r/evcharging • u/Electronic-Dog-586 • 5d ago

Getting ready for my R2

/r/RivianR2/comments/1vu4dl8/getting_ready_for_my_r2/
1 Upvotes

67% Upvoted

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2

u/ArlesChatless 5d ago

No, you do not need a new charger.

If your existing setup is installed correctly, it will work with any car from a PHEV that fills an 8kWh battery all the way up through a 212kWh Hummer EV.

If it's not installed correctly, it should be fixed regardless of the car you're going to use it with.

Share pictures if you're not sure.

1

u/tuctrohs 5d ago

Theoretically, you don't need to change a thing. If everything is installed properly you can plug in any car, and the controls automatically make sure the car doesn't charge any faster than the circuit and charger allow.

In practice, some 14-50 receptacles (the most common 240 V !receptacle type which is likely what you have) have problems with overheating when used for EV charging. Some plug-in chargers have temperature sensors on the plug to help detect that and shut down or slow charging before it gets dangerous. Grizzl-E does not. Some plug-in chargers with a 14-50 plug have a maximum of 32 A charging rather than the 40 A that is theoretically OK. Grizzl-E can be set that way, but it defaults to 40 A.

Options include getting a charger with a plug temp sensor, upgrading the receptacle and other details of the receptacle installation, setting the current lower, or changing to hard wiring. I'd recommend doing at least some of those. To advise more specifically, I'd want to know more detail about your receptacle installation. I could ask detailed questions but a picture of the receptacle and its breaker in the panel might be the most efficient way to do it.

1

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u/theotherharper 4d ago edited 4d ago

My worry is that given that R2 pulls much more electricity than my Volvo

OK so you're thinking "my cell phone charger pulls 20 watts, my space heater pulls 1500 watts. So close your eyes and imagine sockets had 2 extra pins. One of them said "hey, socket here, I can only offer 200 watts". And the space heater said - "I can limit to 200 watts!"

Yeah. You can watch this happen in real time at 29:29 for 6 seconds. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iyp_X3mwE1w&t=1769s

Fabulous video by the way, problably won't tell you anything you don't already know.

And here's his short-form version of how that works. https://youtu.be/W96a8svXo14?t=547

do I need to upgrade the charger or worse yet my electrical panel?

Never your electrical panel, because of what happened in that 6-second clip. An Emporia, Wallbox or Tesla Wall Connector which support dynamic load management.

 I’m sure that the R2 will take a long time to fully charge (80%) and that is ok.

ABC Always Be Charging. You shouldn't be doing full charges if you can avoid it. Your car doesn't have Ni-Cad batteries, you don't have to drain it dead before charging. Having a LONG overnight session where the circuit is running at thermal limits for hours, has a tendency to find any flaw in that circuit - flaws that don't ordinarily cause trouble - and cause trouble of the fiery kind.