Using the Primes 120v Charger at 240 Volts, Cost $20 !!!

I am taking that a step further: using UF wire and inside conduit. I am not comfortable with direct bury.

 

About 100 feet from basement to where I park.


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I would imagine a wire like 12AWG would undergo less stress at 240V than at 120V. Am I correct on that? The reasoning is that at 120V the hot wire pumps 12A by itself whereas at 240V the 12A would be shared among the two hots. So at 240V each of the hot wires is pumping 6A. That’s half the current per hot wire.


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If I am having a 220 V outlet installed in my garage (an electrician is coming for other work so I have asked him to install a 220 V outlet), do I need to get any special plug/receptacle to plug in my Prius Prime standard charger for it work or just the standard 20 AMP outlet will be sufficient?

Thanks

 

I would like to correct my statement there. So I was totally wrong on the “less stress” at 240V. Basically, after asking an electrician, I learned that you can’t add/subtract Amps like that. On 120V, the 12A goes through the hot wire while on 240V we’re still delivering 12A but it’s going through each of two hot wires. That doesn’t add up to 24A if you think about aggregating them, and that doesn’t mean each of the hots share the load as I thought maybe each hot would carry 6A. It’s still 12A just at a higher voltage. It’s the same stress as in 120V, but at 240V you have 2 wires instead of one wire going through that same stress.


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Thanks Rob. I will let the electrician know about the receptacle. Once the outlet is installed I will connect with you for the pigtail option.

 

Rob, is your pigtail cable outdoor rated (waterproof)?


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Rob
One question - Is there any reason you recommend installing the 14-50R receptacle instead of 5-20R receptacle? This way there will be no need to use the pigtail.

Thanks

 

If the plan is to plug in something more powerful in the future, I should add that if you install a 50A receptacle, you should use a thick enough cable for the amperage the outlet supports. You don’t want to exceed the amperage the wire supports and cause a fire.


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I had an electrician install a pair of 240 outlets in the garage. I bought a JuiceBox Pro for my 2018 Prime. And I bought one of Rob43's pigtails for my wife's 2012 PIP. Obviously you don't get a lot of benefit from a PIP, but it works with the original EVSE just fine.
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if you take apart the handle of the charger you can See that L1 and L2 are connected and go to the charger. If it was a 120v charger it would only have L1.

https://i.imgur.com/eKqv6gc.png

https://i.imgur.com/rUHfXJV.png

 

I found out that 10-foot long pipes fit just fine in the Prius Prime. I used these to bury my new 240V outdoor wire. Installation is going well. Not finished yet. I buried 12/3 UF wire. Planning to install a Leviton 5842 receptacle outside and a BR220 GFCI breaker in the basement panel. The 5842 has two outlets, one 5-20 (for 120V) and a 6-20 (for 240V). The 120V outlet uses the neutral and one hot line for multiple purposes, Christmas lights, snow blower, or any other devices I may want to use outside. The 240V outlet uses the two hots and GND to charge the Prius.

Those are my plans. Can anyone spot any potential issues with this plan?


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