Charging at 16 amps and 120 volts?

Has anyone looked into why the leaf only draws 12 amps at 120 volts even if the EVSE signals more current is available? Is this possibly set in software in the charger? Being able to utilize a 20 amp circuit with Phil's rev2 upgrade would be nice. About 30% nicer in fact.

I can't believe no one answered this.
This is important to consider if one has a 120V circuit available that is on a 20 amp breaker. (such as the workplace)

I have an SPX power express, I tried setting the max current adjustment to higher values and measured the current with a kill-a-watt. The current DID increase, but only to 13 amps... sometimes I got an error and it wouldn't charge at all. I am still investigating.

I'm not sure if this is caused by the EVSE or the Leaf's on-board charger.
I hope someone with an open-evse can try this.

jclemens said:

I can't believe no one answered this.
This is important to consider if one has a 120V circuit available that is on a 20 amp breaker. (such as the workplace)

I have an SPX power express, I tried setting the max current adjustment to higher values and measured the current with a kill-a-watt. The current DID increase, but only to 13 amps... sometimes I got an error and it wouldn't charge at all. I am still investigating.

I'm not sure if this is caused by the EVSE or the Leaf's on-board charger.
I hope someone with an open-evse can try this.

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I think Ingeneer (Phil) has already chimed in on this, the Leaf's onboard charger will ONLY use 13A @ 120V, no matter how much is offered... It's the way it was designed, and not changeable as far as we've heard.

This was done so as to not trip 15 amp 120 volt circuits which are far and away the most common. The charger is the limiting factor so it makes no difference what the EVSE pilot tells the charger...

mitch672 said:

[I think Ingeneer (Phil) has already chimed in on this, the Leaf's onboard charger will ONLY use 13A @ 120V, no matter how much is offered... It's the way it was designed, and not changeable as far as we've heard.

Click to expand...

TomT said:

This was done so as to not trip 15 amp 120 volt circuits which are far and away the most common. The charger is the limiting factor so it makes no difference what the EVSE pilot tells the charger...

mitch672 said:

[I think Ingeneer (Phil) has already chimed in on this, the Leaf's onboard charger will ONLY use 13A @ 120V, no matter how much is offered... It's the way it was designed, and not changeable as far as we've heard.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Agree, but isn't it interesting that the Owner's Manual in many references insists that you must have a dedicated 20 Amp circuit to use the supplied EVSE. Living in a rental with little chance of getting a 20 Amp circuit, I was a bit concerned, until I discovered that in reality, only 12 Amps are required.

Bill

Since many circuits also have something else on them, I suspect they suggested that to allow a little head room so that breaker trips are not common.

ebill3 said:

Agree, but isn't it interesting that the Owner's Manual in many references insists that you must have a dedicated 20 Amp circuit to use the supplied EVSE. Living in a rental with little chance of getting a 20 Amp circuit, I was a bit concerned, until I discovered that in reality, only 12 Amps are required.

Click to expand...

Seems like a pretty straight software change. I know that Phil has said that the on board charger will only charge ~ 12a even when a 16a pilot signal is given. Is anyone able to see into the charger software to find why it is being limited. I have several tools in my garage that draw more than 12a (1500watt) and some are rated at 2000 watt (16a) so the precedent is there for delivering 16a via a 120v power cord. Heck even the quick 220 is doing exactly the same by delivering 16a 120v times 2. The only difference is that the 220 is going, I assume through a different charger than the 120, or is the 120 charger only one side of the 220?