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

Nedved85

mp3guy wrote: »

I did the math, even if you only charge your EV once a week and run nothing else during the night it's cheaper to go day/night.

Surely that cannot be true for everyone? I use just about 20kWh daily for the winter months (Heat pump set to 20 degrees during the day, 21 degrees from 530pm to 930pm then back to 20 degrees, it runs 90% of the time during day rate times). I might charge once every two weeks at home (say 25kWh), the rest at work. The other say 8 months of the year I average about 10/12kwh per day.

mp3guy

Nedved85 wrote: »

Surely that cannot be true for everyone? I use just about 20kWh daily for the winter months (Heat pump set to 20 degrees during the day, 21 degrees from 530pm to 930pm then back to 20 degrees, it runs 90% of the time during day rate times). I might charge once every two weeks at home (say 25kWh), the rest at work. The other say 8 months of the year I average about 10/12kwh per day.

I actually use about 20kWh daily too. If you never charge your car at home you need to be running 25% of your electricity over night.

If you're charging your car for 12.5kWh over night once a week on average, you're saving €30 a bill on night saver.

Hold on, let me revise, this is wrong.

Ok if you're only charging 12.5kWh per week you need more than 18% of your usage (excluding the car charging!) to be over night before you make a savings, if you're pulling 20kWh a day without the car.

Nedved85

mp3guy wrote: »

I actually use about 20kWh daily too. If you never charge your car at home you need to be running 25% of your electricity over night.

If you're charging your car for 12.5kWh over night once a week on average, you're saving €30 a bill on night saver.

Cheers,


Yeah I took a look at yesterday for example and I used 10.7 kWh with 95% of the usage during on peak hours.


Will stay on the standard rate for now. Thanks

mp3guy

Nedved85 wrote: »

Cheers,


Yeah I took a look at yesterday for example and I used 10.7 kWh with 95% of the usage during on peak hours.


Will stay on the standard rate for now. Thanks

Updated my post. It's possible to make a saving but you need to rejig your usage schedule if possible. It would be easier if you had to charge at home more.

Nedved85

mp3guy wrote: »

Updated my post. It's possible to make a saving but you need to rejig your usage schedule if possible. It would be easier if you had to charge at home more.

Yup, if I ever change circumstances and have to charge at home more often, I'll switch.

gomamochi1

griffdaddy wrote: »

KN installed the circontrol enext earlier on behalf of Electric Ireland. It was a straightforward install with the charger going on the other side of the fuseboard pretty much. The guy who installed it was sound and did a very neat and clean job though, highly recommended. I'd heard bad things about KN and feared the worst when they started pushing the date out but in the end they were great to deal with. The only thing I will say is that the enext is a big unit. We have it on the sidewall but you probably wouldn't want it on the front of your house.

I have been pushed out twice now by KN as they say that the stock may not be in till end of march. I enquired about refund and going with another company as was talking to Darkin about Solar ready Zappi previously but dont have the funds at the minute for that install!
Any suggestions as we have solar thermal at present for hot water- 6 person family and find it great over the past 5 years on a e/w facing roof and gains from april to Oct. However have been told may not be feasible for Solar PV as have lots of trees surrounding our gaff creating a shadow certain times of the year. It would most likely be e/w facing panels for Solar PV also.
Thanks

Alun

If anyone's wondering about current timescales for the chargepoint installation grants, I got my installation and sent my completed forms off on 12/2, got an email on 26/2 saying they were being processed and got another email today 11/3 saying it had been paid, so almost exactly 4 weeks from sending the paperwork off.

AndyBoBandy

Alun wrote: »

If anyone's wondering about current timescales for the chargepoint installation grants, I got my installation and sent my completed forms off on 12/2, got an email on 26/2 saying they were being processed and got another email today 11/3 saying it had been paid, so almost exactly 4 weeks from sending the paperwork off.

Good to know, I have everything ready to send off, just need the car (Friday) for the picture and will be straight into the post box.

KCross

BrownFinger wrote: »

Bord gais told me yesterday that they do

Maybe it depends on the provider. Obviously the smart meter records at 15(or is it 30min) intervals so the data is there but maybe it was just Energia didnt have the ability at that time to provide the day/night split from a smart meter.

That was back in Nov 2019 they told me I'd have to go on the 24hr rate so I politely declined the smart meter... 60%+ of my usage is at night so I wasnt going back to 24hr rate!

BrownFinger wrote: »

my day rate would go up 20% but my night would be 40% cheaper than my current rate.
16c is my current 24hour would be 19c day and 9.5c night approx

Im with Energia paying 15.91/7.63 inc vat. Your rates look high to me.

KCross

Nedved85 wrote: »

I use just about 20kWh daily for the winter months (Heat pump set to 20 degrees during the day, 21 degrees from 530pm to 930pm then back to 20 degrees, it runs 90% of the time during day rate times).

Why is it set to run during the day so much? Why dont you shift more of it to night time and take advantage of the savings?

You only need to use about 3kWh per night (on average) to make a day/night meter break even. You will already be using about 1-2kWh just from your background load and then push some more of the heat pump and other appliances into night rate hours and you are quids in.

KCross

Alun wrote: »

If anyone's wondering about current timescales for the chargepoint installation grants, I got my installation and sent my completed forms off on 12/2, got an email on 26/2 saying they were being processed and got another email today 11/3 saying it had been paid, so almost exactly 4 weeks from sending the paperwork off.

I installed around the same time as you and it took almost exactly 6 weeks to get the money.

I'd say they batch the payments. Their guidance is 4-6 weeks so we represent both ends of that timescale!

Cyrus

im with energia

rates are currently 11.98 per KWH excl vat 13.60 incl.

i dont have day / night split, we use circa 10,000 KWH annually (all electric, heat pump etc no other bills)

would i be better moving to day / night if i was charging an etron 50 once a week?

Krusty_Clown

Is there any value to the Zappi2 V2 Smart package (which includes the Myenergi Hub), if the Kia e-Niro UVO app is available/working? Given that you can remotely schedule/charge/monitor the vehicle, does the Myenergi hub offer anything other than the capability to carry our firmware upgrades on the Zappi?

KCross

Cyrus wrote: »

im with energia

rates are currently 11.98 per KWH excl vat 13.60 incl.

i dont have day / night split, we use circa 10,000 KWH annually (all electric, heat pump etc no other bills)

would i be better moving to day / night if i was charging an etron 50 once a week?

Almost certainly yes.

~3kWh on average per night is all you need to break even. An eTron will be sucking twice that on its own even if you only charge once a week.... add in your background load and shifting appliances to night rate and you will be saving money.

I suspect at 10,000kWh per year(which is 2.5x the national average) you should already be on night rate regardless of an eTron being added.

As a sanity check, take a few meter readings and see how many units you are using per night as is.... take a reading at 11pm tonight and another reading at 8am... do that for a few nights and see what you are averaging over a few days during the night rate hours.... my guess is you should be on night rate already as your heat pump is probably firing up during the night. It will use less in the summer but it will still fire up to heat water so you could take some more readings during the summer and then decide.

KCross

KCross wrote: »

Im with Energia paying 15.91/7.63 inc vat. Your rates look high to me.

Rural units are more expensive

KCross

BrownFinger wrote: »

Rural units are more expensive

My figures are for rural.

Cyrus

KCross wrote: »

Almost certainly yes.

~3kWh on average per night is all you need to break even. An eTron will be sucking twice that on its own even if you only charge once a week.... add in your background load and shifting appliances to night rate and you will be saving money.

I suspect at 10,000kWh per year(which is 2.5x the national average) you should already be on night rate regardless of an eTron being added.

As a sanity check, take a few meter readings and see how many units you are using per night as is.... take a reading at 11pm tonight and another reading at 8am... do that for a few nights and see what you are averaging over a few days during the night rate hours.... my guess is you should be on night rate already as your heat pump is probably firing up during the night. It will use less in the summer but it will still fire up to heat water so you could take some more readings during the summer and then decide.

just called energia

looks like a no brainer the increased day rate isnt much higher than the current but the night rate is half

KCross

KCross wrote: »

My figures are for rural.

I better check out my options.
I moved from urban to rural about 8 months ago and just took the account with me.

thanks for the heads up

KCross

Cyrus wrote: »

just called energia

looks like a no brainer the increased day rate isnt much higher than the current but the night rate is half

Your standing charge will also usually go up by about €45 for the year and your day rate usually goes up 1c/kWh and as you said night rate is half price.... if you run the numbers on that you will get to the 3kWh being required to break even.

Before you pull the trigger on my recommendation please do check how many units you are using by night as is... to be sure to be sure!

WattsUp

Cyrus wrote: »

just called energia

looks like a no brainer the increased day rate isnt much higher than the current but the night rate is half

When I swapped for my PHEV a few years back to Energia from standard rate ESB I doubled my consumption but my bill in Euro stayed the same.

• Day usage was 2/3 of old standard price
• Night usage was 1/3 of old standard price
• Combined it meant I got 7kW into car every night and still paid same amount.

Have a look at switcher. In there you can select the % usage that will be on night rate. That then give a pretty accurate calculation for best offer.
As a rule of thumb assume 200kW for every 1000km you drive in a year and assume all of that on night rate. Use you current consumption for day rate. The ratio of the 2 gives you roughly % to fill in as night rate in the switcher estimator.

steves2

Cyrus wrote: »

hi folks have been reading through the thread, all very interesting!

my house is a new build (built in the last 3 years) so hoping this will be relatively straightforward.

whats the best charger to buy at the moment, ideally want something black. Also presume tethered makes more sense and finally, are most charges compatible with msot cars, i.e. if i was getting a model 3, or an EQC or an etron its all the same?

Mine was built 2 years ago with the fuseboard smack bang in the middle of the house. Already have my gen 2 leaf, I quickly learned about the regs and that they can't install the charger from the meter. I've seen 1 neightbour who got the cable run from the fuseboard through the house with trunking and it looks awful. then another neighbour got someone to run straight from the meter, which isn't allowed. So in reading here maybe I could get a second fuse board near front of the house inside, then the charger point from that??

KCross

steves2 wrote: »

So in reading here maybe I could get a second fuse board near front of the house inside, then the charger point from that??

You can do that but you’d still need to connect the two fuse boards together so you’d still have the same problem of cables running through the house.

My first option would be to get the cable from the fuse board up into the attic and run it to where you need from there, under floor boards if required. No trunking required, just fishing of the cable. It’s a bit of work but the best solution if at all possible. It’s what I did and my fuse board is on a central internal wall too.

Gumbo

Anyone interested in an ABL 16a/32a Home Charger?

Might have the option to switch to a tethered version so mine could be up for sale.
If you buy this, pay a sparks to fit, you should be done and dusted for under the €600 grant, therefore cost you nothing.

Its a basic plug and play charger now, no fancy app control or anything.

Cyrus

steves2 wrote: »

Mine was built 2 years ago with the fuseboard smack bang in the middle of the house. Already have my gen 2 leaf, I quickly learned about the regs and that they can't install the charger from the meter. I've seen 1 neightbour who got the cable run from the fuseboard through the house with trunking and it looks awful. then another neighbour got someone to run straight from the meter, which isn't allowed. So in reading here maybe I could get a second fuse board near front of the house inside, then the charger point from that??

I’m lucky in that regard our fuse board is close to the side of the house and I already have power coming out to a shomera behind units in the utility so totally unseen

steves2

I had paid for Electric Ireland to install and when they came out they said about the problem with the fuse board, it's my fault that I didn't fully read the terms about the fuse board I assumed the meter being at the front would be ok. I'll call them on Monday and hopefully get a refund, I know they normally wouldn't but in this time maybe they'll make an exception.

Felexicon

KCross wrote: »

You can do that but you’d still need to connect the two fuse boards together so you’d still have the same problem of cables running through the house.

My first option would be to get the cable from the fuse board up into the attic and run it to where you need from there, under floor boards if required. No trunking required, just fishing of the cable. It’s a bit of work but the best solution if at all possible. It’s what I did and my fuse board is on a central internal wall too.

I'd second this and add to go with a local REC as most EV "specialist installers" won't go through the hassle of lifting floorboards etc.

Cyrus

Folks

Does anyone know if the electric Ireland enext charger requires an earth rod or not ?

And who normally does their installs on Dublin

10-10-20

An earth rod specific to the charger? No, the earth is normally carried through the supply feed from the residence and protected using an RCB.
That's unless you had a pre-install inspection and earthing issues were identified?

Cyrus

Ok it’s just I have been reading up on chargers (the eo mini for example and I see people comparing it needs an earth rod ) perhaps it’s a uk requirement?

KCross

Cyrus wrote: »

.... perhaps it’s a uk requirement?

This ^^

The regs changed in UK last year and a charge point needs an earth rod independent of the house earth.

Some charge points have some additional smarts built in which obviate the need and still meet regs.

It’s not required here though.