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Mike W.

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Discussion starter · #1 ·
Can I charge my Rav4 Prime plug-in at these local ChargPoint charging stations? I have a 6.6KW battery. Somewhere I thought I read that these are for all electric vehicles and would charge extremely fast and damage your battey.
Is that possible?
 
#5 ·
jazhanel said:
I do not use ChargePoint because they charge 49 cents per KWH, which is more expensive than running gasoline. My home electric rate is 13 cents on peak, 12 cents off peak for reference.
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There are chargers recently installed at a local Kroger store and they charge $0.30 per minute which seems an odd way to bill but maybe this just keeps folks w/ Level 1 chargers away. Not sure what that would come out to per kWh but I guess a 6.6kW charger would take about 2 hours from zero to fully charged? Our rate is about 10-11 cents off peak so we charge overnight with the OEM charger, which is a gasoline equivalent of about $1.65/gallon.
 
#6 ·
Mike W. said:
Can I charge my Rav4 Prime plug-in at these local ChargPoint charging stations? I have a 6.6KW battery. Somewhere I thought I read that these are for all electric vehicles and would charge extremely fast and damage your battey.
Is that possible?
Click to expand...
That depends. If they are Level 2 chargers, they will work fine with the R4P. If they are DC Fast Chargers, they will have a CCS plug and will not work with the R4P.

By the way, you don’t have a 6.6kW battery. Your battery capacity is 18.1kWh and your onboard charger is 6.6kW.
 
#7 · (Edited)
Mike W. said:
Can I charge my Rav4 Prime plug-in at these local ChargPoint charging stations? I have a 6.6KW battery. Somewhere I thought I read that these are for all electric vehicles and would charge extremely fast and damage your battey.
Is that possible?
Click to expand...
Question 1: Can I charge my Rav4 Prime plug-in at these local ChargPoint charging stations?
Answer 1: Yes, provided it has a J1772 plug.

Statement 2: I have a 6.6KW battery.
Response 2: You have a 6.6kw Charger (Inverter) onboard the vehicle (If you have a XSE w/ PP). Toyota does not list the battery kwh capacity in the manual.

Statement/Question 3: Somewhere I thought I read that these are for all electric vehicles and would charge extremely fast and damage your battery.
Response/Answer 3: The RAV4 Prime can only take Level 1 (normal 110VAC outlet) and Level 2 (220VAC outlet) EVSE charging. It can not accept Level 3 Fast charging.
 
#11 ·
NoelinColorado said:
There are chargers recently installed at a local Kroger store and they charge $0.30 per minute which seems an odd way to bill but maybe this just keeps folks w/ Level 1 chargers away. Not sure what that would come out to per kWh but I guess a 6.6kW charger would take about 2 hours from zero to fully charged? Our rate is about 10-11 cents off peak so we charge overnight with the OEM charger, which is a gasoline equivalent of about $1.65/gallon.
Click to expand...
6.6KW charger will take in 6.6KWH per hour, divided by 60, that is .11KWH per min. At $.30 per min, that is $2.70 per KWH!!!. Major rip off.
 
#14 ·
Mike W. said:
Can I charge my Rav4 Prime plug-in at these local ChargPoint charging stations? I have a 6.6KW battery. Somewhere I thought I read that these are for all electric vehicles and would charge extremely fast and damage your battey.
Is that possible?
Click to expand...
As has been stated, Charge Pointe EVSE's are Level 2 chargers and will not hurt your car. As far as their rates, I wouldn't know because the 2 Charge Pointe EVSE stations I use are free (one in the downtown area where I live and the other in a municipal area where my daughter lives).

They are perfect for my RAV4 Prime but do take more time to charge then the DC EVSE Fast chargers I used to use at Electrify America on my 2021 BEV Mustang Mach E. The RAV4 cannot use a Level 3 charger however.
 
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#15 ·
Illinibird said:
As has been stated, Charge Pointe EVSE's are Level 2 chargers and will not hurt your car. As far as their rates, I wouldn't know because the 2 Charge Pointe EVSE stations I use are free (one in the downtown area where I live and the other in a municipal area where my daughter lives).
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ChargePoint also makes DC fast chargers, so you can't just assume that all ChargePoint stations are Level 2.
 
#16 ·
generaltso said:
ChargePoint also makes DC fast chargers, so you can't just assume that all ChargePoint stations are Level 2.
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True but you would not be able to connect the Level 3 EVSE to the charge port of the RAV4 Prime. All of the Charge Pointe EVSE charge stations I have seen have been Level 2 around where I live (and where my daughter lives) with the exception of one. But you're right, you can't assume every single one is Level 2.
 
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#17 ·
A level three charging station frequently requires a fairly expensive upgrade to the local utility lines. Just like a house, the utility substations have circuits and the number of customers and loads on each circuit is based on an assumed load per customer that generally does not include a large 3 phase 460 volt load like a level 3 charger. The local utility in my town claims that they will need to make 2 million dollars in upgrades to the local transmission system to be able support a level 3 charge station. My guess is they are going to have to add an additional circuit at the substation and split up the loads or replace lines and transformers between the substation and the new charger station.. A level 2 charger is far less power demand to support and the utility always has the right to limit the capacity they provide to a customer. If there is a question, they have a right to require an interconnection study where the customer pays for the utility to hire an engineering firm to look at the system impact to supplying that load. Its not cheap and can take 2 to 3 years in some cases and ultimately the customer requesting the load has to pay for the upgrade. My guess is many of the level 2 charge stations have throttling circuitry in them to limit the overall power demand on the utility, if all the charge stations are loaded up they probably throttle the power similar to broad band carriers throttling data speeds in times of heavy use. Note that commercial accounts like a charger station pays fees that consumer does not. They typically pay in addition to power purchases a "demand" fee that "ratchets" for a set period of time. The peak power demand through the meter over a set period (it can range from a month to year) is measured and then a demand fee is charged for the period usally for 12 months or until a new higher demand is set. They also can sometimes pay a capitalization fee based on the peak grid demand during a rate period. There have been cases where non profits have set up charging stations and had to close them as the demand and capitalization fees that they had to pay for months after a demand period when they werent getting charging traffic cost them more than the revenue they were getting.

I have my own level 2 station in the front yard with about 9 KW capacity but with a 3.3 KW charger in my SE it barely works up a sweat with 26 KWhr of power readily available from two forklift batteries. It takes one or two sunny days to top off the big batteries with the solar or I can pull it out of my surplus solar from my other solar panels. I usually just plug into my garage level 2 plug and use my excess solar to charge it and leave the forklift batteries out of the picture due to the lower wire to wire effciency.
 
#18 · (Edited)
In the Metro area of Salt Lake City ChargePoint are Level 2 with an output of 6.6 kWh

My Rav 4 is 3.3 kWh which means I am only utilizing 1/2 what the ChargePoint is capable of delivering.

My home charger is a Muststart 40 Amp plugged into a breaker that is 50 amps.
Anything over 16 amps is overkill for a 3.3 kWh charger , but I may buy an EV car in the future so I decided to over build.

I also like that the cord is only pulling 16 amps through a 40 amp rated cord so overheating should not be an issue.
 
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