Installing a second home charge point on a looped supply

[Zilla91]

Seriously considering getting rid of the petrol family X3 for a Model Y or an iX3 and going fully electric but one thing I’m not sure about is if I’d be able to get a second charge point installed at my house.

I’ve got a looped supply so my charge point (Hypervolt) has a CT clamp for load balancing and I’m not sure if I’d be able to have two chargers with that setup.

 

[Tony Hoyle]

I'm surprised they let you install one with a looped supply - normally they insist it's unlooped first (which is normally free).

 

[Ted56]

Im currently having my supply unlooped and a new 100amp (up from 60amp) supply put in with UKPN. It has cost me £1.3k in total. I was end of line not sure if that makes a difference of it being free or not.

In terms of 2 chargers, I asked my electrician and they said 2 should be fine but there was something to do with smart load balancing on the zappi (I can message you on the 22nd June once the single charger fitted I can ask for some detail).

2x 7kw chargers is like 64amp, so turn on a cooker/hob and kettle and getting close to the limit and popping the main fuse im guessing. Currently Im having 1 charger installed onto a post that can hold 2, then I can rotate the post 90 degree and have a 2nd one fitted later.

Im in the same boat with the family petrol car, me bing at work all day and the family car normally at home the idea was to have it trickle charged with solar and sometimes top it up with the grid.

 

[Zilla91]

I'm surprised they let you install one with a looped supply - normally they insist it's unlooped first (which is normally free).

Yeah they just installed a CT clamp and asked me to not charge during peak hours (Northern Powergrid)

 

[anarchi]

Yeah they just installed a CT clamp and asked me to not charge during peak hours (Northern Powergrid)

Strange. SSEN told me I was not allowed a charge point on a looped supply. Fortunately they unlooped me for free (apart from the week and a half of chaos).

 

[Fursty Ferret]

Depends on the DNO. No issues with a charger on a looped supply here in Yorkshire - they swapped the fuse from 60A to 80A, but the charger will load limit anyway. The guy who changed the fuse did say that it may present a bigger problem if my neighbour wants a charger too. My supply is looped off theirs, so if you didn't look carefully you wouldn't know anyway.

 

[DaveNN]

As noted in another thread, I'm being unlooped from the semi across the drive ( why they looped my detached property is a mystery.)
I'm using my 7kw charger overnight..
I totally get why the DNO have thrown a paddy but, if my neighbour had a 10kw shower installed, induction hob or a ruddy big hottub, the DNO wouldn't have a clue.
I hope that they see sense and simply ok a load limiter ( they wont)

 

[qwickshot]

Do you actually need two chargers?

Unless you are both doing big miles daily then I’d have thought 1 charger would cover all your needs.

 

[Zilla91]

No but it’ll be less than ideal having to move the cars about depending on which one needs a charge, especially as our drive is pretty tight and it’s a pain in the arse manoeuvring the cars to swap places. First world problems I know.

 

[Mrklaw]

No but it’ll be less than ideal having to move the cars about depending on which one needs a charge, especially as our drive is pretty tight and it’s a pain in the arse manoeuvring the cars to swap places. First world problems I know.

Buy a car with V2L and park that near the charge point, and use the car to charge your tesla

 

[DoricJim]

Get a longer charging cable then?

 

[Country Boy]

Do you actually need two chargers?

Unless you are both doing big miles daily then I’d have thought 1 charger would cover all your needs.

I am from a 2 ev household. I have only ever charged both cars at the same time once, and that was at lower currents... Normally only charge at 16amp anyway.. If you need to charge second car, there is always the granny charger..

Getting a longer cable is much cheaper than getting another charge point.. and the DNO teddies which will likely follow.

I have a 100amp supply, and my DNO (Western Power) had a hissy fit when I was using it before they inspected many months later.. Then just said, OK and left.

It all depends on your DNO..

 

[PITA]

Do you actually need two chargers?

Unless you are both doing big miles daily then I’d have thought 1 charger would cover all your needs.

I have two Ev Chargers...

One 7kW and one 22kW

The 7kW charger can use Solar, Powerwall or Grid. So it's really flexible...

The 22kW charger is Grid Only, but it's faster. This is really handy if I want to charge the car, but not disrupt my Powerwall battery levels during the day.

Having two chargers is just very handy without any concern for contention or load balancing. Just plug in and forget about it.

Also handy if one unit fails or under maintenance... and I can still charge car during a Grid blackout.

 

[Mrklaw]

if you want two chargers for convenience and the cost is ok - thats fine. But with a looped supply (even without a looped supply..) you should look into smart chargers that can work with each other so they don’t both pull at the same time. Or you throttle them both down to 3.6kw so overall load is 7.2 (with each having mains CT clamps to not come on if house load is high).

if you had no chargers that would be simpler - you could be recommended ones that work together. But as you already have one, I don’t know if that one supports communication to other chargers.

 

[DeejUK]

I've had two EVs for the last five years (Renault Zoe and a Model X) and we've never really needed to charge both at the same time. Your usage patterns are almost certainly different, but it's worked fine for us having a single charger. A longer cable seems like the cheapest and most parsimonious solution to me.

What's a looped supply? I've not heard that term before.

One 7kW and one 22kW

Is the 22kW on a three-phase circuit?

 

[PITA]

I've had two EVs for the last five years (Renault Zoe and a Model X) and we've never really needed to charge both at the same time. Your usage patterns are almost certainly different, but it's worked fine for us having a single charger. A longer cable seems like the cheapest and most parsimonious solution to me.

What's a looped supply? I've not heard that term before.



Is the 22kW on a three-phase circuit?

A looped supply is where two houses are connected together by one Grid Cable. Instead of each house having their own direct cable.

I think builders did this to save costs by not having to link each house to the main Grid supply.

But now houses are needing more capacity, one cable (looped) is insufficient to supply two houses at once... so it must be removed, and a new direct cable laid to the looped house.

.... and yes, our 22kW charger is on 3 Phase

What's nice about 3 Phase is that I can charge two cars and Powerwalls and run the house all at the same time, during the 4 hour Octopus Go cheap rate. Around 100 kWh...

 

[Zilla91]

if you want two chargers for convenience and the cost is ok - thats fine. But with a looped supply (even without a looped supply..) you should look into smart chargers that can work with each other so they don’t both pull at the same time. Or you throttle them both down to 3.6kw so overall load is 7.2 (with each having mains CT clamps to not come on if house load is high).

if you had no chargers that would be simpler - you could be recommended ones that work together. But as you already have one, I don’t know if that one supports communication to other chargers.

I wonder if a pair of Hypervolt chargers are able to do that? I’ll post a message on the owners group and see what they say

 

[Adopado]

I wonder if a pair of Hypervolt chargers are able to do that? I’ll post a message on the owners group and see what they say

Yes. Google or their website gives the answer quicker ...

 

[WannabeOwner]

I've had two EVs for the last five years ... and we've never really needed to charge both at the same time.

Me too, but now we have 48 PV panels we generate 15kW at peak, the house will use about 2kW, so if PowerWalls are already full one 7kW car charger won't consume all the rest. So we just plug each car into its respective charger so that we can then juggle which car charges / when, from the APP, as the Mood, and Mr Sun , takes us

98kWh PV yesterday, 24 to-and-from PowerWalls, 0.7kWh from the grid 35kWh into the cars

 

[phil4]

We've got two EV's and one charger... the other just uses the granny charger. So much so, I'm not even sure I'd add a second one if it was entirely free.