My Open EVSE Build Thread

You can just put it on the Private Sales area here on PriusChat.

 

If you don't mind sharing when you sell it, would you mind letting us know what you get out of it? Considering building my own and may unload the stock unit, as I always have the portable 120V unit from our Leaf if necessary.

 

Wow - Great! Thanks for the feedback.

 

Mitch or anyone else - I just purchased the Leviton 15A cable off Amazon for $99. LINK
I have a Leviton Level 2, 16A charger and wanted the longer, more flexible (25ft) cable to replace the 18ft heavy duty cable. I checked and the 30A cable is four wire (green, black, white, and blue). The 15A cable is five wire (black, red, green, blue and orange). Direct wiring as the 30A, eliminating the orange? Any other tips? Thanks.

 

You have to check the wiring with an ohmmeter, it likely the four wire cable wiring is:
Black & White as the 2 AC connections, Green is the ground and Blue is the J-1772 Pilot signal.

The five wire is likely to be Black & Red are the 2 AC connections, Green is the ground, and Blue and Orange are the J-1772 Pilot Signal and the Proximity signal (which isn't used on the EVSE)

You will need to use an ohmmeter to figure out which one is the Pilot signal between the blue and orange.
Check by the positions on the J-1772 head (unwired with no power connected)

 

Thanks Mitch. Which position on the J-1772 connector would be the Pilot signal? Or, I would assume either the Blue or Orange wire isn't connected to the J-1772?

 

Found this...

 

THANKS ny_rob.

 

Excuse my ignorance, but I just came into this. Where does that 12V come from, is that fed from the sensor circuitry and separate from the power input, and unaffected by the size of the power input? What I am driving at is: if the power was adapted at the plug in point, that is after the brick, to 220, would the sensor circuitry be affected. It looks like that is a 12V DC level at th
e sensor, coming from the car. I already know that I can charge at 220 at chargepoint, what I don't get is why the charge cable cannot be easily adapted to take both voltage levels. Is the electronics that complicated . ??? Thanks for the nice schematic.

 

It's called an auto ranging power supply", takes 100-250VAC and outputs 12V, vehicle the OpenEVSE site, there are schematic and pictures of the power supply that Chris Howell uses.

FYI, OpenEVSE can support either 120V or 240V, it's just supplying it to the cars onboard charger.

 

I had my Leviton Level 2 charger installed on the front wall of my garage due to ease of installation (existing wiring). The charge cable would barely reach if I pulled in nose first. I started backing in and that worked fine with less hassle with the thick 1/2" charge cable. Backing was a issue, because I park at a angle. I figured the Leviton 25' thin cable was the answer for straight in parking . Why not do it right, well almost? Friday, I ran another 12/2, 20A line from the circuit breaker to my ideal location. I was going to use the existing run of 12/2 and add for the new location, but decided to limit the length by going directly from the circuit breaker, with considerable effort. Upgrading wiring later, if needed, won't be difficult. With a three car garage, I can now park my PIP in any space, using the existing cable. I purposely mounted the Leviton box high and out of the way. That also reduced the cable to a ideal length for the space I currently use. No need for the new Leviton 25' cable. Charging doesn't get any easier.