How many prime owners have invested in a L2 Charging station at home?

On the other hand, without L2 at home, I would burn a lot more gas because I often get home from work and then have to leave the house right after supper and would not have enough EV range for my evening trips.

 

I rarely run into that scenario. However, if I did, it might drive me to pull a 240V line to the garage and put an adapter on my factory EVSE.

 

Happens to me several times a week for much of the year. Not so much in the summer.

 

I love my level 2 charger. My cost to install was about $500 with electrical work. Some Days I charge a few times and drive up to 100 Miles on electric. Never could do that with a Level 1.

 

Same here. We have an L2 we share for our Leaf and PiP, and it great being able to charge in 70 minutes, for days where I make multiple short trips. Can’t say I have ever reached 100 miles in a day with my PiP though... Definitely worthwhile if you have to plug-enabled vehicles.

 

You need to calculate what your effective cost per mile is for both gas and electric, then convert that to gallons of gas equivalents.

For me, my power cost works out to about $2.75 per gallon of gas. That is, it gets me the same number of miles, on average, as a gallon of gas priced at $2.75. When the price of gas goes above that, I'm saving money on the battery. (The price of electricity is flat relative to the price of gas, although it does adjust every year or so.)

I happened to have a 120V outlet in the wall of my driveway about 3 feet from where the EVSE plug is.

Coincidentally, 3' behind that on the other side of the (brick) wall was a 240V dryer outlet on a 40A circuit.

I had fun trying all sorts of ways of getting 240V from the dryer outlet to the other side of the wall in the carport with minimal damage to anything, and finally settled on a fairly simple approach -- a 10' dryer cord where I attached the pigtails to an RV-type receptacle that I put in a big metal box that I hung on the wall, and then a simple adapter from that to a standard 3-prong plug that I plug the EVSE into but that gives it 240V instead of 120V.

I don't think I came anywhere close to $500 (maybe $150?), but I think it would take quite a while to make up the difference between L1 and L2 if L2 cost me $500 more than L1.

If there's no power anywhere nearby and you need to run an extension cord, then 120V might be cheaper.

But if you need to tap into the circuit box directly and run conduit, then you're probably better off just running 240V from the get-go.

I would not advise spending more than $100-$200 on L2 if you already have L1 available, unless you can definitely benefit from faster or multiple daily recharges on a regular basis.

 

I have L2, but only use it if I plan on going out after work, otherwise I "trickle charge" with L1 overnight.

 

Why use the L1 at all?

 

Probably the main one is my Kill-a-Watt doesn't work on my 240V, but my understanding is slow charging any battery probes life.

Its like filling up a water balloon slowly prolongs the life of the material vs filling it up at full blast and stretching it quickly. Same with charging a battery. My understanding is that fast charging will lower the longevity of the battery.

It honestly may not be a significant amout in this case, but I just err on the side of caution and because my 110 and 220 outlets ate next to each other and my cable supports both.

 

I wouldn't worry about that. When coming down from Grand Mesa in Colorado, I charged from 10% to 98% in about 20-30 minutes. At 98%, the engine started, presumably because the battery had gotten warm enough to shut down the regeneration. That's a whole lot faster than L2 charging and it's indicative of the rate of charge the battery can take.

 

If you already have L2 setup you might gain up to 10% of efficiency (save $$$) over L1. Also, you will have no problem with battery cooler, battery heater, and pre-conditioning functions while plugged in. L1 sometimes does not provide enough juice to support those functions and continue charging the traction battery.

 

??. I have not found this to be the case. L1 charges my battery to 100% every time, from 20F to 90F in the garage.

 

With climate prep? The manual does suggest this possibility.

 

Electricity varies. We've seen L1 charging times differ as a result. So, there's no timing guarantee.

 

L1 120 volt is only used in north america and a few others The rest of the world is 220 or up. L1 will not prolong battery life as the battery is designed for the world that uses 220v . All you are doing is wasting your limited time on earth waiting for the car to charge. What is your time worth? Mine is worth more than the cost of the charger and KWHs

 

When you are sleeping, you aren't wasting time waiting for the car to charge. You are doing something else.

 

I charge multiple times a day. Daily I use up my charge on the way to work. Then plugin. And drive home and use up charge. Plugin my level 2 charge. Eat dinner. Pickup kid from cheer practice or other event. Then plugin over night.

Hate to burn gas.

 

The previous commenter did not have this schedule, and was using L1 while sleeping. For your schedule, L2 makes sense. For my schedule and the schedules of some other commenters, L1 is sufficient to meet our needs.

 

I rarely use climate prep. A few times this past winter, but I don't recall that the battery was less than 100% after using it. I did use climate prep this morning prior to running some sick foster kittens to the vet, and the battery was at 100% at the desired time. But, that's only one data point and others have reported less than a full battery with climate prep.

 

I have multiple 'start' timers. Always climate prep in the morning and my home commute.

Charge for free at home with Solar Power.

Tesla power wall will be installed in October. So I can shift my power use at night to battery.

I may be wrong but 110 generates heat for a longer amount of time that 220.