tps
Well-known member
I'm assuming you mean your home came with a 6-20R socket, not a 5-20R. 6-20 is non-locking 240V, 5-20R is non-locking 120V.DaveinOlyWA said:
17A L1 charging!!
- Thread starter lincomatic
- Start date
Help Support My Nissan Leaf Forum:
DaveinOlyWA
Well-known member
tps said:
ummm, hmmm, well its 240 and it may not be a 5-20r... maybe a L5-20? either way. it did not fit Phils mod and adapter parts would have been at least 500% more than the socket i bought at Lowes
not sure of the designations, but i kinda thought the # after the dash was indication of current rating?
ahhh here ya go!!
davewill
Well-known member
That appears to be a 6-20r, as tps suggested.
z0ner
Well-known member
davewill said:
Definitely NEMA 6-20R. I have an adapter.
DaveinOlyWA
Well-known member
ok. so i thought the 15 amp was labeled as "5-15" which is "style-current"
so the 2nd number does not always designate current rating? or would that make too much sense?
so the 2nd number does not always designate current rating? or would that make too much sense?
GeekEV
Well-known member
It does. As a 6-20, that plug is rated for 20A even if it isn't on a 20A breaker. The presence of an L in front indicates its a locking plug. That's a 6-20, the upgrade uses an L6-20. The P or R on the end indicates plug (male) or recepticle (female).DaveinOlyWA said:
davewill
Well-known member
The 6-15 has two horizontal slots instead of the "T" on the left.
DaveinOlyWA
Well-known member
Ah I got it! Just had a brain fart. Was ignoring the fact that 120 volt could be 20 amps despite my having one on the wall that I charged with at my old house.
Ingineer
Well-known member
Sorry, just now saw this thread. First off, the electrical code in the US is paranoid. It was written by the NFPA (National Fire Protection Association), who is comprised mainly of fire insurance companies, and their main goal is to reduce claims.
Regardless of the code, if you have a 15 amp circuit, you should be able to pull 15 amps (and maybe a little more) safely indefinitely. The "headroom" is just that, mainly to reduce marginal conditions in older buildings, some of which were wired with aluminum at some point and are aging poorly. This is also why the AFCI (Arc Fault Circuit Interrupter) was developed. There are plenty of fault conditions where even a current under 1 amp can start a fire when arcing is allowed to occur.
Back to the point: I've done extensive tests on the LEAF's charging system and never seen the results that Lincomatic is finding. I have charged down to 90 volts, and have not seen anything over 12.5 amps (and that was only transient). I have never seen 17 amps! I measured all my findings with calibrated true-RMS meters, and used current shunts to measure current, not clamp-ons which have many modes where they can be inaccurate. I also find this hard to believe given the architecture of the charger. The primary transformer winding is optimized for the Japanese-Market 200v 16a charging, so when you run them at 100v, you get very high duty cycles on the primary switch to keep the output high enough to deliver the required voltage to the pack. This means there simply isn't enough headroom to go much higher at these low input voltages. It would be difficult to design a charger that can deliver high power levels at this wide a voltage swing, so they simply don't. You can't trust a cheap Kill-a-watt meter to be accurate, I have seem them wildly inaccurate when exposed to harmonic distortion and non-unity power factors.
The Panasonic EVSE has no way to detect incoming voltage without extensive hardware modifications, so there is no way to send a 12A Pilot for 120v. It has nothing to do with me being "lazy" or unable to rewrite the code to support it. It's not about code, it's about hardware. Just the same, my tests reveal it never pulls much over 12 amps, and then only for brief periods. People routinely run 1500w space heaters on shared 15 amp circuits without any bad results. If the circuits could only safely handle 12a, then you can bet the NFPA would have mandated 12a breakers!
If you have a damaged or unsafe electrical system, then it is YOUR responsibility to get it repaired/upgraded. That would be the only condition where anything bad could happen, even IF somehow the LEAF's on-board charger disregards the Pilot and somehow draws more, which I have never seen. In fact, Lincomatic is the only report of such I can find anywhere, so please people, don't panic.
We have a huge amount of units out in the field and have never heard of one single problem where something got overloaded or burnt. In addition, there are people every day overloading circuits in older homes with too many appliances on shared circuits. Fires are extremely rare. As everyone well knows; Getting in a lethal car accident while driving your LEAF is far more likely!
Lincomatic: seeing the kind of voltages you are seeing could indicate a serious problem, I could call your utility immediately!
Even so, charging at 95v is totally fine. Thousands of Japanese residents do it every day!
-Phil
Regardless of the code, if you have a 15 amp circuit, you should be able to pull 15 amps (and maybe a little more) safely indefinitely. The "headroom" is just that, mainly to reduce marginal conditions in older buildings, some of which were wired with aluminum at some point and are aging poorly. This is also why the AFCI (Arc Fault Circuit Interrupter) was developed. There are plenty of fault conditions where even a current under 1 amp can start a fire when arcing is allowed to occur.
Back to the point: I've done extensive tests on the LEAF's charging system and never seen the results that Lincomatic is finding. I have charged down to 90 volts, and have not seen anything over 12.5 amps (and that was only transient). I have never seen 17 amps! I measured all my findings with calibrated true-RMS meters, and used current shunts to measure current, not clamp-ons which have many modes where they can be inaccurate. I also find this hard to believe given the architecture of the charger. The primary transformer winding is optimized for the Japanese-Market 200v 16a charging, so when you run them at 100v, you get very high duty cycles on the primary switch to keep the output high enough to deliver the required voltage to the pack. This means there simply isn't enough headroom to go much higher at these low input voltages. It would be difficult to design a charger that can deliver high power levels at this wide a voltage swing, so they simply don't. You can't trust a cheap Kill-a-watt meter to be accurate, I have seem them wildly inaccurate when exposed to harmonic distortion and non-unity power factors.
The Panasonic EVSE has no way to detect incoming voltage without extensive hardware modifications, so there is no way to send a 12A Pilot for 120v. It has nothing to do with me being "lazy" or unable to rewrite the code to support it. It's not about code, it's about hardware. Just the same, my tests reveal it never pulls much over 12 amps, and then only for brief periods. People routinely run 1500w space heaters on shared 15 amp circuits without any bad results. If the circuits could only safely handle 12a, then you can bet the NFPA would have mandated 12a breakers!
If you have a damaged or unsafe electrical system, then it is YOUR responsibility to get it repaired/upgraded. That would be the only condition where anything bad could happen, even IF somehow the LEAF's on-board charger disregards the Pilot and somehow draws more, which I have never seen. In fact, Lincomatic is the only report of such I can find anywhere, so please people, don't panic.
We have a huge amount of units out in the field and have never heard of one single problem where something got overloaded or burnt. In addition, there are people every day overloading circuits in older homes with too many appliances on shared circuits. Fires are extremely rare. As everyone well knows; Getting in a lethal car accident while driving your LEAF is far more likely!
Lincomatic: seeing the kind of voltages you are seeing could indicate a serious problem, I could call your utility immediately!
Even so, charging at 95v is totally fine. Thousands of Japanese residents do it every day!
-Phil
