Free Plug In Point

[Chris Dance]

British Gas installed the Prius Plug in charging point today. The survey went OK, the installer checked water and gas was correctly earthed and I had a good 02 signal. The work took about 5 hours. The conduit cable was routed out from the trip box cupboard to the outside of the house, along the outside wall and into the garage. The cable is black and as the wall is white I painted the installed cable conduit white. The installer explained it is OK to paint it. It is a neat installation. The installer is coming back as he never had the "trip" that is required for my old type trip unit. Although I do not have a plug in Prius the unit ready should I choose to buy one. Let us hope the Prius Plug In gets cheaper and the range is extended!! I am well pleased with the installation. The installer was a very helpful chap.

PS. The unit is not suitable for the Renault Plug IN but fine for the Toyota Prius and Nissan Leaf plug ins.

[johalareewi]

Contacted BG and they are coming round in a couple of weeks to do the survey and fit the unit at the same time.

[Aceshigh84]

Just had the charger point fitted by a British Gas sub-contractor. It has been fitted exactly where I wanted it in the meter cupboard, and he wound out the 4.5m lead to show where it would reach.

There was a bit of a faff with regard to the earth bonding on my mains water pipe, at first he couldn't locate it and was about to cancel the job until I popped the kick panel under the kitchen units and there it was, hidden out of sight.

I advise anyone getting one fitted to check the location of their gas and mains water earth bonding point ahead of the fitter arriving to save time. Mine was only 6mm cable so I have had an advisory notice that it should be 10mm, one day it will be sorted.

A new mini consumer unit was fitted next door to my existing one, it has the main RCD and a normal trip switch that then leads to an IP box as per aCactus's photo above (the grey box behind the charging plug).

The actual install time was only 2 hours after sorting the bonding cable location.

And I switched it off as soon as he left.

[rotty]

Can anyone tell me the dimensions of the BG Polar charging point? I'm trying to sort out a suitable location for the fitter at the end of the month but I think it may be too wide for my ideal spot and perhaps sticks out too far for the alternative.

Width, height and depth (how much it sticks out of the wall when the thing is holstered) would be a great help.

[Chris Dance]

Hi Rotty,

Just used a ruler to measure the unit so these measurements are not to the exact fraction of an inch. Width 13.75 inch. height 8 inches, sticks out of the wall 5.25 inches. The cable can be wound round the unit, the connector does not have to be stowed in the unit holster. It can be hooked on hook (not supplied) on the garage wall. The unit is only a stowage point it has nothing to do with the electrics.

I am an oldie so I still use inches for measuring.

Can someone tell me if a spare wheel can be obtained for the plug in Prius. Buying a car with "gunge" for puncture repair is just daft it hardly ever works according to the AA and others.

[rotty]

Many thanks Chris - I can now go off and measure for location.

I have a feeling that my installation may not happen though as we have a slightly more complex/unusual mains supply - our garage is under the house and the main 100A incoming supply is split into a 'garage' consumer unit with just 2 ways (lights and ring main) and the other goes up to the house through a 'riser' that has intumescent foam packing for fire protection.

Unless they install another isolator/breaker as part of the installation, I think they won't be able to do it.... or certainly not as part of the free package.

[aCactus]

Measurements from chargemaster technical drawings, unit is 365 wide, 210 tall and 110 deep excluding the coupler which can be clipped to the front of the unit for storage.

Although I had a consumer unit in the garage with a spare socket the BG "engineer" installed their own unit alongside - wired into the input to the existing unit. He used an extra unit as he said it was easier to do this than try and carry breakers to fit all the different units that people could have.

[johalareewi]

Mine was installed yesterday. The BG guy had a box of assorted MCBs and was able to swap one of my spares for the required rating. He then also installed the RCB box as in the above picture.

The survey was very simple and was basically, can you get a decent O2 data signal at the charging point's location; suitable consumer unit; earth bonding up to scratch; any asbestos; does anything have to be moved.

Will post pics later.

[barrycoll]

how long did people have to wait between the application/acceptance and a fitting?

Axios Energy are supposed to be the suppliers, but it is months now with not a peep.....

[Chris Dance]

I had British gas. They gave me a date as soon as they got my on line application. Applied on a Saturday they rang me the following Tueday morning. Three weeks later it was installed by BG gas installer,

[Aceshigh84]

Same as Chris, applied to British gas using the link at the start of the forum post, phone call a couple of days later, I waited a month due to the fitters being busy in my area, it didn't bother me because I just wanted it fitting.

[johalareewi]

British Gas as well.

Filled in the web form, they phoned next day to arrange survey and install.

They were booked up for a couple of weeks but had free slots from then onwards.

[barrycoll]

thanks guys......a threat to go to BG for a Pod Point, and all of a sudden, Axios are coming tomorrow!!

[johalareewi]

Here are the pics. PIC1 is the consumer unit (with swapped MCB) and the BG supplied RCB next to it.

PIC2 is the charging unit. The consumer unit is on one wall in the garage and the charging unit is on the opposite wall so the BG guy just had to run a cable across the garage to join the RCB to the charging unit.

[johalareewi]

Unless they install another isolator/breaker as part of the installation,

They do. The feed to the charging unit goes via a separate RCB.

[Chris Dance]

British Gas Electric engineer returned today and fitted a new separate circuit breaker to our existing trip box. The job is now complete. The engineer has done an excellent job. I hope the price of the PIP is reduced in the future???

[johalareewi]

Toyota were touting an electric IQ a while ago. Could be interesting if the price is right.