Is there such a thing as a device you connect to 120 volt and it charges up and then when you connect it, it fast charges your car at 440 volts or 240 if that's the max it can do. Not sure how much voltage the Model 3 can take.
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Speed charger?
- Thread starter Arizona Willie
- Start date
What you're describing is a large capacity battery bank that would slow charge on 120 volts, 16 amps (1.9 kW) and discharge at 240 volts, 48 amps (11.5 kW) into the car. It would be very expensive to buy the batteries and inverters and it would still take several hours to charge the car.
Your money would be better spent having an electrician run a 240 volt line to your parking place for car charging, even if it's several thousand dollars.
For some reason voltage is marketed as power. Higher voltage does NOT indicate more power, or higher charge rates. The issue isn't directly the fact that the outlet is 120V, there is no intrinsic limit to how much power you can have at 120VAC. The problem is a regular 120V outlet is limited to 15A, 12A continuous. That voltage AND current is what determines the charge rate. So you'd need an outlet that's capable of higher power, which happens to generally be 240V in the US since its cheaper. You could charge at 120V/48A in Model 3, but it would give you half the charge rate as 240V, and costs the same to install.
There is nothing you can add that increases the power available to the outlet. You can very easily step up the 120V to millions of volts if you want, but you'd have the same power you started with. Either way you need a higher power outlet installed. You could run an extension cord to a dryer outlet or something like that if you have one, or plug an adapter into two separate 120V outlets and get double the power. But often times its not that expensive to have an electrician install a high power outlet in the garage, and that's way better.
If you're talking about something that charges slowly, and then rapid charges the car, its possible but extremely expensive. It would likely be in the neighborhood of 100K, but quite possible.
There is nothing you can add that increases the power available to the outlet. You can very easily step up the 120V to millions of volts if you want, but you'd have the same power you started with. Either way you need a higher power outlet installed. You could run an extension cord to a dryer outlet or something like that if you have one, or plug an adapter into two separate 120V outlets and get double the power. But often times its not that expensive to have an electrician install a high power outlet in the garage, and that's way better.
If you're talking about something that charges slowly, and then rapid charges the car, its possible but extremely expensive. It would likely be in the neighborhood of 100K, but quite possible.
A VERY long time ago, I used to set up lasers at dances. They required finding outlets that were on separate lugs and running extension cords to meet at the combiner. Fun times.
/reminisce mode
It would be an interesting product for people who only have access to a standard 120v outlet and aren’t able to plug in long enough to keep up with their daily usage. I suspect, as others here have mentioned, that the price of the batteries alone would make these economically unfeasible compared to the cost of getting a 240 outlet installed in the vast majority of cases.
I suppose it could make sense for people living in apartments who literally can’t get an outlet installed where they park. Maybe a battery pack in a cart they could wheel inside and plug in to a 120 outlet (or even better, a 240 dryer outlet). Then when they get home they wheel the battery pack out and plug in to the car. No idea what it would cost to have enough storage to make it worthwhile, and the more expensive it gets the more you run into issues with securing the pack against theft.
I suppose it could make sense for people living in apartments who literally can’t get an outlet installed where they park. Maybe a battery pack in a cart they could wheel inside and plug in to a 120 outlet (or even better, a 240 dryer outlet). Then when they get home they wheel the battery pack out and plug in to the car. No idea what it would cost to have enough storage to make it worthwhile, and the more expensive it gets the more you run into issues with securing the pack against theft.
A 35kWh (about ½ a charge) pack would probably weigh over 500 lbs and cost almost $5,000. You would need a motorized cart and this would add to the cost. Don't see ANYWAY this could be an option.
Cybertruck has 240V outlet. Get one of those to charge your Model 3.
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Everyone talks batteries. Why couldn't they charge capacitors ( much lighter ) and discharge the capacitors through inverters and step up transformers?
Seems there should be a way. But then I should have been born rich instead of so good lookin'.
Seems there should be a way. But then I should have been born rich instead of so good lookin'.
Capacitors have much, much worse gravimetric and volumetric energy density. Plus they tend to cost several orders of magnitude more. To be able to fully charge a long range car, you'd need somewhere around 80-85kWh minimum. At 6wh/kg, this would weigh in around 1,000,000 lbs not including an enclosure. The costs of such a system would be absolutely staggering.
Of course this can be done, but a complete system that would have a ~100kwh lithium pack and then something like a 50kW CHAdeMO would likely cost ~100K or so. Or you could spend likely under 1K to have a 14-50 installed in the garage and just charge at 11.5kW...
A 35kWh battery would cost much more than 5k. That's in the neighborhood of the assumed hard costs to manufacture the raw cells for the most cost efficient producers in the world. Assembled, with a BMS and case its going to be much more. And then you still need a beefy inverter that's not trivial cost. Whereas a piece of wire and a receptacle IS trivial cost. It might be $50-100 in cost to install a high power outlet in a garage. Or tens of thousands for a storage system that achieves the same task with huge complexity. Tesla does something similar enough to this at some sites, but they tend to have economics backing them. In the US, you rarely billed extra for peak demand on residential service. Comerical service almost always pays more per unit energy based on the peak they use over a 15 minute rolling window for the billing cycle. So if a supercharger site uses 1MW when all the stalls are full, the electric rate for that whole billing cycle is going to be much higher than if they can clip those peaks down to say 400kW and smooth that consumption over a longer span. But this tends to only be used in locations where its economically viable, or otherwise mandated by the grid. Plus supercharger sites tend to have moderate utilization, so the costs of such a system are a bit more tolerable when they're not just serving a single car.
Of course this can be done, but a complete system that would have a ~100kwh lithium pack and then something like a 50kW CHAdeMO would likely cost ~100K or so. Or you could spend likely under 1K to have a 14-50 installed in the garage and just charge at 11.5kW...
A 35kWh battery would cost much more than 5k. That's in the neighborhood of the assumed hard costs to manufacture the raw cells for the most cost efficient producers in the world. Assembled, with a BMS and case its going to be much more. And then you still need a beefy inverter that's not trivial cost. Whereas a piece of wire and a receptacle IS trivial cost. It might be $50-100 in cost to install a high power outlet in a garage. Or tens of thousands for a storage system that achieves the same task with huge complexity. Tesla does something similar enough to this at some sites, but they tend to have economics backing them. In the US, you rarely billed extra for peak demand on residential service. Comerical service almost always pays more per unit energy based on the peak they use over a 15 minute rolling window for the billing cycle. So if a supercharger site uses 1MW when all the stalls are full, the electric rate for that whole billing cycle is going to be much higher than if they can clip those peaks down to say 400kW and smooth that consumption over a longer span. But this tends to only be used in locations where its economically viable, or otherwise mandated by the grid. Plus supercharger sites tend to have moderate utilization, so the costs of such a system are a bit more tolerable when they're not just serving a single car.
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We have a few big capacitors down the road from me at the Lawrence Livermore National Labs. They use them to power the lasers to create fusion at temps hotter than the sun.
Their budget? Those are OUR tax dollars. We should be able to charge from the capacitors... For a few nanoseconds and then the car will vaporize.
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