Thermal images of my Rivian home charger

[Engineer]

Warning, nothing actually scientific here… just some interesting pics:

Picked up my R1S on Monday in Richmond VA and drove it to Raleigh NC.

I got all wrapped around the axle on the charger install, going back and forth on wire gauge, conduit size etc…

in the end I installed a 90A sub panel in the garage with a 60A breaker for the charger. I ran 6ga wire from the breaker to the charger in 1” PVC sch 40 conduit.

I decided to take some pictures with my thermal camera to see what the temps of the system are looking like. It was 78 F in my garage and I had been charging at 11.5 kWh for 3 hours prior to taking the photos (was still charging during the photos).

These pics look scarier than they actually are as the camera auto-ranges for the temps in the picture...

The 6 GA wire temps were only mid to high 40’s C, but the charger cable was closer to mid 50’s C where the two coils were touching on top of the charger.

anyway, this makes me feel better about the install, hopefully you guys find this interesting.

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[Donald Stanfield]

I should FLIR mine. I have one of those cameras too and now I'm curious.

 

[Engineer]

I should FLIR mine. I have one of those cameras too and now I'm curious.

I showed you mine now you show me yours.

 

[MountainBikeDude]

My brother in law has a FLIR camera on his phone. Everytime I see one of the photos, I want to steal it from him.

 

[onebadmofo]

My brother in law has a FLIR camera on his phone. Everytime I see one of the photos, I want to steal it from him.

You made me curious so I looked it up. CAT actually has one with FLIR built in and it's reasonably priced too.

https://www.catphones.com/en-us/features/integrated-thermal-imaging/

 

[MountainBikeDude]

You made me curious so I looked it up. CAT actually has one with FLIR built in and it's reasonably priced too.

https://www.catphones.com/en-us/features/integrated-thermal-imaging/

That's the one.

 

[Engineer]

I have the first gen Flir One. Got it back in 2017. Just plugs right into the phone charger port. They have one now that is wireless, which would be nice.

 

[WSea]

Thanks for sharing!

 

[Supratachophobia]

Warning, nothing actually scientific here… just some interesting pics:

Picked up my R1S on Monday in Richmond VA and drove it to Raleigh NC.

I got all wrapped around the axle on the charger install, going back and forth on wire gauge, conduit size etc…

in the end I installed a 90A sub panel in the garage with a 60A breaker for the charger. I ran 6ga wire from the breaker to the charger in 1” PVC sch 40 conduit.

I decided to take some pictures with my thermal camera to see what the temps of the system are looking like. It was 78 F in my garage and I had been charging at 11.5 kWh for 3 hours prior to taking the photos (was still charging during the photos).

These pics look scarier than they actually are as the camera auto-ranges for the temps in the picture...

The 6 GA wire temps were only mid to high 40’s C, but the charger cable was closer to mid 50’s C where the two coils were touching on top of the charger.

anyway, this makes me feel better about the install, hopefully you guys find this interesting.

I find this super cool (pun intended). Very nice work.

 

[dgennetten]

As an electrical engineer, this looks all normal to me. Looking forward to imaging mine when it's installed in a few days!

 

[Count Orlok]

The Predator movies are underrated.

 

[Dark-Fx]

I'd double check the tightness of the terminals on the breaker since the heat looks slightly unbalanced. Could just be a trick because the visible light overlay is offset quite a bit though. I try not to take photos this close with mine when I am showing both things.

 

[Engineer]

I'd double check the tightness of the terminals on the breaker since the heat looks slightly unbalanced.

Hold my beer... BRB...

 

[Engineer]

so i just torqued both ends of the 6 ga.

The charger was ok (12 in-lb) the breaker bottom lug was ok, but the top lug was maybe 1/8th turn more to get back to the spec of 27 in-lb (stated on the side of the breaker).

I'll take another picture next week when I charge again to see if it is more even.

 

[R1Sky Business]

The PREDATOR is watching

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