The electric car *charging* thread

I thought I would keep this one separate from the main car thread as I have some specific questions regarding charging/options/methods etc with my first electric car being delivered later this year.

If it helps answer any questions, the car is a Lexus Rz and the cost of any charger installation and ongoing charging costs will be paid via my business (which trades as a partnership so no BIN issues).

Home chargers
Are they all equal? Is there any benefit of one over another? We have a drive and we can charge whenever we want so won’t need to rely on charging from public outlets (ie, 99% of the time I will be charging from home).

3 pin chargers
Apparently the car comes with one – I assume this means I can plug it into any standard UK 3-pin charger if out and about? How long would it take to charge an (assumed almost empty) 70kWh battery?

Charging networks
Are they all the same (ie, can I use any that I come across)? I know that some charge more quickly than others, but otherwise can I plug into any that I come across?

SuperCharger networks
I hear about these mentioned lots (on the other thread) – are they Tesla only?

Cost
The car has a 70kWh battery, with a claimed 28kWh / 100 miles (although I have read that it is less efficient than that on normal conditions). I am currently on a tariff with a unit rate of 21.33p kWh and it’s tied in for a further 6 months after I get the car. I could switch to an electric car tariff (EDFs is 9p kWh overnight, 27p kWh during peak hours) with a £50 exit fee (or of course I could switch supplier altogether). Of course this means that daytime costs for electricity usage would be higher so wondering if it is worth the hassle. I am not bothered about trying to save a few £££s each month (as I can claim the cost back via my business) but if the cost of staying on the current tariff would run into hundreds a month, then I would swap. Bear in mind that I probably only do a maximum of around 8,000 miles a year.

I think that’s it, is their anything else I need to know?

– I honestly don’t know if there’s a difference in use between home chargers, but there are currently only two brands (Ohme and Zappi IIRC) that integrate with the most popular EV tariff which is Intelligent Octopus Go. I would (and did) get one of those.  Some cars integrate with IOG but if you have an Ohme charger then any car can integrate with it. It gives you the cheapest power at 7.5p but more flexibility, because you set a schedule and tell it when you want to leave and it plans the charging for you.

– 3-pin chargers, yes they work on any home socket and charge at about 2.6kW so that means 70/2.6 hours to charge, minus about 10% for efficiency losses so about 30hrs.  BUT you won’t ever be doing that, see below**.  Also, some say that you cannot charge long term from regular power sockets because they overheat – however 2.6kW is not the 3kW max so I don’t know. Some 3-pin chargers let you limit the current.

– Charging networks are all the same yes, they will work with all cars (there are two rapid charger connector types, yours is CCS, the other is CHAdeMO which is only for a few older cars). Most if not all rapid chargers you can just tap your debit card and charge.  “Rapid” chargers are the fast ones, 50kW up to 350kW DC; there are AC chargers at 7kW (or 22kW if your car can handle it, most can’t) which are called “fast” but they are not fast.  Many of these require apps, which is annoying, they also usually require your own cable which will also be in the boot when your car comes.  You can pay a subscription to certain charging networks directly, or via car manufacturers or other programmes.  It’s not really worth it unless you are regularly charging away from home (i.e. your’e a business traveller etc).  If you have subscribed to such a programme you will need a card or app to access it at the rapid charger. Rapid chargers often have two RFID contact pads, one for debit cards and one for the apps or membership cards.  The only other payment app that is useful is Electroverse because if you’re an Octopus customer you automatically get 8% off rapids and they cover a lot of big networks. You might get a year’s worth of discount membership via Lexus or something like that when the car arrives.

– Some Tesla super chargers are open to all cars.

– Regarding switching to an EV tariff – you have to get a spreadsheet out and work out how many miles you’re doing and how much electricity you use at home. However, your whole house gets cheap electricity overnight (or with IOG whenever your car is charging) so you can schedule your washing machine/dishwasher overnight to save money; some people say they already save money doing that before any car miles are taken into account. It might be different if you have a heat pump or electric UFH or something, but you could change your usage pattern accordingly.  We saved a fair old chunk of gas by heating our hot water with the immersion heater on an overnight timer.

– Use Zap Map to browse for where chargers are; use A Better Route Planner to plan long road trips

– The WTLP efficiency figure is pretty good generally BUT it’s not very useful because it still includes mostly urban or suburban driving, and when you’re doing that you don’t really care about the ultimate range unless you’re a taxi or something. The range on long trips is what we mostly care about where you’re doing 60-70mph and the WTLP test isn’t that.  The worst situation for range is slow moving queueing traffic with the heat turned up high (21C) because it uses quite a bit of power to warm up and you are going slowly.  The best is open suburban driving 30-40mph, followed by A roads then motorways.  If you’re on a short trip then keep your jumper or jacket on and keep the heating down to 17 or so, if you’re on a longer trip you can put it up and it doesn’t make a lot of difference once warmed up.

** regarding charging from zero – you shouldn’t treat your car like a petrol and drive it til empty then recharge, unless you’re on a long multi-stop road trip.  Octopus recommend you plug your car in all the time when you’re not home, and this is the best way to do it because you never have to think about it in your day-to-day. It’s just always charged.  Octopus recommend it because they can stick surplus electricity into people’s cars whenever it’s super cheap.  This will probably happen more in the next few years when we have loads more wind capacity online.  When you are on a long trip, you don’t need to wait til empty to charge.  If you have a 300 mile trip and a 250 mile range on your car, you can add that extra 50 miles at any charger on the way (obvioulsy not right at the start).  Your car does charge slower above 30% though, how much and at what point depends a lot on the car.  This is your car:

Charging from a 3-pin – I bought a fairly knackered Nissan Leaf 4 years ago to see what owning an EV would be like. It was like owning a car. The main difference was, as mentioned above, you don’t just fill it up and then run it to empty. I had my 3-pin charger on the garage wall and when I parked on the drive I plugged it in until I next needed it.

I only planned to do this until I chose a main charger but after 4 years I was still only using the 3-pin. My Leaf only had a 40 mile range so it is not exactly like your car but don’t dismiss a 3-pin charger for time when it will be useful.

I work for a company manufacturing 7Kw EV chargers:

http://www.fastamps.com

The maths is battery size (in Kw) divided by charger power gives you an approx charge time.

Basically, 7Kw is the way to go at home. Direct from a standard home socket just takes forever (ok if you only drive a few miles a day). Budget around £1k all in, for a charger installation. The main difference is whether they are SMART (ie can communicate with your energy supplier) or not. They don’t have to be SMART, but some tariffs will specify a particular brand/model of charger (e.g. Octopus Intelligent). Over the next 5 years, we will probably see all chargers becoming SMART (we’re currently developing a full SMART version).

Our Fastamps charger can be preset to charge at say 0200-0600. So, you can plug the car in, leave it until the next morning and still get the cheaper rate, with an appropriate tariff (probably the EDF one you mentioned).

Charging networks are pretty much all operated by the private sector (we’re missing out on decent public chargers, IMO). So, price and availability varies according to demand + supply. These are usually upwards of 22Kw. Again, they will be expensive at 1700 weekdays and cheap at 0400 on Sunday morning, for example.

Superchargers are for Tesla only (except a pilot scheme – I forget where it is).

Not much to add to that ^^

Tesla supercharger network used to be completely Tesla only. There is an ongoing “Trial” for Non Tesla’s. Download the Tesla app and you can register as a non-Tesla. It will show you on a map which ones you can use – the numbers are increasing and it’s the cheapest “on the go” charging. Need the app to pay and start charging.

I’d get the Ohme charger, purely for the Octopus intelligent access. Then any car can be charged (guests etc too) rather than just compliant ones.

Octopus monthly bill gives me an average price I pay for electricity, averaging out all peak/off peak. Mine is usually between 12 & 16p/kw, with 2 EVs

When it comes to charging networks there are a couple of them that are best avoided, GeniePoint seem to be pretty much a waste of time with lots of broken chargers that stay broken forever and single rapid charger locations are best avoided now there are plenty of places with a good number of them. Plugshare and Zapmap are useful for finding and checking out the state of where to charge when out on longer trips.

As posted above an increasing number of Telsa sites are open to all via the app and not only are they reliable but also one of the cheaper charging networks.

Current sites open to non-Tesla.

Our Fastamps charger can be preset to charge at say 0200-0600. So, you can plug the car in, leave it until the next morning and still get the cheaper rate, with an appropriate tariff

I should add that pretty much all cars can schedule charging as well even if you don’t have a smart charger and even if you’re only using a 3-pin.  Remember to disengage the timers if you need to charge immediately for some reason.. often there is a timer disable button in the car for this.

Again, they will be expensive at 1700 weekdays and cheap at 0400 on Sunday morning, for example.

I thought it was only Tesla that offered variable pricing at rapid chargers? I haven’t seen this.

I don’t have direct experience of dynamic pricing at public chargers, but apparently it’s happening:

https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/latest-fleet-news/electric-fleet-news/2023/01/10/charge-point-operators-raise-prices-during-peak-times

Charging from a 3-pin – I bought a fairly knackered Nissan Leaf 4 years ago to see what owning an EV would be like. It was like owning a car. The main difference was, as mentioned above, you don’t just fill it up and then run it to empty. I had my 3-pin charger on the garage wall and when I parked on the drive I plugged it in until I next needed it.

I only planned to do this until I chose a main charger but after 4 years I was still only using the 3-pin. My Leaf only had a 40 mile range so it is not exactly like your car but don’t dismiss a 3-pin charger for time when it will be useful.

I have had the same experience. We’ve had a Leaf for 3 years and only ever used the 3-pin charger at home. Never once charged at a charging station, never used a fast charger. The Leaf will charge fully in approx 13-15 hours I believe.

Its battery is 39kWh IIRC so a fair bit smaller than your Lexus but the relevant calculation is how many miles you will use in a day vs energy consumption. E.g. I do approx 25 miles of mixed driving / day at an efficiency of ~ 3.3mi/kWh so ~ 7.5kWh of energy total per day, meaning I can ‘top up’ the range used in ~ 3-4 hours. If I was using the whole battery every day (120 miles or so) it’s plausible I would not be able to keep it topped up by only charging overnight. We have a Diesel estate for long trips so the Leaf doesn’t see huge daily mileage.

We’re changing to an eTron Audi Q4 soon and I plan to stick to the same charging setup, though that car has a much bigger battery and may end up doing some longer trips.

TLDR: You hear a lot of fuss about dedicated home chargers. I’m not convinced they’re necessary.

If you do want to use the 3-pin you can get a higher current rated socket installed (or install yourself) that can handle the current for long periods.  I think they are sold as ‘EV rated’ or something and there is a British Standard variant for it BS 1363-2 EV.  They’re like £3 so worth swapping the one in your garage over or wherever it is. I’m not entirely sure it’s needed if you’re drawing 10A but maybe for peace of mind. There are pictures of melted sockets on the internet.

I keep my granny cable (3 pin plug) in my frunk for use if I’m staying away. It was great staying overnight at a French chateaux on the way back from the Alps last summer, although I did wonder if I might blow the whole place in the middle of the night.
I also used one whilst waiting for my charger install – held up waiting for BG to fit an isolation switch, they cancelled on the day appointments 6 times, with a 6 week lead time for the next available – it was fine with a bit of thought and planning. Be careful that you have a heavy duty extension lead though.

My home charger(s) were both fitted free through the Tusker scheme, so a no brainer for me.

TLDR: You hear a lot of fuss about dedicated home chargers. I’m not convinced they’re necessary.

Yes and No..

Not 100% necessary to acheive a ‘full EV’, but… As has been said the ability to integrate with smart EV tarrifs is incredible. I’m expecting my charger install (about £1100) to pay for itself within the year due to the cheaper EV tarrif it offers; not just the car, but the whole house.

Also – anyone used octopus electroverse? I received my card today and will look into it…seems to be a way of paying for on the road EV charging via my electricity account!

DrP

As has been said the ability to integrate with smart EV tarrifs is incredible.

I dunno about ‘incredible’.  You can get power almost as cheap without it AFAIK (9p vs 7.5p) so depending on mileage you might end up waiting a while to get your money back on the purchase and installation. When we got ours it was £400 due to the grant and I hadn’t really considered using granny charging. I’d have to think a lot harder about paying a grand now.

anyone used octopus electroverse?

Yep. It works, it saves 8% in most places.  Also covers a lot of type 2 chargers on random networks which helps ward off appmageddon.

The thing i fine incredible (OK..maybe that’s a but superlative…but..!) is that i’m generally getting the 7.5p/kWh for the whole house frequently from about 1600.. That’s quite a difference to the “midnight to 5am” cheap tarrifs.

YMMV

DrP

Yeah if you are charging a bit battery and it lets you do that.  I don’t charge for that long.

I just got an ad for Polestar 2s with £900 of free Electroverse credit – did you get that deal?

Nah – I got mine second hand not from Polestar, but from ‘powerlease’.
Is this a polestar specific thing? I do know that Polestar used to ship (new and SH) with the electroverse card, but i never chased it up TBH.

DrP

DrP – how do you know that you are getting cheaper rates outside of the advertised hours? Is it on your smart meter? (we have a really old and rubbish ‘smart’ meter that gives next to no useful information).

<quote>how do you know that you are getting cheaper rates outside of the advertised hours? Is it on your smart meter? (we have a really old and rubbish ‘smart’ meter that gives next to no useful information).<endquote>

you see it on your bill from octopus at the end of the month, aside from that there is no way of telling that its on the cheap rate in “real time”, you just have to trust that the system is working.

If you’re using the ohme charger to integrate with IO, then as long as the ohme app says “smart Charging” then in theory (according to octopus) you can assume that its at the cheap rate regardless of time of day.

DrP my electroverse bill is deducted off my general octopus energy account balance.

“aside from that there is no way of telling that its on the cheap rate in “real time”, you just have to trust that the system is working.”

@julians
There might be a few things you can try
1) ask for an octopus home mini (they’re foc), that will give you instant and rolling data on the octopus app and website (it’s basically a much much better in home display)
2) install an app and enter your tariff, API and meter serial no. You’ll get all the data and how much its costing you etc. I recommend octopus compare app (the compare bit is not that useful as you use different tariffs in different ways, but the info on your specific tariff and usage is brill.)

NB I’m on Agile and it works well in the app, not sure how intelligent will work or even if it does, but worth a try.

<quote>
There’s a few things you can do
1) ask for an octopus home mini (they’re foc), that will give you instant and rolling data on the octopus app and website (it’s basically a much much better in home display)
2) install an app and enter your tariff, API and meter serial no. You’ll get all the data and how much its costing you etc. I recommend octopus compare app (the compare bit is not that useful as you use different tariffs in different ways, but the info on your specific tariff and usage is brill.)
<quote>

Re 1 : The home mini will tell you in real time how many KW you are using, but it wont tell what the cost is (unless you’re using it in the 11:30-5:30 window) . I know because I have one and it just says (when you click on the £ symbol)

“sorry we cant estimate this cost just yet,but we’re working on it. for now check your bills for an accurate look at these charges”

Re 2: Same problem as 1, the apps (such as hugo) using the octopus API can tell you how many KW you’re using, but not the cost (unless again you are using it in the 11:30-5:30 off peak window)

Re 1 : The home mini will tell you in real time how many KW you are using, but it wont tell what the cost is (unless you’re using it in the 11:30-5:30 window) . I know because I have one and it just says (when you click on the £ symbol)

It does tell you the cost on Agile. I know because I have one and it just says (when you click on the £ symbol) how much it’s currently costing you in £/p

@johndoh
I’d just get a multi network RFID card such as electroverse or shell recharge (I suspect they’re the same). Then you just need to add on the other main operators. BP app, Tesla app. I think gridserve is all credit/debit card. I think the most reliable operators are instavolt, osprey, MFG, Tesla and ionity. Gridserve are probably good these days as well. These are all the destination DC rapid charge operators (local AC public charging is a bit different).

@julians
Yes sorry, I realised after I’d written it. Intelligent is a bit unique.

<quote> It does tell you the cost on Agile. I know because I have one and it just says (when you click on the £ symbol) how much it’s currently costing you in £/p<endquote>

yep, it works fine on agile ,but not intelligent octopus. Same goes for apps like octopus compare – This catches some people out because it shows that agile would be far cheaper for them than octopus intelligent, but because it doesnt take into account the cheap sessions outside the off peak window that you can get with intelligent this may be incorrect.

I guess it wont be long before they can show costs for IO in realtime.

@johndoh
In addition, If you’re in Scotland or going to Scotland you need a charge place scotland account and get an RFID card, just in case in the remote regions.

No plans to travel to Scotland specifically, but RFID cards – are they all equal (ie, would there be an advantage of getting, say, a Shell one over an OVO one)?

Been on EDFs EV tarrif for ages suits us really well.

Off-peak 22:00-08:00

And weekends.  Timer on car takes care of it.

“DrP – how do you know that you are getting cheaper rates outside of the advertised hours? Is it on your smart meter? (we have a really old and rubbish ‘smart’ meter that gives next to no useful information).”

As soon as I plug my car in (or the OH plugs the LEAF in) the Ohme app IMMEDIATELY sends a notification to my phone (and my watch) telling you the charge schedule.

So yesterday, it was 2102-0852.

Frequently it’s random 45 minute slots through the afternoon! Like 1500-1545, 1600-1645, 1900-0800…

So yeah, immediate awareness of when it’ll be cheap. So can fry an egg or something in those times…

DrP

Personally I’m only familiar with octopus electroverse card and shell recharge card, they appear to have the same main operators on them, shell, geniepoint, osprey, ionity, MFG and now instavolt. There’s many other small or AC charging operators available using their card, but those I listed are the only ones I’m interested in. Maybe also Fastned but I don’t think there are many of those sites.

Edit : I think zap-map offer one, no idea which networks are on it tho

@DrP I’m on intelligent octopus and my understanding that the whole house is cheap overnight but only the car gets cheap energy outside of the low tariff times.

<quote>I’m on intelligent octopus and my understanding that the whole house is cheap overnight but only the car gets cheap energy outside of the low tariff times.<endquote>

no thats not correct – the whole house gets the cheap rate whenever the car is smart charging regardless of time of day, and the whole house also gets cheap electric between 11:30pm and 5.30am regardless of whether the car is smart charging

“As soon as I plug my car in (or the OH plugs the LEAF in) the Ohme app IMMEDIATELY sends a notification to my phone (and my watch) telling you the charge schedule.”

Quick caveat – sometimes they change the schedule. But the (generally rubbish) graph on the Ohme app is up to date,

@julians
Are lots of people manipulating it, ie they want to put the tumble dryer on so they plug in the car and set it that they want it to charge to x by 1hr later. So it charges at the cheap rate there an then and they put the tumble dryer on?
Or, does it not work like that?

You could

We’re on hols this week in Northumberland, and cottage is only 5 mins or so away from the open Tesla superchargers on the A1 at Adderstone services, so have popped in for a few fast top ups. Just back from there, plugged in at 31%, it starts charging at about 160kw, and I unplugged it 12 mins later, at 60% with the rate down at 100kw, with cost of £10.81. Not a Tesla, a BMW i4 40.

Will do similar before heading the 130 miles back home on Sat am, which will need at least 40% charge to have 20 miles or so in the bank.

<quote>
lots of people manipulating it, ie they want to put the tumble dryer on so they plug in the car and set it that they want it to charge to x by 1hr later. So it charges at the cheap rate there an then and they put the tumble dryer on?
Or, does it not work like that?
<endquote>

From the chatter on various forums there seem to be quite a few people who put the car on charge when they might not strictly need it, or with a target time earlier than they need because it will also give them cheap elec for the house.

Not sure if you’d call that manipulation or just maximising the benefits of the tariff? I think there is a fair use clause in the IO T&C’s that octopus could use to limit this kind of thing, but I havent read of anyone having it imposed on them.

RFID cards – are they all equal (ie, would there be an advantage of getting, say, a Shell one over an OVO one)?

These aren’t really necessary unless you are subscribed to a scheme and want to pay monthly to get cheaper rates, IME.  Some small providers have 7kW chargers at destinations e.g. the hotel you want to stay at or whatever, and these often don’t take contactless so you need an app or an RFID card. But IMO these are rarely useful, I have only ever needed one, and I used two more because they were there – although there were alternatives.  They ought to have mobile signal or a wifi hotspot at the place (or they’re a bit useless since the charger itself needs an internet connection).  I haven’t got any. Well – I have a Hyundai one but it’s useless.    There may be niche situations that require one but if I were you I’d just wait til you plan a trip and it depends on one, then get the app/card.

Not sure if you’d call that manipulation or just maximising the benefits of the tariff?

I think Octopus call it manipulation. The point of IOG is to let them schedule charging whenever there’s a surplus. It will let you force charging, but it will still refuse it if the power is too expensive (I think). However, their calculation is based on you charging the car, they cannot predict that you are going to a load of tumble drying and welding at the same time, and they don’t expect it. If you do, you are clearly taking the piss because you’re essentially concealing your load from their calculations.

It’s difficult, if not impossible for suppliers to show the price in advance; electricity is traded (forward contracts) and must be used when generated. Suppliers might not buy the right amount in advance, so the National Grid has to balance things out and bill everyone afterwards.

If you fancy a long read, check here:

https://bscdocs.elexon.co.uk/guidance-notes/the-electricity-trading-arrangements-a-beginners-guide