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Is it possible to upgrade the in-car charger?
- Thread starter wcoyote
- Start date
Akikiki
A'-Lo-HA ! y'all
wcoyote, Kuhr, if I recall correctly, if you have a 90, its a 48 amp charger, not a 40. You may be charging at home on a 50 amp circuit which would pull only 40, hence the error.
If the option to replace your 48 with a 72 still exists, the cost installed will likely be about $2,000-2500. Are you sure its worth it to you? You will still need to upgrade your circuit at home to a 90-100 amp circuit to take advantage of the higher amperage charger. Have you priced that upgrade?
In 2013, I bought my first S. I insisted on dual 40 amp chargers. Then I learned I would need to upgrade the 50 amp circuit at home and there were so few place elsewhere to charge at 80 amps, it was useless to do it. I wasted both time and money to get the second charger.
And for me, starting charging at 11 p.m. versus 2 a.m. didn't matter because I still had a full tank at daylight.
If the option to replace your 48 with a 72 still exists, the cost installed will likely be about $2,000-2500. Are you sure its worth it to you? You will still need to upgrade your circuit at home to a 90-100 amp circuit to take advantage of the higher amperage charger. Have you priced that upgrade?
In 2013, I bought my first S. I insisted on dual 40 amp chargers. Then I learned I would need to upgrade the 50 amp circuit at home and there were so few place elsewhere to charge at 80 amps, it was useless to do it. I wasted both time and money to get the second charger.
And for me, starting charging at 11 p.m. versus 2 a.m. didn't matter because I still had a full tank at daylight.
ucmndd
Well-Known Member
Early pre-facelift 90s have the 40/80 dual charger setup.
If that’s the car OP is talking about, he may be able to get a quote from Tesla to add and program a second charger. Cost is probably in the $3k range.
Akikiki
A'-Lo-HA ! y'all
Todd Burch
14-Year Member
Coyote, what are your driving habits?
Having driven a Model S for 7 years now and 150,000 miles, charging at home on 240V/40A has ALWAYS been more than sufficient. I cannot think of one circumstance where I would have needed the extra 8 amps, but everyone’s driving is different.
It’s unlikely that the extra 8 amps are worth the extra cost, as that won’t speed up DC charging (like Supercharging) at all.
Having driven a Model S for 7 years now and 150,000 miles, charging at home on 240V/40A has ALWAYS been more than sufficient. I cannot think of one circumstance where I would have needed the extra 8 amps, but everyone’s driving is different.
It’s unlikely that the extra 8 amps are worth the extra cost, as that won’t speed up DC charging (like Supercharging) at all.
The OP is asking about upgrading the charger on his older Tesla. Tesla offers an option to upgrade the charger on older cars from 40 to 80 amps. Going from 40 to 48 amps isn't normally done and I've never heard of it being discussed before.
Todd Burch
14-Year Member
Yes, that’s what I meant but clearly not what I typed.
I meant to say the extra charger bringing your car to 80 amps is unlikely to make a big difference for home charging scenarios unless you do a LOT of local driving in a day.
I have a Model S85 from 2013 (Europe) which chargers at 3x32A 3-phase (96A, 22kW) and I love the charging speed!
The reason is that I drive a lot for work and might come home around 19:00. Car charges for 1 hour and that adds about 100km (60 miles) of range. At 20:00 I can leave again with my wife, friends, family to go out for dinner or what ever reason.
I've got a 2015 MS P85D that I've been waiting for parts for the extra 40A charger for about 3 months.. the service guys said sure it was possible but they wanted to double charge me for labor (it's supposed to be $2500 including labor but they tacked $500 labor on to the quote).
The last time I checked it was in some sort of "out of stock" may not be replenished state... so I hope you have better luck than I at getting them to do the upgrade. It's possible they just don't stock them anymore for retrofits and only stock replacements even though it's the same charger.
Plenty on Ebay for cheap, but good luck getting Tesla service to install and activate.
The last time I checked it was in some sort of "out of stock" may not be replenished state... so I hope you have better luck than I at getting them to do the upgrade. It's possible they just don't stock them anymore for retrofits and only stock replacements even though it's the same charger.
Plenty on Ebay for cheap, but good luck getting Tesla service to install and activate.
Let's say that you install one yourself and find a way to get it activated, do you void your warranty? I wasn't aware that they were not actually doing it, I just got a quote to have it done, didn't ask when they would do it.
The inevitable question coming, I don't have a good reason for doing it, I'd rather not spend $2K and tax to do it. I do have access to two 80A chargers that are free, and I'd like to save time and let others have at them as well. (One is public, the other is used by a couple of commuters in my office building most of the time, my commute is three miles).
Akikiki
A'-Lo-HA ! y'all
You also could contact Jason Hughes TMC member wk057 HRS Motors. He's rebuilt several Model S. He has lots of parts. And he can change and activate stuff some people only dream of. He might be able to help you at a big discount compared to Tesla. He's in Hickory, N.C., so not so far from you.
If you primarily do overnight charging or long distance charging at superchargers, there isn't any need for an upgrade from 40A to 80A or from 48A to 72A - which is why Tesla believed they could limit UMC2 to lower amps.
We had a 80A charger on our first Tesla, and once Tesla had installed superchargers, we never needed to charge faster than at 40A.
We have a 72A charger on our latest Tesla purchase, and haven't needed to charge at more than 48A (on a 60A breaker with an HPWC).
If Tesla increases the battery pack size significantly, this might change. But for the current S/3/X battery packs, 40A or 48A charging is enough for almost all vehicles.
We had a 80A charger on our first Tesla, and once Tesla had installed superchargers, we never needed to charge faster than at 40A.
We have a 72A charger on our latest Tesla purchase, and haven't needed to charge at more than 48A (on a 60A breaker with an HPWC).
If Tesla increases the battery pack size significantly, this might change. But for the current S/3/X battery packs, 40A or 48A charging is enough for almost all vehicles.
davewill
Active Member
They can't "void" your warranty for things like this. They can deny a particular warranty claim if they conclude that the added charger caused the problem. In that situation, you would have access to arbitration if you didn't agree with the decision.
Obviously, warranty coverage wouldn't include the added part.
That's not the only use case, where it is a daily occurrence.
No it isn't.
A lot of people don't want to charge for several hours in the middle of a trip while they are trying to get somewhere.
I see that a lot of people are really stuck on this idea of thinking that the only use case for faster AC charging is around town where you live. Please keep in mind that there are still many routes not Supercharger covered, and the high amp AC charging can make big differences in the waiting time.
To conveniently illustrate this point, next month, my wife and I are going on a trip from Boise to Reno to see a concert. We are going to be taking the gas car, to avoid the long slow charging for over an hour on 40A to make it through a non-Supercharger covered section between Boise and Winnemucca, NV that Tesla still has not covered. There is a 75A charging opportunity available there in the middle, and I would definitely take the Tesla if I had the second onboard charger to use more of that speed. But for a few trips a year that could use this, it's not quite worth the $2,500 or whatever to get the second charger put in my 2014 car.
I use 80A charging to schedule a heated up battery before driving. It helps reduce the warm up and decreases battery cycles. It's also great at destination chargers, I can get out of the way quickly and be fully charged at a restaurant.
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