Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[TheRan]

I'm not 100% sure how they work but I assume it just steps 110v (or there abouts) up to the 240v that type 2 chargers use. Older models don't need it because they can accept 110v inputs (I think the range is something like 90-250v). That said models sold in 240v countries also come with the granny charger so perhaps it does something else as well, otherwise those would just come with a mains to Mennekes cable.

[DonTom]

So you can not charge your SR/F or SR/S using a 120V home outlet? I would not have expected Zero designing a bike that did not have an L1 charging option. 

AFAIK, all EVs can charge with 120 VAC at home. But some, such as the Energica, Harley LW, Zero SR/S and Zero/SR/F make it rather difficult to charge on the road with anything other than J-1772 and in the case of the Energica and LW, also CCS.

Who wants to bring a 20 foot long thick cable to charge with from an AC outlet?  Not me.   But such works great at home for either 120 VAC or 240 VAC outlets. 

But  I modified  mine into motorcycle versions. I often take a group ride and we often stop in Genoa, NV and  other places that only have AC outlets. While we are BSing, I want to be charging. Genoa has two  240 VAC outlets, so I can charge there at 3 KW, but even the 1.5 KW from a 120 VAC outlet is better than nothing when at many other places. I may only get a one mile charge, but that is one mile I won't have to walk with the bike!

 I have my SR set up to charge as much as 8.4 KW at home (even more than the SR/S and SR/F premium) but at 6.3 KW  with a couple of external chargers that I can now use with a granny cable, but I could have just as easily made my own cables as no granny cable is really necessary to charge it from outlets. But this way, I always use a J-1772 type plug to plug in instead of a bunch of cables, regardless if I charge from a 120 VAC outlet or a 240 VAC outlet or a J1772. It will always plug in the same way near the bike. And if something is wrong where the bike is not charging, I can check the lights on the granny cable unit to see where the problem is.

Even the Tesla comes with a granny cable, so if I have three days to charge, I can get a full charge from a 120 VAC outlet. BTW, that will work for me, because I only rarely drive my Tesla. It normally just sits in the garage while I ride my bikes almost every day.

And even when I go grocery shopping, I normally take my ICE pick-up truck. And when I come up here (20 miles north of my Reno house) I almost always take my DS.

-Don-   in 96° F.  Cold Springs Valley, NV

[DonTom]

I'm not 100% sure how they work but I assume it just steps 110v (or there abouts) up to the 240v that type 2 chargers use. Older models don't need it because they can accept 110v inputs (I think the range is something like 90-250v). That said models sold in 240v countries also come with the granny charger so perhaps it does something else as well, otherwise those would just come with a mains to Mennekes cable.

They work pretty much the same way. The EV AC OB chargers are designed to go up to 250 VAC and they are designed in such a way as the voltage goes up, the current goes down, so it doesn't go over the wattage rating of the AC charger, until around 250 volts. Much voltage above that will fry the AC chargers.

Some people in this forum seem to think otherwise as there are  a lot of power supplies these days designed for a world market than DO work like the Zero chargers. Such as for computers. But don't bet your equipment on such, read the specs BEFORE using ANYTHING  on  240 VAC that you have been using with  120 VAC in the past.

By far, not all power supplies work this way. Not even all switching power supplies. I have a 120 VAC 50 amp 12 volt  (600W) switching power supply for my ham radio gear that will destroy itself if it has above 135 VAC going in. It's designed for 100 to 125 VAC ONLY.

EV AC chargers are designed for a wide range of voltages for both convenience as well as the world market.

Granny cables do  almost nothing at all. You put in 120 VAC and get out 120 VAC. Put in 240 VAC and get out 240 VAC from the same granny cable. Its real purpose is to convert outlets to J-1772, along with lights and such to let you know what is going on.

-Don-  Cold Springs Valley, NV

[TheRan]

I forgot the SR/F still has the J port in the US, was thinking it was Mennekes only and assumed it would only take 240v as that's what level 2 stations put out.

[Crissa]

Granny cables does one thing over just a cable:  Tell the car's charger what amperage is safe to charge at.  Just like any AC charging station would do.

-Crissa

Just because the charger takes 240 doesn't mean it's stepping 120 to 240.

The charger needs to take whatever the input voltage is and change it to the operating voltage of the battery and convert it to DC as well.

[DonTom]

I forgot the SR/F still has the J port in the US, was thinking it was Mennekes only and assumed it would only take 240v as that's what level 2 stations put out.

Unlike in Europe, homes use mostly 120 VAC here in the USA. But many,  if not most,  homes also have 240 VAC available for electric clothes driers, and home Air Conditioners  and some other stuff. But some homes only have 120 VAC and use gas to heat. Others may only have the 240 hard wired to the A/C unit and nowhere else. But 240 VAC  can be added to any home in the USA that has city AC power going to it.  The 120 VAC just comes from the center tap of the 240 VAC transformer near the house, yet the 120 VAC is more commonly used here.

At worse case,  if  a house  already  has city supplied 120 VAC it only takes a phone call to an electrician to get 240 VAC installed here.

-Don-  Reno, NV

[Crissa]

A house with only 120 at the box would be seriously uncommon.  But not all houses have a 240 outlet, it's true.

-Crissa

[DonTom]

A house with only 120 at the box would be seriously uncommon.  But not all houses have a 240 outlet, it's true.

-Crissa

My old house in South San Francisco had no 240 VAC at the box. I could see the other wire from the house transformer for the 240 VAC taped to the other two wires (for the 120 VAC) about half way to the house.

I never needed 240 VAC for anything in that house, so I never had it wired to the box. That job would be more difficult than most as an electrician  would have to start near the house transformer.

-Don-  Reno, NV

[Crissa]

A main breaker box without phases in it wouldn't be code.

And I'm not sure how long it wouldn't have been code, like fifty years at least.

-Crissa

[Richard230]

A house with only 120 at the box would be seriously uncommon.  But not all houses have a 240 outlet, it's true.

-Crissa

My home uses gas to power the furnace, clothes drier, stove and the local politicians. I don't see anything like 240V in my breaker box. The homes in my subdivision were built by Alcoa Aluminum as cheaply as possible. (Hopefully I don't have aluminum electrical wiring.) I had some work performed along my foundation a few years ago and was surprised to see that the electrical service wires coming into my home from the PG&E utility box was direct-burial and not placed in conduit.

[DonTom]

A main breaker box without phases in it wouldn't be code.

And I'm not sure how long it wouldn't have been code, like fifty years at least.

-Crissa

My old SSF house was built in 1943. One of the few houses to be built in the middle of WW2.

-Don-  Reno, NV

[Crissa]

You wouldn't see the 240 in the breaker box, as it would be behind the deadman's plate.  Every other breaker would taps off the other phase on the main rail in the box.



-Crissa

[DonTom]

You wouldn't see the 240 in the breaker box, as it would be behind the deadman's plate.  Every other breaker would taps off the other phase on the main rail in the box.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCy0tKL1T7wFoYcxCe0xjN6Q

-Crissa

I don't think you sent the correct link there.

But at all three of my houses, there is 240 AC in my breaker boxes. I see it as much as I see the 120 VAC. The only difference is that the  240 VAC is on a ganged breaker so both legs of the 120 VAC (which is the 240 VAC) go off at the same time when the circuit breaker trips or is tuned off.

-Don-  Reno, NV

[BrianTRice@gmail.com]

The 3kW charging module (Rapid Charge Module) on the FST platform (SRF and SRS) is a totally different vendor and technology generation (switching solid state power supply) than the Calex/GWP 1.3kW charger on the SDS platform (more analogous to a full wave bridge rectifier).

The Calex charger in addition is fully potted in rubber which makes heat dissipation problematic once a fault starts, and so the unit is not repairable. But from examining failed chargers (I depotted one by hand and checked on other failures), it seems like the component failures are induced.

I think the Calex chargers should be discontinued in favor of an adapted new generation charger like the RCM or TC’s HK-J unit with more inbound and outbound circuit protections. The weight savings alone would more than allow additional protective components to be installed to make these more robust in the wet, dirty, mechanically agitated environment that makes electric motorcycle charging actually pretty challenging to perform reliably over the long term.

Anyway, charger replacement is straightforward, but since you have a bike where a charger has gone bad, having an off board charger like the Quick Charger or a TC charger would probably be a good idea to reduce the cycling of the onboard charger so it lasts longer. Also, an off board charger won’t transmit heat into your monolith casing.

[Crissa]

I've fixed the video link.  Man, I should just not trust the 'share' buttons, they often fail me.

-Crissa