I have an electrician coming to wire my Wall charger, but have a question; It can be installed on the wall in my garage next to my fuse box. There is plenty of space for 60 amp fuses (or 2 30 amp fuses, like my dryer is wired). House is 3 years old. Is it going to be as simple as the electrician installing 60 amp fuse and running the wires 2 or 3 feet over to where the wall charger will be mounted? Am I missing something? Thanks for your help.
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Wall charger and wiring
- Thread starter KingPaul
- Start date
It should be simple. 60 amp 240 volt breaker. A run that short will likely use 6 gauge 90C wire.
BTW, if your 240V dryer is on two 30 amp breakers, they need to have a bar connecting them. If you can turn them off independently, it's wrong. While the electrician is in the panel, you could ask them to put in the correct 240v 30A breaker for the dryer. 5 extra minutes.
BTW, if your 240V dryer is on two 30 amp breakers, they need to have a bar connecting them. If you can turn them off independently, it's wrong. While the electrician is in the panel, you could ask them to put in the correct 240v 30A breaker for the dryer. 5 extra minutes.
Had the garage charger installed yesterday. It was as simple as I had hoped. The new charger is very easy to set-up. 60 amp breaker, 48 amp charging, max charging last night was 45 miles per hour. Sweet.
Many boxes can take tandem breakers. Just combine four 120 volt circuits on a pair of tandems to make room.
That's one way, I had a (dryer circuit) 30A/240V breaker replaced with a tandem 30A/50A 240V breaker like this one https://www.amazon.com/Corporation-Bq230250-Circuit-Breaker-30-50-Amp/dp/B002YF6JYU
Bikeman
Member
Super! Larger capacity than needed. Very good for future-proofing for the model Z, or whatever follows.
It would be best if tandem breakers were used on other lighting and receptacle circuits to free up space for a true full form factor breaker for the EVSE. These tandem breakers can be used for EVSE's, but they were developed in a time long before EVSE's, and they will run hotter than standard breakers because they are smaller (obviously) and cannot dissipate heat as well as full size breakers. Hotter breakers means the breakers may trip earlier and unexpectedly. Also, tandem breakers do not have GFI operators in them.
For reference, mine is also full. I have 100A service at the house but since I converted all of my light bulbs from halogen/incandescent to LED's, there is a LOT of available amperage.
I also have a 50A subpanel out of that 100A that controls my central air - it was installed about 4 years ago. I've never had an issue with a breaker popping or dimming once I made the LED change.
I am going to have to replace my box because I'm tandem'ed and combined up all over already. It's truly maxed out.
So, I'm going to have them upgrade my panel to have 8 extra breaker slots on the bottom and also have them combined all the subpanels into the main panel. While they're doing that, they're also going to put in a "whole house surge protector".
Basically the way I look at it - if I can run 100A all year long, and my AC is taking up to 50A on the subpanel (the actual running load of the AC is about 25-30 amps including both the condenser and the handler), in the 9 months of the year where I'm not using the AC I can devote those available amps to charging including the winter when that's the most important.
I am also planning for a 6-20 or 14-30 outlet. 14-50 is cost prohibitive and I don't drive that much.
My quote was around $1200 including tax and permit fees. The federal rebate will cover 30% of that cost (around $400) and then my state (NJ) offers up to a $500 rebate for EVSE, which this counts since I'm installing an exterior 14-30 outlet. So, it'll cost me around $300 out of pocket, which is worth it.
It would cost several hundred dollars more to upgrade the service from 100A to 150 or 200A because that requires the power company to get involved... and it can always be done later if it's a problem...
Don't forget, when a compressor starts it will draw about twice the running load for 1-2 seconds. This spike happens on every startup so you have to allow for the full 50 amps in all total calculations.
I agree, thanks for pointing that out. What I was planning to do (if it was an issue) was just to limit my amperage over the summer months down closer to what a 6-20 circuit would be. That's plenty - I only drive 30 miles a day. I could/would be fine with a 5-15 standard outlet!
Breakers account for that. A 100 amp surge at a compressor's start won't trip a 50 amp breaker or cause any issue with a 50 amp (8 gauge) wire. The breaker's amperage rating is for the slow thermal trip. The fast magnetic trip amperage is much higher.
For example, some 100 amp breakers at a 250 amp draw will still take 60 seconds to trip, and won't trip instantly below 400 amps. See https://www.ecmweb.com/content/article/20900906/the-basics-of-molded-case-circuit-breakers
ai4px
Wes
Hoping to help... those with full panel boxes can add a double tandem breaker. For example, you can replace a 240v breaker with two 240v circuits.... Murray MP220220CT2 Two 20-Amp Double Pole Circuit Breaker https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005D6DOM2/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tau_z5BZEbSH2BHVK . So now you can add 240v breaker for your car charger to an otherwise full panel.
...maybe.
I wish people would stop stating this as if it's a fact that applies to everyone. Not every model of electrical panel is made to allow tandem or quad breakers. I wanted to do this and was disappointed to find that my model of panel cannot take either tandems or quads.
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