What charger to buy in 2023

[mpkeaasl]

Hi All,

Apologies if this is a noob question but I'm completely stuck on which charger to get for my Rav4 Phev. 

We are settled (probably) on Octopus EV tariff

My girlfriend wants to get Octopus to install one of their Ohme chargers. But I'm concerned that, according to Ohmes own website, Toyota does not support the Ohme API, meaning there will be missing functionality. Does anyone charge their Toyota with an Ohme? Is the lack of connectivity with the car a problem?

https://www.ohme-ev.com/resources/article/charging-without-api-support

I wanted to get a third party to install an Easee charger, but they have just been banned by Sweden and a product recall has been issued over safety concerns.

https://www.electrive.com/2023/02/10/wallbox-manufacturer-easee-faces-potential-sales-ban/

So now I'm stuck. Those were the two we were considering, but now it looks like neither are suitable. 

Can anyone offer any advice or experience?

 

 

[philip42h]

Ok, I have no experience and anything offered shouldn't be mistaken for advice ... 😉

• Charging of the PHEV is managed by the MyT app so it doesn't really matter in the slightest which charger you have installed. (OK, the App is pretty rubbish as owners will attest, but you don't need the EV charger to take control of what happens).
• Consider how long you are going to be using the charger vs. how long you intend keeping the car.
• Why on earth would you ever dream of going against a GF's wishes? Are you mad? 🙂

The Octopus / Ohme solution should be perfectly good (but note the disclaimers above!).

[nlee]

Octopus have a few options for EV tariffs. Octopus Intelligent is probably the best value with the off peak rate slightly cheaper than their Octopus Go tariff, has a longer off peak period, and you get additional periods at the cheap rate when grid demand is low. However, OI will only work with certain brands of car, where it has an interface and access to the the car's system (imagine it as your Octopus app and MyT app being linked). In this case, Octopus control the charge from the car interface and the charger can be anything, it doesn't need any "Smart" functionality. Unfortunately, they cannot interface with Toyotas. However, there is an alternative if you are set on OI, in that Octopus can integrate with the Ohme system. So in this case, Octopus control the charge from the charger, not the car and the car needs no remote control or scheduled charge capabilities.

So in summary, to use OI, you need either a compatible car, or an Ohme charger, but you don't need both. (Note: I think they are adding other chargers in time)

There is no actual control interface between an Ohme charger (or any other charger for that matter) and a Toyota, it's just a plug and socket. It will work normally on OI if you allow the Ohme to control the charge and have no schedules on the car. You can also use on Octopus Go, or any other tariff and control the charge from the charger, or car, but it's best practice not to have schedules set on both.

OI is probably a good thing for a full EV and doing high mileage where the extra hours at the cheap rate are useful. But with a PHEV and a 7kw charger you will charge from empty to full in just over 2 hours, well within the Go 4 hour window. I can't remember the current price difference for off-peak rate, it's only about 1p or 1.5p/kWh so you if you charged from empty to full every night you would only save about 13p per night/charge.

I obviously have a Toyota and I don't have an Ohme charger so I have no personal experience with OI but I read quite a lot of issues with missed charges, problems when charging away from home, etc. I get the impression there are issues when linked to a compatible car but even more when linked to the Ohme charger.

Personally, I'd go with Octopus Go (or other standard EV tariff) and any charger that suits your need and has good reviews for reliability.

PS. I have a Hypervolt (schedule controlled on the charger) and its been fine for me.

[mpkeaasl]

7 hours ago, philip42h said:

Ok, I have no experience and anything offered shouldn't be mistaken for advice ... 😉

• Charging of the PHEV is managed by the MyT app so it doesn't really matter in the slightest which charger you have installed. (OK, the App is pretty rubbish as owners will attest, but you don't need the EV charger to take control of what happens).
• Consider how long you are going to be using the charger vs. how long you intend keeping the car.
• Why on earth would you ever dream of going against a GF's wishes? Are you mad? 🙂

The Octopus / Ohme solution should be perfectly good (but note the disclaimers above!).

Thanks Philip, yes, what on earth was I thinking, it's not even my car it's hers. Thin ice. Thanks for the reminder!

[mpkeaasl]

7 hours ago, nlee said:

Octopus have a few options for EV tariffs. Octopus Intelligent is probably the best value with the off peak rate slightly cheaper than their Octopus Go tariff, has a longer off peak period, and you get additional periods at the cheap rate when grid demand is low. However, OI will only work with certain brands of car, where it has an interface and access to the the car's system (imagine it as your Octopus app and MyT app being linked). In this case, Octopus control the charge from the car interface and the charger can be anything, it doesn't need any "Smart" functionality. Unfortunately, they cannot interface with Toyotas. However, there is an alternative if you are set on OI, in that Octopus can integrate with the Ohme system. So in this case, Octopus control the charge from the charger, not the car and the car needs no remote control or scheduled charge capabilities.

So in summary, to use OI, you need either a compatible car, or an Ohme charger, but you don't need both. (Note: I think they are adding other chargers in time)

There is no actual control interface between an Ohme charger (or any other charger for that matter) and a Toyota, it's just a plug and socket. It will work normally on OI if you allow the Ohme to control the charge and have no schedules on the car. You can also use on Octopus Go, or any other tariff and control the charge from the charger, or car, but it's best practice not to have schedules set on both.

OI is probably a good thing for a full EV and doing high mileage where the extra hours at the cheap rate are useful. But with a PHEV and a 7kw charger you will charge from empty to full in just over 2 hours, well within the Go 4 hour window. I can't remember the current price difference for off-peak rate, it's only about 1p or 1.5p/kWh so you if you charged from empty to full every night you would only save about 13p per night/charge.

I obviously have a Toyota and I don't have an Ohme charger so I have no personal experience with OI but I read quite a lot of issues with missed charges, problems when charging away from home, etc. I get the impression there are issues when linked to a compatible car but even more when linked to the Ohme charger.

Personally, I'd go with Octopus Go (or other standard EV tariff) and any charger that suits your need and has good reviews for reliability.

PS. I have a Hypervolt (schedule controlled on the charger) and its been fine for me.

Thanks for the info nlee, thats extremely helpful. The Rav4 is my girlfriends. I might go full electric myself sometime in the future, so very useful to know about the OI. Will probably end up with the Ohme.
 

[TonyHSD]

7 hours ago, mpkeaasl said:

Thanks for the info nlee, thats extremely helpful. The Rav4 is my girlfriends. I might go full electric myself sometime in the future, so very useful to know about the OI. Will probably end up with the Ohme.
 

Whatever charger you go for make sure will be suitable for full ev for future needs. The phev can be easily charged from a 3 pin plug overnight. We even charge our bev from a 3 pin plug for around 10-12 hrs. 

[ernieb]

35 minutes ago, TonyHSD said:

Whatever charger you go for make sure will be suitable for full ev for future needs. The phev can be easily charged from a 3 pin plug overnight. We even charge our bev from a 3 pin plug for around 10-12 hrs. 

I also charge my PHEV from the 240v mains and as I generally only do local mileage of less than 50 miles a day that works really well. I also think that the slow charge from the 240v mains is less likely to stress the Battery, not that I really believe that 7kW would stress the Battery.-

[nlee]

I didn't read the linked article before my previous reply. Have read it now and it seems like Ohme are trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist with their Beta software. It sounds like they are trying to link their software to the car's software to automatically stop charge at 80%. I'm not aware of any other chargers that do this. Most BEV users set the upper limit in the car in order to extend the life of the Battery and only change it to 100% if they have a long trip.

Ok, you can't set a charge limit in the RAV4 PHEV. If you wanted to, you could shorten the schedule but the PHEV Battery doesn't really go below 30% so it can still work as a hybrid after EV range is used, and most of us drivers believe it doesn't charge to the full 100% actual capacity either, so the protection is effectively built in. Some of us have had them a couple of years now and no sign of range depletion yet.

Upshot of this sounds like you would have to manually set the charge you want to add in the Ohme app and if you set it too high and the car reaches its full or set limit, you'd get a notification. I presume if the notification got annoying you could block it. You won't be losing any functionality you'd get from another charger, just adding something that you probably won't need.

It's not really surprising Ohme can't integrate with the MyT system, neither can we half the time!

[ernieb]

There doesn’t seem to be the same stress on the PHEV Battery as you only need to drive a few miles and the car is below the 100% charge level. The 80% limit on BEV’s seems to be for the second and subsequent charges after the car has been charged at home (if you have the facility) the previous night to 100%. I’m not aware that there is a limit for just one charge a day (happy to be corrected).

[philip42h]

48 minutes ago, ernieb said:

There doesn’t seem to be the same stress on the PHEV battery as you only need to drive a few miles and the car is below the 100% charge level. The 80% limit on BEV’s seems to be for the second and subsequent charges after the car has been charged at home (if you have the facility) the previous night to 100%. I’m not aware that there is a limit for just one charge a day (happy to be corrected).

As someone who does have a 'chargeable' vehicle I believe that is entirely correct. Further there seems to be a fair amount of misinformation and disinformation about ...

• AFAIK there are no specific restrictions applied to the Toyota Battery warranty concerning how and when you charge it. Toyota will honour the warranty 'whatever'.
• There is absolutely no restriction on slow (2.3kW) or fast (7kW / 11kW) AC charging via the onboard charger. You can charge to 100% as often as you want / need.
• There are obviously potential issues associated with rapid and ultra rapid DC charging (50kW and above) though these obviously don't apply to the PHEV (no DC charging capability anyway) and are entirely managed by Toyota on the bZ4X - by the time to get to 80% the charge rate will have dropped to about 7kW anyway ... and it will then will take a long time to get up to 100% if the owner really wants to wait!

So, to my mind, there is absolutely nothing for the owner of a Toyota electrified vehicle to be the least bit concerned about! 😉

[Nick72]

I've got a ProjectEV 7.4kW charger albeit the PHEV has a 6.6kW limit so it can't take as much current as the wallbox can deliver. All of that is managed as it will be on any charger. There's an App I hardly ever use. No point. I just plug it in when I need to and after 2.5 to 3hrs I know it's fully charged.

[mpkeaasl]

Hey all

Sorry to bump this thread again, but we're thinking of ditching the charger idea and just installing a normal external electrical socket. Reasons being...

• Given the size of the Rav4 Battery and the number of miles we do in it. 4 hours of charging in Octopus EV window, at 2.4kw every night should be enough to meet our needs.
• If the charging times etc is controlled by the Rav4 software, then the smart functionality in the Ohme would be redundant.
• While this solution wouldn't be future proof by any means. If we were to need more charging capabilities in this household, that would almost certainly be because we have a second EV. Which would mean we'd need a second charger. Otherwise we'd be fighting over the only charger, (which is a fight I'd definitely lose). At that point we'd install a proper charger and while still having the 2.4kw plug for the Rav.
• It's a lot cheaper. ~£1100 for an Ohme, ~ £200 for a standard external socket.
• The normal external socket has more uses. 

That's my thoughts so far. Does anyone with more experience with this sort of stuff see anything wrong with my reasoning? Am I missing something. For example, could a standard scoket be a fire hazard if charging an EV every night? Are there any regulations I might be tripping over?

Thanks in advance. 

[philip42h]

Your reasoning is perfect ...

You don't need a 7kW EV charging solution today - by the time you actually have an EV it is quite likely that the charging solutions will have moved on from today's offerings so you are really better off waiting until then.

A standard 13A socket on a domestic ring main should be capable of delivering around 3kW but there might be some small risk of overheating through drawing 3kW for an extended period. And that is why the design standards for the 'granny' charger solution has limited the draw to 10A / 2.3kW precisely so that the fire hazard risk is vanishingly small.

£200 for a standard external socket sounds outrageously expensive to me, but I guess you would be paying a professional to do it for you ... 😉 And if you are doing that you are pretty much regulation proof ...

[ernieb]

This is what I used:

https://www.halfords.com/motoring/tools/garage-equipment/ev-cables-and-chargers/masterplug-protected-outdoor-socket-for-mode-2-charging---3pin-734110.html

they can be bought at a few outlets. I’ve fitted two without issues, one internally with the cable trough a hole and the other externally (different sites) They have been in use over 2 years without problems.

[Mike2222]

4 hours ago, mpkeaasl said:

Hey all

Sorry to bump this thread again, but we're thinking of ditching the charger idea and just installing a normal external electrical socket. Reasons being...

• Given the size of the Rav4 Battery and the number of miles we do in it. 4 hours of charging in Octopus EV window, at 2.4kw every night should be enough to meet our needs.
• If the charging times etc is controlled by the Rav4 software, then the smart functionality in the Ohme would be redundant.
• While this solution wouldn't be future proof by any means. If we were to need more charging capabilities in this household, that would almost certainly be because we have a second EV. Which would mean we'd need a second charger. Otherwise we'd be fighting over the only charger, (which is a fight I'd definitely lose). At that point we'd install a proper charger and while still having the 2.4kw plug for the Rav.
• It's a lot cheaper. ~£1100 for an Ohme, ~ £200 for a standard external socket.
• The normal external socket has more uses. 

That's my thoughts so far. Does anyone with more experience with this sort of stuff see anything wrong with my reasoning? Am I missing something. For example, could a standard scoket be a fire hazard if charging an EV every night? Are there any regulations I might be tripping over?

Thanks in advance. 

Slightly late to the party, but I have the ohme pro and it's a good bit of kit. It's not actually installed presently due to moving house and thus it's in a box waiting to be reinstalled, but my plan is to use intelligent octopus rather than Go (which I had at my old house). My circumstances are different to yours and I have my reasons, one if which is wanting/needing a longer charging window, but I need the ohme to access IO. I also have a nissan leaf, and @nlee is correct, the main benefit is that with certain manufacturers/brands, the ohme ("home pro", not the ohme cable model) can monitor the state of charge and stop at a predetermined SOC/time, whilst also working this around different time of use tariffs, ie if you say "I want Battery at 80% by 4am", as per Octopus Go, it'll read the current SOC and work out when it needs to start the charge at to achieve this, plus will tell you when it cannot achieve this within the pricing limits you've set up for your tariff. 

 

From my experience, I believe it does this by logging into the same servers that the user does when using the app. In nissan's case, the app is phenomenally temperamental (if MyT makes you grumpy, then this would lead to berserker rage), so this would quite commonly crash or cause difficulties, so could actually be less reliable charging than with the Rav, which it can't read. however the big difference to MyT is that one can actually force charge by clicking a button (assuming one is plugged in) via the nissan app, rather than having to set a schedule manually inside the car itself. So the communication is two ways, rather than just informational (at least for charging). 

 

Thus the ohme cannot read the SOC on the Rav and it's default for this automatically is to assume SOC is zero. This isn't a major problem, as it will still work within the tariff parameters and the predicted charge time at 6.6kwh from empty to full is about 2.5hrs, so we'll within the 4hr Go window, and as others have said, the Rav4 is designed to be charged to 100% all the time.

 

Basically, it's a good bit of kit, and there shouldn't be any issues with using it to charge a Rav4, whether that be on IO or on Go. An important thing to factor in when making your decisions, is that 4hrs of Go won't get the Battery from zero/low SOC to full on a 3-pin plug. And both IO and Go have got a higher day rate than a normal tariff, so make sure you have done all your sums well cos you'll likely need to also shift as much of your regular domestic electricity usage (eg washing machine, dishwasher etc) into the off peak window to make the whole enterprise worthwhile. If you're having to use the peak hours to top up the Battery so that you can make use of the electric range, you'll likely be wasting all your hard earned gains from off peak and higher domestic costs.

 

That said, you also have to factor those numbers against the ~£900 difference in price between an outside plug and an Ohme, and how make kwh that would buy you on any tariff. 

 

Btw, if you're not worried because you anticipate not needing the full battery range for the amount of driving you do, then I seriously doubt shifting to a time of use tariff like Go & IO will be worthwhile for you due the the increased domestic day rate costs compared to what you'll save on motoring. 

 

 

 

3 hours ago, ernieb said:

This is what I used:

https://www.halfords.com/motoring/tools/garage-equipment/ev-cables-and-chargers/masterplug-protected-outdoor-socket-for-mode-2-charging---3pin-734110.html

they can be bought at a few outlets. I’ve fitted two without issues, one internally with the cable trough a hole and the other externally (different sites) They have been in use over 2 years without problems.

@ernieb how many hours does it take you on a 3 pin plug? I've been doing it for a few months since the move and I think it's around 6ish, but I haven't specifically added it up

[NASY]

Always charge from an outside 3 pin socket I installed for about £20. The MyT app always seems to over estimate the time remaining to charge and I think a 5 hour window give or take is realistic to recharge. I don't personally see any benefit from restricted access times to cheap electricity given I'd rather have the convenience of doing stuff when I want to and certainly wouldn't want the washing machine going during the night. Saving money is nice but if it's just a few quid, which it can only be with an 18Kwh Battery capacity then really?

[ernieb]

From zero user charge, still really 30% left that the PHEV uses for HEV mode, it take around 7.5 hours. This does vary slightly depending on temperature etc.

I’ve set the MyT app to ‘leaving time’ and the calculates when to start the charge so that it’s full at 7am in my case. You can set it to a start time to benefit from a tariff change.

Obviously once it’s connected you can use the app to start the charge whenever you want. With the 240v set up the power is on and the cable once connected is locked into the car and only released when you unlock the car.

Hope that helps?

[Mike2222]

1 hour ago, NASY said:

Always charge from an outside 3 pin socket I installed for about £20. The MyT app always seems to over estimate the time remaining to charge and I think a 5 hour window give or take is realistic to recharge. I don't personally see any benefit from restricted access times to cheap electricity given I'd rather have the convenience of doing stuff when I want to and certainly wouldn't want the washing machine going during the night. Saving money is nice but if it's just a few quid, which it can only be with an 18Kwh battery capacity then really?

Well it clearly depends on usage, but it's not rocket science. As an example, if one uses 12000kwh of leccy a year, at £0.35/kwh that's £4200/yr. If your time of use tariff gives £0.45/0.075 for peak/off peak then if you can manage a 40/60 split that's £2700/yr. So it's possible to make it more than just a few quid, but all depends on your household and routines. 

 

Depending on household usage, it actually starts to become a realistic proposition to get a home Battery installation purely for this reason, regardless of whether you opt for solar. This would tick the convenience box for most people, avoiding the need to micromanage everything into the overnight window if you didn't want to. They are not cheap, and in the 12000kwh example, one would need a sizable Battery to get close to 100% off peak usage, but considering inflation, the sums appear fairly sound. However, in the last 3-4yrs particularly, they have been tricky pieces of kit to get your hands on in the UK. 

[Mike2222]

1 hour ago, ernieb said:

From zero user charge, still really 30% left that the PHEV uses for HEV mode, it take around 7.5 hours. This does vary slightly depending on temperature etc.

I’ve set the MyT app to ‘leaving time’ and the calculates when to start the charge so that it’s full at 7am in my case. You can set it to a start time to benefit from a tariff change.

Obviously once it’s connected you can use the app to start the charge whenever you want. With the 240v set up the power is on and the cable once connected is locked into the car and only released when you unlock the car.

Hope that helps?

Thx, but where in the MyT app is there a "push to start charging" button? I have a "Schedule settings" tab, but this is only for the leaving time scheduling as you mention 

[mpkeaasl]

2 hours ago, Mike2222 said:

Slightly late to the party, but I have the ohme pro and it's a good bit of kit. It's not actually installed presently due to moving house and thus it's in a box waiting to be reinstalled, but my plan is to use intelligent octopus rather than Go (which I had at my old house). My circumstances are different to yours and I have my reasons, one if which is wanting/needing a longer charging window, but I need the ohme to access IO. I also have a nissan leaf, and @nlee is correct, the main benefit is that with certain manufacturers/brands, the ohme ("home pro", not the ohme cable model) can monitor the state of charge and stop at a predetermined SOC/time, whilst also working this around different time of use tariffs, ie if you say "I want battery at 80% by 4am", as per Octopus Go, it'll read the current SOC and work out when it needs to start the charge at to achieve this, plus will tell you when it cannot achieve this within the pricing limits you've set up for your tariff. 

 

From my experience, I believe it does this by logging into the same servers that the user does when using the app. In nissan's case, the app is phenomenally temperamental (if MyT makes you grumpy, then this would lead to berserker rage), so this would quite commonly crash or cause difficulties, so could actually be less reliable charging than with the Rav, which it can't read. however the big difference to MyT is that one can actually force charge by clicking a button (assuming one is plugged in) via the nissan app, rather than having to set a schedule manually inside the car itself. So the communication is two ways, rather than just informational (at least for charging). 

 

Thus the ohme cannot read the SOC on the Rav and it's default for this automatically is to assume SOC is zero. This isn't a major problem, as it will still work within the tariff parameters and the predicted charge time at 6.6kwh from empty to full is about 2.5hrs, so we'll within the 4hr Go window, and as others have said, the Rav4 is designed to be charged to 100% all the time.

 

Basically, it's a good bit of kit, and there shouldn't be any issues with using it to charge a Rav4, whether that be on IO or on Go. An important thing to factor in when making your decisions, is that 4hrs of Go won't get the battery from zero/low SOC to full on a 3-pin plug. And both IO and Go have got a higher day rate than a normal tariff, so make sure you have done all your sums well cos you'll likely need to also shift as much of your regular domestic electricity usage (eg washing machine, dishwasher etc) into the off peak window to make the whole enterprise worthwhile. If you're having to use the peak hours to top up the battery so that you can make use of the electric range, you'll likely be wasting all your hard earned gains from off peak and higher domestic costs.

 

That said, you also have to factor those numbers against the ~£900 difference in price between an outside plug and an Ohme, and how make kwh that would buy you on any tariff. 

 

Btw, if you're not worried because you anticipate not needing the full battery range for the amount of driving you do, then I seriously doubt shifting to a time of use tariff like Go & IO will be worthwhile for you due the the increased domestic day rate costs compared to what you'll save on motoring. 

 

 

 

@ernieb how many hours does it take you on a 3 pin plug? I've been doing it for a few months since the move and I think it's around 6ish, but I haven't specifically added it up

My girlfriend (who owns the car) as a nurse who works in the community. On a work day she'll do about 30-50 miles. We don't remember a time when she started with a full electric charge and then was at zero by the end of the day.
However I am a bit concerned that the 4 hour window might not be quite enough time to charge fully from a 3 pin, if she's done a lot of miles that day. What @ernieb said about charge time matches our experience. About 7.5 hours to go from 0-100. However it doesn't charge at a linear rate. It charges a lot faster towards the beginning and middle of the charge that it does at the end. 
So what I'm hoping is that, even if she has gone to zero or near zero during the day, 4 hours will get her enough energy for a typical days use. 
We can certainly shift some of our other electric use to night as well. Dishwasher and washing machine are both quiet enough not to disturb us. Air conditioning will get used at night in the hot weather (but it will also be used in early evening so that might work against us)

[ernieb]

9 hours ago, Mike2222 said:

Thx, but where in the MyT app is there a "push to start charging" button? I have a "Schedule settings" tab, but this is only for the leaving time scheduling as you mention 

Once it’s connected to the mains all you need to do is open the MyT app and select the ⚡️charge state icon and in the new page the app opens will be an option to start charging now.

Agreed it is a none linear charge with a taper probably from about 80% slowly reducing. I’ve estimated that this can vary depending on the original state of the traction Battery charge and external temperature even with Battery conditioning turned on, up to as much as 2 hours.

[Hayzee]

13 hours ago, Mike2222 said:

And both IO and Go have got a higher day rate than a normal tariff

Mike..... I've just received the July rates for GO and it looks like the day rate on GO is now almost the same as the new standard variable rate (+0.3p) whilst the cheap rate stays at 9.5p so it's definitely a no brainer.

[ernieb]

@Mike2222,

 

this is what the app looks like, power connected and needing a charge;

 

[NASY]

22 hours ago, Mike2222 said:

Well it clearly depends on usage, but it's not rocket science. As an example, if one uses 12000kwh of leccy a year, at £0.35/kwh that's £4200/yr. If your time of use tariff gives £0.45/0.075 for peak/off peak then if you can manage a 40/60 split that's £2700/yr. So it's possible to make it more than just a few quid, but all depends on your household and routines. 

 

Depending on household usage, it actually starts to become a realistic proposition to get a home battery installation purely for this reason, regardless of whether you opt for solar. This would tick the convenience box for most people, avoiding the need to micromanage everything into the overnight window if you didn't want to. They are not cheap, and in the 12000kwh example, one would need a sizable battery to get close to 100% off peak usage, but considering inflation, the sums appear fairly sound. However, in the last 3-4yrs particularly, they have been tricky pieces of kit to get your hands on in the UK. 

Sorry, I didn't realise people used so much electricity, your example is based on roughly 4 times my consumption so now I get the economic sense.