EV charging at the Mall

[Markintosh]

Speedy wrote:
But there are continuous 80 Amp EVSEs out there now that require 100 Amp wiring.

But there just are not vehicles out there that need an 80 amp EVSE, much less two of them charging at the same time. Okay, maybe if you are charging your long haul semi EV at home or your EV school bus.

The sales people were incredulous that we were only installing a 32 amp EVSE at home. It can charge the Ioniq 5 in about 5 hours for normal use. With just a tiny bit of preplanning, I dont need any more than that. If I do, I can go to the nearest DCFC and charge in 20 minutes. I could easily do that 250 times before it would cost more than your installation!

[wurm]

Another quick question for those doing almost all of your charging at home. I know it's all dependent on the area of the country in which you live, but on average how much have you seen your monthly electric bill increase?

And those of you fortunate enough to already be totally off-the-grid, no need to rub it in.

[Carnos Jax]

They supposedly offer 7 to 8 cents kWh off peak around here, that would make it dirt cheap.

[special]

Robert M wrote:
Speedy,

That would be true if and only if I have the charging gear at my office. Right now, I don't have it. If I get a plug-in hybrid, I will have to invest in the charging hardware. It would be the only way for a plug-in or electric vehicle would work for me. No need to ask for permission to install the gear because I own the company. If I want the gear, it gets purchased and installed. It's one of the benefits of being in charge.

For the times I can't charge at my office, I'd be forced to use a public charging station. That's an issue for the reasons I mentioned previously. The time it takes to plug and unplug a vehicle is seconds. It's not even relevant to the discussion. The time it takes to recharge the vehicle is a key factor. I've no interest in sitting at a public charging site for 20 minutes or longer charging a vehicle and that isn't factoring in the time spent waiting for an open charging station if it's busy.

Right now, I have a gas-only vehicle. If I spend the bucks on a car, I may as well ensure I have both options available to me.

Robert

Robert M, IIRC your wife also drives a car. Why not have her drive an ICE (assuming she cannot charge at work or at your home) and YOU could drive an EV or at least a PHEV and charge at office? Assuming you go to office most of the days. Then when taking longer road trips in weekends with the family you can use her ICE car.

Another advantage of the EV is almost zero maintenance. No oil changes, no transmission fluid, no belts, no hoses, no air filters. Even brake pads last forever. I never changed brake pads on my 69k mile Volt and they looked like new.

[special]

wurm wrote:
Another quick question for those doing almost all of your charging at home. I know it's all dependent on the area of the country in which you live, but on average how much have you seen your monthly electric bill increase?

And those of you fortunate enough to already be totally off-the-grid, no need to rub it in.

It really depends now how much you drive and where do you charge. My wife charged for free at work so during Summer days she rarely charged at home. or if she did, the Volt used only about 5-8 kWh since the battery was rarely fully empty.

So worst case would be 250 kWh per month and 1kWs is $0.185 here (flat rate, no discount at night with my plan) so I guess that would come to $46 per month. In reality it was probably $30 per month.

Now imagine a car with ICE would use about 30 gallons per month so that would have been around $90.

Really charing at home is about 1/2 the cost of gas given the price of gas and price of kWh here. My friend with 2 Teslas came out with similar figures.

[Markintosh]

We are calculating about $35 to $50 a month,

[graylocks]

For my Volt with 40 mile electric range it was a $30 bump. my work commute was 20 miles round trip. My typical gas in a month was $150. With the Volt i could go many months without buying gas at all.

[Robert M]

special,

Neither vehicle is suitable for distance driving. My wife's car is best served as a station car. My car hasn't reached that point yet but it is definitely time to replace it. Mine is suitable for local driving up to a couple of hours away from us at best. We rent a vehicle anytime we need to do distance driving, i.e. road trip from NY any further than a couple of hours away.

For me, a plug-in hybrid is the best of both worlds, which is why one will replace my vehicle. It givesd me the option of all electric as long as I charge it every other day or gas and electric when that isn't necessarily viable. I've got my eye on a couple of models. Just need to find the time to test drive them. RAV4, Sportage/Tucson (since they're twinsies), etc. I _really_ like the Rav4 Prime.

Robert

[dk62]

About $75/month, soon to be $90 with price increase. Gas would have been around $140 at current prices.

Markintosh made excellent points.

We are also choosing a car to drive based on charging considerations, like Diner Dave.

[wurm]

Thanks for those numbers.