[Paul_Moxhay]

I am getting my Nissan Leaf on Wednesday and want to get a Rolec Smart Charger installed asap. Does anyone have any recommendations as to who could install it? Quality of work and ease of dealing with is more important than price tbh.

 

[Howie]

This is who I used. I have a Leaf and the charger has been installed 15 months with no issues. They came when they said they would, it cost what they said it would and the day after, my house alarm went off for no reason. They came back to the house to investigate, and didn't charge, despite that it turned out to be unrelated to the install.I would use them again.

Home & Business Car Charging Unit Installations | McNally EV | Yorkshire

 

[AndyG]

I am getting my Nissan Leaf on Wednesday and want to get a Rolec Smart Charger installed asap. Does anyone have any recommendations as to who could install it? Quality of work and ease of dealing with is more important than price tbh.

Why a Rolec?
I have one of the original Chargmaster chargers and it has been faultless for 8 years. The Roles I had installed in 2015 has tried to set the garage on fire TWICE already...... Alright thats an exaggeration BUT when it was opened up to be repaired there was far too much scorching for my liking...... I wouldn't have a Rolec again given the choice.....

 

[Paul_Moxhay]

Why Rolec?

I have had 2 Rolec chargers now and they were good value to buy, easy to install and worked flawlessly for several years. Sorry you have had a bad experience though.

I want a smart charger that can handle the Octopus Agile tariff effectively and from reading on this forum and other places it seems to do a good job but using tariffs like this is still early days.

The Home Smart Charger is a reasonable price.

Having said that... if you have a better idea, bearing in mine I will be wanting to make good use of the Octopus Agile tariff, then I am listening

 

[andyswarbs]

For me the Ohme charger is best of octopus agile. Anyway that's the solution I have gone with. Just awaiting my smart meter "upgrade".

 

[Paul_Moxhay]

I'll take a look at Ohme... thanks

 

[firetrax]

You can use the Ohme charge cable which is subsidised by Octopus to half the price. It can plug into either a type 2 socket or a commando socket.

Octopus Energy

octopus.energy

 

[Paul_Moxhay]

You can use the Ohme charge cable which is subsidised by Octopus to half the price. It can plug into either a type 2 socket or a commando socket.

Octopus Energy

octopus.energy

I got excited then... I thought it could plug into a type 2 or commando... as you said. That isn't quite true though... you have to choose which when you buy it.

I think I prefer a fixed solution so the Ohme wall charger might be a good choice if you have a single EV so know the plug you need. I might be switching my Qashqai to an EV in a year or two so I am thinking I might get a untethered cable. Not sure Ohme do untethered.

 

[Howie]

.

 

[firetrax]

I got excited then... I thought it could plug into a type 2 or commando... as you said. That isn't quite true though... you have to choose which when you buy it.

I think I prefer a fixed solution so the Ohme wall charger might be a good choice if you have a single EV so know the plug you need. I might be switching my Qashqai to an EV in a year or two so I am thinking I might get a untethered cable. Not sure Ohme do untethered.

Yes one or the other but unfortunately not both.

 

[glider51]

I had our Rolex HomeSmart charger installed in December, by a local sparky who did a great job (West Berkshire).
However, if I did it again I would use Rolec’s recommended installer. (I think there is a link on their website you can ask for an recommended installer).

Our unit did not commission properly and I got caught between the sparky saying “well I’ve done all the electric work, the unit is not mine to support“, and Rolec who don’t provide support. (Ev.Energy who own the smart charging app have been brilliant and so supportive).

You also need a good mobile phone signal.

• Look in the spec sheet for 14CSQ
• Search for my note in the SpeakEV charging forum

Rolec has done a very poor design. The HomeSmart unit has the GPRS unit right at the back of all the electrical gubbins. It has a small aerial again buried behind all the wire, and then you screw it to a solid wall and it gets a poor mobile phone signal
- who’d have guessed!

To get ours working we needed to install an external GPRS aerial, (if you want any tips on this PM me).

again, the Ev.Energy app is well supported and is working pretty well (octopus GO)

 

[Paul_Moxhay]

@glider51 Many thanks. We have really strong GPRS signal here so we might be OK. Do you have a pic of your external aerial you could post?

 

[glider51]

 

[glider51]

My Rolex external aerial is:

Dual SMA Male 3G 4G LTE Signal Booster Antenna Outdoor Fixed Bracket Mount Kits | eBay

Fits 4G modems with SMA male/TS9/CRC9 por. 1xOutdoor antenna dual interface kit. Antenna should be mounted vertically to maximize performance. Gain: 10-12dBi. Usable indoor or outdoors Enhance and maintain excellent signal quality.

rover.ebay.com

BUT this is not totally ideal. There is so little space above the GPRS module in the Rolex unit, you really need the SMA connector to be right angled.