the car end and bare wires on the charger end..? you'll have to say what your exact config is.

and, i'm pretty sure switzerland limits home circuits to 16A for this application, right? also, with this charger and cable you would not have the benefit of the tesla coded utility mating adapter that contains the resistor that tells the car the current capacity of the charging circuit. for safety you will need to manually set your charge current to 16 or below i would think. (don't know if the installation manual for that charger is online, i suppose there is a chance they included a way to set the charge current in the box. seems like a pretty sophisticated unit, what with rfid and all...)

or, this co seems to make any custom cable you'd like, maybe they can even install the proper resistor for the model s and your supply so the pilot current will function properly?:

Charging Solutions - Charging Point Accessories


anyway... fwiw. looks like a well-made charger though. nice.

 

[Mark de Raaij]

thnx!

 

[arg]

also, with this charger and cable you would not have the benefit of the tesla coded utility mating adapter that contains the resistor that tells the car the current capacity of the charging circuit. for safety you will need to manually set your charge current to 16 or below i would think. (don't know if the installation manual for that charger is online, i suppose there is a chance they included a way to set the charge current in the box. seems like a pretty sophisticated unit, what with rfid and all...)

???? Surely the whole point of having a unit with a type2 connector (like the KeContact) is that it incorporates the EVSE and signals the current limit to the car via the pilot (and detects whether you are using a 16A or 32A cable by the resistor inside the cable).

So you don't want the Tesla UMC at all - that contains the same electronics as are already inside the KeContact unit, and is only needed when connecting to standard 'dumb' power sockets.

Or have I misunderstood what you are trying to say here?

 

[dtich]

???? Surely the whole point of having a unit with a type2 connector (like the KeContact) is that it incorporates the EVSE and signals the current limit to the car via the pilot (and detects whether you are using a 16A or 32A cable by the resistor inside the cable).

So you don't want the Tesla UMC at all - that contains the same electronics as are already inside the KeContact unit, and is only needed when connecting to standard 'dumb' power sockets.

Or have I misunderstood what you are trying to say here?

oh, well i didn't know that the type 2 plugs have the same resistance coding that tesla uses. they may very well do. be good to confirm. thx for pointing that out. but, no, i wasn't saying to also have the tm umc.

 

[arg]

oh, well i didn't know that the type 2 plugs have the same resistance coding that tesla uses. they may very well do. be good to confirm. thx for pointing that out. .

Well, it's (probably) not the same resistance coding, but it does a similar job.


Just to spell everything out, this is my understanding of the situation - where most of it is specified in IEC/SAE standards, only a few things proprietary to Tesla:

• As a general principle, the car always controls how much current is drawn: it will usually know the maximum that it is allowed to draw, but then draws anything up to that limit based on the battery's needs and
  the user's settings on the controls.
• Ordinary domestic/industrial power sockets that you might want to use for charging are 'dumb' - they are always live (mild safety hazard when plugging in), and give no direct indication of how much current can be drawn without blowing the fuse/breaker.
• Type2 plugs or sockets on an EVSE (public or private charging station) are different: they are not live until the EVSE detects that a car is plugged in, and they tell the car the maximum current it is allowed to draw (via the 'control pilot' pin on the connector).
• The standards permit a simple cable with a type 2 connector to go into the car and a 'dumb' plug for a normal socket on the other end. Using such a cable, the car has no information about the maximum current available and it has to make a worst-case guess (perhaps 10A). I don't think I have seen confirmation whether or not Tesla supports this on Model S. Any current greater than this requires an EVSE to tell the car what to do.
• If a permanently-installed EVSE is used, and that EVSE has a captive cable with a type2 connector on the end, then the setup is simple: the EVSE will either be built for a particular maximum current and the installer must provide a suitable circuit (wiring, fuse/breaker, etc) to match that, or the EVSE will support a range of maximum currents with an internal setting that the installer will set to match the wiring & fuse/breaker that has been installed. Tesla's HPWC is an example of such an EVSE - and the European version isn't really Tesla specific at all, it's just a standard EVSE with type2 plug. In all these cases, the EVSE signals to the car over the pilot pin to say how much current is available.
• If the EVSE doesn't have a captive cable, but instead has a type2 socket and expects a type2 plug-to-socket lead to be used to connect the car, there is an extra complication: the cable that the user plugs in might have a lower current capability than the EVSE. This is solved by a resistor coding in the cable: the EVSE can read the cable's rating and then choses the value sent over the control pilot to the car - either the cable's rating or the EVSE's rating, whichever is lower.
• Any cable from a dumb socket to type2 at the car (other than the minimum-current case noted above) requires some electronics in the middle to generate the control pilot and tell the car what it can draw - it is in effect a portable EVSE. The normal approach is to guess the maximum permitted current based on the type of connector on the other end of the cable. This can be done very simply - a fixed type of plug on that end and always the same control pilot signal - so you would need a complete cable/EVSE for each connector type.
• Tesla have chosen to do something more complicated for their "Mobile Connector": the car side is standard type2 connector on a captive cable like an ordinary EVSE, but the other side has a cable with a totally proprietary connector on the end, with a series of adapters to the various domestic/commercial standard plug shapes. A pin on the proprietary connector allows the unit to sense which adaptor has been fitted and so signal the appropriate current to the car via the control pilot. The exact coding on this pin is not yet known for the European version Mobile Connector.
• For DC charging, a special out-of-range value is sent on the control pilot, and the car/EVSE then communicate with a much more complex protocol carried on an RF carrier over the same pin as the normal control pilot (this is confusingly called 'power line carrier', as it shares some aspects of the protocol definition with the HomePlug data-over-mains system, but in this case it is not carried on the power pins). This would be enough to control supercharging, but the IEC standards do not permit 90kW (at Tesla's battery voltage) over the standard type2 connector - it is not yet known how Tesla have handled this, but something at least mildly proprietary seems likely.

Have I missed any cases?

 

[charliestyr]

Sounds about right arg.

• Tesla have chosen to do something more complicated for their "Mobile Connector": the car side is standard type2 connector on a captive cable like an ordinary EVSE, but the other side has a cable with a totally proprietary connector on the end, with a series of adapters to the various domestic/commercial standard plug shapes. A pin on the proprietary connector allows the unit to sense which adaptor has been fitted and so signal the appropriate current to the car via the control pilot. The exact coding on this pin is not yet known for the European version Mobile Connector.

This is the same with the US mobile connector, they can connect different connectors for their "household" outlets, vs. higher power outlets such as the 14-50 which seems most popular. This is just the European equivalents, a "household" adapter like our 3-pin and then more complex adapters (blue/red) for higher power situations.

 

[gregincal]

Well, it's (probably) not the same resistance coding, but it does a similar job.

Given that the car end of the two cables plug into the exact same Type 2 socket, I would assume that the resistance coding is exactly the same. Making them different would only make things more complicated. Tesla in general has followed the specs except in cases where they think they have a superior solution.

 

[arg]

Given that the car end of the two cables plug into the exact same Type 2 socket, I would assume that the resistance coding is exactly the same. Making them different would only make things more complicated. Tesla in general has followed the specs except in cases where they think they have a superior solution.

Well, as I understand it the coding for the type2 cables is at the EVSE end of the cable, not the car end, so the car isn't involved at all even in that case; here we are talking about a private interface between the Tesla adaptors and the electronics box in the middle of the cable. So there's no standards directly applicable to this situation - though of course they may well have chosen the same values just for symmetry.

 

[TEG]

 

[Wxll]

Can anyone recommend a good online shop that sells the KeBa KeContact P20 with the following options:

KeBa KeContact P20 Type2 Socket with the options:
RFID
Type2 Socket
32A,
Electronica 3: Basic+MR/EM+ETH+Powerline[PLC]

[FONT=arial, sans-serif]Conrad is just selling the basic version, I need the intelligent (for smart power adjustment and ethernet) version including the RFID authentication.[/FONT]

[FONT=arial, sans-serif]Looking forward where you guys bought your P20.[/FONT]

[FONT=arial, sans-serif]Wxll [/FONT]