Early days, give it time 
Pedantry time! Itâs not quite as simple as saying âtypically 11kWâ for fast (AC) charging, unfortunately. It depends on the capabilities of the car and the current available at the charge connector.
AC charge connectors are either single phase or three-phase, and can provide up to 64A per phase. The most common variants are 32A single phase (7kW), 16A three-phase (11kW) and 32A three-phase (22kW). 64A three-phase (43kW) was installed at some motorway charging points but is pretty much obsolete now, because the only cars that can make use of it fully are early Renault Zoes.
The chargers integrated into cars will be either single phase or three-phase, and will have a cap on how much they can draw per phase, typically 16A (so up to 11kW on a three-phase supply or 3.6kW on a single-phase supply). Some cars with three-phase charging can put two of their internal charging units in parallel when connected to a single-phase supply so they can draw double the current, which is how cars that can charge at 16A three-phase (11kW) manage to charge at 32A single phase (7kW).
Here are some common combinations of charge point and car, and the charge rate that will actually be achieved:
32A single-phase charge connector (7kW max):
- 32A single-phase car: 7kW
- 16A three-phase car: 3.6kW
- 16A three-phase car with parallel chargers: 7kW
- 32A three-phase car: 7kW
16A three-phase charge connector (11kW max):
- 32A single-phase car: 3.6kW (oops!)
- 16A three-phase car: 11kW
- 32A three-phase car: 11kW
32A three-phase charge connector (22kW max):
- 32A single-phase car: 7kW
- 16A three-phase car: 11kW
- 32A three-phase car: 22kW
2 Likes
And people complain that EV charging is confusingâŚ
3 Likes
It certainly used to be, and to an extent still is.
I think itâs going the right way, though. Newer models of electric car seem to be converging on 16A three-phase/32A single-phase for AC charging, and the CCS2 standard for DC rapid charging at ever-increasing rates; 50kW seems to be the absolute minimum and âĽ150kW is now quite common. Avoiding the âoops!â in my post is going to get easier in the future.
2 Likes
This has been done some years ago, in Sweden I think, a trial that is.
Never seen the results so who knows if this is a workable solution.
Hydrogen may be but given that Teslaâs Semi, with a claimed range of over 600 miles, is about to go in to production to meet many customer orders the trial may be academic.
Yeah isnât is the case modern cars take up to 7 kW on a single phase, and most just the 11 kW max on three phase AC as they have the DC CCS/Chademo for rapid
Type 2 - Slow home charging (AC)
Vast majority are single phase, and we use 230 volts in our homes.
13A * 230 = 3 kW (Standard three pin plug)
16A * 230 = 3.7 kW
32A * 230 = 7 kW
Type 2 - Faster charging station (AC)
Three phase at 400 volts.
16A * â3 * 400 = 11 kW
32A * â3 * 400 = 22 kW
64A * â3 * 400 = 43 kW
CCS - Rapid charging station (DC)
50 kW
100 kW
120 kW
150 kW
350 kW
CHAdeMO - Rapid charging station (DC)
50 kW
100 kW
Yes, thatâs what the industry appears to be converging on â and in Europe definitely CCS rather than CHAdeMO. The biggest âgotchaâ for existing cars is 32A single-phase cars like the Hyundai Ioniq plugged into 11kW three-phase chargers where they will get 3.6kW rather than the 7kW their drivers might normally expect.
Just a note about home charging: the âgranny leadâ used to connect a car to a regular 13A socket will typically tell the car to draw 10A, not 13A.
2 Likes
Just found an interesting page, if you click on a vehicle its documented what the max is on AC on both single and three phase.
https://pod-point.com/guides/vehicles?type=batteryElectric
Just had a look and only these vehicles arenât Type 2 and CCS.
CCS - Type 1
Ford Focus Electric (2017)
Chads - Type 1
Nissan LEAF 24kWh (2011)
Nissan LEAF 30kWh (2015)
Citroen C-Zero (2016)
Peugeot iOn (2016)
Peugoet Partner Electric (2017)
Kia Soul EV (2017)
Nissan e-NV200 (2018)
Chads - Type 2
Nissan LEAF (2018)
Nissan LEAF 3.ZERO e+ (2019)
Lexus UX 300e (2021)
Basically its the LEAF and Nissan and previous gen BEVs.
However what were Lexus thinking adding CHAdeMO (50 kW max) in 2021 over CCS.
2 Likes
I think Toyota (who own Lexus) seem to have a thing about electric cars and are trying to be as awkward as possibleâŚ
1 Like
Coincidentally last few days
1 Like
They are working on them but 2023 for a first car is way behind everyone.
1 Like
I think that Toyota have lost the race to be honest, Hyundai Group (Inc. Kia) and a lot of Chinese Car Manufacturers are stealing a march and leaving them behind the same goes for Ford⌠although I would love a mach-e
It is interesting that Ford are sharing manufacturing and technology in some areas with VW so watch this space as the saying goes!
So I read this article and thought Nah mate youâve got to be chatting 
about not been able to access ChargePlace Scotland infrastructure without having the required card which you order.
A 90 second glance at the FAQs state
If you are visiting Scotland and need to start a charge, please contact our helpline to remotely start a charge when your vehicle is connected to the charge point. Or you can visit http://chargeplacescotland.org/guest/ to make a charge through your devices browser.
I swear certain journalists have no integrity these days and will just do and say anything to get the clicks.
He makes up all this drama about how his charging opportunities are few and far between due to him not ordering this card in time.
Like mate youâve been on the physical website to create the account, did you not logically think I know Iâll just spend a couple of minutes looking at the FAQ
Edit - the guest link admittedly doesnât work when I click on it, however theyâve got an app launching 2nd August which you can do all this through, so no having to make a phone call, or get through on that guest link
3 Likes
Sounds like he had an eventful and exciting journey all things considered. Shame he didnât plan very well as that definitely contributed to his anxiety.
One thing these âtravelling across UK in an EVâ articles often talk about is the struggle in finding a charger. Which is fair enough for those long trips to somewhere unfamiliar. But the majority of charging you ever do in an EV will be done somewhere that youâre very familiar with (either your home, your workplace, your local supermarket or a nearby motorway service station). And you quickly gain the knowledge about how many chargers are typically available and the best times to use them.
Ultimately, I guess that article at least demonstrates that you can make the trip from Landâs End to John oâGroats even if you donât do all that much planning and are generally underprepared.
2 Likes
Unfortunately poor journalism is The Guardians new mantra, and from reading that I canât think anything other than he didnât read any of the info on the Charge Place Scotland Website or read they where planning to do their migration to e.swarco.
I have to agree way too many apps etcâŚ
1 Like
The thing about this though is that electric trucks donât actually need that much range on a single charge.
Legally, truck drivers have to take a 45 min rest at least every 4 and a half hours - and they can do roughly 300 miles in that time.
So, the important factor for electric trucks is actually the speed of charging - not the size of the battery. If they can come up with a battery pack for 350 miles but can also come up with a charging system that can recharge that fully is 45 mins, then thereâs nothing stopping electric trucks working fine. I know that Tesla said theyâre also developing âHyperchargersâ for their electric truck to launch alongside their Semi.
The electric trucks already on the road from other manufacturers are not there yet - because theyâre basically just normal trucks with their engine taken out and replaced by battery packs and havenât been designed and built from the ground up as a battery electric vehicle. Volvo trucks only have 300km range and take 2 and a half hours to fully charge at a 250Kwh charger but even 300km would cover, for example, from the Channel Tunnel up to Liverpool.
To be very slightly fair to him, although yes he is just trying to make it sound worse than it is to make a better story, one of the complaints about chargers is the issue with the multiple different apps and cards needed and for those that use apps, thereâs some chargers put in locations where thereâs poor mobile phone coverage anyway (which could cover a lot of Scotland - especially north of Inverness).
I think what would continue to stop them is a lack of chargers. Shipping is different to personal transport, they arenât going to be heading 30 miles off track to find a charger and they canât risk having to wait for another lorry to pull off an available charger. For it to really work, youâd need a near perfect distribution of chargers, basically them sitting at every truckers rest stop as well as garages, trucking parking lots and depots etc. An increase in range helps the problem quite a bit, though, but I wonder if ultimately the ârigging up the whole motorway with cablesâ thing actually works out better.
Yep - I agree charging is definitely going to be the choke point on this unless something is done on a larger scale.
I think the ÂŁ2m theyâre going to spend though on the pilot scheme rigging up a small section of motorway with cables for a proof of concept is a waste of money though, especially as others have pointed out, the technology isnât new and has been around for a long time. Instead, that money should be looked into how we get a massive rollout of hyper-speed chargers for trucks at all motorway services - and not just 1 or 2 chargers per services, but have every truck bay at motorway services setup with their own charger. My local Amazon depot runs all their local deliveries from EV powered vans now and last year installed 300 chargers to power them all. These are all the slower âFastâ chargers (not rapid chargers) designed for recharging to full overnight. I would assume to do something like that with 300 rapid chargers would need a huge upgrade to the local electricity network, substation etc.
Theyâve just âfinishedâ electrifying the main London to South Wales train line - and that project went massively over budget and over time and that was even after they descoped a large chunk of the line so avoided the line into Bristol and Bath. If they canât do that, then cabling the whole motorway network will cost far more than even HS2 and possible even more than the Covid Track and Trace serviceâŚ
It also doesnât deal with trucks that come in from Europe and beyond. Will we be telling freight companies they need to have a depot at every port to transfer any cargo from a truck which doesnât have the over cable rig onto it onto one that does?
For better or worse, the only way these changes can work is if we minimise the difference between the existing setup and the new carbon neutral setup. Which generally means not restricting where trucks can go and which countries they travel through.
1 Like