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How to charge Model S at home?

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Order the Tesla wall connector. Use the mobile connector and superchargers if it can't get installed before your car arrives. I do not think any other charger can supply a faster charge than the Tesla Connector. Most others can only supply 40A where the Tesla provides the full 48A to your car when properly installed. I get 44 miles an hour of charge added to my Tesla
 
I use my mobile connector for at home charging. Use a Dryer Buddy to share my dryer outlet 30 amp connection (14-30 adaptor). I've also charged on a 50 amp circuit (14-50 adaptor). Both are adequate. You will need to get the proper adapter from the Tesla Store. Have your electrician install a circuit with the proper plug.
 
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Look for a 1st gen UMC. They provide 40A vs. the current UMC which is only 32A. Both will be fine for charging the car, but with a UMC and a 14-50 receptacle you can simply unplug the UMC if it fails and plug in a new one. They are also less expensive than the HPWC.

I keep my other UMC in the car for charging at family members' houses or other places that don't provide a Tesla or J1772 connector.
 
Is the cost to install a Tesla Wall Connector prohibitive for anyone who purchases a $90K+ Tesla? If you already have a 240V 50A+ circuit near the car parking area, I can see some advantages to using the mobile adapter. If you are going to run a new circuit, the cost of the Wall Connector is nothing. It's like putting regular gas in your car when premium is specified. It will run, but why did you buy the car? Just my thoughts.... :)
 
Is the cost to install a Tesla Wall Connector prohibitive for anyone who purchases a $90K+ Tesla? If you already have a 240V 50A+ circuit near the car parking area, I can see some advantages to using the mobile adapter. If you are going to run a new circuit, the cost of the Wall Connector is nothing. It's like putting regular gas in your car when premium is specified. It will run, but why did you buy the car? Just my thoughts.... :)
HPWC is sold out though. That’s why responses have been about installing a NEMA 14-50 outlet.
 
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the mobile charger isnt going to cut it, obviously.
Please stop making assumptions like that. You seem to think that all they come with is the pathetic dinky little plug-in cords that only work with low power 120V outlets like the old Nissan Leafs and stuff had. That's not true. The mobile charging cable that comes with Tesla cars is one of the best things in the industry. There are swappable adapter plugs that can go into many different kinds of outlets, including some pretty high ones, that can refill a couple hundred miles overnight. So don't immediately dismiss that as being "obviously" inferior. I've been using that as my only home charging for over 7 years from a 240V 50A outlet.
 
Is the cost to install a Tesla Wall Connector prohibitive for anyone who purchases a $90K+ Tesla? If you already have a 240V 50A+ circuit near the car parking area, I can see some advantages to using the mobile adapter. If you are going to run a new circuit, the cost of the Wall Connector is nothing. It's like putting regular gas in your car when premium is specified. It will run, but why did you buy the car? Just my thoughts.... :)
I assure you the wall connector doesn't supply "premium electricity".

Me, I didn't buy the car to look at some pretty thing hanging on the wall of my garage. I don't care, and didn't get to the place where I can buy $90k cars by spending money for no reason. "I bought an expensive thing so I should buy another expensive thing" isn't a particularly compelling argument to me.
 
I assure you the wall connector doesn't supply "premium electricity".

Me, I didn't buy the car to look at some pretty thing hanging on the wall of my garage. I don't care, and didn't get to the place where I can buy $90k cars by spending money for no reason. "I bought an expensive thing so I should buy another expensive thing" isn't a particularly compelling argument to me.
No other connector supplies a higher rate of charge. It is inexpensive. No one sees it but me. It is in the garage. I don't look at it. It is very convenient to use, and have the mobile connector for travel and emergencies in your car. There is a good reason to have a backup mobile connector available in your car. Hope you don't get stranded somewhere with your mobile connector sitting at home in your garage. Nice to have a backup in case your primary method of connecting fails. Each has their own priorities.
 
No other connector supplies a higher rate of charge.
Eh, there are lots of them.

I agree, if you need 48 amp charging (precious few do) and have a Tesla, the Wall Connector is the way to go in terms of price and convenience. Provided you can actually buy one given Tesla's apparent inability to produce them.

There is a good reason to have a backup mobile connector available in your car. Hope you don't get stranded somewhere with your mobile connector sitting at home in your garage.
In 125,000 miles of EV driving all over the Western US, I have yet to come across such a good reason. I take it with me here or there for opportunistic charging if I'm going to be on the road or at somebody's house, but there are approximately eleventy billion J1772 public charging stations in the US now. I can think of no such emergency that would leave me stranded if I didn't have a UMC in my car 24/7/365. I also never carried a spare gallon of gas with me in ICE cars for the same reason, but I suppose maybe I live a little more dangerously than some. ;)

Each has their own priorities.
Definitely, and people can certainly make their own decisions on such. Just providing my own data points to the discussion. :)
 
In 125,000 miles of EV driving all over the Western US, I have yet to come across such a good reason. I take it with me here or there for opportunistic charging if I'm going to be on the road or at somebody's house, but there are approximately eleventy billion J1772 public charging stations in the US now. I can think of no such emergency that would leave me stranded if I didn't have a UMC in my car 24/7/365. I also never carried a spare gallon of gas with me in ICE cars for the same reason, but I suppose maybe I live a little more dangerously than some. ;)
If I lived in California, this would not be a problem. In the center of the US, it is much more likely I will "run out of gas" and need to hook up to 120V to get 15 miles to get to a charger. Hopefully in a year or two, this will be less of a problem for me -- unless I just push it too much, and run out of gas, the way people with ICE cars do now with gas stations on every block.
 
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No other connector supplies a higher rate of charge. It is inexpensive. No one sees it but me. It is in the garage. I don't look at it. It is very convenient to use, and have the mobile connector for travel and emergencies in your car. There is a good reason to have a backup mobile connector available in your car. Hope you don't get stranded somewhere with your mobile connector sitting at home in your garage. Nice to have a backup in case your primary method of connecting fails. Each has their own priorities.
Why not have two UMCs? Purchasing a second UMC for use at home is cheaper, easier to replace, and you always have a backup if it fails. I didn't buy a second UMC to save money, I bought it because it's more flexible (and it was nice to save a few hundred bucks in the process). Gone are the days of super fast home charging at 80A anyway.

I'd only recommend a HPWC if you wanted to charge two Teslas concurrently and if running a second circuit would be prohibitively expensive.
 
IMHO - I like the Tesla wall connector. I use the Supercharger 20 miles away and top off at home. Or if needed I can charge overnight even from a low SOC. Cost me $140 to have an electrician install. I put up a sheet of starboard to fend off the stuffings from the cable.

M
 
Why not have two UMCs? Purchasing a second UMC for use at home is cheaper, easier to replace, and you always have a backup if it fails. I didn't buy a second UMC to save money, I bought it because it's more flexible (and it was nice to save a few hundred bucks in the process). Gone are the days of super fast home charging at 80A anyway.

I'd only recommend a HPWC if you wanted to charge two Teslas concurrently and if running a second circuit would be prohibitively expensive.
I used to have that kind of thinking before NEC put in the extra requirements in the 2017 version. Now that cost argument you are trying to make falls apart quickly.

This has been laid out by @jcanoe in several threads, but because of the extra expenses involved in doing an outlet to use the UMC, there is about an extra $200 in breaker, wire, outlet, cover plate, etc. parts just to enable using the UMC that the wall connector would not have. So you can pay $500 and save $200 (net cost of $300) to get a wall connector, or you can pay $275 to buy an extra UMC. It's a $25 difference, but what do you end up with?

If you buy the wall connector, you have two different devices with different capabilities and have gained the ability to do charge rates of 40 or 48A instead of just having two identical devices which are both limited to 32A.

So I never will recommend buying a 2nd UMC now. It makes no sense from a utility or cost perspective. I will recommend either using the UMC that is included permanently and not buying anything extra, or if you want to buy something extra, then that should be a wall connector.
 
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What are the install cost differences in the receptacle vs. wall connector? I did the 14-50 install myself and the biggest cost was the 50ft of 6/3 romex (holy crap is that expensive now), but that wouldn't even cut it for a 60A circuit. True, you don't need a box, receptacle, or cover plate for a HPWC install, but that's what, $15-$20?
 
I had 125 feet of 6/3 run (actually was between 100 and 125 feet, but I bought 125). Labor ($500), wire, 60A breaker, some conduit ($200), Tesla connector ($500 + Tax). This was June, 2020. AWG 6 is what Tesla specifies for 48A on a 60A circuit.
 
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What are the install cost differences in the receptacle vs. wall connector? I did the 14-50 install myself and the biggest cost was the 50ft of 6/3 romex (holy crap is that expensive now), but that wouldn't even cut it for a 60A circuit. True, you don't need a box, receptacle, or cover plate for a HPWC install, but that's what, $15-$20?
OK, itemized invoice time!

1. Breaker. If you're doing the wall connector, you get to use a cheap, standard $20 one. If it's an outlet, code requires a $100 GFCI breaker, so an extra $80 there. I am glad I got mine done back in 2014 before this stupid requirement came around.
($80)
2. Wire. Seems like everybody and their mother-in-law's dog thinks you should do a 14-50 outlet instead of a 6-50. So there is that extra thick conductor for the neutral that is 6 gauge probably for however many feet that goes. The wall connector doesn't require the neutral.
($??)
3. outlet, box, etc. DON'T use a damn Leviton. A decent Cooper, Bryant, or Hubbel one will be about 30-40 dollars just for the outlet. Box and cover plate for an extra $10? Maybe a few bucks shipping too?
($50)
4. UMC plug adapter. Obviously with the hard wired wall connector, you don't need this, so spring for an extra $45 if you want the 14-50 plug or $35 if you want a plug for any other kind of outlet.
($45)
5. Something to hang the cord for the UMC. The wall connector is its own hanger, because you just loop the cable around the body of it, but if you are plugging in the UMC, you will want some kind of hanger or hook mounted on the wall. That doesn't need to be anything fancy, but it is something, even if it's a garden hose hanging bracket. That's another 20 or $25.
($25)

So adding those up, excluding the vague wire cost difference in #2, that is $200 just from items 1, 3, 4, & 5. That wire difference is going to be really variable, depending on how long people's circuits are, so I'm not going to try to guesstimate that one.


I had 125 feet of 6/3 run (actually was between 100 and 125 feet, but I bought 125). Labor ($500), wire, 60A breaker, some conduit ($200), Tesla connector ($500 + Tax). This was June, 2020. AWG 6 is what Tesla specifies for 48A on a 60A circuit.
And because I get nervous when I see this from people, this was wire in conduit instead of Romex? 6 gauge would be OK if that is individual wires in conduit, but not if it's NM-B cable for a 60A circuit.
 
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I charge off of a dryer plug with the 14-30 adapter that I got off ebay for about $40 - $50 four years ago. Dryer is on the other side of wall where I park my car. My work has a charger also which gives me 2 hours of free charging a day about 60km. First couple of years I used to only charge at home but stopped and started to utilize the work charger everyday. I have only charged at home about ten times since beginning of 2020. If i get lazy and don't charge at work and get down below 150 km I go to neary supercharger which is free. At the end of the day it's up to you what kind of setup you want to get at home if it's the only point of charging for you. Been on a couple of 1000 - 1500 km trips in the last few years and have never taken the mobile connector with me.