Mobile Connector and 220v

[Turlejay]

Sorry if this has been answered somewhere. I couldn't seem to find the right search query to get an answer.

Can the mobile Connector accept 220 as is? Meaning without buying an adapter? Maybe it sounds weird but I already have an adapter that receives a standard 110 plug and converts to plug into the dryer outlet we already have. I have used it with my volt connector with no-issue.

 

[Enginerd]

I believe that the standard gen 2 mobile connector comes with a 110V NEMA 5-15, and a 220V NEMA 14-50 adapter. You'll want to plug your car into the 220V source for charging speed and efficiency. Your dryer outlet may be 14-50, or 14-30, or 10-30, and you would just select the appropriate gen 2 adapter for your outlet.

 

[Turlejay]

I was told by my sales person that it only comes with the 110 plug 5-15. That being said I understand I can purchase Teslas adapter from them. What I was wondering is if I feed 220 throught the 5-15 by way of an adapter that I already have (female 5-15 to make 6-30).

 

[Turlejay]

According to the Tesla site as well. Sorry, I couldn't figure out how to edit my post

 

[srs5694]

(For those who don't know, the EVSE that GM delivers with the Bolt and 2nd-generation Volt is able to handle 240v, although it's not advertised as such, and the physical plug is a hard-wired NEMA 5-15, so it won't work at 240v without a hackish custom-built adapter. Some people use such adapters to plug it into a 240v outlet so as to double the charge rate compared to standard NEMA 5-15 charging.)

Most likely you'll need to buy a $35 adapter to plug into your 240v outlet. It's conceivable that the hackish adapter you've got would work with the Model 3's Mobile Connector and its NEMA 5-15 adapter to charge at 12 amps and 240v, but there's also a chance that it won't work or that you'd fry the Mobile Connector. I don't recall hearing of anybody who's tried it. Personally, I wouldn't risk it -- not to save $35. You're spending tens of thousands of dollars on the car, so don't cheap out on this. You may even be able to add the adapter to the financed price, which would work out to a buck or so a month.

I'm afraid that @Enginerd is providing outdated information. Although Tesla used to provide a NEMA 14-50 adapter with the Model 3, that adapter was removed from the standard kit a while ago (about 4 months ago, IIRC). Thus, unless you happen to buy a car that was produced before that date, or somehow otherwise luck out, you'll need to buy an adapter. It's unclear from your description, @Turlejay, what type of outlet you have. It might be a NEMA 14-50 or something else. Chances are it's one that Tesla supports, but if not, you'll either need an adapter in addition to the Tesla adapter or you'll need a third-party product. Post a photo of your outlet if you need help identifying it.

Note that the adapters for the Gen2 Mobile Connector that comes with the Model 3 are "smart." Each one is encoded with the amperage it supports, so you can only draw 12 amps through the NEMA 5-15 adapter, 24 amps through a NEMA 14-30 adapter, etc. I don't know offhand if the voltage is also encoded and limited.

Also, I'm sure somebody else will want to note, so I'll save them the hassle: 220v is not a standard voltage in the United States. Most homes have 120v and 240v, each with an acceptable variance, so you might actually measure 220v in a few cases, but it's nominally 240v. Some multi-family and commercial sites use 208v rather than 240v.

 

[SSedan]

The car can recognize the adapter and limits amperage based on such, so long as you have the 5-15 adapter it will limit things to 12amps and since it only has one hot terminal it will only receive 120volts.

Spend the $35 on the right adapter.

 

[Turlejay]

My question has been answered based on the "smart" factor. This is exactly what I wanted to know and couldn't quite figure out the proper wording. I certainly won't cheap out at all. I'll get the proper adapter and have an outlet installed to match it. Thank you!

 

[ewoodrick]

No, you will need an additional pigtail/adapter.

Plugs are designed to limit their use. A NEMA 5-15 is a 120V plug. Sure, you could stupidly wire it at 240V, but them someone else could plug something into it and render the equipment unusable (if not on fire).

You want to go to Tesla's site and get the adapter that matches your plug. Now, not all plugs can charge as fast as others, so you may be asking for something that you don't want.

But, all Teslas can charge off of 120V NEMA 5-15 plug. This works as a long term solution for many people. It depends on how many miles you drive daily.

 

[Kirby64]

Okay, to everyone who keeps avoiding the question OP asked:
YES, technically, you can connect the NEMA 5-15 adapter to 240V and it should be completely fine. It will function. The adapters only have 'detection' for current, but not voltage. This is the same reason people can use the 240V 30A adapters for TT30 (120V 30A) outlets. Internally, the UMC only has 3 connections: ground, L1/hot, and L2/neutral. There isn't a 3rd connection specifically for neutral distinct from L2. The input to the UMC can handle anything from like 100V to 260V without any problems.

As others have mentioned though: would I recommend it? No. Just fork out the $35 (or whatever) for the right adapter. Per code the NEMA 5-15 shouldn't be subjected to 240V... but speaking from experience, you're unlikely to actually cause problems for somewhat temporary solutions. Let's just say I have a very non-code-compliant power strip I use when going overseas to adapt all my electronics to the local power ... no fires yet.

 

[Turlejay]

Thanks for the info everyone. Again, I never intended to use this solution permanently or at all. I will for sure be buying the adapter. Just need to discuss what plug makes sense for our house with an electrician

 

[Rocky_H]

Thanks to @Kirby64 for getting this one correct. Yes, all of the Tesla mobile connectors--1st gen or 2nd gen or whatever--can take the 120V or 240V or 208V or whatever happily, and I know a lot of people who have done this often, back in 2013 or 2014 or so when Tesla didn't have much of a variety of official plug adapters. The plug and connector won't care and will pass it into the car, where it will be detected and used properly. So yes, you can make kludge-y hackish adapter pigtails like that, but I only suggest that if there's some kind of outlet that Tesla doesn't make an official plug for. Hand built one-off stuff just isn't quite as solid and reliable as the official ones, so I wouldn't want the extra connections and possibilities for things to get loose.

Plus, the official plugs from Tesla do have a temperature sensor in that plug end that is up against the outlet, and it can detect if the outlet is getting hot from a loose wiring connection inside and throw you a safety warning in the car. So that is good to have.