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

Good plan to let Energia go ahead with the install if you will not lose out paying the higher day rate before you get the benefit of the night rate when that car arrives. I'm currently on a 13c 24 rate which is excellent so I waited until the end of my current contract to switch. I'm also on school holidays so doing very little driving at the moment.

My dealer passed on my details yesterday and Airtricity just rang me a few minutes ago. I'm getting the meter installed on Monday morning, Airtricity will ring me on Tuesday morning to switch and that will take effect immediately. With my usage of approximately 7,500 units day and 6,000 units night I will save €733 with Airtricity over Energia.

I'd say there's a slim enough chance you'd get it in the next 2 days. Last one I did in May took 6 days via email and I never got a hard copy. I'd suggest contacting them directly if your timeframe is that tight.

Whatever you do, don't allow the work to go ahead until you have the letter of offer as they won't cover any cost incurred before the letter is issued.

This will not resolve your main issue which is undersized cables

whilst your meter may be replaced ,a notice of potential hazard may be issued. You’ll need a rec to install the new mains cables and upgrade earthing and new earth rod and provide a certificate for Esbn. There’s a charge also from Esbn (@€180) to do their connecting.

I know that. My REC was the one who said the meter tails upgrade (which he’ll be doing) would be facilitated by a new meter and isolation.

Good to have you post that information for any others in a similar position.

Apologies if this has been answered already, but with the new rules, is an isolation switch a requirement or can you get away without one? Not sure it matters but the house is five years old and we have an air to water heat pump. Thanks

Thanks Garo. Do you know if there are any chargers which have it built in, to hide it? I'm guessing not...

Hi are you sure you need to install a wall charger..For PHEV the standard 3 pin Granny charger that should come with the car should do..A friend of mine got the Ford Kuga PHEV and was told no need to install a charger as the 3 pin would do..Someonelse on the forum may be able to shine a light on PHEV home charging.

Might save yourself a lot of hassle on an install

Thats pretty much it alright.

The convenience of having a proper charger with proper wiring and weatherproofing to be able to take "high" current for extended periods. A granny cable isnt a long term solution.

And if they have a PHEV now there is a very good chance they will have a BEV in future in which case they will need the proper charge point then and you'd be as well to get the charge point in now while the grants are still in play. They wont last forever.

Anybody got information in regards how to be compliant in regards pen fault detection requirements if using a Tesla wall charger with a TN-C-S electricity supply? From what I can gather it doesn’t have anything built in.

or what would the recommended wall chargers other than zappy that would have this built in safety built in?

No haven’t bought anything yet. I was about to purchase it (gen 3) & had been reading the install manual to see what protections and features were built in & noticed a warning about additional protection required if installed in a TN-C-S type system. Seems an additional earth rod dedicated for charger or separate pen fault unit installed at consumer unit is required to make the Tesla charger compliant to be installed in Ireland. looking at the wall box & Anderson A2 units now as they seem to have this pen fault protection built in. Thanks for link

August was our first full month, with 2 EV’s, in our household. so thought it might be interesting to share some range, and home charging stats. Note: These are all NON motorway driving results.

EV1)

Kia E-Niro:(2021 Long Range model)

My wife is getting well over 450kms, typically 475kms range on the car.

EV2)

BMW i3:(2020 120 model)

I am getting typically, a little under 300kms, but varies of course on driving habits, just fully charged it, and showing 317kms.

Andersen A2 Charger- Month Of August, both EV’s are fully charged by am August 30th.

This shows we used 404 KW for the entire month of August charging the 2 EV’s, we had zero public charging in August. Total cost of both EV car charging was €60.50. The green, is car charging, the grey is house usage. About 64 % of total electricity used, was to charge the 2 EV’s.

That cost is based on 15 cent cost per KW inputted, as the c/KW cost, into the Andersen app.

My mid July ‘21 Bord Gais Electricity bill was 19.08 c/KW, less a 31% discount = 13.17 c/KW plus 13.50 % vat = just under 15 c\KW, i’ve excluded the fixed Standing Charges & Fixed PSO Levy.

There is a price increases effective August 8th, which will push that unit price up to about 17 cent/KW, that would increase the cost to about €69 in total for both EV’s for the whole month.

Even taking that tarriff increase into account, this is roughly a quarter the cost of what we were paying in monthly fuel.

Am in a contract for Electricity, but waiting to have maybe 2 to 3 months stats, so i have accurate data to consider moving to a smart meter tarriff, but so far, the smart meter tarriffs, don’t look like good value.

Alas,

we had a smart meter installed last year, well before, we decided to go the EV route, and also before, i had read the many posts on here, saying avoid a smart meter installation, like the plague !!

Will keep an eye out for good Smart Meter night rates, but they are not so good right now.

you can put the charging point on a pedestal if you want. The cable for the charging point needs to come from the fusebox inside the house or the meter box (its only recent that this is allowed)

Itll be a non standard install from what you are saying so could be costly.

the cable that is there for outdoor lighting wont be suitable.