She went for a chai and a breakfast burrito. 20 minutes later she calls me and I think the worst.

She sat in the back seat of her Ioniq 5 to feed our skittish puppy a pup cup. With the child safety locks on. And she couldn't get out.

We had a laugh, and I got a kiss from the damsel in distress! ♥️💋

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[–] 6 points 3 days ago (6 children)

I highly, highly recommend that you get a hardwired charger instead of just a 240V outlet. The proper outlet to install is like $100 (and your electrician might try to cheap out with improper parts to beat other estimates, or he might not know better, or he might charge for that but give you a shitty, cheap outlet which could be a fire hazard), and it's gonna require running GFCI for it which will add even more cost, and realistically you're either never unplugging your charger or you're unplugging it so much that you're gonna do a lot of wear and tear damage. I don't think you're realistically gonna be bringing a 240V charger with you anywhere just to plug into another 240V outlet. The only legitimate reason to want the outlet is if you have your clothes dryer nearby and you're swapping which thing is plugged into that outlet, but even then there are smart swapping outlets that can accept both plugs and just redirect current whichever way you want at the time.

I also recommend you run at least a 60A line for this to allow 48A (80% continuous load) charging. Any lower and you're risking having to upgrade at some point in like 10 years just because less is enough now, but it's an investment for your home as much as it is useful for your current situation. Maybe 500+ mile battery tech is right around the corner, and you decide to just charge once a week or something. Who knows. But cutting into the walls and running cable costs the same no matter what the amperage is, unless they need to charge slightly more for thicker gauge or something, but that's negligible.

I opted for a universal charger just so it works with either form factor. But that's up to you. There is now a decided standard, so go with that if you want. I just had my equipment installed before knowing what car I was getting, and that was fortunate because I picked a Bolt EUV which is not the NACS plug type. If I had chosen NACS only, I'd have to fiddle with an adapter every day, and that's just another potential point of failure.

Good luck!

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  • [–] 6 points 3 days ago (1 child)

    I highly, highly recommend that you get a hardwired charger instead of just a 240V outlet.

    Consider the plan to allow for swapping the connection at the car every few years as tech drifts (away from tesla). You may need to swap the end every now and then, and that once in a blue moon it's a 10-sec thing instead of a self/contract plug change.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 days ago

    The Tesla connection is the NACS standard now. But you're right, just like with mini, then micro, now C type USB, standards will change with time. Hopefully, the standard changes won't really affect level 2 charging design, but I'm not a soothsayer.

    I could be wrong, but I think most if not all chargers are pretty easy to replace the plug to the car, since I'm sure people drop them and break them often enough. And maybe some people discover that they need a longer cable and buy one aftermarket to throw in there. Even outside of updates, it's a good idea to see what that process is like. I gotta check mine lol.

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  • [–] 5 points 3 days ago (3 children)

    Wow, thank you for the solid advice! I was planning to do a portable installation as I'm not too concerned about charge speeds, unless there's more to it than that. Futureproofing with more robust hardware is a good idea nonetheless. Honestly trying to keep the process relatively unexpensive, but I've gotten nothing but. First two estimates (mind you for just for the outlet and run) have been $1500 and $2800, and I've heard most of these installs are sub-$1k, and it's not a long run ,~20ft, half through floor beams. I know copper is going up, but wth.

    Anywho, sorry for derailing from cute cat stuff.

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  • [–] 3 points 3 days ago (2 children)

    Yeah, I think mine was like $1500, plus I provided the charger for like $600. It would've cost more but I closed up the drywall holes myself afterward since that was gonna cost like an extra $500. Definitely ask in your estimates what your walls will look like when the work is done so you know what to expect for your money.

    It's a capital investment, but ideally the investment pays off when you rent or sell. Not to mention, a "tank" of fuel costs 1/4 what you're used to, and you avoid other trips or waiting because it charges while you sleep. Depending on your driving, the ROI might be like 2-3 years.

    Because of aforementioned charging while I sleep, it gave me extra peace of mind to opt for the hardwired choice due to the small but still possible risk of fire that comes with trusting somebody to do due diligence with regards to code and rating. It was also the cheaper option for me, but it's always worth asking for both estimates, itemized.

    If you trust yourself with electrical work (and it's totally okay if you don't) you could probably do this job yourself over a weekend with some YouTube tutorials for under $500 (plus charger cost). The guy I hired took like 2 hours, but I'd definitely make multiple hardware store runs and probably have to fix a disastrous whoopsie or two lol.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 day ago (1 child)

    Yeah, no lol. I fix computers, but the only electrical I've ever done is replace light switches with dimmers, and even then I was running back and forth tot he breaker box to confirm power was off. I don't trust myself with 50A+, not by a long shot.

    I got my third quote and it comes to $1800 plus charger purchase. I'm split, because the $1500 estimate is from the OG builders of our house, but this quote is from my local brewery owner who praised them for the work on his own charger setup. I'm leaning towards the latter though. Plus, they itemized in advance as well. Downside is drywall patching isn't included, but I hope the access holes they'll be using the route cables will be minimal and I can personally patch them.

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  • [–] 2 points 21 hours ago

    It's worth asking for them to try to keep the holes they cut out intact so you can just plug the holes without having to buy and cut drywall to fit. It's not super complicated. You can find simple, short tutorials on YouTube like I did. You just need some cheap supplies and a power drill.

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