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Old 04-18-2013, 03:11 PM   #9 (permalink)
Blue Angel
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Join Date: Feb 2013
Location: Ottawa, ON, Canada
Posts: 190

Previous Car - '12 Chevrolet Cruze Eco MT
Team Chevy
90 day: 44.29 mpg (US)

535d XDrive - '16 BMW 535d M-Sport
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Quote:
Originally Posted by jamesqf View Post
Except there's still the problem of handling the amount of current it would take to recharge the batteries that quickly.
High voltage/current chargers. That's an infrastructure thing, though, unless you'd want to have one in your house.

What's funny about people's perceptions regarding charging on 110V/15A is they think a car with a large battery capacity needs to be charged over night. What they don't realise is that a 110V/15A circuit can charge enough energy into a car to meet most people's daily driving needs in 9-10 hours.

I did this myself with a JDM iMiEV that I had for a week. Since my daily mileage needs were less than the ~120km range of the car I went two days between charges, about 100km. Plugging it in after 7pm (when our hydro rates drop), it was fully charged the next morning.

Once I depleted it almost completely; I had the Turtle warning light flashing and had driven over 130km when I parked it for the night. I plugged it in at ~10pm, and at ~7AM the next morning (roughly 9 hours) it was reporting a 7/8 charge. It's likely that another hour or so would have had it topped up completely.

This was all done on plugged into a 110V/15A circuit in my garage.

When discussing the Tesla Roadster with the public almost everyone asked the same thing; how long does it take to charge? I can't remember the exact number, but on a 110V/15A circuit it takes something like 36 hours to charge. When given that number most people's reaction was the same, something to the tune of "What good is THAT?". Then I would explain that it would take much less time to charge unless their daily driving requirements were over 300km. Then they would start to "get it".
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2016 BMW 535d
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