Tesla - Ultimate Home Charging Guide

today i will go over six main things to consider when deciding on a

home

charging

setup for your

tesla

cost of

charging

device panel or circuit breaker limitations charging speed daily driving distance transportable and serviceability and aesthetics, so if you have recently purchased a

tesla

model 3ry and If you have a house, you will most likely charge in a garage or driveway. In previous videos, I have covered installing Nema 1430 and 1450 240-volt outlets and also showed charging on 120-volt outlets. This video will compare them all and explain how. These different ways to charge your car may be best for your situation.

I'm based in the United States, so everything I'll talk about is for North America. Other parts of the world will have different solutions. I want to start first with some terminology. Specific to electric vehicles, technically these are not chargers, they are called evse or electric vehicle supply equipment and are basically like a smart converter to provide power and communication to the car. I could do a whole video covering the different charging standards for AC and DC charging. We'll leave it for another time, getting back to the topic, the commonly used Tesla charging equipment is the mobile connector, one of which is included with every new Tesla sold.

They are also known as charging stations or charging bases. The main function is as electrical safety equipment. You can also purchase or use non-Tesla vehicles, which may be the case if you already have a non-Tesla vehicle, you just need to attach the j1772 adapter that comes with the car to the end of the plug to make it work with the Tesla. It provides AC electricity to the car, which has an on-board charger that will convert it to DC for the car's battery. Once connected to the vehicle, the evse informs the car what power is available and at what level from that point the car takes control. initiates and takes full control of the power transfer unless a power failure occurs, in which case the EVSE will stop the power transfer immediately.

Another term I will use in this video is level 1 and level 2. It is based on the equipment level voltage. 1 is 120 volts and level 2 is 208 to 240 volts, certainly if you want the fastest charging speed you need a 240 volt connection to your car charging equipment. I'll show later in the video how much difference this makes between For the two types, Tesla offers several different charging solutions, starting with the included mobile connector and going all the way to the wall connector. Let me now start with the first factor, the cost of the charging device. I'll show you the Tesla web store. which has a whole page on charging what is the difference between the mobile jack and a wall jack basically a couple of things the mobile jack allows the use of multiple charging output adapters for example the mobile jack can be charged at 120 volts or 240 volts and at different amp levels with a variety of connectors, so a mobile connector is both level 1 and level 2, depending on which adapter you use.

Note that it only comes with a nema 515 adapter, which is the common 15 amp outlet you see everywhere if you want it. A 240 volt adapter must be purchased online. The mobile connector is included with the car, making it the least expensive way to charge your car, whether you use 120 volts or 240 volts with the appropriate adapter, which will need about $35 to $45 each. an electrician to install an outlet if one is not available. If you want to keep the mobile connector included in your car, you can simply purchase another mobile connector. It costs around $275. The key word is mobile, which can be easily unplugged and moved in a second.

The wired mobile connector is 400, providing faster charging at 240 volts than the included mobile connector. It has a fixed connector, so it is the only outlet you can use. Basically, it is a compromise between a mobile connector and a wall connector. The following wall connector is another option. to charge at 240 volts, it currently costs $495 on Tesla's website. The wall connector is 240 volts only. It is mounted in a fixed location and can be connected in two ways. All current wall connectors sold by Tesla require a direct connection. wired connection, meaning no outlet is used. House wires are connected directly to the unit.

Tesla has sold wall connectors that had a Nema 1450 plug that could use the 240-volt outlet; however, they currently no longer include it online, plus Tesla used to. I sell wall connectors with 8 and 24 foot cables. Only the longer version is now sold. The wall jack cable is also much thicker than the mobile jack, as seen here in this video. The next issue is the limitations of the panel or circuit breaker, basically what will fit. Your electrical panel Some

home

s have load centers also known as electrical panels that can be 100 amps. This can be a big limitation on the charging method you can select.

This can also happen if you have a 200 amp electrical panel with no more breaker clearances. I would consult an electrician to determine if there are ways to make an entire panel work, for example two individual breakers can be replaced with what is called a tandem breaker which basically fits two breakers into the space of one. This could be done for some low amperage circuits that are 15 or 20 amps, this may free up enough space to install a larger 240 volt circuit breaker that is double pole and is twice as wide as the 120 volt single pole circuit breakers. This is my charging center and it has 200 amps and there happens to be a spare.

The circuit breaker is already installed, so if you have a spare, you're one step ahead, but like I said before, you don't want to do it yourself. Get an electrician to evaluate your load center and see if this is a possible solution. Another way to get more space is if you replace the original 100 amp load center with a 200 amp version, this can be a big deal and can be very expensive, potentially several thousand dollars, this may also involve installing a larger gauge service line wire in your home in addition to replacing the load center itself. One advantage of this upgrade is that it will increase the value of your home and the number of potential electrical circuits you can add, but what if you can't do this?

For example, if you are renting a house, you may be limited. To charge at a 120 volt outlet, most likely outside the house or inside a garage, you need to make sure the car charging equipment is the only thing connected to this circuit, otherwise you may have overcharging issues. and you will have problems with charging Before we leave the topic of circuit breakers, I wanted to mention that if you have the ability to install a 60 amp circuit breaker in your facility, then the wall connector offers an interesting advantage over other options: you can connect more than one of the newest wall connectors.

Basically daisy chaining them so they can share the same circuit breaker and work together when charging multiple Teslas. The third issue is loading speeds before you start. I want to give a quick explanation of how amps work when talking about outlet circuit breakers and usable load, for example a 15. An amperage outlet like the 120 volt nema 515 common outlet would connect to a 15 amp circuit breaker. , but the usable number of amps is limited to 80 percent of the circuit breaker and outlet size, for example, 80 of 15 is 12. So 12 amps is the maximum you can safely use in this circuit breaker combination.

I'll start with the slowest solution, also known as level 1 or 120 volt charging, a moving plug at 120 volts, 12 amps, using a nema 515 outlet. I'll open the storage bag and have the moving plug inside plug in the adapter outlet to the main unit I located a suitable outlet in the garage it is a good idea to support the main unit so that the cable connected to the outlet is not strained once I have it installed I plug it in It is good practice unroll the cable before charging and now I can plug it in. The Tesla logo turns green when it starts charging.

I'll get in the car and show you what he's doing. The charging screen is currently displayed and the maximum charging current. It is 12 amps as shown, this can be reduced if you wish, go to the top left of the screen and you will have the charge rate, miles, amp level and voltage added. You can see it's now charging at four miles per hour by the way, the miles. per hour are specific to the particular vehicle, a model 3 may have a slightly different number than a model y, sos or x when you press the miles to percentage, you can now see that the charge is 1 kilowatt.

Next is the mobile connector at 120. volts 16 amps using a nema 520 outlet this is not as common but this is the quickest level one or 120 volt solution. I'll swap out the nema 515 for the nema 520 and show you the difference for this example. I have a nema 520 outlet turned on. the side of my house near the service entrance, since it is far from my driveway, I will have to use an extension cord for this test. Watch the video above explaining how to use extension cords. These are not normally recommended, but do provide the correct cable. guy, it will work fine, I plugged the cord into the outlet and stretched it out to the driveway, then plugged in the mobile connector with the nema 520 plug on the end of the cord, now I'm going to extend it to the car and plug it in now.

Come in and see what we get. I have to increase the current from 12 to 16 amps as it shows the maximum here. With 12 amps I got 4 miles per hour, but now with 16 amps I get 6 miles per hour or about 50 percent. plus, which equates to a third shorter charge times, changing from miles to percentage shows that I now get 2 kilowatts if I am limited to 120 volts, this is significantly faster than 12 amps, as I mentioned above, this outlet requires a 20 amp circuit breaker and as For example, the maximum you can use is 16 amps. The next step is to connect a nema 1430 adapter to the mobile connector and then plug it into a nema 1430 outlet that has 240 volts connected to a 30 amp circuit breaker.

If your electrical panel is limited, this option offers an outlet connected to a 30 amp breaker, so the most you can use in this combination is 24 amps, plugging it into the car, let's jump in and see, as expected, the display load shows 24 amps and, looking at the top left of the screen, we have to wait. a little bit as the amps increase to 24 and when it gets to that we see that it is running at 22 miles per hour. Note that this speed is significantly higher than 6 miles per hour when charging 120 volts at 16 amps by changing from miles to percentage. shows that we are getting 6 kilowatts, remember the car is rounding these numbers, the actual kilowatts are 5.76.

Next is the fastest charging that can be achieved using a gen 2 mobile connector for those panels that have enough space, a nema 1450 is a good option. Solution, the maximum amount of this outlet you can use is 40 amps, since that is 80 of 50 amps; However, if you have a Gen 2 mobile connector that comes with 2018 and newer Teslas, you are limited to 32 amps, no matter how high the amps are offered. next to the breaker combo here is one in the front of my garage, the outlet is connected to a 50 amp breaker in the garage subpanel. I'll plug in the mobile connector and plug it into the wall mount, take the cable and stretch it out.

Connect it to the car and charge it inside, we see that the charging current is 32 amps. Now we are charging at 30 miles per hour changing miles to percentage. We are now charging at 8 kilowatts, which by the way rounds up to 7.7 kilowatts if you want. To charge faster you can use a gen 1 mobile connector like this one I have in the garage. Another option is the wired mobile connector that I showed previously in the tesla online store and which is a compromise between a gen 2 mobile connector and a wall connector. It will allow up to 40 amps just like the Gen 1 mobile connector using the NEMA 1450 outlet, but has a non-detachable plug;

However, these are 400 and are usually out of stock, but this is a good option to consider if you want to get a nema 1450 and don't want to buy a used gen 2 mobile connector. You can use a maximum of 40 amps that the nema 1450 outlet can provide. I have it plugged in and let's see what we have in the car. I will increase the charge current to a maximum of 40 amps by pressing the plus button several times, the charge level is increasing and will reach a maximum of 40 amps. Looking at the left side of the screen you will see 10 kilowatts rounded out to 9.6, press the percentage to go to miles and now you will see that it is charging at 35 miles per hour.

One thingWhat I want to mention is that the gen 1 mobile connector is no longer for sale, if you want one you have to buy it used on eBay. Overheating issues were reported in the gen 1 version. Mine has worked fine for 4 years. This is one of the reasons why the gen 2 mobile connector was designed with a reduced amperage rating. You can also purchase a third party evse that provides 40 amps of charging. and use a j1772 adapter if you prefer, I'm in the process of reviewing one and will have a video on how it will work shortly. The other level 2 charging version is hardwired.

The Tesla wall connector is a good example. You can use a 60 amp circuit breaker with the wall connector. This will allow a maximum of 48 amps for a Model 3 or Model Y. I do want to mention that the wall connector has a reset button on the outside of the main unit in case there is a problem. and you need to restart it. Mobile connectors must be disconnected to reset. Thanks to Gary Yorkdale for giving me the ability to video his wall jack setup at his house, for how older Tesla models from 2013 to 2016 could charge faster. Wall connectors larger than 48 amps supported dual chargers on some models reaching up to 19.2 kilowatts or 80 amps; however, the current syx models can charge up to 11.5 kilowatts or 48 amps, the same as the model 3, and I'll plug it into the car and show you by looking at the screen we can see that the charging rate is increasing to a maximum of 48 amps and now we get to 48 amps and that's 11.52 kilowatts which rounds up to 12.

By pressing the percentage button to get to the miles I can see that it provides 45 miles per hour of charging. I want to mention that the standard Range 3 model has a maximum of 32 amps for charging, so a wall connector provides no benefit for faster charging. The fourth part is the daily driving distance if you drive 200 miles a day or more for example using a full battery then I would definitely recommend spending the money to add a nema 1450 outlet for a mobile connector or a wired wall connector. If you use about half the battery or less per day, I would say a wall connector is not necessary and a nema 1450 or 1430 is.

Much if you drive 25 to 50 miles a day you can get by with a mobile plug into a nema 520 outlet, you can charge it overnight with no problems and finally if you drive less than 25 miles a day you can get by with a plug mobile into a nema 515 outlet, you can charge it overnight without problems, these are just rough estimates and if for example you want to be able to charge quickly, say for a long trip at short notice, the first two options will probably be the best. The best option for you, another thing to keep in mind is that if you have other types of cargo available, if your job has a location where cargo is provided, that can make a big difference in the amount of cargo you need to get to home.

Also, some people have a lot of local public charging infrastructure and the time to use it, so keep these things in mind first, any of the mobile connectors can be transportable and easy to move, for example if you have a house on vacation, you can move the connector when you need it, secondly, if you have a problem with your charging equipment, it is much easier to replace a moving connector than a hardwired wall connector. In fact, if you have two mobile connectors, that's good insurance, buy an extra one for the house and keep the original in the car if so. important to you and finally we get to the aesthetics, another reason why people buy a wall jack is that it looks great especially if you get the replacement glass faceplate cover, for some just the clean look of the Hardwired installation is worth it so to summarize you have level 1 or 120 volt charging with two flavors 12 amps providing 4 miles per hour or 16 amps of charging with 6.

Next is level 2 or 240 volt charging With two methods using outlet or wiring to outlets, there are several options that I recommend either the 1430 which provides 24 amps and 22 miles per hour or the nema 1450 which provides 32 or 40 amps around 30 or 35 miles per hour respectively, the wiring will allow you to have the fastest charging using a wall connector and a maximum of 48 amp charging for newer Tesla vehicles excluding the standard model 3. This gives you 45 miles per hour, as you can see there is a wide range of speeds charging from 4 to 45 miles per hour, if you want something you can do is start with the Free solution of using the mobile plug in a 120 volt outlet and see how it works.

If that doesn't work, you can look at the other options I've shown you if you have an outlet in your garage or home and you're not sure which one. guy, i have included a link in the video description to help, there are quite a few different nema outlets if you can determine the identity and if there is an adapter that makes it easy, most 240 volt outlets are usually the only outlet on the circuit, which is good for 120 volt outlets, there is a chance that there are other outlets on the circuit, so if you use one outlet for charging you need to make sure it is the only thing connected to the circuit otherwise you could experience an overcurrent or short circuit and it will trip a circuit breaker or worse if you reduce the amperage setting you may be able to use it but this will degrade the speed at which you can charge of course there are many details regarding the electrical circuits that could affect your charging settings and that is beyond the scope of this video, for example, whether your home charging center is overloaded or not, if you are unsure, contact an electrician so they can determine if your charging plan is correct.

Better safe than sorry. I also do not specify the wiring gauge size in this video as it can be affected by the distance from the electrical panel as well as the amperage of the breakers and outlets. Typically 4 to 6 gauge wires are used, 4 gauge for 50 to 60 amps 240 volts and 12 gauge for 15 amps 120 volts and 10 gauge for 20 amps 120 volts. I hope this helps you make a decision on what type of charging setup you want to have in your home. Check out the link above to see my charging playlist which covers other charging topics and some of the things in this video in more detail if you have any questions or comments please leave them below thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next video