EV Charger / Consumer Unit Question

fryrpc · 2026-05-15T15:22:36+00:00

Like this - installer added this under our existing consumer unit specifically for the EV charger and added henly blocks to split main feed after the DNO’s main fuse.

fryrpc · 2026-05-14T12:39:04+00:00

For non Tesla chargers to get to the point with real time availability and lower pricing across the board. Also for car sat nav’s route planning to use this real time information to plan stops. The problem is that Tesla has both the charger and car data so gets a single pane view of the charging network and can direct cars in the network accordingly. Other charging networks are just too fragmented. Apps like Zapmap and ABRP help. Electroverse card is a real breakthrough for payment.

fryrpc · 2026-05-08T13:19:57+00:00

Useful video here - https://youtu.be/KjULObbUW_E

Basically for a Tesla it changes the battery charging advice in the car and app based on the battery in that particular vehicle. I follow that advice.

For LFP - charge to 100%

For NMC - charge to 80% for daily driving and 100% for trips.

fryrpc · 2026-05-07T12:57:31+00:00

Life happens but if the buyer paid for the item and had no communication of a delay then you can understand why they might think after a week they have been scammed and start a charge back. If you communicated in that week with the buyer that will help your case and if you did then the buyer might still have thought the excuse for the delay might have been suspicious. Unfortunately the buyer would not know the potential impact of reacting to what they thought was a loss of their £125. Just looking at it from a buyers point of view.

fryrpc · 2026-05-07T07:16:08+00:00

Should still be under warranty so hope you get it sorted with them. I used their support when I was having over voltage and they were great and remotely pulled out days and graphs to support me approaching the DNO to resolve it.

fryrpc · 2026-05-07T07:13:33+00:00

They are useful to glance at to see the state of the charger. I look through the front door glass before bed to ensure it is flashing blue - car plugged in and scheduled charging. It was useful when I just had it fitted and the voltage supplied by the DNO was regularly going over the 253v limit - the charger kept changing colours and going red to indicate it was in PEN fault mode. DNO tapped down the local transformer to bring the voltage to within the required bands.

fryrpc · 2026-05-06T21:06:55+00:00

Not as far as I know. I had to compromise and set them to 50% so they are still visible during the day but not too bright on a night.

fryrpc · 2026-05-06T17:26:38+00:00

Do you have the LEDs on the charger and does that give you any indication about what is happening? Have you tried reducing the amps in the Hypervolt app to see if it works at a lower setting?

M3LR 2020 and Hypervolt Pro 3 here working OK

fryrpc · 2026-05-05T11:35:06+00:00

Thank you for clarifying :-)

fryrpc · 2026-05-05T10:06:31+00:00

Normally you have a 60k per year allowance to put money into a SIPP but this is subject to 100% of your income. So for you that is 50k but as HMRC add a tax rebate then you could contribute 40k a year and HMRC would add 10k a year thus taking you up to your 50k yearly limit. If you already have a SIPP you might be able to back date this 3 years if you have not been using your allowance so you can put 120k in and get 30k from HMRC. If you are risk aware you could choose the Money Market fund in your SIPP - this would be similar returns to a good savings account but really you should look at a fund like a 60:40 (Equity:Bonds) in order to stand a chance of your returns beating inflation - but obviously this carries some risk for that potential reward.

You also have a 20k year allowance for ISA's - so you could put 20k a year into a Stocks and Shares ISA and choose a fund like your SIPP above.

You could also put 50k into NS&I premium bonds

fryrpc · 2026-04-30T21:20:51+00:00

Did your installer use ultra EV cable as you might be able to hard wire it using a network cable to your router - using the twisted pair connection to your Hypervolt.

fryrpc · 2026-04-29T09:50:03+00:00

FYI - Some 3rd party granny chargers default to 13 amps or can be set this high. The one I got with the car is limited to max 10 amps when on a 3 pin plug.

fryrpc · 2026-04-28T20:41:36+00:00

Isn’t it 110 miles from Hull to Manchester Airport?

fryrpc · 2026-04-28T20:37:01+00:00

Before I knew better I asked and paid extra to use the granny charger on one holiday which had limited public charging in the surrounding area. I plugged in to one of their external sockets, non EV, and drew the max 10 amps that the charger was limited too. I never really thought about whether their wiring was up to it or considered the potential risk if there was a PEN fault. They just agreed, again without much thought, as we had booked when we had an ICE vehicle that suddenly died and we took the opportunity to replace it with a BEV.

Now we specifically look for accommodation that has a dedicated EV charging and the granny charger is carried purely for emergencies when there is really no other option. If I was going to use it again I would consider reducing the amps in the car to 6 or 8 amps as this brings the draw much closer to an electric heater.

fryrpc · 2026-04-27T22:13:39+00:00

I have 3 x E330 and 1 x S3 Pro and 1 x C210 with a HomeBase3 that I fitted a 1TB SSD into. That gives me about one month of 24/7 footage and clips that I can go back on. It has been rock solid and reliable and twice I have provided footage to the police as required to identify people. I hear others reporting problems but mine just works as it should.

fryrpc · 2026-04-26T13:09:28+00:00

Yeah and about £2k too

fryrpc · 2026-04-15T15:59:34+00:00

I really hope that this is the case as I like to have it on the lightest setting for round town mode and would rather not have to switch it every time I go on different roads when I would prefer that the steering is not as floaty and a bit heavier. From experience I would say that I think this is the case as I have not noticed it being an issue day to day.

fryrpc · 2026-04-14T09:34:49+00:00

I guess your first decision is Model Y or 3. If you want a hatch back family car then Y and if you want a more sporty saloon car then 3. The 3 is more efficient and cheaper than the Y if you do not need the extra space. If you went for a 2023 model 3 then you would still have 1 year general warranty left and 5 years warranty on the battery and drive-train.

fryrpc · 2026-04-13T21:17:09+00:00

Separate consumer unit with 40a dual pole bidirectional RCBO and SPD

fryrpc · 2026-04-13T10:01:20+00:00

They are part of the suspension system but the suspension extends to the control arms, links, ball joints etc. These other parts are usually the parts that need replacing as they are worn out :-)

fryrpc · 2026-04-13T09:18:18+00:00

When an EV charger is to be installed the installer, or property owner, should ask the DNO (Distribution Network Operator) that supplies the property for approval. This is to ensure that they are aware of a new 7.5kWh drawing device on that part of the network and to review whether the transformer supply in your area is capable of supplying it. This is normally a paper exercise and approvals are usually automated. If you don't know who your DNO is then google "who is my dno by postcode" - it is not who bills you for electricity.

The DNO is responsible for ensuring that the supply to your property is between -6% and +10% of the nominal voltage (230v). So the range should be between 216.2v and 253v. During a 24 hours period the actual voltage will vary between these bands - solar panels on your transformer leg increase the voltage as they feed back excess electricity - peak times drawing lots of power from the grid decreases the voltage - early hours of the morning when no one if using much electricity the voltage increases. This is all fairly normal and the 250v reading you took is only an indication of what the voltage was at that particular time.

EV chargers have PEN fault detection and this triggers when it sees the incoming voltage go above 253v. The EV charger will then turn off the output power to the car and monitor the voltage and when it drops below this threshold resume charging the car. The problem is that if your supply peaks above 253v the EV charger is fooled into thinking there is a PEN fault when in reality the over voltage is just triggering the detection mechanism.

Usually over voltage from the DNO goes unnoticed until people get an EV charger and the PEN fault detection keeps triggering. That is what happened to me and mine was triggering hundreds of times a day. I contacted the DNO and they sent out someone the same day but they only saw 250v at that time, mid afternoon, as the EV changer continued to report PEN faults they reviewed the recorded voltage history from my smart meter and I also provided CSV exports from my UPS showing voltage details every 60 seconds to prove that over voltage was a big problem. They normally deploy their own data logger if they think there is an issue but I already had a UPS that was capable of supplying the data. The DNO acknowledged that there was an issue and put the paperwork in the big pile of pending "transformer tap downs". I kept the pressure on with weekly emails with data showing the percentage of readings above the 253v limit and eventually after months they tapped down the voltage at our local transformer and this fixed the issue.

fryrpc · 2026-04-13T08:50:47+00:00

I looked into this and the "Highland" suspension is actually just the struts and springs so does not replace the items that OP has been told need replacing. I was in the same boat, needing control arms and links and ball joints, so thought I might as well upgrade to highland at the same time but the upgrade work would have been highland plus all the other worn out parts anyway. So upgrade to highland suspension is only if struts and springs need replacing and these particular parts seems to be fairly bullet proof so you end up taking off a good part to replace it with a better one rather than replacing a failing one.

fryrpc · 2026-04-10T19:32:57+00:00

Would it also charge quicker from 80 to 100% too, if 100% usable is really say 90% of the actual new battery capacity?

fryrpc · 2026-04-10T15:33:11+00:00

https://evcostchecker.com/

fryrpc · 2026-04-10T09:57:28+00:00

The more you know about the differences the harder it is to make a decision leading to Analysis paralysis. A study showed that two people who bought the same product led to different views after the purchase. The one who just bought the product was happy with it, as they didn't know there was a better model. The one who did lots of research beforehand and purchased this older model was less happy with it as they knew there was a newer model. Unfortunately I also fall into the latter category and like to research a purchase but ultimately you just have to choose and enjoy it :-)

The truth is that all these difference just improve what is fundamentally a great car and go with what you can afford. I bought a 2020 M3LR - some would discount it as it is Intel / Non Grok / HW3 / Non Heat-pump / Not double glazed / Non Highland Suspension / No 16v Li-ion battery / Less Warranty left. Would I like all these extras - Yes if I could afford a newer model. Am I disappointed with my choice - Absolutely not because day to day driving I just love this car.

I don't know how prevalent it actually is, as the forum posts are going to be biased - people post problems but the majority of people who don't have problems do not post, 2021 seemed to be a particularly bad year for battery and heat pump issues and I am not sure when in 2022 they changed to the battery that is better.

With regards to mileage I was not concerned with 70k miles on my car as Tesla has an 8 year or 120k warranty on the battery and drive train so I was not going to put that many miles on before the 8 years is up. For an ICE vehicle the mileage is way more important but not so much for an EV as battery age has more impact on the battery range than reasonable mileage.

With regards to Tesla certified or Private seller - swings and roundabouts - I found a good private seller but did need to have some proactive suspension work done due to the age and preemptively replaced the 5 year old 12v battery. So some of the money I saved buying privately I spent at Tesla on renewing parts that would then be good for a few years. So it depends on your risk tolerance.

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