Cybertruck price increase?

[Bill906]

Why is it going to cost $2-$5K to install a Wall Connector? I got mine free from Tesla but it only cost me around $150 to install it and I had a 34' run from my panel, underground, to my driveway. Price included conduit, copper wire, 60 amp breaker, junction box, and a bunch of incidentals. An electrician would have charged me around $300-$400 to wire it up but it was easy, so I did it myself and now I have a first-class charging solution right where I park.

Good question. I didn't stipulate. My house has 100A service. I'm guessing I'll need to upgrade my service. Asking around, word of mouth people estimate $2-5K.

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[HaulingAss]

Good question. I didn't stipulate. My house has 100A service. I'm guessing I'll need to upgrade my service. Asking around, word of mouth people estimate $2-5K.

That's a lot of money for a simple 100 Amp to 200 Amp panel upgrade but prices do vary quite a bit regionally and which electrician bids the job. It might only be $1200-$1800. Also, don't assume you need to upgrade it, ask a qualified electrician. The fact that it's only 100 amp might mean the house doesn't have a high electrical load and has plenty of overhead for a 40 A charge circuit (which is plenty fast for most people). Of course, if the electrical system is old and decrepit you might want to upgrade it even if not installing an EV charge station. In that case, you are investing in the value of your house and your family's safety.

 

[HaulingAss]

I was kinda thinking it had to do with Tesla also, but it's way more to do with dealer markups. Here's an interesting article talking about Tesla having the lowest increase in price.

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-hol...ase-rate-as-new-car-prices-hit-all-time-high/

With Tesla selling less than 2% of new cars in the US, it's pretty hard to blame the price increase of the average new car from $35K to over $45K on the 2% of sales that are Tesla.

 

[Bill906]

That's a lot of money for a simple 100 Amp to 200 Amp panel upgrade but prices do vary quite a bit regionally and which electrician bids the job. It might only be $1200-$1800. Also, don't assume you need to upgrade it, ask a qualified electrician. The fact that it's only 100 amp might mean the house doesn't have a high electrical load and has plenty of overhead for a 40 A charge circuit (which is plenty fast for most people). Of course, if the electrical system is old and decrepit you might want to upgrade it even if not installing an EV charge station. In that case, you are investing in the value of your house and your family's safety.

Thanks. The “quotes“ were ballpark estimates. They were guessing $1200-$1700 just from the electric company. Plus the cost of the electrician upgrading the panel In the house. Will also need to run a new circuit to the detached garage. (I planned on doing the digging).
The house is a 3 bedroom 2 bath 1500 sq ft home built in 1947. I believe the panel has been upgraded at least once as it is a circuit breaker panel. (Not sure what year CB’s started replacing fuse boxes). Furnace is natural gas, everything else is electric including central air and water heater. So I think (will check with electrician) I’m close to maxing out my 100A service as it is. I believe right now the highest home charging circuit offered by Tesla is 50A. I’ll probably wait until we get closer to production to see if there will be other (higher) options.

 

[HaulingAss]

Thanks. The “quotes“ were ballpark estimates. They were guessing $1200-$1700 just from the electric company. Plus the cost of the electrician upgrading the panel In the house. Will also need to run a new circuit to the detached garage. (I planned on doing the digging).
The house is a 3 bedroom 2 bath 1500 sq ft home built in 1947. I believe the panel has been upgraded at least once as it is a circuit breaker panel. (Not sure what year CB’s started replacing fuse boxes). Furnace is natural gas, everything else is electric including central air and water heater. So I think (will check with electrician) I’m close to maxing out my 100A service as it is. I believe right now the highest home charging circuit offered by Tesla is 50A. I’ll probably wait until we get closer to production to see if there will be other (higher) options.

There are a hundred ways you can do it and the one you want will depend upon how many cars you want to charge, whether you want to invest a little more for future flexibility, how far you drive each day, whether you have Time of Use pricing for electricity, whether you want to improve your existing electrical infrastructure or just safely add more capacity, etc. etc. etc.

Most new EV owners tend to over-estimate the amount of charging power they need for their current situation. That said, if you own the home, I recommend making a modest investment in the future and setting it up for likely future needs. Meaning, even if you only have one EV now, maybe the house will need to support 2 or 3 EV's in future. That doesn't mean you need three complete charging solutions installed now but it could be cost effective to install a circuit large enough to effectively charge 2-4 EV's depending upon the likely number of drivers in a given residence.

The Tesla Wall Connector is one of the top units at a bargain price ($500). It has the ability to powershare one or more electrical circuits. For example, it can take a 60-amp circuit and allow it to support the charging of numerous vehicles (you can add more Wall Connectors at a later date). I have my home Wall Connector on a 100-amp circuit which is overkill for our needs but when I compared the cost difference with a more minimal solution, the cost was almost insignificant. The equation could change depending upon how far the charge point is from the panel and how much power you have available. Bigger wires can add up if the distance is great. Depending upon circumstances, it may be advantageous to do a new power drop from the grid to your garage and treat your existing panel as a sub-panel (fed with 100 amps from your new main panel).

Every situation is different. It's not rocket science but even a lot of professional electricians will not give the best advice because they do not have a good idea of where things are going. Even though electrical devices are becoming more efficient in a modern world, the trend is away from gasoline, oil, propane, and natural gas and towards electricity, even for space heating. Most electricians have no idea how quickly EV's will displace ICE cars or what their real-world power needs are. With the purchase of an EV, it may make sense to do the minimum necessary to reasonably charge one or two cars, spending as little as $100-$200 (or $300-$400 if hiring an electrician), or it may make sense to do a $5,000 electrical upgrade of the entire house to prepare for the future. Or something in between, it just depends upon too many variables to list them all.

The EV power sharing scheme I mentioned earlier works especially well for multiple EV's, especially when the drivers have different schedules. In other words, it's generally not a bad idea to oversize the circuit(s) dedicated to charging because future needs are quickly changing, and it costs less to do one upgrade than two or three. To put this in context, the minimum I recommend for charging one Cybertruck is a 30-40 Amp 240V circuit. This will work very well for 95% of drivers and would be the minimum I would install for one vehicle. In most cases it makes sense to install a 60-amp 240V circuit. That would allow not only faster charging in case you happened to need a quick turnaround but would also make practical the charging of two to three EV's on a power sharing scheme (with Wall Connectors added at a future date). In my case, it made sense to add a 100 Amp circuit (for the Wall Connector and potential future power-sharing with additional Wall Connectors) and a 60-amp circuit (for a NEMA 14-50 outlet) because it cost so little extra to the minimum work that was already required.

Sorry for the length of this post but I thought an over-view of some of the practical considerations would help people make better decisions as every location has such different considerations that there really is no "one-size fits all"

 

[Ogre]

Most new EV owners tend to over-estimate the amount of charging power they need for their current situation.

Yep.

So far still haven’t gotten frustrated enough to get motivated to install the wall charger I bought 6 months ago.Still on 110v 12amps.

 

[Sirfun]

There are a hundred ways you can do it and the one you want will depend upon how many cars you want to charge, whether you want to invest a little more for future flexibility, how far you drive each day, whether you have Time of Use pricing for electricity, whether you want to improve your existing electrical infrastructure or just safely add more capacity, etc. etc. etc.

Most new EV owners tend to over-estimate the amount of charging power they need for their current situation. That said, if you own the home, I recommend making a modest investment in the future and setting it up for likely future needs. Meaning, even if you only have one EV now, maybe the house will need to support 2 or 3 EV's in future. That doesn't mean you need three complete charging solutions installed now but it could be cost effective to install a circuit large enough to effectively charge 2-4 EV's depending upon the likely number of drivers in a given residence.

The Tesla Wall Connector is one of the top units at a bargain price ($500). It has the ability to powershare one or more electrical circuits. For example, it can take a 60-amp circuit and allow it to support the charging of numerous vehicles (you can add more Wall Connectors at a later date). I have my home Wall Connector on a 100-amp circuit which is overkill for our needs but when I compared the cost difference with a more minimal solution, the cost was almost insignificant. The equation could change depending upon how far the charge point is from the panel and how much power you have available. Bigger wires can add up if the distance is great. Depending upon circumstances, it may be advantageous to do a new power drop from the grid to your garage and treat your existing panel as a sub-panel (fed with 100 amps from your new main panel).

Every situation is different. It's not rocket science but even a lot of professional electricians will not give the best advice because they do not have a good idea of where things are going. Even though electrical devices are becoming more efficient in a modern world, the trend is away from gasoline, oil, propane, and natural gas and towards electricity, even for space heating. Most electricians have no idea how quickly EV's will displace ICE cars or what their real-world power needs are. With the purchase of an EV, it may make sense to do the minimum necessary to reasonably charge one or two cars, spending as little as $100-$200 (or $300-$400 if hiring an electrician), or it may make sense to do a $5,000 electrical upgrade of the entire house to prepare for the future. Or something in between, it just depends upon too many variables to list them all.

The EV power sharing scheme I mentioned earlier works especially well for multiple EV's, especially when the drivers have different schedules. In other words, it's generally not a bad idea to oversize the circuit(s) dedicated to charging because future needs are quickly changing, and it costs less to do one upgrade than two or three. To put this in context, the minimum I recommend for charging one Cybertruck is a 30-40 Amp 240V circuit. This will work very well for 95% of drivers and would be the minimum I would install for one vehicle. In most cases it makes sense to install a 60-amp 240V circuit. That would allow not only faster charging in case you happened to need a quick turnaround but would also make practical the charging of two to three EV's on a power sharing scheme (with Wall Connectors added at a future date). In my case, it made sense to add a 100 Amp circuit (for the Wall Connector and potential future power-sharing with additional Wall Connectors) and a 60-amp circuit (for a NEMA 14-50 outlet) because it cost so little extra to the minimum work that was already required.

Sorry for the length of this post but I thought an over-view of some of the practical considerations would help people make better decisions as every location has such different considerations that there really is no "one-size fits all"

I had an electrician come to my house to see about an old dryer 220 plug that doesn't work. Long story short, the guy ends up telling me I’m better off doing nothing, that houses don't have enough capacity, and just take EV's to the charging station is the way to go!
At that point I said Buh Bye!!!!

 

[Crissa]

Ouch! No kidding.

As pointed out, even if you were getting 3 miles to the kilowatt (like jamming a performance Tesla, something super-inefficient) and then could only charge at 1 kilowatt per hour (the average house outlet can do 1.650kW) and only could plug in while you slept every night... 365 days times 8 hours times three miles is still over eight thousand miles, like over half of the average American's annual miles.

-Crissa

 

[HaulingAss]

Ouch! No kidding.

As pointed out, even if you were getting 3 miles to the kilowatt (like jamming a performance Tesla, something super-inefficient) and then could only charge at 1 kilowatt per hour (the average house outlet can do 1.650kW) and only could plug in while you slept every night... 365 days times 8 hours times three miles is still over eight thousand miles, like over half of the average American's annual miles.

-Crissa

Yeah but this is not a good way to think about it. The idea is not to have enough capacity over the course of a year, it's to have enough day-to-day, enough to cover that one time you are busier than usual and have further places to go. It's also about efficiency. The most efficient way to get the electrons back into the battery while parked at home is to charge near the capacity of the on-board charger. For most Tesla that will be 48 amps and 240v.

But that is only one reason I recommend 30 amps and 240 V as the minimum for a single EV. It's because a good practice in colder weather is to preheat the car 2-5 minutes before departure. This reduces battery cycling by pre-heating the cabin climate control using 'shore power' instead of battery power. The climate control draws the most current in the first couple of minutes. It also makes the cabin comfortable as soon as you get in. But 30 amp service is required to prevent the climate control from drawing down the batteries. Reducing battery cycling means they last that much longer.

Charging on 120 volts is very inefficient and it doesn't supply enough current to prevent cycling the batteries to run the climate control. It makes a whole lot more sense to run the climate control using grid power when you can and saving the batteries for when you can't.

In short, there are a number of practical reasons, reasons that are largely hidden from the user, why 120 volts should be reserved for emergency charging, a way to add a few miles in a pinch, not the go to charging method.

 

[HaulingAss]

I had an electrician come to my house to see about an old dryer 220 plug that doesn't work. Long story short, the guy ends up telling me I’m better off doing nothing, that houses don't have enough capacity, and just take EV's to the charging station is the way to go!
At that point I said Buh Bye!!!!

That's funny! Electricians in general have very little training or knowledge about EV charging. BTW, that dryer outlet is 240 volts, 220 volts was retired in the US many decades ago and utilities no longer supply 220 volts.

Many electricians don't even know how to do the calculation to determine if code allows the addition of another circuit to an existing panel. Instead of admitting they don't know, they just tell you it's not possible.

 

[Ogre]

Yeah but this is not a good way to think about it. The idea is not to have enough capacity over the course of a year, it's to have enough day-to-day, enough to cover that one time you are busier than usual and have further places to go. It's also about efficiency. The most efficient way to get the electrons back into the battery while parked at home is to charge near the capacity of the on-board charger. For most Tesla that will be 48 amps and 240v.

But that is only one reason I recommend 30 amps and 240 V as the minimum for a single EV. It's because a good practice in colder weather is to preheat the car 2-5 minutes before departure. This reduces battery cycling by pre-heating the cabin climate control using 'shore power' instead of battery power. The climate control draws the most current in the first couple of minutes. It also makes the cabin comfortable as soon as you get in. But 30 amp service is required to prevent the climate control from drawing down the batteries. Reducing battery cycling means they last that much longer.

Charging on 120 volts is very inefficient and it doesn't supply enough current to prevent cycling the batteries to run the climate control. It makes a whole lot more sense to run the climate control using grid power when you can and saving the batteries for when you can't.

In short, there are a number of practical reasons, reasons that are largely hidden from the user, why 120 volts should be reserved for emergency charging, a way to add a few miles in a pinch, not the go to charging method.

30 amps @ 220v is a good baseline which will result in almost always having as much power as you need when you wake up in the AM.

I do get by with 110v, but it does mean I have a few extra Supercharger stops between weekend trips and I have to think ahead when I want to make a trip or Supercharge. With your 30 amps you will almost always wake up with enough juice. In the big battery CT it is possible to return with an empty and not have enough for a full 500 mile/ 250 mile towing trip the next day, but that will likely be rare enough that the Supercharger stops won’t be frequent enough to be annoying.

I wouldn’t say 110v is for “emergency charging only” though, it’s just a bit less convenient. Only 50x better than dealing with gas stations every 200-300 miles instead of 100x better.

 

[Crissa]

It's a great way to looks at it. It tells you that in the worst possible case you're not really up a creek, you're getting 24 miles while you sleep on a low setting on a granny cable. That's a hundred miles in a work-week. You don't need to get all your charging from a granny cable, but if you drive less than 20 miles in your commute like the average person, you're covered. 95% of the time, cars are parked... and if you commute, that means only a quarter of that time is away from home...

...Which is twenty thousand miles a year.

And no, you don't need to cover all of your charging every night: The car has a battery. And a range more than couple hundred miles it can bank up in range at a time.

-Crissa

 

[Throwcomputer]

It's a great way to looks at it. It tells you that in the worst possible case you're not really up a creek, you're getting 24 miles while you sleep on a low setting on a granny cable. That's a hundred miles in a work-week. You don't need to get all your charging from a granny cable, but if you drive less than 20 miles in your commute like the average person, you're covered. 95% of the time, cars are parked... and if you commute, that means only a quarter of that time is away from home...

...Which is twenty thousand miles a year.

And no, you don't need to cover all of your charging every night: The car has a battery. And a range more than couple hundred miles it can bank up in range at a time.

-Crissa

Even more to the point.. it seems like once people start thinking about buying an EV, they forget they didn't have a gas station at their house prior to owning an EV. Sure it saves money being able to charge at home, but its possible to survive going to the "gas station" every couple hundred miles like you have done for your whole driving life. And the EV "gas station" is still cheaper than filling up at the gas station.

Might be a bit inconvenient for those in rural areas where chargers are not on every corner like gas stations are, but that will change in the next 5 years by the time you get your CT.

 

[Bill906]

How many miles/hour do we think we’ll get using 120V cord on the CT? I’m guessing very low.

 

[Crissa]

How many miles/hour do we think we’ll get using 120V cord on the CT? I’m guessing very low.

1-3 depending on weather and driving habits. But even that level will let you completely pre-heat the truck in the morning without losing range. Or manage the battery in cold or hot weather.

It will not be great. But you can set your charging at whatever the outlet can manage, so if you have a 20a tool outlet you can get a little more, or a 240v outlet at 3-11kW. A Tesla is really flexible in that regard, without having to do much fiddling.

If you drive a thousand miles a month, you'll probably be able to make do, with a stop at the store or movie with a charger added in every once in awhile. That hundreds of mile range comes in handy that way.

-Crissa

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