Are there Level 1 EVSE's that are faster than the OEM one?

[MrFixit]

Do you have a local code that doesn’t allow this, because he says there is no NEC rule against it??
This is of course a separate issue from the fact that Honda says to use a dedicated outlet for charging

@KentuckyKen:
There are special requirements for electric vehicle charging equipment. This is identified in Section 625 of the National Electric Code which is very clear on this issue. Here is Section 625.40:

Local jurisdictions generally follow the NEC, but local codes can vary so you should always check.
The bottom line is that the "dedicated circuit" is not a local requirement, and it is not a Honda requirement... It is the NEC.

In addition, there is the continuous operation rule that only allows operation up to 80% of the circuit capacity (circuit must be rated at 125% of the max equipment load):

Hence, the factory charger is 12A, but requires a 15 amp circuit... To use a 32A Charger (the max that the Clarity can utilize), you need a 40 amp circuit.

 

[craze1cars]

Well....I have a very simple answer for much of this. I just did some research and checked my NEC book and did a PM or two with some buddies on the Mike Holt forum (my primary electrical resource when my small brain gets all fulled up). I have been flat wrong. MY APOLOGIES. Egg on face. I have deleted some of what I wrote earlier in this thread to help avoid further confusion. What I wrote up in post #4 is also WRONG, and it is too old for me to edit...so it lives in infamy. Ignore it. I retract post #4.

YES, if you have a 20 amp breaker, and 12 gauge wire, you CAN absolutely install 20 amp receptacles...as many as you want. It is in no way a violation of NEC as I earlier wrote. If the circuit ends up being overloaded, you might get nuisance trips...that's the only downside I can see to this idea. I have a tendency to overbuild a bit for my customers when it comes to doing electrical work, cuz underbuilding occasionally causes death and I don't allow that on my watch.

BUT I love Mr Fixit's very clear answer, with a quote from the NEC that is extremely clear. This educated me as well, and I had no idea that statement was in there as my book is a few years older than that. Every car charger I've installed for customers in my handyman business has been a 240V and dedicated/stand-alone. And I've never had a customer ask me to install just a 20 amp 120V to run a level 1 16A charger -- so this is a rather unique request and never crossed my path before now. Now I know the answer if it does come up.

So Ozy, confirm you have 12 gauge in the walls and carry on with your plan. It's absolutely fine to install the outlet itself. It just seems the down side (thanks to MrFixIt's post), is that you cannot use such an outlet to operate a car charger...which seems to be a bit of a detriment given that is your exact goal for the outlet. So make sure you tell your electrician you need him to swap the outlet to run your 120V WELDER. Now he can install it. But if you tell him it's being installed with the purpose of running a CAR CHARGER, he cannot install it and be in compliance with the NEC.

Are we confused yet?

 

[MrFixit]

@craze1cars:
There are special rules associated with electric vehicle charging.
Please read my previous post (#21)

 

[KentuckyKen]

@craze1cars:
There are special rules associated with electric vehicle charging.
Please read my previous post (#21)

Thanks. I’m passing this on to my electrician who is obviously old school and not up to date on the part specific to charging EVs.

 

[craze1cars]

MrFixIt I caught that, and rewrote what I had previously rewritten...and I thank you for the education. Much appreciated.

 

[MrFixit]

So Ozy, confirm you have 12 gauge in the walls and carry on with your plan. It's absolutely fine to install the outlet itself. It just seems the down side (thanks to MrFixIt's post), is that you cannot use such an outlet to operate a car charger...which seems to be a bit of a detriment given that is your exact goal for the outlet. So make sure you tell your electrician you need him to swap the outlet to run your 120V WELDER. Now he can install it. But if you tell him it's being installed with the purpose of running a CAR CHARGER, he cannot install it and be in compliance with the NEC.

@craze1cars:
Not true... You CAN use such an outlet to charge an EV. You need a 20A breaker, AWG12 wire, and the 20A receptacle. This is all fine. What is NOT fine is if the same 20A breaker is also supplying any other receptacles. In almost all cases, there will be a string of receptacles. 625.40 requires a dedicated outlet with NO other outlets. I think the code-compliant solution is to disconnect all of the outlets except the one used to charge the EV. This satisfies the dedicated outlet requirement. The down-side is that possibly all of the other outlets in the garage will disappear, and that may not be acceptable to Ozy.

 

[craze1cars]

I agree with you -- kinda what I meant but you said it more clearly. But I'm right with you. My comments you quoted above were assuming Ozy is starting with a multiple outlet branch circuit, which as you say is almost always. If he leaves it with multiple outlets and just swaps in one 20amp outlet, NEC says that's fine to do, but he's not supposed to use it as a car charger. But if he kills all other outlets on the circuit and caps them off, then it's a dedicated circuit, and acceptable to use for a car charger. That's how I interpret the rules anyway.

 

[MrFixit]

@craz1cars:

Yep... I went through a similar mind game when I installed my Level 2 charger. I Initially wanted to share an existing 240V branch already in the garage. After becoming more educated, I wound up doing it correctly, and installed another dedicated 240V, 40A circuit that powers my JuiceBox 32.

 

[ozy]

These electrical questions always seem to invoke the NEC as if they were the holy bible. I understand the safety issues involved but also have a brain of my own. I understand that a 20A circuit should be dedicated, should be 12 gauge and that only one receptacle should take the entire draw. There are 3 other receptacles on which I can put some tape over and make sure no one ever uses. Furthermore, the car charges at night and this is in a garage where there are no appliances of any kind on the other receptacles. For these reasons, I feel quite secure in selecting one of those receptacles, swapping it out for a 20amp and charging my car with it. I understand that I can pay an electrician hundreds of dollars to remove the wiring to the other circuits or I can pay 10 cents for 3 large pieces of tape to cover the others.

 

[MNSteve]

These electrical questions always seem to invoke the NEC as if they were the holy bible. I understand the safety issues involved but also have a brain of my own. I understand that a 20A circuit should be dedicated, should be 12 gauge and that only one receptacle should take the entire draw. There are 3 other receptacles on which I can put some tape over and make sure no one ever uses. Furthermore, the car charges at night and this is in a garage where there are no appliances of any kind on the other receptacles. For these reasons, I feel quite secure in selecting one of those receptacles, swapping it out for a 20amp and charging my car with it. I understand that I can pay an electrician hundreds of dollars to remove the wiring to the other circuits or I can pay 10 cents for 3 large pieces of tape to cover the others.

Thank you for saying this. I understand that a licensed electrician is bound by the letter of the code, but I also understand that I have a working brain that I can use.

 

[craze1cars]

Ozy, as long as you have your head wrapped around it, and it seems you very much do at this point, swap the outlet and roll with it. I'm not gonna pretend my own personal home is 100% to code either...it's not and I can point out a few flaws. But it's safe, largely grandfathered in, and I understand it. And I wouldn't be surprised if 95% or more of the homes in this country have a NEC violation wired into it somewhere/somehow. Happy charging!

 

[MrFixit]

There are very good reasons that the code is written the way it is. You have taken the most important step in gaining a complete understanding of these reasons. It is certainly possible to do things that are not technically compliant in a safe way. There are some who would have just blindly plugged the thing in along with a dozen other electrical gizmos in the garage. The circuit breaker is the final line of protection for this sort of thing (people trip circuit breakers all the time even without an EV charger when they plug in all kinds of things like electric space heaters, etc). The important fact (which you now realize) is that the EV charger uses every bit of the circuit capacity, and thus you really can't expect to operate anything else concurrent with it.

 

[Geor99]

I have not used it, but there is a product called "Quick 220."

You plug in a extension cord cable into 2 separate 120V wall outlets (make sure that they are on different circuit breakers.)

It takes these 2 inputs at 120v, and puts them in series, stepping your voltage up to between 220-240V. This will cut your charging time in half without installing a 240V line at your home.

Once again, I do not own this product; but the theory seems solid to me. It basically takes 2 separate 120V lines and combines them in series- doubling ypur incoming juice to the car.

Remember to make sure they are not on the same breaker!!!!

If you buy it, please let us know how it performs.

 

[MrFixit]

I have not used it, but there is a product called "Quick 220."

Interesting. There are some important caveats here that would make this a challenge to use in a practical setting.

1. As you mention, the 2 outlets must be on different breakers.
2. Not only must they be on two different breakers, but the circuits chosen must be out-of-phase (residential power is split-phase. Simplistically half of your 120V outlets are on one phase and half are on the other). This makes it hit-or-miss as to whether the two outlets that you pick will work or not. They have instructions as to how to test for this when choosing outlets.
3. If the breakers are not the same current rating, you would be constrained to the lower rating of the two.

If you did find two outlets that were located conveniently enough AND they were different breakers AND they were out-of-phase, you would then presumably feed this into a Level 2 charger. You would need a Level 2 charger that would not exceed 16 amps (assuming both the 120V circuits you found were 20A).

This will definitely violate the National Electric Code, but could you theoretically do this safely? You would need to be VERY careful ! As described earlier, EV charging will be running at the maximum limit for these circuits, so there can be nothing else running on either of these two circuits while charging.

Given the constraints, I would recommend against this approach. There is nothing wrong with the theory, it's just that there are enough practical constraints that I feel it would be dangerous to try and set this up for use on a daily basis.

 

[Robin]

...plug in a extension cord cable into 2 separate 120V wall outlets (make sure that they are on different circuit breakers.) ....

Reminds me of trying things out on a Radio Shack 100-in-1 electronic breadboard kit.

With a 9v battery this is amusing.

With multiple 120v AC extension cords this seems like an unequivocally bad idea.

I can’t imaging any electrical code outside of Timbuktu where this is even remotely advised.

 

[Geor99]

Reminds me of trying things out on a Radio Shack 100-in-1 electronic breadboard kit.

With a 9v battery this is amusing.

With multiple 120v AC extension cords this seems like an unequivocally bad idea.

I can’t imaging any electrical code outside of Timbuktu where this is even remotely advised.

Guys,

I do not own this product, I have never used it, and I do not know anyone who has. I ran across this Quick 220 product on another forum.

I'm merely stating that it exists, and it could possibly be a solution for the original poster. He will have to decide for himself if he will buy it.

He wants a quicker way to charge his car without installing a 240V line. This product advertises to do just that . So, I passed the name of the product along.

It could be a fire hazard or the perfect solution- I do not know

I write this just to reiterate to the original poster that I am not vouching for this product. Im just saying that this could be a solution to your issue.

 

[craze1cars]

Ozy, another alternative to discuss with your electrician -- since you say you are intending to tape over/not use any other outlets on the circuit...and you haven't mentioned this yet:

Assuming you have 12 gauge wire, which you must, it is entirely feasible to convert that single outlet you're targeting into a 240V, 20 amp outlet that will charge your car fully in a bit over 4 hours, vs the 8 hours of the 16 amp 120V charger you intend to buy.

You just need an open double-space in the main panel for a new 240V 20 amp breaker. The electrician relocates the black and white wires within in the panel to the 2 hots on the new breaker, replaces the duplex outlet of your choice with a proper 240V 20 amp outlet, and he also removes all other outlets on the line, wire nuts and/or disconnects the wires within the box as needed, and closes up all those abandoned boxes with solid cover plates.

This would require no pulling new wires anywhere, and therefore is relatively inexpensive and easy...just a few hours labor probably, and maybe $50 worth of material. And now you can purchase a 16 amp level 2 charger to plug into that outlet. The only negative is you will permanently lose all other outlets currently on that circuit...they would need to be physically removed from the home. It could all be easily reversed and converted back to a circuit of 120V duplex outlets (with another electrician visit obviously), should you drift away from electric cars someday in the future or sell the home.

If you're OK with losing all the other outlets on the circuit for now, this might be something for you to seriously consider. The only possible code violation I see here is that it might leave you without a single 120V outlet in your garage? Usually required to have one in most jurisdictions -- not to mention inconvenient to not have one. But this depends on how your house is wired and I have no idea...

Anyway it probably costs less than or similar to buying a Quick 220, and could be done within the walls of your house, with no cords laying anywhere.

 

[MrFixit]

Assuming you have 12 gauge wire, which you must, it is entirely feasible to convert that single outlet you're targeting into a 240V, 20 amp outlet that will operate 2x faster than he 16 amp 120V charger you intend to buy.

I like this idea !

It's just a question as to the importance of the other receptacles. You could no longer use them judiciously along with the charger, they would be gone forever. It also would allow the whole thing to be code compliant for what that's worth.

This would be a 3.84 kW charger, and I would estimate the time for a full charge to be approximately 14.5 kWh / 3.84 kW = 3.8 hours.

 

[Geor99]

Here is a discussion with people who actually have used the device, a YouTube video, and much more info than I know on the Quick 220 (device that combines 2 ordinary 120v home outlets into a 220-240V output which could drastically increase your charging- at least theoretically. )

https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/quick-220-system.83845/

 

[ozy]

Ozy, another alternative to discuss with your electrician -- since you say you are intending to tape over/not use any other outlets on the circuit...and you haven't mentioned this yet:

Assuming you have 12 gauge wire, which you must, it is entirely feasible to convert that single outlet you're targeting into a 240V, 20 amp outlet that will charge your car fully in a bit over 4 hours, vs the 8 hours of the 16 amp 120V charger you intend to buy.

You just need an open double-space in the main panel for a new 240V 20 amp breaker. The electrician relocates the black and white wires within in the panel to the 2 hots on the new breaker, replaces the duplex outlet of your choice with a proper 240V 20 amp outlet, and he also removes all other outlets on the line, wire nuts and/or disconnects the wires within the box as needed, and closes up all those abandoned boxes with solid cover plates.

This would require no pulling new wires anywhere, and therefore is relatively inexpensive and easy...just a few hours labor probably, and maybe $50 worth of material. And now you can purchase a 16 amp level 2 charger to plug into that outlet. The only negative is you will permanently lose all other outlets currently on that circuit...they would need to be physically removed from the home. It could all be easily reversed and converted back to a circuit of 120V duplex outlets (with another electrician visit obviously), should you drift away from electric cars someday in the future or sell the home.

If you're OK with losing all the other outlets on the circuit for now, this might be something for you to seriously consider. The only possible code violation I see here is that it might leave you without a single 120V outlet in your garage? Usually required to have one in most jurisdictions -- not to mention inconvenient to not have one. But this depends on how your house is wired and I have no idea...

Anyway it probably costs less than or similar to buying a Quick 220, and could be done within the walls of your house, with no cords laying anywhere.

Ozy, another alternative to discuss with your electrician -- since you say you are intending to tape over/not use any other outlets on the circuit...and you haven't mentioned this yet:

Assuming you have 12 gauge wire, which you must, it is entirely feasible to convert that single outlet you're targeting into a 240V, 20 amp outlet that will charge your car fully in a bit over 4 hours, vs the 8 hours of the 16 amp 120V charger you intend to buy.

You just need an open double-space in the main panel for a new 240V 20 amp breaker. The electrician relocates the black and white wires within in the panel to the 2 hots on the new breaker, replaces the duplex outlet of your choice with a proper 240V 20 amp outlet, and he also removes all other outlets on the line, wire nuts and/or disconnects the wires within the box as needed, and closes up all those abandoned boxes with solid cover plates.

This would require no pulling new wires anywhere, and therefore is relatively inexpensive and easy...just a few hours labor probably, and maybe $50 worth of material. And now you can purchase a 16 amp level 2 charger to plug into that outlet. The only negative is you will permanently lose all other outlets currently on that circuit...they would need to be physically removed from the home. It could all be easily reversed and converted back to a circuit of 120V duplex outlets (with another electrician visit obviously), should you drift away from electric cars someday in the future or sell the home.

If you're OK with losing all the other outlets on the circuit for now, this might be something for you to seriously consider. The only possible code violation I see here is that it might leave you without a single 120V outlet in your garage? Usually required to have one in most jurisdictions -- not to mention inconvenient to not have one. But this depends on how your house is wired and I have no idea...

Anyway it probably costs less than or similar to buying a Quick 220, and could be done within the walls of your house, with no cords laying anywhere.

Thanks Craze1cars for that detailed suggestion. I'm quite excited about it since it represents the best option I've heard yet. I went to look at my main panel and noted that there was a double 80amp breaker that was labelled "Subpanel". This controls the subpanel in my laundry room in which resides my garage breakers (20amp for outlets, 15 amp for lights and 15 amp for garage door openers). This may be helpful? There is also a "spare" double but it the smaller kind and has a 15 and 20amp breaker. I would like to know if there is a simple way to use this setup to provide a dedicated 240V outlet in my garage even with the limitation of lower amperage and/or removing or covering up the other receptacles in the garage.