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Use manufacturer supplied power lead as extension?

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3.5K views 25 replies 12 participants last post by  JeffG  
S
#1 ·
I've got a Wallbox Pulsar home charger which came with a 5m lead. With the positioning on the power socket on my ID.3 I have to bring my car right up my tandem drive to get it within range of the lead.

This was fine and working as planned until No.1 daughter dropped the bombshell that she's going to live/work/study in France for a year and would be leaving her Fiat 500 with me to look after. I'm going to measure it up later today, but I'm sure there's not going to be enough room for her car to sit at the top of my drive out of the way and still leave room for my car to get near enough to the charger lead. I charge two or three times per week so having to move her car out of the way each time and then back again is going to get old really quickly.

My initial solution is to have a longer lead fitted to the Wallbox; I know you can get them with 7 meter leads, but then I thought, would it be possible to use the lead that VW supplied with the car as an extension? I've just been out and offered it up and the ends are correct. I'd need to do something about weatherproofing the part where the two leads connect, but otherwise is this a viable plan?
 
#3 · (Edited)
Sorry but those leads are not designed to daisy chain along. The internal pins don't connect to allow that.

You can fit a longer tethered lead to the wall unit, or move the wall unit down the drive to a new position on a post.

Or rent a local lock-up for her car.

Or bed a few paving slabs in the adjacent lawn. :sneaky:

Then again, I quite like this solution,

Modulo Twin | Optimal Parking Solutions

optimalparkingsolutions.com optimalparkingsolutions.com

Suddenly a longer lead to the wallbox starts to look attractive, doesn't it.
 
F
#13 ·
#14 ·
Type 2 connectors have been designed to prevent daisy chaining, by recessing the pilot pin to a free plug does not mate properly with a free socket. This is a very deliberately safety precaution. Apart from anything else, Type 2 connectors are not sealed in any way, and if left on the ground coupled together water can very easily get in. They are designed to drain any water out that gets inside via the underside of the connector, so have to be oriented correctly to achieve their splashproof rating.

You can bodge a Type 2 to make it daisy chain by machining a bit off the end, to make the pins mate sort of OK. It's a really nasty bodge, that should really be outlawed, yet there are some real monkeys selling extension leads like this. My advice would be to never, ever contemplate using one of these bodge leads. The connectors they use are not in any way shape or form approved or safety certified, do not comply with IEC 62196, are not designed to be connected in this way and will almost certainly not meet their original IP rating.

Best solution is to spend the same amount of money on a new, longer, tethered cable. You can get cables up to 15m long, and that would be a solution that is as safe as the charge point is at the moment. It's very easy to swap the cable over, I gave a check list as to what needs to be done in another thread yesterday.
 
#20 ·
Sorry, misunderstood. Yes, a Dri-box would be fine. IIRC they are IP55 when they have leads coming out through the seals, so should be more than adequate. I still think that daisy chaining is a bodge, though, and the connector is being used in a way that is outwith it's approval, so stating that it has TUV approval, complies with IEC62196, etc is just untrue for this use case.

Far better to do the job properly and just swap the lead over for a longer one. Nothing in it as far as cost goes, and it would give a safer and very much neater solution. I have a 10m cable on one of our charge points and it's extremely useful, as it's long enough to reach around my car and charge another one parked in front of it.
 
C
#22 ·
Of course, this is one situation that gives a justification for fitting an untethered EVSE in the first place. If you need a longer cable for an unseen reason (like buying a second EV) then you just buy a longer cable. That's exactly what we did. And we bought another cable for use with the EVSE in the first place to avoid getting one in and out of the car for each charge. [Our EVSE is in the garage so cable theft is not an issue.]
 
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