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I've swapped to IOG and connected the ID7. First charge controller by octopus was last night. Not sure what's happening with the export, still says flux but they also say that is not allowed. Have used the solar edge app to configure overnight charging and to discharge just before the cheap period.
If you haven't already worked it out, you link your electroverse card to your octopus account in the electroverse app /website (not the octopus app / website). I presume in your account settings, I think within the payment method
Thank you. That option does not appear to be available in the app at the moment. I can only add card payment methods. Still waiting for the physical card to arrive so may change after activation. Will give them a call if that does not work.
Why do electric cars need so much space to charge? I observed in a supermarket that three charging spaces for electric cars took up six conventional car spaces. Is it because they’re bigger?
Is it because they’re bigger?
Well, my neighbour's got an Audi-something on test for a few days, and it's undeniably gi-bloody-normous. He likes big cars but this one takes the biscuit somewhat.
Why do electric cars need so much space to charge? I observed in a supermarket that three charging spaces for electric cars took up six conventional car spaces. Is it because they’re bigger?
I'd guess because sockets are in different places on the cars so you need room everywhere to allow for all the options and cable space.
That an probably some H&S about distance between supplies.
Just a guess.
Why do electric cars need so much space to charge? I observed in a supermarket that three charging spaces for electric cars took up six conventional car spaces. Is it because they’re bigger?
Wait till you notice how many spaces the fuel forecourt takes up.
Oh and mobility access
Question for y'all. I rarely public charge, but had to do so this week. I parked up with 53% remaining of an 83-85kWh (no one is exactly sure) the car charged to 100% but indicated that it had used 46kWh...how is this possible? 47% of even 85kWh is only 40kWh and given my car's battery health was supposedly at 95.6% you've got to assume its actually somewhere between 81 and 83kWh. This was a slow charger - it took 9.3h to charge.
@daffy - the car said 46kWh, how much were you billed for? also, what car have you got? that might help someone to give you an answer.
EVs aren't bigger. There are big EVs but there are also big ICEs. And there are small EVs too.
@Daffy there are charging losses.
The bill said 46kWh. It's Jaguar Ipace and was using a Pod-point 7kW charger. Surely transmission loss is accounted for in the charge price per kWh, not by measuring how much the charger uses and not what it actually delivers? That's like saying a leaky pump at a petrol station measures from the tank, not the nozzle and you pay for the inefficiency of the pump.
Hmmm few interesting issues today.
Car linked to IOG. Plugged in last night and told both in car and Octopus app to 100%. Woke up this morning to 55% charge! For some reason it trickled in at 1kWH rather than the chargers full rate. My suspicion is that the charge cable might have not been seated properly. When I checked the car the DC cover retaining strap was pinched. After pulling the cable and reinserting the car then charged at full rate.
Second issue was when the car was plugged into a rapid charger away from home octopus seemed to interrupt the charge and create a charge schedule. VW app then reported a charging issue and charging ended. Not sure at the moment what wife did to restart the charge. Clearly don't want that to happen again so need to work out why Octopus though a schedule was needed.
Surely transmission loss is accounted for in the charge price per kWh, not by measuring how much the charger uses and not what it actually delivers? That's like saying a leaky pump at a petrol station measures from the tank, not the nozzle and you pay for the inefficiency of the pump.
I dunno. Ecotricity bill me for the gas they supply, not how warm my house is. They can't control how much heat leaks out of my windows or how efficient my boiler is.
I don't know if the chargers actually know how many kWhs have gone into your battery. They know the battery's SoC, because it's being communicated, but not sure if it knows the actual kWhs delivered. Next time I rapid charge I'll check.
Surely transmission loss is accounted for in the charge price per kWh, not by measuring how much the charger uses and not what it actually delivers?It most likely delivered 46kWh, most of the "losses" are in the car. Cooling the battery while you charge and running the three or four ECUs required to be active during charging.
I "lose" around 1.5 kWh on my hybrid (I regularly get a bit more than the total physical capacity of the battery)
Also, if i run preheating on my car for the while it's plugged in i "lose" an extra couple of kW for every quarter of an hour i run it.
The losses in the charger will be minimal.
This was a slow charger - it took 9.3h to charge.That won't help. Very fast charging = lots of cooling over a short period. Very slow charging = not very much cooling for a long long time...
I don't know if the chargers actually know how many kWhs have gone into your battery.
Why wouldn't they?
I have various electricity monitors that know exactly how much power has passed down a cable in a particular direction.
Anyone tried configuring a second car to IOG yet? Apparently they now support 2 (compatible) EVs so you don't have to switch to IOG controlling the charger for a multi EV household.
Second issue was when the car was plugged into a rapid charger away from home octopus seemed to interrupt the charge and create a charge schedule. VW app then reported a charging issue and charging ended. Not sure at the moment what wife did to restart the charge. Clearly don't want that to happen again so need to work out why Octopus though a schedule was needed.
Hmm smart charge was enabled in the Octopus app. Not very smart though if it can't tell the difference between at home or not and of a rapid DC charger or home AC charger. Seems quite lame you would need to disable this anytime you wish to charge away from home.
Anyone tried configuring a second car to IOG yet? Apparently they now support 2 (compatible) EVs so you don't have to switch to IOG controlling the charger for a multi EV household.
We have 2 cars (an EV and a plug-in hybrid) and are on IOG.
Have an Ohme Home Pro charger and have both cars set up in the Ohme app. Select which car is going to be charged in the app, plug in and away to go. Works without any problems.
Have an Ohme Home Pro charger and have both cars set up in the Ohme app. Select which car is going to be charged in the app, plug in and away to go. Works without any problems.
That's the old way of doing it because Octopus limited you to one car. Seems they will now control 2 cars directly.
I have the Ohme charger, IOG, and a mate staying tonight who will want to charge his car. What's the best way of doing it?
I think it's just plug in and schedule the guest car for the overnight period? I think Ohme will realise it's not the car it's been programmed with and probably just start charging. The schedule on the car will then control when it accepts charge.
I parked up with 53% remaining of an 83-85kWh (no one is exactly sure) the car charged to 100% but indicated that it had used 46kWh...how is this possible? 47% of even 85kWh is only 40kWh and given my car's battery health was supposedly at 95.6% you've got to assume its actually somewhere between 81 and 83kWh. This was a slow charger - it took 9.3h to charge.
That doesn't surprise me. My battery is nominally 32kWh and if I have 30% to put in I aim for 30% of 37kWh, which seems to work. So the charger is putting in 15% more than the battery is gaining. My car does have fairly old charging technology.
Charging to 100% may also take a bit more, as you're stuffing more charge into a nearly full box, and a slow charger may also contribute, as I suspect the overhead for the charging systems, both in the charger and the car, is partly time based.
I have the Ohme charger, IOG, and a mate staying tonight who will want to charge his car. What's the best way of doing it?
In the Ohme app go to ‘Settings’ and under ‘Charging settings’ click on ‘My EV’s’. You can then ‘Add an EV’.
When you then go back to the app home screen you will have a drop down in the top left corner that allows you to select t which car you want to charge.
I have the Ohme charger, IOG, and a mate staying tonight who will want to charge his car. What's the best way of doing it?
Are you using the cars API or just adding a percentage. If the latter you can just plug your mates car in and make a guess as to how many percent of your car corresponds to the desired percent of his. If you see what I mean ….
Thanks all. I added his car from the list in the Ohme app and put it on max charge during our IOG cheap rate. It didn't seem to work initially but I can see that it charged at 7kW from midnight.
As an aside, he has a Kia EV3 and he gets 350 miles out of it.
That's just how much energy has gone down the cable. Doesn't really tell the wall box how much energy went into the battery. I don't even know if any cars are yet transmitting the amount delivered to the battery anywhere outside the car itself. Just controlling how much can come down the cable.Why wouldn't they?
Anyone on IOG able to do a quick check for me? I've noticed that during one of the recent free electric sessions the car didn't charge so the extra energy I used (almost 10kWh) was billed at the standard rate, but they've refunded me based on the lower rate so I've basically been charged for their "free" electricity. Wondering if it's a common thing - you need to cross reference the free energy rebate against the actual billed electric but only if the website shows usage at standard rate during the session. TiA.
Does anyone have any experience with buying a secondhand charger?
Still looking at options for solving the issue of home charging from the front of my terraced house to the street.
Council will give us planning permission for a cable channel in the pavement and we have good relations with our neighbours and can park outside our house 95%+ of the time.
I’ve got an electrician coming to give me a quote to install a cable from our fuse board to the front of the house.
A 3-pin socket will be the cheapest option (with some sort of lockable box to stop people unplugging it) but I’ve seen that you can get second hand chargers and got wondering.
Not too bothered about any ‘smart’ potential for off-peak timing because anything from home will be MUCH cheaper than public chargers. Even trickling through a 3-pin will be great as 12 hours from 8-8 will still top us up most days.
Not sure you actually need a charger? You can get a commando socket on the house and a cable, no? What does the charger actually do if it's not a smart one?
EDIT it does do something, like negotiating charging and providing isolation and electrical thingies. You can buy what looks like a cable with a commando plug on one end and a type 2 on the other, but it still has electronic gubbins inside.
Dumb EV chargers start at under £200 anyway by the look of it.
We’ve got a 3-pin granny cable already so would just want a high-rated socket on the house.
What’s the advantage of a commando socket and can they be locked to prevent the plug being pulled out?
Don't discount smart charging, 7p per kWh overnight and dynamic charging vs 31p for the rest of the time on Intelligent Octopus. All 3 pin sockets are rated for 13 amps, some are better quality but they have the same rating. 3 pin charging is really slow, OK if you have a hybrid, not so good for a full fat EV.
Smart charging on Octopus is 7p/kWh and dumb off-peak is only 9p. So you'd have to drive a lot of miles to make back the cost of the smart charger.
I think the suggestion is that the commando socket can be installed more cheaply and the 'cable' is cheaper than the charging box, but I'm not even sure about that any more.
If your car is supported by Octopus you can configure IOG with a granny charger and get 7p/kWh for the hours and hours and hours that they schedule the car to charge. That's how I ran for the first couple of weeks until I got my charger installed.
Yeah, you are quids in if your car is supported directly by IOG but the list is quite small IIRC.
For IOG, you need the car OR the charger to be supported directly, you don’t need both, but you do need one.
We've got an id3 so that's on the IOG list. The online checker seems to suggest that we can have IOG with that car and a 3-pin socket - which is going to be the cheapest thing to have fitted to the front of the house.
If we plugged the car in at 7pm and left it until 7am would we be charged the 'expensive' rate for the hours outside the IOG period or, because the charge started before the cheap period, would the whole charge be on the expensive rate? ie do you have to start the charge in the cheap period or can I start charging sooner?
Thanks for the tips so far...
If we plugged the car in at 7pm and left it until 7am would we be charged the 'expensive' rate for the hours outside the IOG period or, because the charge started before the cheap period, would the whole charge be on the expensive rate? ie do you have to start the charge in the cheap period or can I start charging sooner?
Schedule the charge in the Octopus app, say you want xx % charge added and to be ready by 7am. Octopus will create a schedule depending on battery capacity and how long it thinks it'll take with your charger. When Octopus turn the car on charge, that's when you're getting the cheap rate and its all household usage.
As above you get cheap rate when octopus choose to charge the car but as I understand it you also get cheap rate from 11:30 to 5:30 regardless. We are currently force discharging anything left in the house battery just before this then filling it up on 7p electricity. Also use that period to charge our other car which is not IOG compatible.
Same applies if you have an IOG compatible charger, charger controls when the car chargers via IOG so you get charged the 7p when it charges which might be outside of the normal 23:30 to 05:30 window.
If we plugged the car in at 7pm and left it until 7am would we be charged the 'expensive' rate for the hours outside the IOG period
Probably. You are guaranteed the cheap rate overnight, but IOG may charge you outside that if they have spare power which they often do, but not always. You tell it what state of charge you want by what time, if they can't do it all at the low rate a message pops up to tell you. My message comes from Ohme so I don't know what happens if you are using a compatible car and dumb charger.
^^ I think ? the last few replies are assuming that the question
If we plugged the car in at 7pm and left it until 7am would we be charged the 'expensive' rate for the hours outside the IOG period or, because the charge started before the cheap period, would the whole charge be on the expensive rate?
is assuming a compatible car and non compatible 7kWh charger, rather than a 3 pin socket, as is the case. I’m not convinced that IOG will do it all at cheap rate on a granny charger though ?
My message comes from Ohme so I don't know what happens if you are using a compatible car and dumb charger
I get messages from the octopus app indicating a schedule has been created then multiple messages from the car as each block starts and ends.
I've not managed a 100% charge using octopus control yet. Fairly sure this is the car resetting to 80% max after the first charge block (despite me setting 100 in the car when I plug it in then 100 in octopus). Next time going to disable the auto reset in the car.
If you have a compatible car, it doesn't matter if you are on granny or 7.4kW. The point is that Octopus have to know what is going on with your car. The compatible cars make that available via the API directly to Octopus. It just so happens that Ohme are compatible with way more cars and they can pass the information on to Octopus.
I generally plug the van in late afternoon and Octopus regularly has cheap sessions immediately and/or early evenings, well before the alloted 'cheap times'. Also had a few free sessions notified in the Octopus app after recent windy spells.