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Advantages of Rivian Wall Charger?

rhumbliner

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First, I said "at least 6AWG copper wiring."
I apologize if I came across too harshly. It’s just that I get so tired of people on EV forums throwing out careless electrical advice.

Like you pointed out, changing breakers is easy, but it ignores the fact that you should do a quick load calculation to be certain you’re not overloading your circuit breaker panel. Adding a 70-amp breaker to a 100-amp or even a loaded 200-amp panel is not wise. For example, there are situations where you may have to swap an electric water heater out for a gas heater in order to make room for an EV charger. You should point out these caveats anytime you recommend adding breakers to a panel.

And, as you also pointed out, you advised the OP to use at least 6 AWG, but you failed to add that only 6 AWG THHN copper wire can handle 70 amps and that it must be run in conduit. You run the risk of some DIY’er going to Lowes, seeing NM-B wire and assuming 6 AWG is good enough. Again, you should point out the caveats of your recommendations.

It’s nice that you jump into these threads to help out, but please give some thought to the advice that you offer.
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zymolysis

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I apologize if I came across too harshly. It’s just that I get so tired of people on EV forums throwing out careless electrical advice.

Like you pointed out, changing breakers is easy, but it ignores the fact that you should do a quick load calculation to be certain you’re not overloading your circuit breaker panel. Adding a 70-amp breaker to a 100-amp or even a loaded 200-amp panel is not wise. For example, there are situations where you may have to swap an electric water heater out for a gas heater in order to make room for an EV charger. You should point out these caveats anytime you recommend adding breakers to a panel.

And, as you also pointed out, you advised the OP to use at least 6 AWG, but you failed to add that only 6 AWG THHN copper wire can handle 70 amps and that it must be run in conduit. You run the risk of some DIY’er going to Lowes, seeing NM-B wire and assuming 6 AWG is good enough. Again, you should point out the caveats of your recommendations.

It’s nice that you jump into these threads to help out, but please give some thought to the advice that you offer.
Edit: Apology accepted; thank you.

Okay, let's go back to the OP's original question: "Charging at 50 amps would require a breaker (and wiring) rated for at lest 62.5 amps — which, of course, doesn’t exist. So I’d like to know how they offer a charge rate of 50 amps. "
The OP, for some reason, was stuck on needing a 62.5A breaker in order to "offer a charge rate of 50 amps." I merely pointed out that that was really not an obstacle, since one would go up to the next size breaker (and appropriate wire size). He wasn't actually looking for advice on rewiring his house.
Of course there is a lot of figuring to be done before a major circuit, such as discussed here, is added to a house's wiring. He wasn't asking for that kind of advice - it was more of a rhetorical question. And I didn't pretend to be giving that level of detail about a real-world situation - I was answering it as the rhetorical question I took it to be. Most people, who find themselves contemplating such an addition, will need to involve a professional (designing and/or specifying and/or installing).
As someone else pointed out, EVs seem to have (for the time being) settled on 48A as the maximum charge current on a Level 2 charger, so the difference between 48A and 50A charging (or 60A and 62.5A breakers) is probably moot.
 
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SSteveEV

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Very unlikely.

Earlier Model S and Model X could L2 charge up to 80A, and they had the "High Powered Wall Connector" that supported that.

The difference between charging at 48A or 80A at home overnight was not a deal breaker for anyone.
Even with the 100kwh battery, where a drained battery can't charge overnight at 48A but could at 80A... Nobody cared.

The onboard charger was more expensive, the EVSE was more expensive, the installation of the EVSE was way more expensive... And almost nobody did it.
And for those who did, almost nobody *needed* it.

They no longer ship any cars that can L2 charge any faster than 48A, nor do they sell a wall charger that provides anymore than 48A.

The industry has kinda decided this is the upper end for L2 charging at home. And any more energy needs should be handled by at-work L2 charging, or making L3 charging as plentiful and easy as gas stations.

I don't think this'll change anytime soon, if ever.
.... until someone makes a HummerEV... :eek:
 

SSteveEV

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(Not sure if joking or not, but...)

The Hummer EV AC charging maxes out at 48A.
Was indeed a joke and a raised eyebrow at how long their 212kWh battery takes to fuel up. I thought ours were a long night's sleep!
 

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FWIW, the Rivian app does provide charging history of the Rivian Wall Charger. I'm not proposing this is a better charger than other options, but you can access charging data and history.
I have found my app as of the 29 of Oct ha been giving me to charges for every hookup almost always not every time. It gives 1 with my charger address and 1 with no charger info. The values don't usually match and can be wildly different. Rivian is working on the problem. Anyone else seeing this problem?
 

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If you order the Rivian charger with your vehicle, does it ship ASAP (so you can get it installed ahead of time) or do you get it when the car is delivered? I assume the latter since the cost is bundled with the vehicle, but I wanted to make sure (unless there's some way to pay for just the charger in advance). Thanks!
 

SilverII

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mine shipped the 1 day before pickup day. I paid them 2 days before pickup
 

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Thank you for the information someone else said yes but maybe they didn't know what I meant. Well that kinda sucks the only way to work around that would be to have a smart breaker and do some sort of home automation to shut that thing off when no one is near the house
I bought 2 Autel Maxichargers a couple of weeks ago when Amazon had a $110 off coupon ($449 each). 50A charging, Bluetooth and WiFi connectivity (decent metrics on phone app)and it has RFID connectivity that you can set to lock out unauthorized users. Very solid build quality, 25' charging cable. Great value.
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