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Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

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Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cable weight corresponds to charging power rating and choice of materials, not plug choice. A combined CCS2 plug is chunkier and might be a bit heavier, but not compared to, say, using a fuel pump.

Just go try them both. CCS2 Has separate AC and DC conductors, and the plug is huge owing to having 2 pair of charging pins and backward compatibility. They are more awkward and heavier than a fuel pump, and significantly heavier than the Tesla plugs. It's terrible.

Nope. No separate AC and DC conductors for CCS2. From wikipedia [1], the DC cable has: PE, CP & PP (comms), fat DC+ and fat DC-. That's it. In the AC portion of CCS2 there are connectors for Neutral and up to three lines (for three phase charging), but these are not present for a DC cable.

I have to admit I haven't used Tesla plugs, but there is already a slight difference between the cable from a 50kW charger and a 350kW charger.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combined_Charging_System

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#482

This makes me sad in a way that's a little hard to articulate. But I'll try! I plug my $9000 2013 Nissan Leaf into an ordinary 120V extension cord each night so I can commute to a neighboring city for work, and the electricity costs me $20/mo. I also have a 1986 Toyota pickup like on Back to the Future that I had to gas up every other week, using 30 gallons of gas per month and costing over $100. So the operating cos…

I don't understand your comment. Tesla sells a charger for $230 that comes with 120V/15A and 240V/50A connectors ( https://shop.tesla.com/product/mobile-connector ). You can also buy a connectors for every type of socket there is ( https://shop.tesla.com/product/gen-2-nema-adapters ). I had a 240V outlet installed in my garage and plug that in there to charge. I also bring it with me if I go to cottages, etc. I've us…

That's pretty cool actually, and very similar to the J1772 Nissan Leaf charger that I have, thanks for the heads up! I've been looking at the dedicated chargers which are more like $500+. Here's what I have, and some alternatives:

https://audiovideo2go.com/nissan-leaf-charger/ $385 since discontinued, used to be ~$200

https://www.vevor.com/portable-ev-charger-c_11497 $115 and up

My point though was that EVs should come with cords like every other appliance. Ideally the car itself would be able to take up to 480V AC/DC and "just work", no charging standard needed. But external power supplies like these have the advantage of being easily replaced.

Another gripe I forgot to mention is that pretty much no EV can charge while driving, which prevents putting solar panels on the roof. There's no engineering reason for this, so I think it's another plot to slow the inevitable designs which Aptera and Lightyear are pursuing. Thankfully there's an adapter to make it work:

https://us.ecoflow.com/products/portable-power-station-groun...

Unfortunately it only works with EcoFlow's power stations, and they're one of the companies trying to get people to buy two at 2x cost to reach 240V.

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#483
post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People also made the argument that the exclusivity of the Tesla supercharger network was a positive for Tesla. It's hard for both to be true. I think the reality is that uncertainty about charging away from home pushed a lot of people towards Tesla who might otherwise have considered a different make/model. With that gone, a moat vanished. That being said, competition in the US EV market is still weak. Maybe the adde…

Times change and companies need to adapt with the times. 2015-2022, exclusivity would be a huge positive for Tesla. Their vehicles would have lots of charging stations while other vehicles wouldn't. That's great for Tesla. When the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure plan, it became clear that CCS would become the dominant charging standard in the US - unless Tesla acted fast. Tesla's port would go from an advan…

Good take, I think that’s accurate. Part of me still wants to believe that Tesla as a company also just wants to help speed up the global transition to EVs (more than they already have). Maybe that’s naive though.

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#484

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A large number of standards are what one company did on their own and then made available to everybody via the likes of ANSI/ECMA/ISO. There are a number of reasons a company would want to do this.

This is basically how USB C became a thing. A group of engineers at Google created the connector design and then gave it to the USB standards body to use as the next gen.

TIL, one more terrible design I can thank Google for!

Maybe in another 30 years we’ll get a properly symmetrical design with something approaching lighting’s durability.

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#485
post #195

I am the founder of Starlight Charging[1]. We are working on crazy-low-cost L2 chargers for multifamily apartments. Plug-and-charge is a sine-qua-non for us. One still major unsolved problem is the lack of agreement on a standard for payment/powerline communication from the EVSE to the vehicle. OCPP 2.0.1 and ISO 15118 is supposed to bring "Plug and Charge" capabilities -- this, in theory, would allow drivers to simp…

How are you still in business when everyone will use Teslas standard chargers?

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#486
post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea if Google had anything to do with USB C but "design" doesn't mean "build schematics for". It could be that they just had a few specs they liked and thought would make a good connector and did a rough proposal of form factor and specs.

That's not useful. Here's my diagram for a new connector -> . Connector design like this is a delicate balance between signal integrity (wants biggger) and mechanical integrity (wants bigger) and size (always smaller). As for signal integrity: A lot of the signal integrity was papered over by having complex interface chips. This is why there is so much training and negotiation in USB-C. As for mechanicals: The whole…

In practice none of that is true, the cables hold up fine and the ports wear out. Lightning was a FAR superior design and form factor to USB-C, where what you’re suggesting was actually the case.

I have never encountered an iPhone with a dead lightning port, it’s always the cable that wears out. There’s tons of laptops and android phones with worn out USB-C ports

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can plug in at home and use chargers very rarely. After a year or so, I’m yet to try use one. I guess this very much depends on your driving patterns.

Anyone who has an ICE car will probably still prefer that for long trips. Most people are multiple car families and so will have that choice today. Even if the EV was the choice, a lot of people will fly (or take a train) for longer trips and so never hit the limits.

The free standard autopilot on teslas makes highway driving much less taxing. I also have an ICE car, but will always take the Tesla on long road trips. Charging stops make the trip take maybe 10% longer, but that’s fine with me.

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#488

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better maintained than the horror show that is Electrify America as well

I've posted about this before, but the reason EA is such a horror show is due to their history. EA was created basically as government-mandated punishment against Volkswagen for dieselgate. So it's not that surprising that they didn't feel incentivized to deliver a great product. Compare that to the Supercharger network, where providing a great experience is a huge selling point for Teslas. I might despise Musk, and…

> I might despise Musk, and I'm not a fan of Tesla lately

I’m getting sick of this tiptoeing in every thread that mentions Tesla. No ones going to come to your house and beat you if you say something positive, un-hedged, about Tesla

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#489

This makes me sad in a way that's a little hard to articulate. But I'll try! I plug my $9000 2013 Nissan Leaf into an ordinary 120V extension cord each night so I can commute to a neighboring city for work, and the electricity costs me $20/mo. I also have a 1986 Toyota pickup like on Back to the Future that I had to gas up every other week, using 30 gallons of gas per month and costing over $100. So the operating cos…

The reality is that particularly in winter and outside, most recent EV cars will barely gain any charge from a 120V standard power outlet - keeping the battery conditioned eats up all of that power.

That hasn't been my experience charging outside in the northwest with average winter temperatures.

But the charger does power a heater to keep the batteries around freezing, so you're right, it's better to charge in a garage. And cold weather causes additional losses, but I would expect no more than 20% or so. I lose 10% range just by running the dashboard heater.

Re: Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi say they will use Tesla's EV charging plug

#490

I think people are missing the big story here. This is Tesla winning the charging network battle (it wasn't close before this). Any EV car (which will eventually be all cars) will immediately be available for Tesla's supercharger network. This gives Tesla a massive revenue stream and scale to grow that network even bigger. Anyone who wants their superchargers has to also support all Teslas.

Nah. The real win here is for the public. The "standard" charging plug and cables weigh a LOT, so much that my elderly mother probably couldn't use one. The "standard" also mandates the use of PowerLine Communication chips even though the signal is not over the high power conductor. We are all better off just biting the bullet now and changing everything over to the Tesla plug.

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