As the discussion of electric cars keep trending up, keen to know if anyone here living in an apartment complex owns an electric car? How do you charge/maintain the car, does the strata complex provide specific spaces for EV car to charge?
Or maybe EV cars at this stage are just not for people who live in apartment building? Just can't see how it's going to work out at this stage for apartment resident.
Just use a random power point in the carpark, and an extension lead.
not sure if that's a legal thing to do lol. Once they found out, they will increase the strata fees.
Nothing tells the strata to invest in upgrading infrastructure like this though ;).
You could share this welcome news to the strata committee / manager in your apartment building (depending on the size of your apartment building, your apt may be eligible for government funding)
https://fleetevnews.com.au/government-support-to-build-ev-ch…
Yeah, happened in our building. It was a by-law breach.
Would be a much shorter list if you listed the things that aren't a bylaw breach in apartments.
so EV cars can be charged with a normal power point, no fancy power point required ?Asking as i live in a rented home where garage has few normal power point but since its a rental i cant modify anything without a big hassle.
Yes you can charge with normal power point.
Yes, it's just slower.
You can charge an EV from a normal 240V power point. It won't top you up all the way from empty to full overnight, but if you only drive a short to average distance each day an ordinary domestic point can be enough to top up from.
perfect that works for my use case
@FiDad: Check the vehicle you are contemplating. It should have some info on how much range you can expect per hour from a standard point, or alternatively, how long a charge takes from a standard point. From the there, use your predicted usage to see if you will get enough sparks overnight.
Eg. You drive 10km to work and 20km of errands after hours = 40km. Range is 240km, full charge takes 10hrs. Therefore 40km would take under 2 hrs.
@Euphemistic: So this Kms range does not depend on how much time you spend in the car? What I mean is, say full charge battery can cover 80km, does the Kms coverage get impacted by the traffic jam? Can it completely gone before you even reach the 80Kms because of the traffic?
@Taro Milk Tea: If you arent actually driving along, the motor uses no power. It’s not like ICE where idling waiting to move off burns fuel. The air con and radio will use some, but it’s a small proportion of the overall power usage. Plus, if you are slowing down a lot you’ll get some regenerative power back to thebbattery.
Plus, if you are slowing down a lot you’ll get some regenerative power back to thebbattery.
You have to have sped up a lot, to slow down a lot, so that negates this. 😀
@RockyRaccoon: Might be tongue in cheek, but it’s true. Difference is that when you slow down an ICE vehicle all your petrol turns to heat and brake dust. When you regenerative brake, not all of the energy you put into accelerating is lost.
@Taro Milk Tea: Saw someone did a calculation on this question. EV seems to flip the ICE range assumptions on its head, where it's better in start-stop traffic than on, say, highway.
In Melbourne the rich people in $600k+ 2BR apartments can afford to charge elsewhere.
As above depends on your strata. They probably won't want to spend money it. Then it depends on whether you can figure out how to run a power point (if you can't use some random one in the car park).
Generally strata is useless and you go to meeting and listen to these people talk like they are some kind of big shot in real life. I know of one strata that didn't know they may have gotten defrauded by building manager with duplicate invoices and kick backs for years until almost 5 years after the fact.
Generally strata is useless and you go to meeting and listen to these people talk like they are some kind of big shot in real life.
Never a big fan of Strata scheme, really useless.
But anyway, it'll be borderline impossible to get the approval to make EV charger as the non-EV car owners will not be agreeing to pay their portion for the special levy.
That is why I just can't quiet understand if Australia really wants to start promoting EV cars but they don't have solutions for the apartment residents.
Just pay for wiring a charger to your parking then.
Might be a bit more complicated than that as that charger would need to come off your electricity meter. And the wiring would need approval from strata as it would go through common areas
Might be a bit more complicated than that as that charger would need to come off your electricity meter
Or they can just install a sub meter on the power point and charge the owner for power used. But then on the other hand I am not sure strata is smart enough and their electrical contractor would rather make many thousands and nobody can be bothered to read the meter and bill the owner.
That is why I just can't quiet understand if Australia really wants to start promoting EV cars
There is a lot of vested interests involved. Just look at the idea of buying a hybrid will cut down fuel consumption by 30% (to be conservative) and the decrease in oil dependence yet nobody cares. Victoria used to give $100 off annual registration for hybrids. They took that and said they were concentrating on EVs. Guess what, ended up being an EV road tax and they can't get the ODO submission portal correct.
Federal government's idea of promoting EVs is to make them FBT free. Everyone here got all excited they will get 3 year old EVs with 100km on the ODO and bog standard white (pretty much electric version of hybrid corollas and camrys per what councils buy). FBT saving is like $10k. The government might as well give $3k for all buyers of EVs.
I just can't quiet understand if Australia really wants to start promoting EV cars but they don't have solutions for the apartment residents.
Who is this "they"? Are you wanting everyone else in Australia to pay for EV chargers just for apartment dwellers?
Yes
@Taro Milk Tea: There are solutions for apartment dwellers. They require a little more work than plugging in in your garage though.
But anyway, it'll be borderline impossible to get the approval to make EV charger as the non-EV car owners will not be agreeing to pay their portion for the special levy.
Why would the non-EV car owners want to help pay for this? You want it, you pay. Easy.
Here is a video of a person who got a sparky to get the wiring done to his parking spot linked to his own electricity meter and strata were happy with it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epf6aubGUQg&t=693s
Where can i get a cheap apartment like that?
Here you go, right in Melbourne CBD 1 street away from Queen Victoria Market
Send me a used gift card as a thank you when you got the deal done and dusted.
rich people in $600k+ 2BR apartments
umm, that's not rich.
Melbourne the rich people in $600k+ 2BR apartments can afford to charge elsewhere.
And then over $100k on top of that for the parking space. Which is why a lot of people in the city area rent out their parking.
The one I posted in the link about is $600k - $650k including parking space.
The shocker would probably be the body corporate fees. Probably $10k+ a year.
Must be too many people in that building charging their EV off of common power ;)
@Matt P: Wouldn't be surprised. I know one builder where the common water bill went from $2k to $10k because the building at the back some how started using a tap in the common area next to their building and stored COVID waste there too.
For that much levy, it's better have a EV charging port in the parking lot.
The bigger issue is those that don't have off street parking.
Imagine the trip hazard with all the extension leads over footpaths.
Don't worry they'll jack up the taxes and put a pole next to every parking space so people can charge. $100k per charger I read somewhere. Good luck recovering that money.
$100k for a Level 3 DC charger which is designed to charge your car in half an hour, but a basic level 2 charger is less than a grand. The main cost of putting them in the street will be the local council spending 3 days installing each charger with two sparkies, six people to manage traffic, two to dig a hole and four more to fill the hole in again, but really it won't be harder to install than a parking metre.
I lived in northern Canada for a long time, which meant plugging in a block heater overnight to stop the engine freezing up (it hit -40 there). The townhouse I lived in had outdoor parking, I just had a power cable from the footpath to my car, every spot at the airport had a power cable, plenty of car parks did. It's just something you get used to and it's not hard to install once you get used to the idea that every new build, street works, etc needs to involve installing charging points.
but a basic level 2 charger is less than a grand
To buy the charger. Don't forget the cost of digging up the pavement, getting in traffic control, cost of connecting to mains (if they don't charge you to upgrade the connection).
For a grand you won't get a street side rubbish bin installed.
@freefall101: Point is why would you put in a L2 charger? You know most spaces in like the central business district is like 1 - 2 hr parking. So you'll get 40 kms max in 1 hour. Might has well not install one at all. Install a L3 charger at every street corner rather than a L1 charger in every parking spot.
@netjock: Because the level 3 charger is $100k. And L2 chargers top out at about 100km of charge an hour, depending on how much power is going to them.
Plus the conversation is about those who don't have off street parking, we're not talking CBD 1 hour parking. That's people who don't have a place at home to charge their car and instead park on the street overnight. One L3 on the corner does nothing to help those people.
If you want to full charge your car quickly, go to a charging station, that problem has been solved already. But EVs are designed to be able to trickle charge on a regular basis, that means doing it where your car is parked stationary for long periods of time. For most people, that's their off street parking but for the rest L2 chargers make sense to start rolling out.
But EVs are designed to be able to trickle charge on a regular basis
Trickle charge or slow charge? Or you just trying to making it up so you sound right?
Level 2 charge only does 7kw an hour, here is the link won't even get you 50km. Tesla uses 17kwh per 100kms Link
That's people who don't have a place at home to charge their car and instead park on the street overnight.
You tell me whether there is parking meters on streets with no parking restrictions at every spot? You're from Victoria. Can you imagine the council in Craigieburn, Pakenham etc ripping up the pavement to put a L2 charger outside every house. How much is council rates? Like $2k a year. They drop $20k (lets be very generous) on a L2 charger (not for the charger but the labor and getting materials), how are they going to recover that $20k? Borrow up to their eye balls?
I am for reducing carbon foot print but I think you're just thinking so far outside the box that it just isn't feasible.
@netjock: On street Parker’s are just going to have to organise getting a charge at a charge station. Save money on having a driveway and garage, pay a bit of that back with charge station rates.
@Euphemistic: Probably right. But expecting someone else to bring a charger to the door step of your car for very little outlay is a bit rich.
Trickle charge or slow charge? Or you just trying to making it up so you sound right?
Slow charge, trickle charge, whichever wording works for you. They're not meant to be on L3 chargers daily.
Level 2 charge only does 7kw an hour, here is the link(jolt.com.au) won't even get you 50km. Tesla uses 17kwh per 100kms Link(carsguide.com.au)
Level 2 chargers do 7kw on single phase and 22kw on three phase.
You tell me whether there is parking meters on streets with no parking restrictions at every spot?
What does that have to do with anything? I mentioned it above because it's an example of a cheap installation at the street level, why on earth would they exist where there's no parking restrictions?
I'd lay off trying to argue for argument's sake.
You're from Victoria. Can you imagine the council in Craigieburn, Pakenham etc ripping up the pavement to put a L2 charger outside every house. How much is council rates? Like $2k a year. They drop $20k (lets be very generous) on a L2 charger (not for the charger but the labor and getting materials), how are they going to recover that $20k? Borrow up to their eye balls?
I am for reducing carbon foot print but I think you're just thinking so far outside the box that it just isn't feasible.
You just pulled that $20k out of nowhere to suit your argument, it's not even remotely close to what it would cost to do. A trial in Port Phillip wound up being $5k and was on charged to the individuals - https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/all-charged-up-c…
It doesn't need to be every house either, simply make it a copayment. Much like my council doesn't give me a green bin unless I pay for it, it's not new. Most houses have offstreet parking, apartment buildings will need something specific for their car parks.
You seem incredibly set on this costing ridiculous amounts of money. I know it's common to joke about the cost of government labour (I know because I did it), but if it cost $20k to install a fancy power point the NBN would have cost about $50 trillion.
Level 2 chargers do 7kw on single phase and 22kw on three phase.
You think 3 phase grows on trees. If you look around how many houses have 3 phase and 3 phase upgrade costs.
Enough said from you to tell that you just believe what you believe.
A trial in Port Phillip wound up being $5k and was on charged to the individuals
You don't think it is massively subsidized. If it was that cheap to begin (and profitable) with then it would be open to all comers who want to apply for it.
NBN is already unprofitable even if it doesn't cost $50tn and the high price of internet we must pay as a result (in both monthly and also taxes).
You sound like one of those people who are happy to spend other people's money.
You think 3 phase grows on trees
In houses? No.
Down the street, where council might be installing car chargers? Yes. Every "telegraph pole" (er, power pole) has the three phases, and a neutral.
@NigelPearson: You think wiring up a 3 phase is free? I haven't seen anything that is 3 phase that is cheaper than single phase.
Again someone who thinks everything is "cheap" and someone else could foot part of the bill even better.
There was someone on here or another forum I'm on that saw extension lead over fence and being held up in tree then down to the car…
Just plain rude. That extension cord was meant to be going to the blender next to the park BBQ.
Dont you mean the ice machine?
In Germany, I saw chargers on streets. They were installed at same positions as parking meters, so not a problem at all.
Germany vs Australia - ok
They were installed at same positions as parking meters
Depends on where you live. In Melbourne city they have removed parking meters and it is many meters before you'll find a pay machine for parking.
Not to mention they removed a lot of roadside furniture because it was either dangerous to hit or was frequently being hit and expensive to keep replacing. Things light light poles are often installed behind the footpath now so less chance of cars hitting them.
You need a long extension cord from Germany to Australia… just a bastard when it gets caught on the coral and you have to go diving to fix it
just give the cord some floaties
If you want to make it work, you can make it work. you don’t have to charge at home overnight it’s just convenient if you can. Most would not need a charge daily.
What do apartment dwellers do now for fueling their cars? They go out of their way and fill up the tank at a servo. If you haven’t got a parking space with a charge point, then you need to go out of your way to charge somewhere. Just need to learn when you need to charge, or take advantage of opportunistic charging even if it doesn’t ‘need’ charging (top up while shopping or seeing a movie) This will get easier, more charge points are being installed in shopping centres, work places etc.
yes, it takes long we to charge than to refuel a petrol car, but you don’t need to stand there holding the cable. Plug in, go and do whatever, come back when done.
What do apartment dwellers do now for fueling their cars? They go out of their way and fill up the tank at a servo
Yeah but fueling does not take 30-60 minutes to do.
Yeah, but you don’t have to sit there holding the charge cable either. You can go shopping or grab dinner while it charges. It’ll be more time efficient to charge. Plug, unplug, no waiting for fill.
Plenty of businesses installing chargers because they know you’ll be around for a bit and want something to do.
A friend has this exact same setup. Lives in a large apartment complex, no power in the car park and strata hasn't come to the party, so he uses public chargers. He either uses a point near a dog park and takes the dogs for a run/has breakfast while he waits, or works around other things in his life (shopping, working, etc, etc, etc). He has also taken a laptop and done some work in the car for the time it takes to charge if he needs a top up outside his normal/scheduled charging times.
Electric cars can be charged at supermarkets and other charging stations, having it at home is an added convenience. It shouldn't be a fatal flaw if you don't have access to a powerpoint at home, just fill up as if it were an ICE vehicle.
Super charger are more expensive but still cheaper then Petrol.
Then you have the charging stations in shopping centres and public car park.
In time, council will start building more curbside charging stations.
There's also community based micro-grids.
A few months back there was a horror story of a doctor needing to move out because he couldn't charge his EV at his rental apartment. He even offered to pay for the charging but it was refused by the building management/Strata.
"horror story"
Basically yes he couldn't put EV charging in his rental apartment.
But there was nothing stopping him from charging it at shopping centres etc.
It's not like his car didn't have 600k's range.
More a scare campaign by murdoch again.
Well, I am not on his side. Just because he got an EV doesn't mean others have to give way to him. It made it on the "news" and I didn't want OP to buy an EV and he couldn't charge it at "home."
My local shopping centre charges $10 an hour to park in there
Where do you live?
Double bay in Sydney?
I hope they give the option of free charging included in that.
Do you park there anyway?
Nah ScoMo secretly appointed himself head of newscorp and did it
Sounds like you've just volunteered to spend 2-4 hours 2x a week charging everyones EVs for them!
No home-charging is defintely enough to prevent people getting EVs. There is no way I'd get one unless I had a home-charge solution. Charging in public places sounds like it's a complete mess at the moment.
No home-charging is defintely enough to prevent people getting EVs. There is no way I'd get one unless I had a home-charge solution. Charging in public places sounds like it's a complete mess at the moment.
There's the quiet majority who can get by fine, it's the vocal minority that complain and Murdoch's trashbloids jump on these to fearmonger anyone looking on taking it up. Gotta look after those Oil and gas lobbyists somehow.
@Drakesy: Anyone who uses it as a commuter won't be able to tolerate that kind of use case. And these are the people who should be on EVs first since they have the most environmental impact.
If these concerns are just hand-waved away then EV adoption will be crippled. Even with low adoption it's already a problem - go check out 'Tesla Model 3 & Y Australia' on Facebook to see a list of people frustated with inefficient public charger usage.
Body corporates need to come up with frameworks allowing people to install (and pay for) their own chargers and metering. Councils need to facilitate on-street charing, private or otherwise. The 'quiet majority' of people, particularly in cities, don't have driveways or garages!
@pos: If anything the at home charging is an additional perk, you could never fill your ICE vehicle at home. How is it a problem? Because our government has dragged its feet, favouring oil and gas companies for the last 10 years we're well behind the curve.
Just look at America, adoption is almost too much. The private companies will catch up, but the possibility to charge at work and then power your house during the night is a real thing, effectively giving you free running costs.
@Drakesy: It only takes 2 minutes to refill an ICE, whereas charging can take hours. Supercharging maybe takes 30 minutes if you can find an available free one, but they are often broken or in-use. So not really comparable, is it? Neither me or my partner's work offer charging (which is fairly typical). So at present day, charging at home is effectively essential as it is the only thing the car user can control.
I agree that the government has done almost nothing and has a lot to do! I also suggest you look at your local councillors properly - a lot have a strange strong tendancy against putting in things like kerbside charging (even at home-owner's expense).
horror story
Lol, did you find this on news.com.au?
I have no idea. Probably did. It popped up on my daily round of local news.
This is an issue. If you want to pay to install power socket and your Strata won't let you (even though it doesn't cost them anything) then there's a problem.
This is a problem for now. Rules are hard to change and strata managers don’t like change or expenses.
Forward a few years and I wouldnt be surprised is strata managers are jumping at the chance for a commercial operator to install chargers so they can get a commission on every kw sold through them. Sure, it’ll cost a little more than ‘your own’ power bill, but it’ll be still cheaper than petrol and with competition the rates should be competitive.
I wish you hadn't posted that - I am going to have nightmares for months!
It made sense for the strata of you look into it. They could let him do it and pay for the install, but then the strata worked out that their feeder cable and substation could only support three EV chargers. So they could let him do it, and the next two people, but then the fourth person was an upgrade in the hundreds of thousands. So they chose not to allow him to do it,. This is a massive issue for all apartment buildings.
So their solution is not to let anyone have power in their carpark? That's not really a solution.
If the builder has underspecced the power feed then it might eventually become a problem, but I would only worry about that if there are actually four people wanting to install EV chargers.
I have a Tesla M3 LR and live in an apartment complex without EV charging.
It's absolutely fine, superchargers are fast.
That said, I'd be hesitant if;
a) you were getting a vehicle with a lower range
b) you were getting something other than a Tesla (until the supercharger network is open to all)
Check plugshare/chargefox apps and see what your local charging options are.
Also, I wouldn't bother with a fast charger, if you're topping up each night you'd be fine with standard 240v.
you were getting something other than a Tesla (until the supercharger network is open to all)
Why is this?
I think the new PHEV Outlander seems to be a good option too, though it's not really a full EV
Probably because the Tesla charge network has been developing for the longest and has decent coverage. Other networks are catching up fast and Tesla will realise they can get $ and data from other brands/drivers so they will probably open it up at some point.
We are also at a point where charge plugs are becoming more standard.
Makes sense. Anyway, the pricing for EV cars are still ridiculously expensive anyway, maybe not worth it to buy now.
Not as difficult as some may think. All the cable trays and penetrations tend to be readily available in a car park, so you can get a specialist installer to run a cable directly from your apartment's meter to your personal car spot and then wire up your EV charger that way. All billing is done off your usual bill, and you can lock the EV charger to prevent others from using it.
All the cable trays and penetrations tend to be readily available in a car park,
Is this the one looking like a small box with little circle on it?
Cable trays are just the things hanging from the roof with all the power+data cables on them. Electricians will install the EV charger you provide on the wall of your car spot, then run a cable from the car spot all the way to your meter. It might be in the basement somewhere or on the same floor as your apartment, but there are ways of getting the cables there already.
In our building, we have a charger that is installed in one shared spot, and people pay immediately with a card. We have only a few electric cars in our building, so it is fine, but I cannot imagine how it would work if everyone had one. I guess they would have to introduce more shared spots with chargers.
but I cannot imagine how it would work if everyone had one.
Yeah, this would cause a big issue until everyone owns a dedicated power plug linked to their unit.
a dedicated power plug linked to their unit
A plug might be easy, but I doubt electric circuits in buildings were designed to charge dozens of cars at the same, so that would probably require completely new wiring.
There are load management systems that manage this. Every charger will have a connection back to a control unit which monitors the draw on the building and lowers the charging speed appropriately. It will just mean instead of charging within 3 hours, it might take 9 hours overnight while everyone has their cars plugged in. No re-wiring or modification to the building supply required
It entirely depends on the apartment complex and whether they have charging spots or not. Some do, most don't.