Charging strategy

welcome to toyota japanenglish. can't you just plug it in?

 

You know, I grew up during the era of the blinking 12:00 on VCR displays. It was common knowledge that programming a VCR was as complicated as rocket science. No one knows how to use that thing. Then one day, they moved Power Rangers to air 30 minutes earlier to before I came home from school. With motivation I got my daily Power Ranger fix. And you know what? It's actually pretty easy when you read the manual and learn how to use it.

This new one looks garbage. But I'll be "programming" my Netflix when it comes out 5 months later.

 

My screen stays on for several seconds when the car is powered off. The Charge now button is displayed clearly. Since I know when I turn the car off that I'm going hop out and plug it in, I press the button and plug in. Someone here also posted that you should make sure the doors are locked when either charging now or scheduled. My car has so far always charged when I expected it to, using both modes.

 

I never lock the doors when charging. It is in my garage. And I have locked the doors when charging somewhere on a street. Seems to work both ways.

EDIT: I think it is you have to have the doors unlocked to open the charge door open.

 

On the Prime Plus model the charge door can always be opened, and the charge cable does not get locked to the vehicle.

 

On the Prime Plus model the charge door can always be opened, and the charge cable does not get locked to the vehicle.[/QUOTE]

The charge door can't be opened if the doors are locked and you don't have the key fob.

 

Correct, no locking on plus. A reason I went for premium over plus, didn't want folks easily monkeying around with my h1772 in public, not that I really expect to charge car unattended in public, just in the garage.

As Bisco said in another thread, how do I sleep at night?

Re locking, just had my first oh crap moment last night, plugged in to charge, some point later wife locked the car without me knowing. J 1772 came out OK, went to close the charge door, didn't close quite right, tried to open and could only open it partially, thought something was physically jammed until I realized car was locked (didn't have keys on me). Heads up, at least on my premium when locked you can partially open the door enough to trigger the charge convenience light. Not sure if light is on a timer?

 

Correct. I only charge in the garage anyway.

 

The charge door can't be opened if the doors are locked and you don't have the key fob.[/QUOTE]

The original poster had an Advanced Prime. I believe his post on the charge door being locked if the doors are locked is correct. I was merely trying to point out the difference with my Prime Plus.

I just confirmed again locking the doors with the key fob kept 30 feet away from the car. This action did not lock the charge door. Maybe my Prime Plus is different than others. Also there is not any mechanical or electrical device present on my car that could lock the charge door. There is only a switch that would signal if the charge door is open or closed.

Does anyone else have a Prime Plus with a charge door that can be locked with the act of locking the doors?

 

Why delay the charge? Do you have time-of-day pricing of your electricity? If not, just plug it in and let it charge. You won't lose any charge by charging it early.

 

The owner's manual says to depart soon after a full charge in order to get the longest battery life. My words from what I remember reading.

 

Manual page 133 is where this is discussed. I don't use the car on a regular daily basis so I have tried to guess my next use and distance such that I don't leave the battery fully charged for an extended period of time, although manual discusses this scenario in climates like Alaska.

For example I used 1.5 kWh yesterday, probably another 2kwh tomorrow, probably will charge on Wednesday evening. Planning sucks but price to pay for not driving daily I guess, wonder what is more wear and tear daily charge/discharge or holding a high-ish charge for a few days? My uneducated guess it is mostly a wash, a few pct at most over 10 years but would love for an actual chemist to come in

 

It's better for battery health to charge when the battery is cool. Better to charge in a cool garage than a hot one.

 

I live in CA and we do have the option of Time of Use billing, so I will be switching to that meaning its cheapest electricity from 11pm to 7am

But more importantly I have the plus, and you can only use the pre-warm feature with the departure timer setting.
Although I have had ZERO success with the car being warm when I get in it. Seems to be some voodoo magic I need to perform to enable that function.

 

Lock the doors

 

Lee Jay, You're right about the Schedule. If no Sat or Sunday charge events, it will wait for the Monday Schedule event.
However, you can enter 15 events on the Schedule. If the Prime is charged when you first drive it Saturday and you want to charge again later on Saturday, add a few events that will Start a charge if you plug in before them.
Otherwise, just remember to press Charge Now when you Turn the car off.

 

I'm on a TOU plan where peak hours are 3-8 pm. Is there a way to program a charging schedule to avoid these hours? I'd prefer to charge during daylight hours. I think not, but have to ask anyway.

 

What I want is to charge now, stop charging when the hours are between 3-8 pm, then continue charging till the battery is full. Will a Chargepoint charger accomodate this schedule?