Home charge points (purchase/problems/questions) (See mod note post#1)

ted1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119600534#Comment_119600534

How are you turning off load balancing? It’s not a standard setting.

NinjaTruncs

If you put the unit into installer mode you can disable Load Balancing.

Metalpanic

Just an update on my search for quotes for tethered Zappi installed at a pre-wired house. The original company came back with a cheaper price of €1,349. A second company quoted €1300. This seems to be the ballpark figure in the market going on those two prices.

GalwayMan74

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119612162#Comment_119612162

Pre wired with isolator and all ?

If you can change a plugtop you could fit it yourself.

Screw it to the wall and connect 3 wires.

Metalpanic

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119612471#Comment_119612471

I'd need RCB, CT clamp and rotary isolator installed. Plus won't get the grant if I attempted a self-install.

GalwayMan74

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119612479#Comment_119612479

Fair enough 🤙

budhabob

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119575925#Comment_119575925

What are the Pros v Cons of connecting the charger at the meter with all required protections or back to the main tripboard?

We live in a mid terrace house with tripboard at the rear of the house. When Car charger survey was done the rationale explained to me was they could use the meter connection if connection to the tripboard would damage the fabric of the house.

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119615777#Comment_119615777

What are the Pros v Cons of connecting the charger at the meter

Mainly aesthetic reasons.

If the consumer unit is in an awkward place in the house and you dont want trunking and drilling going through your inside walls its neater to install outside in some cases.

If you can run a cable to your consumer unit (via attic) and have it all hidden its neater to do it that way.

Once its in, there isn't any difference from the perspective of operating the charge point.

Installing it at the meter box will also have some ugly items installed on your outside wall.

So, its a decision you have to come to between you and your electrician.

budhabob

Thanks for that. As long as no impact to safety or performance that's key for me.

VikingG

Any recommendations for an installer in the Limerick region? probably looking at a Zappi as would need built in load balancing.

...Ghost...

I ordered myself a Hypervolt 2.0. Asked them to remove VAT because it was being sent from UK to Ireland. Cost £560 (€650) including delivery. Didn't get hit (yet) with any VAT or customs charges. Happy days!!

17larsson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119615777#Comment_119615777

Pros are you don't have to drill walls or mount trunking/have cable clipped to walls.

Cons are you have another small board beside your ESB cabinet.

If it's awkward to get to your board and your charger will be mounted close to your ESB cabinet it's probably the best option

11811

Possibly not the right spot for this question, but anyway...

I have just bought PHEV and have installed a home charger as it's much handier than the granny charger. Now I'm wondering if it's worth changing my electric plan to day/night one instead of 24hrs. The thing is my PHEV has only a 7KWh battery or so. Is there any point in changing?

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119621382#Comment_119621382

You'd need a few more bits of info to answer it accurately as it depends on a few other variables.

What mileage do you do per year?

How many units of electricity do you use right now per year?

And, if possible, how much of it is by day/night? If you already have a day/night meter you should be able to press the buttons on the meter and it will give you that breakdown.

Once you have that info it is then easy to calculate if you would be quids in or not with a day/night tariff.... my bet is that you would be and even more so with the addition of the PHEV.

11811

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119621465#Comment_119621465

Ah, I must go and check out my night vs day consumption so! I didn't realise I could check that on the meter!

Haven't gotten a handle on total yearly units yet as it's a new home, but reckon ~6,000 (have air to water heating, so runs off electric too).

Probably do about ~10,000km a year. My commute is about 20km, three days a week.

stimpson

I had an outlander (10kW battery) and the house had night rate when I moved in. I did the sums after a year and it worked out cheaper on the night rate. We did run the dishwasher at night too. I probably did similar milage as you, but the outlander was heavier on the juice. It’s probably a close run thing with the smaller battery.

What PHEV do you have? I’m wondering if you have the charge rate and capacity confused as 7kW seems quite small.

Edit: I found the spreadsheet. It was only over a couple of months (Nov-Dec 2018), but a good yardstick

11811

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119622158#Comment_119622158

Ah nice, that's a handy spreadsheet!

I have a BMW 330e, that has a battery capacity of 7.6 kW. It's not massive but suits my needs.

stimpson

Yeah, but you can only do it if you already have the day/night figures. If you can estimate how often you do a full charge and subtract it from your 24hr usage then you should be able to approximate it yourself. Remember that the standing charge is more for day/night.

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119621861#Comment_119621861

have air to water heating, so runs off electric too

It will be a no brainer for you to move to a day/night tariff... with a heat pump and a PHEV it will be very easy for you to save money.

You can tell the heat pump to heat all the hot water during night rate so overnight your hot water costs will be less than half the price, all year round. You could probably tweak the heat pump a little to run a bit more by night also and then the PHEV on top of that.

You should be able to get 50%+ onto night rate which will more than make up for higher standing charge and slightly more expensive day rate.

But lets see what your current day/night rate figures are and then we can add the PHEV in to see how it works out.

mc2022B2TF

Amazing how many big houses in the country built over the last few years all with air to water heat pumps but no solar panels. 100% of their energy coming from electricity (no gas or oil etc.) yet they decided against solar.

Another one of my gripes is that why no one is installing air to air heat pumps is beyond me as those same houses are like sweat boxes in the summer with no way of cooling them down.

Manion

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119623332#Comment_119623332

It's because they didn't need to in order to get the BER rating. We've an air to water heatpump but a large number of houses in the same estate but built after by a different builder have gas and solar, which seems an odd combination.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119623332#Comment_119623332

PV not required when installing HP.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119623437#Comment_119623437

Cheaper is the basic answer.

With the gas they don’t have the tighter Air Tightness requirements to make the HP efficiently work. They can rely on back stock values for the cold bridge points and don’t have to demonstrate a lower value.

Cyrus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119622768#Comment_119622768

Is it easy enough to get heat pump heating water at night ? Never fiddled with it too much but maybe I should

mc2022B2TF

You're all missing the point lads. Anyone that relies on electric as their only energy source and doesn't have solar is complete retarded

People going on about regs. Wtf. Use your own brain for a change.

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119624190#Comment_119624190

It should be easy but I dont know what make/model you have. I could only attest to my own. You need to pull out the manual and figure it out. It should be as simple as going into a hot water menu and setting up a schedule that tells it to only heat water between, say 3am-8am.

Its possibly (likely even) that your installer just left the default settings which will have it heating water as soon as it drops below a certain temp which means it will start heating during the day rate (likely after a shower).

Manion

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119624190#Comment_119624190

We've out coming on at 7am for the last hour of night rate. You don't need to run the heat pump through the night and there is usually a control panel where you can alter the schedule. Specifically out heat pump is a DWH as well, so that's what we have coming on. The radiators remain on thermostat. You don't have to run the heat pump through the night, your house will loose heat slowly and the pump uses a lot of power getting started in the morning, so the single best thing you can do is just shift that start point a bit early. Apart from that I wouldn't go messing with settings, could end up costing you a bomb.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119624565#Comment_119624565

Solar may not be viable nor affordable for a significant number of people. Solar as a service is basically booked out. Additionally there is a massive range in terms of what installers are charging which can result in extremely long payback periods.

VikingG

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119624565#Comment_119624565

Talking to a friend yesterday who is starting out on a major renovation - asked why he wasn't putting in solar and the response was capital costs - said he simply didn't have the extra 10K that he had priced it at. Obvious solution here is government providing 0% interest loans for Solar. PS he is not retarded

stimpson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119624565#Comment_119624565

You're missing the point. If you can hit the required BER with a heat pump, then there is no need for solar.

Also, for much of the the time you need your house heated, your solar may not be producing very much.

Cyrus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119624847#Comment_119624847

cheers ill take a proper look, ours is a samsung / joule system.

Manion

Hold on, do you think people buying a house off a builder can just opt to get solar installed at the time? The question was why builders are building new houses with Heat pumps and no solar, the answer is they can hit the Regs cheaper without it. Pure business. Solar for the longest time was just seen as a thing to help hit the required BER rating. The person building the house doesn't live there like.

Cyrus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625402#Comment_119625402

exactly

and then the decision to invest in solar becomes a return on investment question, and if you arent planning on staying into the long long term it may not make sense.

Citizen Six

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625342#Comment_119625342

Tell him to run any necessary cables now, so he can do it later on with minimum disruption.

I advised a mate on what he needed to do it a few years back, when he was in the same position with budget. Then he was able to install panels and inverter this year really easily.

Citizen Six

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625349#Comment_119625349

It's not all about hitting a certain BER, is it? Your solar will be reducing your overall bill via feed in tariff.

11811

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119622768#Comment_119622768

Righty, so used 5163 kWh so far this year. Split 1720 nighttime. 2932 days and 510 peak. Having done a quick bit of sums, there's not much difference between 24hr rate and day/night for me right now. But I think if I set up my charging, heat pump and other appliances to nighttime activity I can probably shave a few quid off the bill.

Cyrus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625580#Comment_119625580

you need to add to that charging your new car at the night rate and i assume adding 7kwh per day at night rates.

11811

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625585#Comment_119625585

Yup, taking that into consideration, it definitely looks worth my while to switch to day/night. Be a few hundred quid in the difference on that alone. Thanks for the help!

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625580#Comment_119625580

Split 1720 nighttime. 2932 days and 510 peak

Ooh... "peak"... have you got a smart meter? Are you on a "smart tariff" or a standard 24hr tariff?

If you have a smart meter and you want to go on a day/night tariff you will need to request a change of meter to a day/night meter via your electricity provider... its free to do but you will need to do that to get access to the day/night tariffs.

11811

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119625884#Comment_119625884

Yeah, have a smart meter alright and on a standard 24hr tariff. Didn't realise you had to change meters...

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119626017#Comment_119626017

As it stands, with a smart meter, you can have a standard 24hr tariff or a smart tariff.

You cannot have a day/night tariff. They are only allowed if you have the older day/night meters, which you can request. They are much better value than the smart tariffs.

You can stick with your smart meter and signup to a smart tariff and have a day/night/peak rate but I’d advise against it at the moment as the rates are really poor compared to the day/night tariffs.

e.g See Energia rate of 27/10 for its day/night rate and compare that to the smart tariffs!

DaveyDave

Slightly off topic but there's a discussion on an EV group on Facebook about a neighbor using someone's charger and not paying for it. I'm getting grief for saying if I was charging at a friend's house I'd count the kWh usage pay them for it and someone is suggesting I should pay something towards the cost of the charger for using it! Jesus. Should I pay someone's mortgage when I'm in their house too? Bloody hell.

micks_address

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119630717#Comment_119630717

Well to be fair if I was using a private homes charger I'd probably offer to pay somewhere between their unit rate and on the road public charging.. so if it cost 16 euro to charge is probably throw them 20 euro... No one's business what you pay really.. I'm sure your neighbour wouldn't be long telling you if they weren't happy... I have offered to pay my parents the odd time I top up and their place but they won't hear tell if it

DaveyDave

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119630760#Comment_119630760

I wouldn't be counting it down to the nearest cent, a 20-80% charge on a night rate in my car is around €3.50 so I'd probably throw them a fiver but they wouldn't want it because it's only €3.50. If they didn't want it I'd get them a pint or something of course we always get each other back for stuff. I just can't believe the idea of having to contribute to the cost of the charger unit itself just for using it.

Manion

Depends on if it's a regular thing or not and nature of your relationship. I wouldn't let a neighbour charge full stop.

Old Jim

Has anyone seen any nice designs for a dedicated wall/pillar to mount a zappi unit to? My unit will be situated away from the house/shed and am looking for an alternative to mounting it on a pole or pedestal. I am thinking something that incorporates a degree of shading to keep the sun & rain off the unit as well as cable management.

Cyrus

are you not over thinking it ? It’s weather proof anyway and the zappi has cable management I.E. the cable wraps around the unit.

Manion

It's IP65 rated, there was a person on here before who lived near the coast and said it wasn't uncommon to get salt deposits and very heavy rain, which that rating may not really cover. In most urban settings you shouldn't need to do anything, but if your very remote, with weather extremes, I can see why you might.

slave1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119638043#Comment_119638043

I assume you are not interested in the MyEnergi pedestal then? It looks good on the few YT videos I've seen

...Ghost...

Replaced the Type 1 Rolec with a Type 2 Hypervolt 2.0 today. Took me less than 2 hours and all working well. Tested the charger and getting 32A now. Left the clamp off for now, because we have a priority switch in place. Just need to test the Type 2 - Type 1 adapter for the Leaf when I find it later and then I’ll be happy out.

The SIL just moved into a new house and has a 24kWh Leaf, so I’ll give her the Rolec.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119630773#Comment_119630773

But what if they’re not on night rate?