You clearly had a significant cost at $5k, but that's a fairly extreme outlier. The capital outlay for charging for the vast majority of folks will be tiny. It cost me $150 to have a 14-50 installed. As long as you've got an open breaker spot, you should be fine. The fact it's another 50 amp shouldn't matter as long as you don't simultaneously run your dryer or oven or whatever other 50amp item you already have in your house. Even a 30amp should be sufficient for overnight charging.
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Pure BEV Dogma
- Thread starter bonnie
- Start date
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
Indeed, there is a knee jerk defensive mode we often see in Volt owners that assumes we must hate the vehicle simply because we use the proper terminology to describe it. The Volt is a good choice for those people who don't feel comfortable buying an actual EV, but you can't ignore the fact that the entire reason you chose a Volt over an EV is because of it's hybrid nature and it's ability to use an ICE.
mknox
Well-Known Member
No, not necessarily. You need to have an electrician assess the current and proposed loads according to the electrical code in your area and make that determination. You can't just throw a 50 amp breaker into a panel and try to remember not to use the stove. That is dangerous.
As we all know it is a perpetual debate. Anyhow, my view is that the Volt is propelled by only one engine, an electric one.
gnelson
Member
When you get a permit and they require a load analysis expenses can add up quickly. The cost for the 40 amp circuit with a 14-50 receptacle was $450. The Blink charger was free, but it cost over $4500 to run a new service from the transformer to the house and upgrade the main service from 150 amp to 200 amp. It would have been even more expensive If I had to replace the breaker box. Part of that $4500 was costs for the permit and inspections. If I had gone for a 100 amp circuit for an HPWC it most likely would have doubled the cost. When I moved the seller provided a 14-50 receptacle included in the deal. It cost him $3500. I don't think he thought it would cost him that much.
Actually, when I was comparing the Volt against the Leaf, the two main factors steering me towards the Volt were better styling and performance. There's more EV choices now, but there weren't then, and to avoid the look of the Leaf and greater than 10 second acceleration I would have taken the ICE if I had to.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
That is simply wrong, on two counts. One, an electric motor is a motor, not an engine, and two the ICE can indeed drive the wheels at times, because it's more efficient that way when using the ICE.
I think I'll start going with NREV. Not Really Electric Vehicles.
Or maybe HABTAIHICE (hot and bothered to admit it has ICE).
That's fine, but in my opinion totally useless in actually looking at how cars are sold or advancing the technology. There's a reason this thread is labeled dogma. I hereby label the Model S as not having a "real" touch interface because there's a physical button to open the glove compartment.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
roblab
Active Member
Some people maybe shouldn't, but that doesn't mean all of us.
You are assuming that "I" don't have access to the electrical regulations when I am not an "electrician". But... I did throw a 50 amp breaker in the box. I put a 14-50 on the wall. It has proper wire gauge and routing.
An electrician wired a 200 amp breaker box at my house. It has 260 amps worth of breakers in it. I would imagine that many boxes have more than max labeled amperage simply because it is difficult, very difficult, to run every circuit at max amperage.
And, my locality allows me to make wiring changes if I am the homeowner. The inspector then approves or denies my work.
I am not an electrician. I am not a plumber. I am not a carpenter. I am not a contractor. But I built and wired and plumbed where I now live.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
Indeed. Too many people try to make simple things seem complex. I also slapped in a breaker, drilled a hole through the concrete block foundation, and wired up an outlet on the side of my house with the proper gauge wire. Let's pretend I overloaded my panel with too many breakers, the end result would be the main breaker tripping, as designed. No big deal.
Most breaker panels have waaay more amps they could potentially pull than the house is rated for. Mine is rated at 200, but I have something closer to 400 amps in breakers. All installed by electricians. Even an electrician's analysis isn't going to necessarily be accurate. I happen to know my dryer breaker will never be used because I switched to a natural gas dryer.
I have a 200 amp service and about 10 or 11 15 amp circuits that mostly do lighting.
When the house was built it had about 5000 - 6000 watts of light bulbs in it - so about 42-50 amps if I turned them all on at once.
Now it has about 700 - 800 watts of light bulbs in it. If I turned them all on at once it would pull around 6-7 amps.
Could replace all of those breakers with one 15 amp ( of course that wouldn't be convenient for playing with wiring ).
( Those totals may not be completely right but almost every bulb in my house has been replaced with something that draws about 1/8th of what it replaced. 100s becames 12s, 75s became 10s, 60s became 7s, 40s became 5s )
It actually saves enough juice to make 40-50 miles of driving free.
When the house was built it had about 5000 - 6000 watts of light bulbs in it - so about 42-50 amps if I turned them all on at once.
Now it has about 700 - 800 watts of light bulbs in it. If I turned them all on at once it would pull around 6-7 amps.
Could replace all of those breakers with one 15 amp ( of course that wouldn't be convenient for playing with wiring ).
( Those totals may not be completely right but almost every bulb in my house has been replaced with something that draws about 1/8th of what it replaced. 100s becames 12s, 75s became 10s, 60s became 7s, 40s became 5s )
It actually saves enough juice to make 40-50 miles of driving free.
mknox
Well-Known Member
I looked and couldn't find it either. To be honest, I don't think that playing up "range anxiety" in the linked Volt ads is a bad thing at all. It is a real concern for people, and none of the linked ads poked directly at Nissan or anyone else. If an ICE generator can quell fears and still provide a vehicle that people will drive in all-electric mode for the majority of the time, what's wrong with that? Some other BEV makers are providing buyers with ICE rentals for road trips. Isn't that really the same thing?
I was seriously considering a Volt or ELR but wanted my +/- 100 mile daily commute to be all-electric and these cars just don't have that electric range. Honestly, if the ELR had a 100 mile electric range with the ICE generator, I may very well have gone that route. My Model S is great for my day to day driving, and its range exceeds what I would do in a typical day. However, if I want to visit my daughter and son-in-law in Chicago, I have to take the ICE. No Canadian Superchargers yet, and with the Jackson, MI Supercharger apparently cancelled, it may never be a realistic possibility for me. I can do the trip in 8-10 hours in an ICE, but would never be able to do it in that time in the S, even if Superchargers were all along the route. Having a Volt-like ICE generator for road trips makes sense to me.
This opinion likely comes down to my primary motivation for driving electric which is "fuel" cost, not environmental stewardship or concerns over "foreign" oil (most of which is not "foreign" anyway).
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
Sorry, but a company pretending to sell an EV, then talking about range anxiety, is a bad thing. The GM marketing campaign for the Volt was pretty much a disaster across the board, for EV's and for the Volt. I don't want to go over it all again here since we have a thread for that already, and it's been argued to death. In any case, your original objection to the Nissan ad failed to take into account the history behind it.
mknox
Well-Known Member
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