please recommend me a charger

[johnmfriend]

I went to Fully Charged Outside Show last Sunday. There were a lot of charger vendors there. I spoke to about half-a-dozen of them. My particular use case is that I want to be able to connect up solar panels to the charger. My favourite, having spoken to them all, was WallPod from RolecEV. Previously, I had been expecting to buy MyEnergi's Zappi (spoke to them too). There is a new version of the WallPod coming out in six weeks, so I'm going to wait for that. I also spoke to HyperVolt (seemed ok), Ohme (the ugliest charger of the lot in my opinion), and someone else.

A specific advantage of the WallPod if you have solar panels is that it doesn't need an extra cable. It's made in the UK, along with some of the others including MyEnergi.

[MotMot]

Wallpod is a Spanish company and made in Barcelona iIRC… not that it should matter.

Also I think all chargers require an extra wire / sensor for switching on when solar is charging. It’s a sensor that goes on your electricity supply to measure how much surplus you are making from the panels - and when it’s above a certain point it starts charging to the level of the solar surplus.

On SpeakEV there is some criticism (not sure if it’s justified) that the main controlling board on the wallpod is a (slightly) out of date raspberry pi. Which is OK except the memory cards the OS runs off tend to fail after a few years of continuous use (memory cards have a set lifespan apparently). Also users have commented that the LED ring is very very bright and can’t be turned down.

Again - none of this may be important but perhaps worth thinking about.

If you dig around the forums (there are loads of posts about this) there seems to be some issue with nearly every charger brand.

To me it’s a real minefield getting the right charger - and I’m not sure There is a clear market leader at all.

[degur]

I went for a SyncEV charger, which is a nice unit. Very minimal. However, the fitter stuck a white waterproof consumer unit where I explicitly said I didn’t want it. Not had a chance to try it out yet, but it looks nice and the app seems handy.

Only problem is it relies on the built in sim for connectivity because I can’t work out how to get it to play nicely with my Virgin wireless hub.

[bitmanEV]

Wallpod is a Spanish company and made in Barcelona iIRC… not that it should matter.

Also I think all chargers require an extra wire / sensor for switching on when solar is charging. It’s a sensor that goes on your electricity supply to measure how much surplus you are making from the panels - and when it’s above a certain point it starts charging to the level of the solar surplus.

On SpeakEV there is some criticism (not sure if it’s justified) that the main controlling board on the wallpod is a (slightly) out of date raspberry pi. Which is OK except the memory cards the OS runs off tend to fail after a few years of continuous use (memory cards have a set lifespan apparently). Also users have commented that the LED ring is very very bright and can’t be turned down.

Again - none of this may be important but perhaps worth thinking about.

If you dig around the forums (there are loads of posts about this) there seems to be some issue with nearly every charger brand.

To me it’s a real minefield getting the right charger - and I’m not sure There is a clear market leader at all.

We presently employ approximately 175 personnel in our purpose-built office, showroom, warehouse and two factory complexes in Boston, Lincolnshire - in addition to having a distribution network of representatives in over 40 countries.

source; https://www.rolecserv.com/about-us

[MotMot]

Oh crap - I was thinking of wallbox (BOX) not pod! sorry!! I should have read your post properly.

Have a google for Rolec and problems.

[bitmanEV]

Yeah the first batch of Rolec WallPod's had problems with the RCBO burning (Neutral) up but easy to replace as modular concept

Own one my self but hacked it to make it better