Which charger? Experiences?

[rjb70stoke]

Loving my new car and Octopus Go is on its way in a week or so, so the question now is which charger to get. Favourite at the moment is the Ohme, as I'm concerned i may need the earth rod for the others.

Has anybody had experience with the Ohme, or preferences for other chargers?

 

[Jake]

BP Chargemaster fit a voltage monitoring device in lieu of an earth rod at no extra cost. The BP unit serves my needs but I think their Chargevision App is not the best for controlled charging so I wouldn't necessarily recommend them. Others on this forum will be able to help I'm sure. Ohme seems to be one of the favourites. Glad you like your new car and good luck with home charging.

 

[mystreet]

Got the EO Mini Pro, small neat and does what I need.

I doubt if there is a charger that does everything that everyone wants. You will need to look at the charger and the app as one unit and choose the best one for you.

You can have a Gaso unit fitted instead of an earth rod

 

[JodyS21]

I got the Ohme recently as there's the £199 offer from octopus.

My experience however I have to say is that I am very very disappointed, if it was not for the very low cost - I have a commando socket so it was a super cheap way to get a 7kWh charger, £199 vs about £600+ for something installed after gov discount.

The Ohme app, does not work at all well in terms of scheduling charging on the ZS on a fixed off-peak tariff. You cannot make it just turn on when off-peak starts and let it charge and balance.
I am having to bodge it to try to get it to start charging as soon as my off-peak starts, and I cannot get it to automatically carry on and finish doing a balance afterwards.
I have written to them and am not getting anywhere with them in trying to address the problems.

 

[rjb70stoke]

I got the Ohme recently as there's the £199 offer from octopus.

My experience however I have to say is that I am very very disappointed, if it was not for the very low cost - I have a commando socket so it was a super cheap way to get a 7kWh charger, £199 vs about £600+ for something installed after gov discount.

The Ohme app, does not work at all well in terms of scheduling charging on the ZS on a fixed off-peak tariff. You cannot make it just turn on when off-peak starts and let it charge and balance.
I am having to bodge it to try to get it to start charging as soon as my off-peak starts, and I cannot get it to automatically carry on and finish doing a balance afterwards.
I have written to them and am not getting anywhere with them in trying to address the problems.

Is that the Ohme intelligent wall charger? As the one on Octopus for £199 is the smart charge cable.

 

[JodyS21]

Is that the Ohme intelligent wall charger? As the one on Octopus for £199 is the smart charge cable.

That is one and the same.

The Ohme, is a cable with a box inline that does the "magic"

They do a few "versions":
with a 3 pin plug on the end (only does 13Amp max)
with a commando plug on the end
with another type 2 plug on the end
with nothing on the end that is hardwired into a terminal box.

I actually got the one with the commando plug on the end, but decided this is a waste of space and more secure, so remove the commando plug and just hardwire it instead where my commando socket is.

 

[AdeB]

I got the Ohme recently as there's the £199 offer from octopus.

My experience however I have to say is that I am very very disappointed, if it was not for the very low cost - I have a commando socket so it was a super cheap way to get a 7kWh charger, £199 vs about £600+ for something installed after gov discount.

The Ohme app, does not work at all well in terms of scheduling charging on the ZS on a fixed off-peak tariff. You cannot make it just turn on when off-peak starts and let it charge and balance.
I am having to bodge it to try to get it to start charging as soon as my off-peak starts, and I cannot get it to automatically carry on and finish doing a balance afterwards.
I have written to them and am not getting anywhere with them in trying to address the problems.

I've had an Ohme since October and not had any problems with charging as per the Octopus Go schedule. As long as you have the right tariff selected in the settings, then it will automatically start charging at 12.30 and turn off at 04.30 - which, in my case, seems to result in about 87 miles added. Then it's easy enough - if you're needing more, or to get it to full charge for a longer run - to select Rapid Charging from the dashboard (which ignores the tariff rate).
My charge history shows that the 87-ish miles usually costs around £1.30, using approx 25-27kWh.

 

[ZSDave]

I have got a MyEnergi Zappy. It may not be the cheapest but if you have solar panels (I haven't) it could be ideal.

It does everything I want including timed charging at off peak rate.

Dave

 

[JodyS21]

I've had an Ohme since October and not had any problems with charging as per the Octopus Go schedule. As long as you have the right tariff selected in the settings, then it will automatically start charging at 12.30 and turn off at 04.30 - which, in my case, seems to result in about 87 miles added. Then it's easy enough - if you're needing more, or to get it to full charge for a longer run - to select Rapid Charging from the dashboard (which ignores the tariff rate).
My charge history shows that the 87-ish miles usually costs around £1.30, using approx 25-27kWh.

I want (need) my car charged to at least 90% in the morning by 6:30am.
Depending on the day, when I get home and plug it in about 6pm, it could have as little as 10% battery remaining.
I want it to charge as much as possible during off-peak rate.

So I want it to start charging as soon as off-peak begins e.g. 12:30.
If it is finished by 4:30, great it'll all have charged during the off-peak tariff.
Usually it wouldn't be finished by 4:30 so the final part of the charge would be at peak rate.
Also, I want it to do any balancing that maybe necessary after it's done it's main charge to 100%.

This isn't really possible to achieve using the Ohme application.
In order to guarantee a full charge & it allows balancing, with Ohme you have to say you want 100%/163m added.
It obviously has no idea how much charge is already in the car so it assumes it it completely empty. It then works backwards from your set target time - 6:30am in my case, it then decides that in order for it to be at 100% by the target time it must start the charge before the off-peak period begins.
You can force it to only charge at the off-peak rate, which will make it start charging as soon as the off-peak begins, but it will then stop charging once the off-peak ends and therefore will not always be fully charged/plus it won't let it do any balancing.

It is "trying" to be too clever, when all I need it to do it start charging when the off-peak rate begins and keep charging/balancing for the next say 12 hours.

The other thing I forgot about, is you can't really tell when it is actually planning on charging as the scale on the graph it shows you to see this info is pretty useless.

 

[Mikes]

We have a BP Chargemaster unit, but it wouldn't work with scheduling no matter how hard I tried. Replaced it twice didn't help. Eventually got it swapped for a socketed unit, and now use with an Ohme cable.

I'm also on the Octopus Go tariff and want to charge starting at 12:30, ideally for 4 hours, but otherwise until charged. I was also surprised to find this wasn't possible in the Ohme app, but I find a workaround. Instead of selecting my actual electric tariff, I've created a custom one, I've set the cheap rate correctly, then from 4:30-10:00 I've set the price to be my standard price, then for the rest of the day I've set the price to be 0.01p higher than my actual price. I've then set the maximum price to my actual price, this forces it to start charging at 00:30 and essentially permits it to continue until 10am. This is doing exactly what I want now.

 

[Mikes]

Here are some screenshots of my settings in case that makes more sense! I chose the name "Octopus Go Modified" - this is something you can search for.

 

[Mikes]

Forgot to mention... Also have it set to fully charged every time:

 

[Deleted member 2439]

Zappi here, with Octopus Go. All good, but expensive IMHO. I have solar so am able to put a good chunk of energy into the car “free”. I also have a home battery system, so I can charge that on Go as well, and essentially run the whole house on the Go tariff.

 

[DavidGM]

Loving my new car and Octopus Go is on its way in a week or so, so the question now is which charger to get. Favourite at the moment is the Ohme, as I'm concerned i may need the earth rod for the others.

Has anybody had experience with the Ohme, or preferences for other chargers?

I have a SyncEV www.syncev.co.uk 7kw charger - very neat but does not have attached cable. The app installed on my mobile phone allows you to set the charge time - l am on Octopus Go so the charge is set for 00.30 to 06:30, but I can override to charge immediately. Provided you follow the sequence of first plugging the cable into car, plug cable into charger, lock car (MG ZSEV) the app shows the charger as "waiting" - the light on the charger flashes green/blue. The charge record on the app shows the charger connects to the car at low voltage every 30 minutes or so before the full charge kicks in at 00:30. The app records the charge typically at 6.95 KW initially it reduces to around 2kw for the last hour showing the battery is balanced. Typically the range is 168 - 172 on E setting with voltage 452 - 455 at the end of the charge. Unfortunately I can't send a copy of the charge profile recorded on the app but it does show the history of every charge in graphical format.
I normally leave charging until the range is 80 miles or less, typically once or twice a week depending how much I have used the car.
Over the winter I have averaged 3.5 KW per mile but this is now starting to creep up now the weather is getting warmer but I am happy with cost at 1.42p per mile
I give both the MG ZSEV and the SyncEV charger

 

[DavidGM]

I have a SyncEV www.syncev.co.uk 7kw charger - very neat but does not have attached cable. The app installed on my mobile phone allows you to set the charge time - l am on Octopus Go so the charge is set for 00.30 to 06:30, but I can override to charge immediately. Provided you follow the sequence of first plugging the cable into car, plug cable into charger, lock car (MG ZSEV) the app shows the charger as "waiting" - the light on the charger flashes green/blue. The charge record on the app shows the charger connects to the car at low voltage every 30 minutes or so before the full charge kicks in at 00:30. The app records the charge typically at 6.95 KW initially it reduces to around 2kw for the last hour showing the battery is balanced. Typically the range is 168 - 172 on E setting with voltage 452 - 455 at the end of the charge. Unfortunately I can't send a copy of the charge profile recorded on the app but it does show the history of every charge in graphical format.
I normally leave charging until the range is 80 miles or less, typically once or twice a week depending how much I have used the car.
Over the winter I have averaged 3.5 KW per mile but this is now starting to creep up now the weather is getting warmer but I am happy with cost at 1.42p per mile
I give both the MG ZSEV and the SyncEV charger

The average mileage should read 3.5 miles per Kwh

 

[Jomarkh]

That is one and the same.

The Ohme, is a cable with a box inline that does the "magic"

They do a few "versions":
with a 3 pin plug on the end (only does 13Amp max)
with a commando plug on the end
with another type 2 plug on the end
with nothing on the end that is hardwired into a terminal box.

I actually got the one with the commando plug on the end, but decided this is a waste of space and more secure, so remove the commando plug and just hardwire it instead where my commando socket is.

Hi, I have an Ohme cable with type 2 both ends and was going to put a commando plug on the end but what do you do with the CP wire?

 

[mj224]

I have the OE charger, and Octopus Go, but as yet have to set it up. As a straightforward charger it works fine.

I have tried to set it up, but am stuck. I have the App. I find it easier to start the charge manually at 11:30ish, and pay the extra for an hour...

Alas, the Octopus Smart meter cannot recognise the different tariffs, so tells me that my charging costs are a £5 odd.......

 

[bloggsy]

I've got a Pod Point Solo, which is an untethered charger as the ZS EV takes a Type 2 charger but my Outlander PHEV takes a Type !, so I have to swap cables every now and again.

Pod Point have recently introduced scheduled charging and, after a slight hiccup in the first couple of weeks, it all appears to be working and I've only had 1 issue with it when it wouldn't start charging and I had to call their Customer Service but, give them their due, they reset my settings remotely and the car was charging within 5 mins.

Their app is okay, but I need it anyway for the free chargers at Tesco!

I've switched to Octopus which will be going live this week and I've had an email saying they've not forgotten about switching me over to a smart tariff.

Cheers

Bloggsy

 

[JodyS21]

Hi, I have an Ohme cable with type 2 both ends and was going to put a commando plug on the end but what do you do with the CP wire?

I did read something about this a few days ago, can't remember exactly what it said - have a google, someone I think had opened one up and commented on the extra command wire that's in there for the type 2 plug and what had been done with it for the other plugs. I've got a vague recollection it just wasn't connected to anything, but best google and make sure.

In my commando plug that I just unscrewed off the cable, were just the 3 wires - L/N/E.

I wish I'd have got the type 2 to type 2 instead of commando, and removed the type 2 - would be a handy spare plug to have! I hadn't had the thought beforehand unfortunately to just hardwire it and make it much neater.

 

[JodyS21]

We have a BP Chargemaster unit, but it wouldn't work with scheduling no matter how hard I tried. Replaced it twice didn't help. Eventually got it swapped for a socketed unit, and now use with an Ohme cable.

I'm also on the Octopus Go tariff and want to charge starting at 12:30, ideally for 4 hours, but otherwise until charged. I was also surprised to find this wasn't possible in the Ohme app, but I find a workaround. Instead of selecting my actual electric tariff, I've created a custom one, I've set the cheap rate correctly, then from 4:30-10:00 I've set the price to be my standard price, then for the rest of the day I've set the price to be 0.01p higher than my actual price. I've then set the maximum price to my actual price, this forces it to start charging at 00:30 and essentially permits it to continue until 10am. This is doing exactly what I want now.

Excellent info thanks, I've just set my tariff & setting up like you have.
I've got a charge going already so will see what it says tomorrow when plugged in.

I'm not completely sure it will always work, but will soon see hopefully....
I need a full battery by 6:30am Mon/Wed/Thurs.
At 7Kwh - 6 hours (00:30-6:30) should provide 42kWh.
If the car is really low, I'm not sure this will quite be enough to get it to 100%, given the AC-DC losses. Will need to do some experimenting to find out what percentage is added with a given AC kWh input.
Maybe on the occasion (mainly in really cold conditions) if the car is extremely low on charge and will need definite 100% by 6:30am, I'll manually give it an hour at max charge in the evening before letting the schedule do its stuff.

Thanks for helping.
Ohme's suggestion was I use the "MG ZS EV trickle" car option to somehow solve it!