Mike, Thanks. Your approach makes sense.
I don't actually have access to a 220v outlet at the moment and probably won't until after we finish our move to Portland. I just wanted to know how it would need to be set up. Am running the charger off board for now. Peter On Jul 10, 2013 7:43 PM, "Mike Nickerson" <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Peter, > > I have a similar Elcon charger and went through the same questions. The > charger can switch automatically to the voltage on its inputs. It took > some > wincing the first time I plugged it into 220V, but it did work fine. The > fans are noticeably faster and louder on 220V, since the charger power > output is higher. > > You could make an adapter cord, but I was nervous about having a cord that > had 220v pins on one end and 110v socket on the other end. In the wrong > hands, this could be used to destroy 110V appliances. Kept out of those > hands, it would work fine, though. > > I went a slightly different route. I put a connector on the car that was a > little unusual. I chose a 250V/30A twistlock connector. It was a little > tricky finding the flanged connector I needed for the car, but I found it > mailorder. I wanted the male pins on the car so the cord would have the > female end. The female twistlock was commonly available (Home Depot). > > I then made two pigtails. One was 110V male to twistlock female. The > other > was 220V male to twistlock female. I keep the 220V cord at home and carry > the 110V cord in the car. Some care was required on the 220V cord. The > cord > on the charger is positive, negative, and ground. Luckily, my outlet was > wired that way also (hot, hot, ground). If your outlet is wired as split > 110V circuits with a neutral, care would be required because the third wire > to the charger should be ground instead of neutral. The 220V plug and > socket > are different between hot, hot, neutral and hot, hot, ground. > > On my installation, I wired the ground on the charger and outlet to > chassis > ground for safety. > > The flanged twistlock connector is shown on my evalbum page. > www.evalbum.com/2778 > > The connector in the car is a NEMA L6-30P. I like this because no high > voltage is present on any pins, no matter what is plugged in (or not). > > Mike > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On > > Behalf Of SLPinfo.org > > Sent: Wednesday, July 10, 2013 9:30 AM > > To: Electric Vehicle Discussion List > > Subject: [EVDL] using dual voltage charger > > > > Hi folks, > > > > My Quick Charge Select-A-Charge charger is getting old as are my lead > acid > > batteries in my S-10 http://www.evalbum.com/3739. I've been using them > > for about 2 years and have about 450 cycles on them. > > > > For the past several weeds the charger never seems to get up to the > target > > voltage. The display seems to get stuck at about 55-60% (varies a little > from > > one day to the next) and then it just times out after about 11 hours. > > Using my DVM it looks like it's hitting about 135V or so which is quite > low for > > my 120V pack. Clearly I'm undercharging my batteries. I sort of knew > this > > would happen as I bought the charger used and it's only rated for > batteries > > up to 150 AH and mine are 170 AH Trojan T-875s. It also only puts out > 10 > > amps at 110V so I may have been undercharging since day 1. > > > > Anyway I ordered and have now received an Elcon 2.5KW HF/PFC charger. > > It's supposed to run on both 110V and 220V. I ran it last night on 110V > and it > > seemed to work (though the voltage never seemed to get above 140V on my > > 120V pack - should go to about 165V according to the Trojan algorithm > it's > set > > for). I suspect that the 10 amps it puts out at this voltage just isn't > strong > > enough for these older batteries. So I'm hoping that running it at 220V > (which > > should put out about 18A) will do a better job. > > > > My question is this. The charger comes with what looks like a standard > 110V > > male plug for AC input. How do I hook this up to 220V? There is nothing > > about this in the very minimal manual that came with the charger. > > Do I actually need to change the plug on end of the AC cord? Or is there > > some kind of adapter I can buy so I can use both 110V and 220V as > available > > (that was why I bought this one). I'd like to be able to use public > charging > > stations occasion for example. > > > > - Peter Flipsen Jr > > -------------- next part -------------- > > An HTML attachment was scrubbed... > > URL: <http://lists.evdl.org/private.cgi/ev- > > evdl.org/attachments/20130710/60990ce4/attachment.htm> > > _______________________________________________ > > UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub > > http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org > > For EV drag racing discussion, please use NEDRA > > (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) > > _______________________________________________ > UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub > http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org > For EV drag racing discussion, please use NEDRA ( > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 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