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Which Home Charger Supplier
- Thread starter PaulMac
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- Ireland United Kingdom
Arg, it's an Etrel:
Etrel ::
Be warned they aren't cheap, but they are very, very nice to look at. My photo's don't do it justice.
I got mine from here: Electric Car Charging Stations | EV Charging Solutions I'm not sure if anyone else is a distributor in the UK yet.
Si
Etrel ::
Be warned they aren't cheap, but they are very, very nice to look at. My photo's don't do it justice.
I got mine from here: Electric Car Charging Stations | EV Charging Solutions I'm not sure if anyone else is a distributor in the UK yet.
Si
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Looks like the funding is being taken up quite quickly. I just organised Chargemaster to fit at my 2nd property (before spotting the Rolec deal in this thread). They are fully booked until mid March. I did speak with Rolec and they are fully booked for next 4 weeks as well.
Not sure if the funding will get exhausted before then.
I told Chargemaster I might cancel and they reminded me the benefits of them are:
Lockable unit
Ergonomic and discrete (sic) design (surely eye of the beholder)
Installation and follow-up service (surely same for all who claim against OLEV)
Free access to electrical consumption data for 3 years (not convinced I need that)
6 months free subscription to POLAR charging (doubt I will use that, especially as unit is being installed 6 months before I get Model S)
The lockable element is nice, but who is going to drive an EV onto someone's property and use the electric? If I go away on holiday for a few weeks I will pull the breaker out of / flip it off in the consumer unit. Presume none of you with Rolec charge points worry about lockability?
Not sure if the funding will get exhausted before then.
I told Chargemaster I might cancel and they reminded me the benefits of them are:
Lockable unit
Ergonomic and discrete (sic) design (surely eye of the beholder)
Installation and follow-up service (surely same for all who claim against OLEV)
Free access to electrical consumption data for 3 years (not convinced I need that)
6 months free subscription to POLAR charging (doubt I will use that, especially as unit is being installed 6 months before I get Model S)
The lockable element is nice, but who is going to drive an EV onto someone's property and use the electric? If I go away on holiday for a few weeks I will pull the breaker out of / flip it off in the consumer unit. Presume none of you with Rolec charge points worry about lockability?
I wouldn't buy a chargemaster unit today. Rolec and ABL unts are now both available for £0 fully installed (even the 32A versions) compared to £90 for a 30A chargemaster unit. Also the newest iteration of Chargemaster tethered units come with a different type of tethered cable whose flex is too stiff to actually wrap around the unit properly for storage. Mine looks a complete mess - there is nowehere to store the cable.
Access to consumption data - their online portal is crap and the data is frequently gibberish. With Rolec/ABL on the other hand you will get a separate meter installed in your wiring cupboard which you can just go and read the numbers from.
Locking - LOL. Does anyone actually use that?
Access to POLAR charging network - ROTFL
Also the junction box fitted with my Chargemaster unit caught fire, and the guy who did the install was, in hindsight, pretty incompetent.
Not sure if this is a concern but switching off the charger at the consumer unit also switches off the box that sends the data to OLEV. Would that be an issue? I have left mine on even though I don't have the car. The Rolec unit has a breaker in the top part which I have switched off. I think this is sufficient deterrent to anyone wanting to sneak a quick charge.
Does anyone sign up to plugshare.com and allow people to borrow their charger? It seems like a nice idea but obviously a bit worrying!
Does anyone sign up to plugshare.com and allow people to borrow their charger? It seems like a nice idea but obviously a bit worrying!
I turned mine off for the several months between installation and the arrival of the car; nobody appeared to notice.
But that was just out of a general dislike of waste - I'm really not worried at the prospect of someone sitting on my driveway to steal from me at the rate of £1 per hour or so!
I considered it, but decided not - I'm very close to a hospital and we already have trouble with people from the hospital parking in our street, while there's existing public charging provision at the park&ride sites which serve the hospital.
The trouble is, once you've made a listing it's out there - I'd be very happy to offer my chargepoint once in a blue moon to someone passing by who is desperate for a charge, but in my case it would attract people looking for free parking rather than needing a charge.
If I lived somewhere in the middle of nowhere, I'd be more inclined to do it.
I do live in the middle of nowhere, and have been considering putting a charge point on the outside of my garage (which is located by the road, but with off road parking) which could be made available to EV's to charge from - if and when needed.
now I really have no intention on making this a 'free for all' charge point, so would need one that had some controllability (ie not one that someone just drives up to everyday, charges at my expense than departs, without a bye or leave!)
Anyone suggest a suitable charger (besides the Etrel - which looks nice but pricey) that would do the job ?
anyone got experience of supplying this sort of service ?
Any sort of cheap chargepoint without this feature, plus a padlockable isolator such as: these ones at almost no extra cost.
Bear in mind they'd be stealing from you at the rate of only about £1/hour, so while irritating it's not worth spending a lot to combat it. With something like the above you could just leave it on normally, and fit a padlock (combination?) if someone starts taking the piss.
Hello All, we placed our order for our S85 not long after Christmas, they said it should be with us sometime in May. However the OH got a phonecall yesterday saying that its already built & awaiting shipping. I didnt want to mess around too much, equally Pod|Point contacted us yesterday with ordering details. So, i just went ahead and ordered the 7kw standard charger for £108, we do have a reasonable driveway but realise the unit comes as standard with a 4.8m cable, is there an extension cable which i can attach or should i try & spec a unit without a cable & buy my own longer cable. Any Thoughts cheers James....
The standards don't permit extension cables (for safety reasons). There are ways of bypassing the mechanism that stops you using one, but if you've any doubt about the cable reaching, I'd strongly advise getting a chargepoint with a socket, trying how you get on with the cable that comes with the car, then buying another one - longer or shorter as appropriate.
Having said that, 5m should be plenty unless you can't install the chargepoint close to where you want it - for example, mine is inatalled under the front porch with the car reversed up in front of the house (so not directly beside the chargepoint), but the standard cable is more than long enough.
Are you going for a tethered or untethered version?
As arg says, I've found the standard cable plenty long enough on my untethered version, even though my point is on the "wrong side" of the car in relation to the charge port.
I bought a cheap (single phase and shorter cable) that I leave plugged in constantly, and the Tesla supplied cable lives permanently in the boot only coming out on the rare occasions I use public charging. Even this shorter cable is plenty long enough.
I can post a photo of my setup tomorrow if that helps you gauge how far away you can get away with placing your point in relation to where you park your car.
Rluner
Member
I have to agree with the last posters, 4.8m is a good lenght. Mines actually behind the car when I park up, but I need to go round a large post to get to the car, I still have plenty.
Can you measure from the rear of the car to the location of the charge point, if you can get the car to within 4 meters I feel you should have no problem connecting to it.
Cheers for the info, podpoint phoned me last night. They are ordering an untethered unit for me. Am i right in thinking the Tesla comes with a 7m cable. If thats the case i'm sure i'll be fine. To be honest, i'm probably being paranoid & i'm sure i can get within a couple of meters of the unit once i'm parked. We are SC enabled & the OH has an office within 10 minutes drive of the West Drayton Showroom so i imagine she will be charging there mostly. Starting to get very excited now..
My Tesla-supplied cable is 7.2m (not including the connectors). So you'll be fine to try it out and see how it fits, then I would concur with smac's advice above - get one that's just right to leave permanently in the chargepoint, and carry your Tesla-supplied cable with you for charging on the road.
Obviously you can do most of your charging at the Supercharger if you want - but then you are opting out of one of the great benefits of EV ownership: you just plug it in when you get home and the car's always full and ready to go in the morning, you never have to think about {charging, going to a petrol station} for all your everyday driving. With Economy 7, electricity is costing you about 2p per mile so although 'free electricty' at the Supercharger sounds good, you are not valuing your time very highly if you have to make a trip to fill up.
Fixed it for you
Seriously though I completely agree with this sentiment. The best thing is never having to fill up. I was always putting off going to the petrol station with my last car, and invariably the petrol light would come on just when I was late to get somewhere
Such worries are now a thing of the past!Don't know what is going on with Rolec. There are hardly any OLEV approved ROLEC installers, but finally got Rolec to appoint one. After cancelling my Chargemaster install because Rolec said they could deliver, they have now changed their minds and Rolec cannot provide a unit to the installer, which probably means that Chargemaster are fully booked until end of March and I have messed them about.
Might have to wait and see what the OLEV grant looks like April onwards. Think it will reduce every quarter or 6 months, but not seen any guidance on plans to extend the grant.
Might have to wait and see what the OLEV grant looks like April onwards. Think it will reduce every quarter or 6 months, but not seen any guidance on plans to extend the grant.
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