San Francisco Bay Area Quick Chargers Getting them sooner

[ElectricVehicle]

Here's the beginning charge pictures in sequence, including 2 pictures I didn't post earlier. The whole sequence is only 13 seconds that I captured. Then after a minute or so, no more volt or amp data on the display for the remaining 27 minutes I charged.
Recall that I started this charge at 5 bars, for which the EFACEC charger indicated 49%.

 

[TonyWilliams]

Recall that I started this charge at 5 bars, for which the EFACEC charger indicated 49%.

Point of Order - While the charger may display that data, it comes from the LEAF. It's just doing what it's told.

 

[ElectricVehicle]

Recall that I started this charge at 5 bars, for which the EFACEC charger indicated 49%.

Point of Order - While the charger may display that data, it comes from the LEAF. It's just doing what it's told.

I recall talking to a person running the AV QC at a Nissan event, and he had mentioned to me that the charger displayed % on the AV QC was different than the car while I was doing a QC from the AV unit. I didn't have any tools to cross check so I don't know the entire context or validity of the statement. I was also balancing on the back edge of the AV truck trying not to do something stupid like get my foot caught in the mounting structure for the charger in my excitement of my first QC for my LEAF. I'm definitely looking forward to putting somw more advanced instrumentation in my car from the LEAF community so I can see what's really going on. 12 bars don't cut it!

 

[ElectricVehicle]

Thanks for the Graphs! Great Stuff. I guess they both start at about 50% charge. (For Tony's graph starts at about 130 GIDs which is close to 46%) Here they are right next to each other for analysis:
TonyWilliams (Graph from TickTock -edit thanks Tony for the "Point of Order" )

JeremyW (Tony beat me with the graph, I was going to post this- 50%-90% soc sesh

 

[JeremyW]

I don't want to derail the norcal topic with too many socal problems, but really quick:

2. Pay outlandish demand charge for 10-50 users a month. I think somebody would go postal the first time a LEAFer complained about the price and nonchalantly offered, "I'll-Just-Drive-My-Prius (TM)". Remember folks, these are expensive to insure, and operate, even if all the hardware and installation and maintenance were free. The demand fee just pushes things over the top.

I think we need to keep hounding Socal Edison about moving this meter to the EV rate that Tbleakne mentioned in his thread. Your second call in the morning should be to to Southern California Edison. It wouldn't make the demand fee go away, but it would relax it significantly.

To put "the cost of charge" and what people are willing to pay in perspective, in my SUV, I usually go through nearly a full tank going to Bear and back. Right now, that's a hair shy of $60. I would love a $7 qc, but if I had to pay up to $25x2=$50 (that's my personal limit, hypothetically, for now ) for two qc's to take my (future) leaf to the mountains and back, I would. Note that I have no plans on having two cars, my other option would be to take a friends car (with said friends) up to the mountains. I would certainly not pay more then the cost of gas in a 20 mpg vehicle (going up the mountain kills mpg, I wouldn't be surprised if it was less) to get up there.

3. Spoof box to manipulate EATON to sub 20kW, but I don't have the skill set to make this happen, and those that do won't just drop everything to make this happen. Can you do this? I know Ingineer can, but he's currently working 32 hours per day. I'd have to buy him cases of NoDoze to try and work 35 hours per day.

I could, but the charger is about 60 miles from me, and I'd need to work on it for quite some time (a few hours a day for weeks, probably a month or two). I can talk to my work about "storing it" for a while, if moving it closer to me is a possibility. I have 208 3 phase there.

4. Replace unit with one of the DC charger units I'm buying. This is a good option for a lot of reasons, but what do you do with a $50k "slightly used" DC charger ? I wouldn't be able to have this optional operational until July / August 2012.

Well, I know the mountains do have some summer tourists with mountain bikers and such, but my deadline is the start of the next ski/snowboard season.

1. Leave it shut down forever.

Anything but this.

Jeremy

 

[TonyWilliams]

Recall that I started this charge at 5 bars, for which the EFACEC charger indicated 49%.

Point of Order - While the charger may display that data, it comes from the LEAF. It's just doing what it's told.

I recall talking to a person running the AV QC at a Nissan event, and he had mentioned to me that the charger displayed % on the AV QC was different than the car while I was doing a QC from the AV unit...

I'm going to suggest that that is not correct. I think Ingineer pointed out that it is reported SOC from the car, of course, and not Gids (or % of Gids).

Sorry, but I'll go with a real engineer over a QC salesperson for my technical info

 

[ElectricVehicle]

Using 21 kWh for total useable battery capacity, 50% is 10.5 kWh.

If the initial charge starts a 48 kW to the batttery, then it's 13.1 minutes to 50%. - So far less than the 15 minute demand interval, so how much does it drop in the next 2 minutes?
( 10.5 kWh / 48 kW * 60 min / hr = 13.1 minutes)

Looking at the graphs, if we assume the knee is 50%, then within 2 minutes, it seems to drop to about 100A at about 390V for 39,000 Watts.

So the based on all this loose analysis, the first 15 minutes has a sustained peak of 39 kW. Say the charger is 90% efficient, the utility draw is 43.3 kW.

Now this REALLY makes you want to tweak the charge power! Let it go full power for 13 minutes, and then limiit the power to say 30kW (76A @ 390V). The power drops to this level anyway about 3 minutes after reaching 50% charge. That reduction (3 minutes * (100A - 76A)/2 * 390V) is only about 250 Wh less charge!

So slam it full power for 13 minutes, then drop it down to reduce the demand charge for that high power initial 15 minutes and lose very little in terms of charge time because it was ramping down anyway at 50%. Of course this strategy won't work so well when they introduce upgraded LEAFs with 300 mile (72 kWh) battery packs!

 

[TonyWilliams]

Thanks for the Graphs! Great Stuff. I guess they both start at about 50% charge. (For Tony's graph starts at about 130 GIDs which is close to 46%) ]

Another Point of Order: Graph credit goes to TickTock.

 

[TonyWilliams]

I don't want to derail the norcal topic with too many socal problems, but really quick:

1. Leave it shut down forever.

Anything but this.

Jeremy

Well, this particular topic is quite timely to anywhere in The People's Republik. Option 5 is let the unit run for 5 minutes only, with a 10 minute rest.

 

[ElectricVehicle]

I recall talking to a person running the AV QC at a Nissan event, and he had mentioned to me that the charger displayed % on the AV QC was different than the car while I was doing a QC from the AV unit...

I'm going to suggest that that is not correct. I think Ingineer pointed out that it is reported SOC from the car, of course, and not Gids (or % of Gids).

Sorry, but I'll go with a real engineer over a QC salesperson for my technical info

Yes, that's why I want real engineer tools in my LEAF. Of course with it being an early AV unit, It wouldn't surprise me if the % number from the car is manipiulated for display! Though I guess that's part of the CHAdeMO standard. Can't wait for the tools!

Thanks for the Points of Order, you're a serious Parliamentarian!

 

[Ingineer]

The SoC is given to the QC by the Battery ECU via the CHAdeMO protocol over it's CAN link. It's the "real" SoC tracked by the battery ECU and will not match anything else displayed to the user by Nissan. So it's the Leaf that's lying to you, not the QC.

I've got a device on the drawing board that monitors the main power feed at the meter and insures that demand fees are not triggered by dynamically calculating what the maximum QC load can be, and then adjusting the QC on the fly via manipulation of the CHAdeMO protocol between the car and the QC. Once I can get a QC to test it on, I'll offer it for sale to QC owners/installers to help open up sites to QC that may not have considered it due to the demand charge. I think the Nissan/Sumitomo unit is the best unit to build this device for, but it could be added into any CHAdeMO compliant QC.

-Phil

 

[davewill]

From the other thread:

... The QC and the adjacent L2 are on separate breakers and share one dedicated meter, separate from 7-11 and the other small tenants in the building. This means to avoid the SCE demand charge threshold, which is 20 kW, the L3 would have to be dialed back to 15 kW if the L2 was allowed to run at the same time. This would be a serious blow to its utility, but better than nothing. Perhaps the L2 could be switched to the 7-11 meter so the L3 could be raised up to 18 kW.

The unit's parameters can only be adjusted by an Eaton tech who has the diagnostic password. Donovan explained that full access included some parameters that could be set to dangerous values. They should have separate password levels, so the host could at least retrieve fault codes. Right now any changes might require another trip by Donovan from North Carolina, although they trusted the local Eaton sales rep to retrieve the fault codes before Donovan came.

Since the L2 and L3 are on a separate meter, they are eligible for SCE's special EV charging demand tariff of $12 per kW, which would be (40+4)*12 = $528 for the month. ...

So, apparently the unit can be dialed back without hardware mods.

 

[ElectricVehicle]

The SoC is given to the QC by the Battery ECU via the CHAdeMO protocol over it's CAN link. It's the "real" SoC tracked by the battery ECU and will not match anything else displayed to the user by Nissan. So it's the Leaf that's lying to you, not the QC.

I've got a device on the drawing board that monitors the main power feed at the meter and insures that demand fees are not triggered by dynamically calculating what the maximum QC load can be, and then adjusting the QC on the fly via manipulation of the CHAdeMO protocol between the car and the QC. Once I can get a QC to test it on, I'll offer it for sale to QC owners/installers to help open up sites to QC that may not have considered it due to the demand charge. I think the Nissan/Sumitomo unit is the best unit to build this device for, but it could be added into any CHAdeMO compliant QC.

-Phil

Nice job Phil! I'll donate a few of my QC sessions for the testing if you like! If get or borrow the logging instrumentation (prototype or production), I could log a QC session from a low state of charge for our collective analysis and use.

I'm sure your device will be clever enough to have a higher limit for 13 minutes (shorter than the common 15 minute demand interval), go to a lower limit for the next 20 minutes and then re-enable the higher limit for the next cycle.

This could be viewed as gaming the rate schedule, but as long as the high limit isn't too spikey (very much greater) than the low limit, it really is optimizing the use of the utility equipment and the benefit for all - win - win for all parties. The higher limit will load the distribution a bit and will heat up for 13 minutes, but during the low limit, the distribution equipment will cool down a bit compared to being at a constant high load. The utilities have designed this into their rate structures by having a 15 minute interval and not making it 5 minutes, 1 minute or instantaneous, both to allow customers some reasonable spikes without really crazy demand charges and to reflect the ability of the distribution equipment to hand some spikes in load spread out by lower load periods to cool down.

 

[Ingineer]

Thanks for the offer of logs, but I don't need them. I already have the CHAdeMO protocol, but I would not want to offer any products for sale without extensive testing. Though, this testing could ostensibly be done (somewhat) by using the module installed in the Leaf on a "public" QC and simulating the meter data.

-Phil

 

[JeremyW]

I would not want to offer any products for sale without extensive testing.

Yes, the timings are pretty tight between the car and charger. It can be done, but it's not the easiest... :?

I hope that the Eaton unit down here can get moved to the EV rate that SoCal Edison offers. I foresee the main problem being that this unit doesn't offer any way to process payment. Even a "token" based system where you pay inside and get a code or a fob (like a bathroom key) would work.

Jeremy

 

[TonyWilliams]

I hope that the Eaton unit down here can get moved to the EV rate that SoCal Edison offers. I foresee the main problem being that this unit doesn't offer any way to process payment. Even a "token" based system where you pay inside and get a code or a fob (like a bathroom key) would work.

Jeremy

I talked with Eaton Tech Support, the City of San Bernadino permit office and SoCal Edison. The unit should not have any problem getting electric TOU-EV-3 (no demand charge, under 20kW) dedicated to the Eaton, and have the unit lowered by 10kW factors.

What I would probably recommend is to run it on a diesel generator to test Phil's device, then tune it for about 18.5kW. On that rate schedule, it absolutely cannot go over 20kW, even during a test.

Payments can be a cash drop box and a little honor should work. Obviously, if that didn't work, it can be unplugged again and the "I'll-Just-Drive-My-Prius(TM)" crowd can keep on burning petrol. That gives a bit of time to add a credit card and RFID reader.

 

[JeremyW]

then tune it for about 18.5kW

Don't forget that L2 unit is on the same meter. Both could be running at the same time, so you'll need to take it into account when you're doing load calcs. How payment handled on the 15kW Fuji?

Jeremy

 

[TEG]

I am at VW ERL right now, and the Blink CHAdeMO is powered up!
But, it isn't working for me. I swiped my card, it asked for my zipcode then said to plug in the vehicle. After 'establishing connection', and 'locking the plug' it said my vehicle was at 0% SOC (but car itself says 40%) and asked how much I wanted to fill it... I picked 80% then it just said 'error' and shut off. Tried a 2nd time with the same failure...

 

[Ingineer]

There is no "timing" issue, but anything going to be operated by the public, and especially where a malfunction may result in nasty $ demand charges, I would want to be sure everything is 100% working as designed.

The Level II unit is no problem, as it's real-time power usage would be subtracted from the max consumption of the QC. This is why I feel it's important to monitor consumption at the meter.

It would also be trivial to add a dollar bill reader to the system to collect fees per charge. I think $5 per charge would be a fair amount, and by taking cash, no need for complex IT systems. You would need a hardened cash box, though these are available off-the-shelf.

-Phil

 

[Ingineer]

I am at VW ERL right now, and the Blink CHAdeMO is powered up!
But, it isn't working for me. I swiped my card, it asked for my zipcode then said to plug in the vehicle. After 'establishing connection', and 'locking the plug' it said my vehicle was at 0% SOC (but car itself says 40%) and asked how much I wanted to fill it... I picked 80% then it just said 'error' and shut off. Tried a 2nd time with the same failure...

The Blink is on the Blink before it even Blinked! :lol:

Maybe we need a new word for these; Blunk. "That blink is blunk."

-Phil