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34 Posts
Hi all, first off apologies for the length of this, so after having our PHEV for a couple of weeks, i've been thinking about charging. As i suspected based on my wife's usage patterns of lots of small journeys, school run, shops, parents etc. she's doing most of the runs on EV, which is great.
We're currently using the granny charger and basically the car is charging most of the day, now i'm planning on moving to Agile as soon as my smart meter goes in next month. This presents me with a challenge around the peak 4-7 times, i.e. the car will most likely be charging between these times after the school run etc, which isn't desirable. I don't really want to be plugging and un-plugging the car around these times everyday, and there's not a chance my wife will work like that.
The plan is (once my electrics are sorted out!) to install a 7kwh charge point, i was leaning toward the point point for the aesthetics, being tethered for ease of use and not having to have an earth rod (challenging location). I can't get a clear answer, but it would appear that the "smart" pod point can't effectively schedule the car not to charge during the peak times - is that correct?
I'm not looking for something as intelligent as the Ohme with low rate charging, as that probably will mean the battery won't be charged on just a few low rate slots a day, fine for an EV with the extended range, for the PHEV not so good, plus the earth rod is a challenge.
Any thoughts? i could obviously hack the pod point with a IFTTT switch - but that would mean more cost and warranty issues maybe? alternatively look at a different charger - possibly the Zappi?
Ideally i could just get the car itself to do this, however for whatever reason i can't get it to not charge during the 4-7pm window, this could be fault with my car, i suspect its a software issue by Land Rover, i think its expecting the start time to be before the end time i.e. 01:00 - 07:00, i'm trying to get it to do 19:00 - 16:00 as the "preferred time" - very annoying.
I don't want to make and expensive mistake getting the wrong charge point and having to physicaly disconnect the cable during the peak or indeed pay for peak charging!
We're currently using the granny charger and basically the car is charging most of the day, now i'm planning on moving to Agile as soon as my smart meter goes in next month. This presents me with a challenge around the peak 4-7 times, i.e. the car will most likely be charging between these times after the school run etc, which isn't desirable. I don't really want to be plugging and un-plugging the car around these times everyday, and there's not a chance my wife will work like that.
The plan is (once my electrics are sorted out!) to install a 7kwh charge point, i was leaning toward the point point for the aesthetics, being tethered for ease of use and not having to have an earth rod (challenging location). I can't get a clear answer, but it would appear that the "smart" pod point can't effectively schedule the car not to charge during the peak times - is that correct?
I'm not looking for something as intelligent as the Ohme with low rate charging, as that probably will mean the battery won't be charged on just a few low rate slots a day, fine for an EV with the extended range, for the PHEV not so good, plus the earth rod is a challenge.
Any thoughts? i could obviously hack the pod point with a IFTTT switch - but that would mean more cost and warranty issues maybe? alternatively look at a different charger - possibly the Zappi?
Ideally i could just get the car itself to do this, however for whatever reason i can't get it to not charge during the 4-7pm window, this could be fault with my car, i suspect its a software issue by Land Rover, i think its expecting the start time to be before the end time i.e. 01:00 - 07:00, i'm trying to get it to do 19:00 - 16:00 as the "preferred time" - very annoying.
I don't want to make and expensive mistake getting the wrong charge point and having to physicaly disconnect the cable during the peak or indeed pay for peak charging!
for example my missus went out this morning, did the school run, shopping, coffee and came back on 1%, she then did the school run again at 3pm on EV as it had recharged enough. We will be pretty much charging all the time as it barely does 20miles on EV from what i can tell.
