SAE vs CHAdeMO

[scaesare]

and coincidentally charging stalls != Sites.

It all depends what you are going for, is it better to have more places you can go to charge? or more chargers at the same location? There isn't a straightforward answer to that one either, all these people saying SC is so much better because it has more total charging heads are missing the idea that many of those charging plugs are empty while someone wishes they could charge somewhere that doesn't have any SC.

Both approaches have advantages, and ideally you'd have both more sites and more plugs at each, but the advantage the SC network has is in the planning of their locations, not in their number.

While this is true, the numerical comparisons typically don't give any quantitative analysis on geographical location. They simply compare the number of actual charge points. Therefore, lacking anything else, the correct comparisons number of charge points for each.

 

[ggr]

and coincidentally charging stalls != Sites.

It all depends what you are going for, is it better to have more places you can go to charge? or more chargers at the same location? There isn't a straightforward answer to that one either, all these people saying SC is so much better because it has more total charging heads are missing the idea that many of those charging plugs are empty while someone wishes they could charge somewhere that doesn't have any SC.

Both approaches have advantages, and ideally you'd have both more sites and more plugs at each, but the advantage the SC network has is in the planning of their locations, not in their number.

There is a lot of mathematics about capacity of networks. If you want more detail see wikipedia about Erlang for example. It is much more efficient (for both the charging network and the people) to have more overlap in charging capacity at fewer sites. Otherwise what happens is that you show up at a single-charger site only to find that it's in use; what do you do, wait, or go somewhere else in the hopes it will be free? Putting only a single charger at a site is a very short-sighted approach based on the assumption that these things will never really catch on. Of course having more sites is also better, but I like Tesla's scientific approach much better than the competition's "Let's stick one here at our service center!".

 

[jerry33]

and coincidentally charging stalls != Sites.

It all depends what you are going for, is it better to have more places you can go to charge?

More places to go for a charge (assumes one or two stalls per location) is best for government sponsored sites because they can say they have chargers in all those places. Having more chargers at fewer locations is better for real-life use because drivers are assured there will be at least one working (worst case) and that there will likely be a charger open without a wait (I know there are a few exceptions, but they are the exceptions).

 

[green1]

My point was that it isn't that straightforward, both are "better" and both are "worse". The people on here saying that there are more supercharger outlets are just as guilty of cherry-picking data as those who say CHAdeMO has more locations.

What we need is more of BOTH locations AND plugs.

The advantage the SC network has in reality is it's planned nature making fewer locations cover more ground, the rest will come, but I think it does everyone a disservice to shout about how much better SC is on a numerical number of plugs basis while ignoring that CHAdeMO has more locations. It's an argument that can't be won that easily.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

My point was that it isn't that straightforward, both are "better" and both are "worse". The people on here saying that there are more supercharger outlets are just as guilty of cherry-picking data as those who say CHAdeMO has more locations.

What we need is more of BOTH locations AND plugs.

The advantage the SC network has in reality is it's planned nature making fewer locations cover more ground, the rest will come, but I think it does everyone a disservice to shout about how much better SC is on a numerical number of plugs basis while ignoring that CHAdeMO has more locations. It's an argument that can't be won that easily.

Range. Range. Range.

Haphazard, single-charger CHAdeMO/CCS can work as emergency chargers for short-range BEV owners, as long as they're willing to take the risk of the charger failing. It works because they aren't road trip cars. If people actually tried to use the cars for tripping the network's low capacity would suck horribly.

Not only does Tesla have more stalls, the design inherently has a pair of stalls for each Supercharger in order to maximize the use of the Supercharger. Not all public chargers have two cables.
Tesla's model has two opposite factors: it's road trip car so people drove more miles, so need to use Superchargers more; but the range is greater so any given trip is less likely to require the use of a chargers.

Two different needs, two different placements.

 

[jerry33]

What we need is more of BOTH locations AND plugs.

I don't believe anyone is arguing about the need for more of both. However, given limited resources charging locations need to be where they are a real benefit and where there is almost certain to be an available stall (which mitigates against one stall locations). (Dealers that aren't open when charging is needed, mostly have their own cars plugged in, or don't allow anyone who hasn't purchased their car there don't count.) There's a thread somewhere on TMC that shows silly locations, where chargers were put just because they could or needed to meet some quota. I remember one where the EVSE could only be accessed by boat.

 

[bxr140]

What we need is more of BOTH locations AND plugs.

Yes, but its not chicken and the egg.

Multiple plugs at fewer high traffic locations maximizes use of the network. Building more locations is a necessary, but obvious step B.

 

[Larry Chanin]

Given how long it is taking for Tesla to produce a CHAdeMO adapter, would a CCS adapter be any easier to implement?

Almost certainly yes. CHAdeMO was a proprietary standard, so the specs probably weren't very tightly done. CCS was a public standard with lots of input from the community at the outset. CHAdeMO is an extension of the car's CAN bus, which was never designed to be used externally in an EVSE, which no doubt adds much interoperable complexity. CHAdeMO EVSEs were only designed and tested to be running with less than one hour continuous loads, which worked OK for all cars except the Tesla. Finally, Tesla has no doubt learned a lot from the design and testing of the CHAdeMO adapter that they can replicate to a CCS one.

With the easing of patent enforcement and the accelaration in Superchargers expansion, it appears that Tesla is very serious about making Tesla's charging port the de facto standard, at least in North America. Despite CHAdeMO having first-mover-advantage, the the number DC fast charging points for Superchargers surpassing CHAdeMO in North America is an important metric demonstrating Tesla's resolve.

Since CHAdeMO was an established "standard" in Japan it was necessary for Tesla to offer an adapter in that market. However, as Cosmacelf points out it appears that there are various flavors of the CHAdeMO "standard" and that perhaps testing each version is taking Tesla a bit of time before releasing the adapter here. For whatever reason Tesla is obviously not in a hurry to release it in North America and another explanation for the delay is that Tesla simply sees no need to rush out in supporting a competing DC Fast Charging "standard" in North America when their own rapidly expanding network does a much better job at supporting its customers.

No doubt it should be easier to implement a CCS adapter and I believe that Tesla's position regarding a SAE Combo adapter is that will provide an adapter IF there are sufficient combo installations to warrant the effort. At the rate that Supercharger expansion is proceeding in comparison to CCS, I'm guessing that Tesla is hoping an SAE combo adapter will never be warranted.

Larry

 

[Larry Chanin]

My point was that it isn't that straightforward, both are "better" and both are "worse". The people on here saying that there are more supercharger outlets are just as guilty of cherry-picking data as those who say CHAdeMO has more locations.

What we need is more of BOTH locations AND plugs.

The advantage the SC network has in reality is it's planned nature making fewer locations cover more ground, the rest will come, but I think it does everyone a disservice to shout about how much better SC is on a numerical number of plugs basis while ignoring that CHAdeMO has more locations. It's an argument that can't be won that easily.

As I see it the intent of this thread is to discuss which DC Fast Charging specification has the best chance of eventually becoming a de facto "standard". As I discussed in my previous posting, despite CHAdeMO having first-mover-advantage, the the number DC fast charging points for Superchargers surpassing CHAdeMO in North America is an important metric demonstrating a significant new trend developing in the DC Fast Charging landscape in North America.

Of course numbers of charging points doesn't show the complete picture and it is not the only advantage that Tesla has. For those that think charger placement is more important than numbers let's discuss a situation with "perfect" placement and let's see if that gives CHAdeMO an advantage.

Some of us are discussing network pros and cons independently of the cars that use them and to me that simply doesn't make sense. The dominant car that can use the CHAdeMO network is the LEAF. At highway speeds a LEAF will be lucky to get a range of 70 miles. Suppose for the sake of discussion that a CHAdeMO charging station could magically appear at the point the LEAF runs out of charge. So after driving an hour the LEAF would have to stop to charge and charging would take about a half hour. So if we repeat this with a CHAdeMO station magically appearing every 70 miles, even in this extreme best case senario with perfect placement the owner of a LEAF would spend one hour driving to one half hour charging. That is not an attractive situation and what this of course means is that the LEAF/CHAdeMO combination is currently not suited for long road trips regardless of charger placement.

In other words we currently have to compare the LEAF/CHAdeMO combination to the Model S/Supercharger combination when evaluating emerging fast charging standards. In the future there may be carXYZ/CHAdeMO combination to evaluate to see if that is more competitive to the Model S and X/Supercharger combination.

It should be pointed out that instead of coming out with higher capacity CHAdeMO and CCS chargers we actually see a trend to smaller capacity DC "Fast" chargers which are not much more than the capacity of a Tesla HPWC although costing much more and weighing a lot more. This means that an emerging CHAdeMO or CCS network using a greater number of these so-called "fast" chargers is even less suited for road trip situations especially if a legitimate longer range EV were to emerge that was compatible with CHAdeMO or CCS. Obviously comparing the pure numbers of these 24 kW "fast" charging points to Tesla 120 kW to 135 kW Superchargers is not going to tell the full picture. In comparision Tesla is literally giving away hundreds of 20 kW HPWCs to host locations particularly to hotels and resorts, and as we know these Tesla Level 2 devices use the same charging port as a Tesla Supercharger.

So Tesla has a very serious multi-prong approach to promote its charging specification over the competition. 1) Relax patent enforcement on its charging spec to make it easier for other manufacturers to adopt the Tesla charging spec, 2) Aggressively build out a Supercharger Network at no cost to the host locations, 3) Use a common charging port for both Level 2 and 3 charging, 4) Employ a DC charging specification that is higher capacity and more compact than the competion, 5) Provide free HPWCs to qualifying host locations, 6) Demonstrate a serious commitment (Gigafactory) to produce a mass market EV that will flood the market with hundreds of thousands of vehicles per year, year after year, that use the Tesla charging standard.

Larry

 

[Tedkidd]

PLUS, Tesla has backward compatibility to CHAdeMO and j1772 should any manufacturers (hey Mercedes!!) decide to adopt it, there is already built great infrastructure and the best EVSE devices on the market.

What TESLA needs to do is make their EVSE products attractive to the whole EV marketplace by offering a Tesla TO j1772 adapter. This would accelerate dissemination of Tesla chargers into the marketplace.

I'd buy one for my soon arriving Smart ED.

 

[Thumper]

A Tesla to J1772 adapter would open the superchargers to EVs who had not paid anything toward the construction and operating expense of the superchargers. I'm also not at all sure the superchargers would handshake with non-Teslas. I suspect not.

 

[ecarfan]

@Thumper, I'm not sure I understand what you are saying in your post, but non-Teslas, even with an adaptor that would allow them to physically connect to a Supercharger, would not be able to charge unless the EV manufacturer had firmware that allowed them to "trick" the charger into providing power, and then the car would have to modulate the power so that it would not overheat and damage its battery.

 

[Cosmacelf]

In the next five years, most car manufacturers are going to be selling or designing an EV. Most will be making city cars, in which case the Japanese car manufacturers will choose CHAdeMO, and the European ones will choose SAE since fast charge isn't as important an option for a city car (you can sell the fast charge network as something that will come, as BMW now does with their i3). Tesla isn't an option as the battery is too small for Tesla Superchargers.

Some car manufacturers will actually produce a 200 mile range car. With this, Tesla Supercharger compatibility becomes an option. For a car that has aspirations of being a touring car, there is only one option worldwide, and that is the Tesla Supercharger network. CHAdeMO has already been surpassed by Tesla in terms of numbers and utility in the US and Europe. And well within 5 years, Tesla will have a solid network in the rest of the world (Japan, China, Canada, Australia, etc.).

Given this, there is a slight possibility that the big US automakers will actually consider licensing Tesla Supercharger. I don't know about the European brands though. In fact, I would consider it extremely unlikely. Their interconnected corporate boards and politicians will scotch any non Europe standard usage.

So, if Ford or GM brings out a 200 mile EV, there is some possibility of licensing Supercharger access, otherwise, it'll be SAE and CHAdeMO.

There is also the slight possibility of a U.S. version of a foreign car to license Tesla supercharger access.

 

[Tedkidd]

The more versatile they make "everything Tesla" and the more consumers pressure/opportunity is created, the more self fulfilling the outcome.

I want a Tesla female to J1772 adapter so I can start building my Tesla toolkit (hpwc and mobile connector).

Tesla could easily own the EVSE market, and they should.

 

[roblab]

The more versatile they make "everything Tesla" and the more consumers pressure/opportunity is created, the more self fulfilling the outcome.

I want a Tesla female to J1772 adapter so I can start building my Tesla toolkit (hpwc and mobile connector).

Tesla could easily own the EVSE market, and they should.

But why would a Tesla owner want an EVSE? I just plug into my 50 amp 220 volt outlet, which cost me, oh around a hundred bucks installed. Now, someone who owned a LEAF might want an EVSE, and I know of some Tesla owners who have an EVSE, but still, I say, Why? You can now charge in 2 hours at night (if you actually drove 120 miles during the day) instead of 4 hours, all while your car sits idle outside. The car is inactive for probably 23 of 24 hours, and is full (~220 miles range EPA 90%) every morning. You won't need to charge any during the day. If you forgot to charge, well, you'd probably forget a few other things, too.

I still think this sounds like a Leaf owner.

 

[Tedkidd]

EVSE is what connects tyour house to the charger(s) in your car. Hpwc and mobile connector are both technically EVSE. There is a company converting the ends of mobile connectors to j1772 (jesla) so people with other brands can use Tesla EVSE.

I think it is more interesting to have an adapter from Tesla to J1772 than to convert the end, then convert BACK to Tesla via j1772 to Tesla adapter (ie, you have a Tesla and a golf).

 

[jerry33]

The more versatile they make "everything Tesla" and the more consumers pressure/opportunity is created, the more self fulfilling the outcome.

I want a Tesla female to J1772 adapter so I can start building my Tesla toolkit (hpwc and mobile connector).

I'm obviously missing something here. The HPWC and UMC are EVSEs. The EVSEs for other plug-in cars tend to be put in big boxes so that they can sell them at a high price. Of course, some have systems to accept payment, but that's not usual for home EVSE. There's no reason to charge $1200 for a 30 amp EVSE other than excessive profit.

 

[Larry Chanin]

PLUS, Tesla has backward compatibility to CHAdeMO and j1772 should any manufacturers (hey Mercedes!!) decide to adopt it, there is already built great infrastructure and the best EVSE devices on the market.

What TESLA needs to do is make their EVSE products attractive to the whole EV marketplace by offering a Tesla TO j1772 adapter. This would accelerate dissemination of Tesla chargers into the marketplace.

I'd buy one for my soon arriving Smart ED.

Tesla won't even permit a 40 kWh Model S to connect to the Supercharger network. They are not going to permit non-Teslas that are not suited for long trips to displace cars that are. You won't be seeing your Smart ED becoming Supercharger enabled.

Larry

 

[stopcrazypp]

I think Tekkid is talking about an adapter with Tesla female on one end and J1772 male on the other (similar to the soda can adapter with J1772 female and Tesla male) so that other EVs can share the mobile connector easily in the case of a multi-EV household (where not all EVs are Teslas). Similar to below except with the J1772 and Tesla roles swapped:
http://shop.teslamotors.com/products/sae-j1772

He is not advocating for Tesla to support supercharging for other EVs via such an adapter.

Currently the only option for that is to convert the mobile connector to J1772 to support other EVs and then use the soda can adapter for the Tesla.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

But why would a Tesla owner want an EVSE? I just plug into my 50 amp 220 volt outlet, which cost me, oh around a hundred bucks installed. Now, someone who owned a LEAF might want an EVSE, and I know of some Tesla owners who have an EVSE, but still, I say, Why? You can now charge in 2 hours at night (if you actually drove 120 miles during the day) instead of 4 hours, all while your car sits idle outside. The car is inactive for probably 23 of 24 hours, and is full (~220 miles range EPA 90%) every morning. You won't need to charge any during the day. If you forgot to charge, well, you'd probably forget a few other things, too.

I still think this sounds like a Leaf owner.

Multi-unit dwellings. Nothing major has yet happened in this area. I'd like to see Tesla make a move and make use of their Level 2 multi-plug EVSE patent. Maybe something to ask Elon Musk on his Reddit session. (Besides "Can you get JB Straubel to do one?")