EV charger dropping to 6A

I have recently has a GivEnergy 7kwh charger installed, just bought a VW ID.7 and on Octopus intelligent go. On the GivEnergy app I have set to charge at maximum, but everytime the app refreshes it changes back to 6A so I only get max 2kwh charging. It means my car is never charging up fully on the off peak rates and now my home battery isn't charging over night either. I have checked the car setting, they are set to charge at max available. There doesn't seem to be any settings I can change in the Octopus Energy app. So that just leaves GivEnergy. I have GivEnergy battery and inverter too.

adamrobinson

Hi. In the GivEnergy app and under the EV Charger section there is a Settngs option. Under Change EV charger Configuration have you got it set to Standaline (grid charging) ?

SteveClubley no it's on the Invertor control for grid and solar

Also Check your car settings and make sure you haven't accidentally enabled current limiting (Its what Skoda calls it but think its the same name in ID software) I think that limits charging to 2 kWh

adamrobinson

Try it in Standalone mode. Also as DreadorUK says make sure the car is set so that ‘Reduced AC charging current’ is set to off. Do it in the car itself if possible because if you haven’t already realised the VW app is cr*p as it doesn’t always sync settings with the car.

SteveClubley yes tried in stand alone mode last night and charged at 7kwh, so a result. However my home battery keep changing it's setting to charge at 0 power so that didn't charge. Will try again tonight.

Good news about your EV charging rate.
I also charge my 8.2kW battery during the same hours. Using the setting cog on the Home Screen in the app I set two charge periods and a slower charge rate as per these screen shots

Just a follow up on this, whenever I have my EV charger set to inverter controlled it always only ever charges at maximum 2kwh as it auto changes the setting to limit to 6a. So I get through my off peak window and it has only partially charged the car. If I change it to stand alone I can charge at over 7kwh but uses my home battery even though I have this set to not to. Can't win!

adamrobinson

Try setting the house battery to charge at the same time. Use a really slow charge rate if you don’t want to charge it for some reason but why not anyway as it will be a the same cheap rate.

I am still having this same problem, I have tried all settings, any other advise?

I am still having this same problem, I have tried all settings, any other advise?

I am having the same/a similar problem, but with different hardware.

I have a zappi charger, and use IOG. I find that charging often happens at a very low power, but then often increases to the maximum 7kW usually after some hours.

Using Home Assistant I can track the PWM of the zappi and see that it falls to a low level at the times when the charge power is reduces.

I have an open ticket with myenergi to try and track down the reason for this.

adamrobinson

Have you checked the EV Charger and Inverter sections of your GivEnergy portal just in case there are any settings that are not set as you think they should be?

If you have the Fixed Export tariff the ideally you want both your car and house battery to charge from the grid at the IOG off peak rate and any excess solar to export. So keep EV Charger set to Standalone mode.

SteveClubley if i set my ev charger to stand alone though it drains my house battery, there is no setting to stop that from happening in stand alone mode

adamrobinson

Hi Adam, I agree that when Standalone mode is selected in the mobile app then the option to prevent battery discharge is not visible. I was wondering though if there is a field in the inverter settings that are visible on the cloud portal that is not set correctly. There are 10 charge and 10 discharge fields that can be set for different times. Sometimes the mobile app doesn’t set or unset these. Does yours have discharge ones set? One suggestion is to make sure there is one set to charge between 23:30 and 00:00 and another from 00:01 to 05:30. The principle being that if set to charge then the battery should not discharge.

Yes I have it set so it doesn't discharge during those hours, I am on Octopus intelligent though so sometimes it gets my car to charge at random times. Looks like I am either going to have to suck it up and accept the battery discharging or get off the intelligent scheme. Frustrating.

adamrobinson Looks like I am either going to have to suck it up and accept the battery discharging or get off the intelligent scheme. Frustrating.

Its been said a few times, you just need your CT clamps repositioning and possibly your EV charger connection changing so that your inverter can’t “see” your EV load. Then you can charge your EV with no risk of the batteries discharging into it

Geoffrey - If the CT clamp positioning prevented the inverter from ‘seeing’ the EV charger then wouldn’t that prevent charging the EV from solar IF that was required? I get that grid charging is usually preferred.

Adam - I’m on IOG and Octopus try sometimes to charge my EV (also a VW) in peak times but the GivEnergy EV schedule I have set for the off-peak charging prevents that taking place. In the Octopus app on the Devices tab I have ‘smart control’ turned off. My inverter is a Gen 3. You say you have discharge disabled but do you have charge enabled for the house battery?

SteveClubley Geoffrey - If the CT clamp positioning prevented the inverter from ‘seeing’ the EV charger then wouldn’t that prevent charging the EV from solar IF that was required? I get that grid charging is usually preferred.

No that should still be OK. If the EV tap-off and its CT clamp is positioned first, nearest the meter, and then the inverter CT clamp and inverter is ‘downstream’ the inverter can’t “see” any charge going into the EV.

In. terms of solar charging, depends what you are trying to do with the solar. If the solar generation is being exported then the EV CT will see it an should be able to charge from it. What you wouldn’t be able to do is push solar generation into the EV in preference to it going to the batteries unless you set the batteries to stop charging. If in Eco mode then the batteries would charge first, and only when full would excess solar go to the car.

geoffreycoan you just need your CT clamps repositioning and possibly your EV charger connection changing so that your inverter can’t “see” your EV load.

Does that work for GE's own chargepoint? I assumed it shared that infrastructure with the inverter.

DD no idea sorry. There are modes on the EVC to integrate to the inverter but from what I’ve seen here some people have reported problems with the integration between the GivEnergy EV charger and GivEnergy inverters so I don’t know how well it works or doesnt in practice