question of the week a viewer asked me can you survive charging your electric
car regularly off of just a 120 volt outlet the answer is yes but it depends
on how much you're driving on a daily basis in the North America there's
generally two regularly common styles of 120 volt outlets we have the NEMA 515
which is a 15-amp outlet provides 12 amps per hour charge rate and the NEMA
520 which is a 20 amp outlet and provides up to 16 amps continuous charge
rate the difference is about 30 to 33 percent faster or higher charge rate
with the 20 amp if it's available generally you're gonna see the 15 amp in
older construction older homes and residential setting whereas you're gonna
see the 20 amp moreso in commercial apartment buildings newer apartment
buildings condos and most mostly new construction now the charge rates are
going to get you're gonna get roughly three to five miles per hour range back
with the 15 amp adapter and roughly 5 to 10 miles per hour back with the 20 amp
adapter now charge rate is also gonna vary depending on the line voltage the
lower the voltage is the less power you're going to get the average is going
to always be the same but the amount of power you can get at that amperage is
going to be lower volts times amps equals watts on a day-to-day basis
Mobe will base it off of you know an overnight charge you're gonna get
roughly forty to sixty miles range back with the 15-amp outlet or adapter with
the 20 amp adapter you're gonna get roughly 60 to 100 miles back per night
so factor that think of it this way if you're driving less than you're gaining
back see where I'm going with this if you're getting if you're driving less
than you're gaining back on a day-to-day basis you will be just fine charging off
of 120 volt outlet or if say you don't drive a lot for a couple days
and then you do some more driving you can Bank it's it's not like it just
disappears you can bank your power so if you have
like three days where you're not driving very much you can get back 150 200 miles
of range I mean if you're flat then you're going too full
you're only looking at four days and you got a full charge so it can really add
up plus if you have the option of say a supercharger nearby and I'm at the
newly-opened Oak Creek supercharger it's actually pretty close to my home it's
only about a five minute drive to get here and it just opened up last week
Friday so three days ago just giving that test out makes it a lot easier on a
regular day-to-day night to night usage you plug in at home and on those
occasions were you know you're gonna need more plug in at a supercharger or
find a public Jay 1772 240 volt station or a high powered wall charger somewhere
and you can you can always Bank up or top off a little more than yet to help
you along your way it's perfectly fine to do don't hesitate at using the
supercharger network it's here for you to charge don't feel bad now if you're
charging up everyday at that supercharger at that point yeah try and
find a way to get a 240 volt outlet for you to charge off that that being said
there are ways also if you if it's not cost-effective to run a new higher
powered outlet or line to your garage or your parking space you could very well
convert an existing 120 volt outlet to a 240 volt outlet a couple requirements
you're gonna have to consult an electrician for your specific for your
specific case but it's it's generally okay
especially if it's a dedicated outlet say you have you live in a condo and you
have your own garage and your garage has a dedicated outlet for you and you're
using using it to charge your cars 120 volts say a 20 amp outlet you can
convert that 20 amp outlet from 120 volts to a 200
volts you switched out the single pole breaker put in the tool pole to pole
breaker tandem breaker and now you've got 240 volts going to that outlet now
you're gonna also have to change the plug plug Stiles so someone doesn't go
plugging in you know a random object or item into that outlet and frying it
because it's expected they're expecting 120 volts so you'd have to put in that
240 volt outlet but now you can charge at twice the speed double the voltage
you'd double the amount of power to the car actually a little more than that
because the 120 volt car charging at 120 volts is not as efficient as it is on
240 you're looking at about 70% charging efficiency on 120 volts and
approximately I believe it was around close as 90% efficiency at 240 volts and
you Tesla does have 20 amp 240 volt adapters available now even more with
the new UMC's that are that are they're releasing for the model threes and
they're also I think supplying those for the Model S and X now I have the the
old-style which is has overall faster charge for up to 40 amps whereas the new
style has a maximun I believe of 32 amps so you can always use the same out in
the same way run as long as you match the correct amperage outlet and breaker
for the wiring so if it was a 15-amp outlet before at 120 volts it has to be
a 15-amp outlet at 240 volts now I also say don't do this unless it's a
dedicated outlet so if so if that same garage outlet and I mean that's supposed
to share outlets from like a garage on the same breaker as you know inside the
house it really shouldn't do that but come on we all know electricians take
shortcuts all the time things don't happen how they're supposed to so if
it's a shared outlet with other areas of the house don't do it but if it's a
dedicated outlet just for your garage just for you to charge
maybe you think about having an electrician come out and convert it it's
relatively cheap you're actually looking at only maybe thirty dollars not even in
part see me a circuit breaker and a new outlet plug style a new new outlet to
plug into so um what would have been 40 to 60 miles per night is now 80 to 120
miles per night what was sixty to a hundred is now 120 to 200 miles per
night it's a big difference plus you know you
have a factor in the increased efficiency so yes you can survive off of
a hundred twenty L outlet 120 volt outlet and my friend Robert who's
probably watching us right now he did so for almost a year until we finally said
I finally said come on let's put that NEMA 1450 in there and now he has a 1450
now he just needs another car to plug into it but in the meantime he's also
using it for his generator for backup power so that's that yes you can survive
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