[Eleven]

Hello,

I have just bought a 67 reg Golf GTE and want to get a dedicated charger in my separate garage, which is about 15 meters from the house across a gravel driveway. I wanted to know which are the best chargers to use, the car is at home most of the day and also if there are options for me to get the charger installed without having to do groundwork’s To link to the main fuse board in the house? I have read about commando chargers and Ohme but not sure what that means or if they may be an option?

please assume that you are explaining this to someone with the electrical knowledge of a 4 year old as that’s about my level.

thank you as always for your help

 

[electricdriver]

Do you have any electrical supply at all in the garage now? If so, can you take a picture of the fuse / distribution board in the garage? That makes a big difference to the answers...if you have a supply now that's sufficiently meaty for the job it makes things a lot easier.

 

[farmergiles]

If your garage has a good quality 13a socket, and as your car is at home most of the day, you can use the granny charger to slow charge it. This is kinder to the battery as well and it doesn't sound like you need a 7kw charger.
If the socket is old then best replace it with an MK or Crabtree version and monitor the temperature of it the first time you use it. It will get warm but should stabilise after an hours or so.

 

[foureyes]

GTE can only charge at 3.6kW anyway.

 

[ChrisCross123]

Hello,

I have just bought a 67 reg Golf GTE and want to get a dedicated charger in my separate garage, which is about 15 meters from the house across a gravel driveway. I wanted to know which are the best chargers to use, the car is at home most of the day and also if there are options for me to get the charger installed without having to do groundwork’s To link to the main fuse board in the house? I have read about commando chargers and Ohme but not sure what that means or if they may be an option?

please assume that you are explaining this to someone with the electrical knowledge of a 4 year old as that’s about my level.

thank you as always for your help

Photos / sketches of your property showing location of main CU in the house, location of meter, location / condition of garage electrics, route from house to garage would be helpful.

Power cable to EVSE needs to be attached to something permanent (eg a wall) or buried, so from the sounds of it you may need to bury the cable.

If you were really lucky (ie lottery winner levels of luck) you would be able to add the new EVSE supply cable to the existing conduit carrying the existing supply cable to the garage.

A commando socket and Ohme cable is an alternative to an EVSE, but the requirements for supply cable to the commando socket would be the same as the requirements for supply cable to an EVSE.

 

[mad_rich]

A few questions

Do you need to park in the garage? Sounds from your description that charging on the driveway would be much easier - if there’s no supply to the garage. Just route a cable to the outside wall of the house.

Do you want to future proof it, or go cheap? The golf will only charge at 3.6kW even on a dedicated charger. About 50% quicker than an ordinary socket (2.4kW). So for the Golf alone, it may not be worth going to the expense of fitting a full 7kW. But if you might get a full EV in the future, it’s worth investing in a proper supply to where you want to park it.

 

[Eleven]

Hello, I think having it on the driveway would be easier, but I’m not that keen on leaving the car out 24/7 when I have a garage. We plan to get an EV in 5-7 years so I would like to future proof if feasible. I have attached a picture of the fuse board in the garage, it means nothing to me and there is also a picture of the distance between the house and the garage, taken at the nearest point to the house fuseboard.

I can’t thank you all enough, this is a minefield and it helps to get some sensible advice.

 

[ChrisCross123]

Hello, I think having it on the driveway would be easier, but I’m not that keen on leaving the car out 24/7 when I have a garage. We plan to get an EV in 5-7 years so I would like to future proof if feasible. I have attached a picture of the fuse board in the garage, it means nothing to me and there is also a picture of the distance between the house and the garage, taken at the nearest point to the house fuseboard.

I can’t thank you all enough, this is a minefield and it helps to get some sensible advice.

On a positive note that looks like a good quality installation (as far as you can tell from a single photo of the outside of the garage CU)

I assume there is a circuit breaker in the main CU (fuse board) supplying the garage CU? What rating is it?

Where does the supply cable into the garage CU come from? Does it disappear into the garage wall? Or floor? Or go into a tube of some type?

Is the power cable to the garage visible at the house end at all?

 

[ChrisCross123]

Also - is there any text / numbers written on the supply cable going into the garage CU?

 

[Woodulike]

I would get an installer or 3 out to quote on getting a change point installed, if you want a charge point fitted for the GTE.

Looking at the picture of your garage it isn't that old and you probably have a socket or two in the garage. You could use the granny cable that comes with the car to charge it up for now while you look into what you need.
If you want to be extra safe with the electrics you can limit the car to charging at 6amps. I only say that as there's sure to be someone along soon to say it isn't safe to charge all the time from a 13amp plug but with the electrics in good order the risk is slight.

 

[Eleven]

Thank you all, unfortunately the main fuse board is not labelled up very well and nothing has the garage identified, but there is a blank circuit breaker in the main board which is 80A, the cabling goes into a tube in the garage, which then goes into the floor and appears in the electricity meter cupboard on the outside wall.there is nothing written on the cable going into the floor.

we have both lighting and electrical sockets in the garage, so I assume the two trip switches are one for each.

 

[ChrisCross123]

Thank you all, unfortunately the main fuse board is not labelled up very well and nothing has the garage identified, but there is a blank circuit breaker in the main board which is 80A, the cabling goes into a tube in the garage, which then goes into the floor and appears in the electricity meter cupboard on the outside wall.there is nothing written on the cable going into the floor.

we have both lighting and electrical sockets in the garage, so I assume the two trip switches are one for each.

If you turn off the 80A breaker do the lights / sockets in the garage go off?

Have you got a photo showing what the cable from the garage connects to in the electricity meter cupboard?

It may be that you are in that rare (unique?) position where you have suitable wiring already in place for an EVSE.

 

[Eleven]

Hello, yes the lights and power go off if I turn the circuit breaker off, for some reason i now can’t post a photo as it says there is a security issue, but the cable goes into the meter cupboard and into a grey box with 100A on the side, the cables then come from the top and into the box that shows the numerical reading of electrical usage.

 

[ChrisCross123]

Hello, yes the lights and power go off if I turn the circuit breaker off, for some reason i now can’t post a photo as it says there is a security issue, but the cable goes into the meter cupboard and into a grey box with 100A on the side, the cables then come from the top and into the box that shows the numerical reading of electrical usage.

It sounds like the cable you are looking at in the meter box is a different cable - specifically it sounds like it is the main incoming supply cable for your property.

This cable comes into the main (DNO) fuse (grey box with 100A on it) and then into your meter, then from your meter to your consumer unit (CU - 'fuse box').

Assuming the electrical install on your property is to a good standard (impossible to say definitively without opening boxes / checking cables, but looks good from the one photo above) it should be straightforward for an electrician to replace the CU in the garage to include a supply to an EVSE, and fit an EVSE.

I would get a few quotes from installers and go from there. If they suggest it is a lot of work find out what work they claim is required and let us know.

 

[Eleven]

Thank you so much👍🏻

 

[Eleven]

The first quote I have had is £770, but pod point have said that the following needs to be completed before they can install, I have no idea what most of this means

• A minimum of 6mm SWA 3-core cable supplying the sub-board from your house - 4mm is not sufficient enough.
• Supply from main board to garage to be a minimum of 40A - this may need to be greater if you have many electrical components on the sub-board.
• Supply to the sub-board is either non RCD protected or protected by a Type A RCD.
• A Spare 40A MCB available on sub-board which is either non RCD protected or is protected by a Type A RCD.
• All MCBs and RCDs on one board must be the same brand.

 

[ChrisCross123]

Have they visited you to survey your current electrics, or are they just working from photos / emails?

 

[Eleven]

Just from photos, no one has even suggested coming for a site visit, it’s all being done by photos.

 

[ChrisCross123]

Ok, so I have not seen the photos, but it sounds like they are saying

1. They think the cable to your garage is too small (4mm2) for a 32A EVSE, and it needs to be at least 6mm2. It does look small to my eyes so they may well be right - if you could find any writing on the outside of the cable we could be sure. 4mm2 is borderline for direct buried SWA cable at 32A, there are various factors (eg length) that may add up to mean the cable is too small. You could get round this with an EVSE limited to 16A.

2. The breaker in your main CU supplying the garage must be rated 40A, and the wiring in the CU must be suitable for this current. Currently your breaker is 80A, which is a bit worrying as under overload conditions it will not protect the cable to your garage. This breaker would have to be changed to 40A. If you use a lot of power in your garage the breaker in the main CU would have to be a higher rating than 40A (but still within the current rating of your cable) so that it does not trip when everything is running.

3. They want the supply to be less sensitive to the fault currents that may be generated by the EVSE than the local protection of the EVSE so that the 'right' component trips. You may already meet this.

4. There needs to be a 'spare' 40A breaker in the garage CU for them to connect the EVSE to.

5. You should not mix and match different manufacturer's breaker in a CU. If the current breakers are all (for example) ABB or Schneider then any new breakers need to be as well.

Basically they are saying they only do standard installs, and anything non standard about your current setup needs to be sorted before they will touch it.

 

[Eleven]

I’ve had a quote for the various electrical bits of work that pod point said are required and it was just over £1k, so we are now balancing that cost with the charger install adding another £600 on top or we just go for one fitted to the outside of the house and leave the car outside to charge. I wish it was all so much more straightforward.