AMP and Charging Question

That's going to depend on your driving patterns. I often have to come home from work, eat supper, and then leave for a meeting. In that case, it's a big help. If you don't need to charge more than once a day, maybe not so much. Even so, L2 will save a tiny amount just due to less overhead since the cooling fan doesn't have to run as long. But payback will take a long time unless it enables you to drive a higher percentage in EV than an L1 charger. Even then, it'll take a while.

 

I had a different mind set when I purchased my EVSE which is a Clipper Creek 40. I thought “who’s coming to dinner?” in the future. It may not be just be me that shows up in an PHEV and needs to plug in. At the time the only available chargers in the area were a couple of L2 chargers, so when I purchased it I also listed it in PlugShare. I also assumed some members of my family or friends may eventually own an EV or PHEV at some time as well.

Now I use it more to replenish the battery when I precondition the car in the winter and summer and for quick turnarounds during the weekend. I don’t necessarily need the precondition for my comfort.


Unsupervised!

 

Yeah, Level 2 is a plus when it comes to preconditioning. The gen1 Volt couldn't even do it on Level 1. For others, Level 1 is an either or situation; the battery isn't charged while conditioning the cabin. Which isn't a big deal with the Prime's battery size, but can be for other plug ins and daily drives.

My understanding is that it won't make a difference, as the the unit is limited to 12A draw.

 

It won't matter if the outlet will supply a million amps. Unless you set the car to only take 8A, the EVSE will determine the charge rate and it's 16A with L2 and 12A with L1. Just like your toaster and your TV, the charger draws what it needs, not what the house can supply.

Excellent point! I notice that if I go out and hit the AC button when I'm plugged into L1 but charging is done, when I come back and open a door to stop the AC, the charger keeps running. The display will still say 100% when I start the car, but it's apparently not a full 100%. If it's plugged into L2 and I do the same thing, the charger stops as soon as I open the car door to stop the AC.

 

Special Note about Preconditioning: If you have a Prime Advanced and use the app to set to Max Cooling or Max Heat, not even the L2 can keep up with the battery drain. The car requires an extra 10 to 15 minutes to recover the charge used by preconditioning.

If you use the Remote A/C button on the key fob or leave the Entunes Remote app at “LAST IN-CAR SETTING” then the L2 will keep up with the battery drain.


Unsupervised!

 

I suppose that preconditioning starts and completes before the charging begins thus delaying the start of charging.

Using the Air Cond button on the fob with my L2 EVSE, my power meter only reads 1.59 amps. I should check it on L1 with my Killawatt. I'd guess it's double that amperage, which makes it surprising that my charger keeps running after the AC stops on L1.

 

No, I usually use the Entunes Remote Climate to cool the battery down before I leave for work, well after it finished charging. Since the battery always, always supplies the primary power for the A/C, even when plugged in, the drain on the battery using Max Cool is more than the charger is capable of supplying from the L2 EVSE. There is NO direct link from the EVSE to the climate control system.

Yup, based on your last setting it probably wasn’t as cold as Max Cool. But the draw on your battery is more than what an L1 EVSE can supply. On my OBD app a normal cool setting of about 74 which is a little low even for me, uses less than a kW in Normal driving mode. One of these days I’ll set my OBD app up to see how much Max Cool actually uses.


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