LEAFfan
Well-known member
LTLFTcomposite said:Um, aren't ALL outlets powered by generators?
Um, no. Mine and a lot of others are powered by the sun. Can you say PVs?
LTLFTcomposite said:Um, aren't ALL outlets powered by generators?
jkirkebo said:I will periodically charge my Leaf from a Honda EU65is generator. This is because I have no power lines to my cabin in the mountains. I can get there by fast chargers, but have to get a full charge before returning to the fast charger. The trip is ~400 miles and I will use about 4 gallons for a full charge (I think...), giving me 100mpg. I think this is better tham using the 45mpg VW Touran 2.0TDI we also have.
LEAFfan said:Um, no. Mine and a lot of others are powered by the sun. Can you say PVs?LTLFTcomposite said:Um, aren't ALL outlets powered by generators?
TomT said:In terms of MPG, maybe. In terms of emissions, definitely not.
jkirkebo said:I will periodically charge my Leaf from a Honda EU65is generator. This is because I have no power lines to my cabin in the mountains. I can get there by fast chargers, but have to get a full charge before returning to the fast charger. The trip is ~400 miles and I will use about 4 gallons for a full charge (I think...), giving me 100mpg. I think this is better tham using the 45mpg VW Touran 2.0TDI we also have.
There is no current path. Your assertion that there is 60V AC "relative" to earth ground would require an earth ground somewhere. You would have to drive a ground rod and connect it to the generator DC side to effect this. The generator works by generating 3-phase AC in an alternator and rectifying it with a 6 diode bridge, then the resulting DC is filto use in a high frequency H-bridge used to generate 60hz sine wave via PWM. The "center" or average of the generator windings is indeed at +/- 60v, but since it's not connected to anything and it's isolated, there is no potential. In the event of an alternator winding insulation failure short to chassis, there would be current flow if you had neutral to chassis bond connected, and the generator would overload. If you didn't have a ground connection bonded, you'd be blissfully unaware of the fault, so one might argue it's actually safer to make the bond.GroundLoop said:Be carefully connecting that generator (EU2000i) Neutral to Ground to appease the EVSE.
My understanding is that the generator's inverter puts out two out-of-phase waves on the Neutral and Hot.
That is 60V AC RMS on each, out of phase to make 120v power.
The typical residential outlet is "split phase" with Neutral grounded at the panel, and 120v on the Hot. (or 240v between two phases, of course).
If you connect Neutral to Ground on the generator, the entire generator frame will carry 60V AC relative to earth ground. I don't know if the EU2000i insulates this well, or if 'ground' is exposed. Likewise for the car, which would now also be hot versus earth ground.
Can anyone confirm?
This seems like a significant hazard if it's true.
LTLFTcomposite said:Hopefully someone like ingineer would weigh in on this, but I think there are two types of generators, ones that run at a constant RPM (3600? or 1800 for diesels?) to produce the 60hz frequency, and others that use the magic of inverters to allow the engine to run at variable speeds. I have a honda 5000w like construction workers use that falls into the former category, while the EU2000 and 3000 most of you are talking about is the inverter type. Don't the constant RPM generators put out a regular sine wave as they are like miniature power plants, while the inverter types only approximate a sine wave?
Are you running the EU2000i units in series or using a transformer? I thought they could only be paralleled. :?Ingineer said:I have a device that will allow hooking two Honda EU2000i's up together to allow charging at 240V / 12A. Unfortunately the 2000's don't quite appear to have enough "oomph" to run the full 240V 16A rate.
A single EU2000i will charge the Leaf at 120V 12A fine.
There are no problems with the waveform, nor will it hurt the Leaf's on-board charger or the EVSE.
I've been looking at picking up an EU2000i so I'm extremely curious what the trick is. I know that the built in inverters will automatically adjust when using the parallel cables, but only provide 120 volts...Ingineer said:Yes, it "tricks" the second genny into running 180 degrees out using the built-in paralleling mechanism.
MarkBC said:Just to bump this up the list, I also posted this question in the Engineering section. I got the Honda generator and need to modify the plugs to be able to charge the Leaf. I have learned that I need to connect the neutral and ground prongs for the EVSE GFCI check. However, it was mentioned that I need to connect via a 100,000 ohm resistor. Is this true?
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