Chevy VOLT

[1793]

Looking to see if anyone can answer a question for about the Chevy VOLT.
Customer is having an issue with the portable, 110v, charger charging at his home. My question is what is an acceptable voltage drop for this charger?
As always thanks in advance.

 

[templdl]

Looking to see if anyone can answer a question for about the Chevy VOLT.
Customer is having an issue with the portable, 110v, charger charging at his home. My question is what is an acceptable voltage drop for this charger?
As always thanks in advance.

"Issue" what is the issue?

 

[jxofaltrds]

"Issue" what is the issue?

It requires charging after use.

 

[hillbilly1]

Couldn't find any spec on it, but both Chevy and Nissan are having problems with the 120 volt chargers because of the weight of the charger hanging off the NEC mandated 12" cord. Loose connection there can cause the red light (voltage out of range ) to come on. I would change the res grade receptacle to a spec grade, much tighter connection. ( I don't know if they make a spec grade tamper resistant receptacle though, if you want to stay within the letter of the code):roll:

 

[1793]

I had posted some more information just after jxofaltrds's post but it does not show up in my list of posts. I'm not sure if it went through.

My missing post was to the effect of the unit will not charge at full, 12A setting but will most of the time charge at the 8A setting. It shows the red light on the unit and that is an indicates a ground fault. The receptacle being used by my customer is a GFI and working properly. He has plugged this same charger in at another's house and it worked just fine.

My thought is a possible Voltage Drop issue. The distance from the panel to the receptacle is about 125', #14 on a 15A 120v breaker. The breaker holds, but the charger shuts down.

Thanks and I'm sorry if this is a repeated post.

 

[hillbilly1]

Yeah, that's a pretty long run on #14, the gfi outlet it's plugged into should have nothing to do with it though. With the voltage dropping so much, that's probably why it kicks down to the 8 amp setting, which brings the voltage back up due to the reduced charge. It's probably seeing a voltage difference between the neutral and ground due to the voltage drop, causing it to think there's a ground fault.

 

[rt66electric]

I smell Money

I smell Money

Smells Like the charger needs a new dedicated circuit. I would run #10ga and a 20amp 120v circuit.
or 220v 12ga ,the price is the same and works faster.
Ask Him If he wants it patched, or, If he would like it to look good and last forever??
Give a bid to do it right and walk away.

Is this the same guy to whom the HOT-TUB guy said " It will work fine and any electrician can hook-it up for $200"

Why cant these things tie-into a 30amp RV circuit???

I suppose auto engineers know everthing a college degree can teach them.

 

[hillbilly1]

I would go ahead and install a 240 volt charger, Chevy says the 120 volt charger is to be used occasionally and is not for frequent use anyway.

 

[templdl]

It requires charging after use.

Obviously.
I was looking for a specific concern such as:
Is it a guess then that there is a recharging issue because you suspect that there may be a low voltage condition, if so what would is that voltage of is this a hypothetical question, a "what if?"
And then are you asking what is the minimum voltage that would be allowed for a reasonable charge time?
Or are you asking if the charge would cease to operate at a given low voltage level?

 

[1793]

Smells Like the charger needs a new dedicated circuit. I would run #10ga and a 20amp 120v circuit.
or 220v 12ga ,the price is the same and works faster.
Ask Him If he wants it patched, or, If he would like it to look good and last forever??
Give a bid to do it right and walk away.

Is this the same guy to whom the HOT-TUB guy said " It will work fine and any electrician can hook-it up for $200"

Why cant these things tie-into a 30amp RV circuit???

I suppose auto engineers know everthing a college degree can teach them.

There is not a way at this point to get a new circuit to this location. I had a thread awhile back this year about the 240V circuit run that I was able to work around.

I would go ahead and install a 240 volt charger, Chevy says the 120 volt charger is to be used occasionally and is not for frequent use anyway.

There is one but it is tied to an A/C unit via a DP /DT switch and with our record high temps. the A/C needs to run about non-stop.

Original post question was to find out what Voltage Drop is acceptable for the charger to work.

 

[hillbilly1]

They make an auto buck/boost for RV's, but since your already starting with only 15 amps, the buck/boost would increase your primary amps, you would have to stay with the 8 amp charge rate. It would be an easy install because it's a plug and play set up, though you would have to use a 15 amp to 30 adapter, then 30 back to 15.

 

[Rampage_Rick]

I put a deposit on a 2013 Volt a couple weeks ago. Should get it sometime around the end of August.

Anyways, with the Volt the charger is actually built into the car. It's got a wide range for how much it will draw. The minimum charge rate is 6A / 120V (720 W) and the maximum is ~14A / 240V (3300 W) The car's onboard charger adapts whatever line voltage it receives to charge it's 360V battery.

Any model "charger" (EVSE) is essentially just a smart extension cord with ground fault protection. When you plug in the car the EVSE sends a PWM signal to the car telling it how much power is available. The car says "great, turn it on" and the EVSE closes a contactor sending line voltage to the car. The bulk of the circuitry is for safety: GFP so you can unplug it in a rainstorm, circuitry so you can't drive away while plugged in, etc.

The factory "Level 1" 120V EVSE that comes with the Volt has two settings: 8A and 12A (there's a button to toggle while unplugged from the car) Have you tried the lower setting? Here's a thread about something similar. One thing mentioned there is to make sure it's a "new" unit, as GM recalled all of them a few months back.

They do make 16A 240V "Level 2" charging stations, but if I'm going to the expense of installing one I'd probably go with a 30A 240V "Level 2" unit. As of right now the Volt won't use the entire capacity, but the newer Nissan Leaf will (6.6 kW max charge rate) There's a chance the Volt could upgrade to 6.6 kW in a few years as well.

Level 3 (360VDC fast charge) is a whole other ballgame, and not pertinent to the Volt at this time

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAE_J1772

 

[hillbilly1]

Level 3 (360VDC fast charge) is a whole other ballgame, and not pertinent to the Volt at this time

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAE_J1772

Right now the manufactures are calling It a "level 2 DC" , and they are only used commercially because of the extreme power draw. (Requires a 150-200 amp three phase feed at 208 volt) I don't know why they don't use the "level 3" designation yet, but I know of two manufactures that do this.