Volchar 40-amp EV Charger Review
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- Опубликовано: 7 июл 2024
- My full-length review of the 40-amp Volchar EV charger. For those who want a more condensed version, look for my Quick-Charge 10-minute version of this review in about a week.
Purchase the Volchar charger directly from the company website: volchar.com/
This video is powered by Qmerit, North America's leading provider of installation services for EV charging, home energy storage, and other electrification technologies. See how Qmerit is making the energy transition easy for home and business owners: qmerit.com/ev/charge
Chapters
00:00 Intro
00:28 Unboxing
04:45 Key features
05:59 First impressions
11:12 Opening up the Volchar and looking inside
18:24 Cable management
21:08 The Volchar app
22:58 Extreme heat test
25:59 Cold weather testing
34:12 Automatic reset test
35:31 I found a major safety flaw
42:55 The ChargerRater scorecard
46:30 Final scoring
48:29 My Volchar hits & misses
50:31 Outro
Need an EV Charger? Check out my top recommendations:
Emporia 48-amp: amzn.to/3EgDRGS
ChargePoint Home Flex: amzn.to/3UrUwR8
Grizzl-E Smart: amzn.to/3BCxexV
EVIQO 48-amp: eviqo.io/?ref=c0nLwakF8tvZBN
Wallbox Pulsar Plus: amzn.to/3UqsjtT
Tesla Universal Wall Connector: amzn.to/3Jyl9NS
Autel MaxiCharger Lite 50: amzn.to/3UekLcw 
Авто/Мото
Tom hits another home run! Excellent review and as a former product line manager I appreciate his focus on quality control regarding power setting.
Am I crazy, or does this look like a water filter system?
Thought the same lol
Very Dyson or Apple. Very pretty
It not attractive and rather big for what it does. Expensive too.
Tom, A-1 job figuring out the safety issue. Without your thorough testing, this would not have been obvious. How did this thing get UL certification?
Good job Tom finding the safety charging issue with the charger enjoyed watching the video
Great review per usual. Great job pointing out the plastic wall bracket, the cable management, and especially the issue with the 50 amp default setting. And I agree, you need to re-do the charger scoring system.
Thank You for All that you are doing for our Planet Earth.... Peace.. Shalom.. Salam.. Namaste
🙏🏻 😊 ✌ ☮ ❤
Tom you need to get an amp probe to see the true amp draw on the unit. This proof then needs to be given to Volchar
Yes, I'm thinking that a professional-grade power meter permanently installed on the circuit used for testing would be a great investment in the channel.
Happy with my ChargePoint + especially when I’ll want to swap out the J1772 for the J3400 in the future or hardwire it. The 50A capable with a 40A plug was my deliberate choice in case I want to hardwire it in the future. For now I carry it on occasion for a convenient charging option. 52:37
Thank you
Good catch on the default dip switch setting. Hopefully Volchar gets back to you why their 40 amp charger can deliver more.
Maybe exceeding the circuit capacity is their plan for delivering the char in Voltchar.
My experience with L2 chargers in the Phoenix, AZ area is not that they derate in high heat. I have not encountered one with a thermister or thermocouple. The units actually fail permanently in high heat regardless of whether the charger is in use. The Webasto Turbo DX and the Lucid Home charger both perform well in high heat though.
Thx Tom! I think it’s always important to mention if you’re going to use a NEMA 14-50, to make sure your receptacle is an industrial grade. Either a McKillians or Bryant, not no $10 HOME DEPOT fire hazard. Any logic why these companies make a 50A hardwire option? They don’t make a 62.5A breaker right? Just make it 48A, that way it lines up with most EV’s AC charge MAX, and a 60A breaker. Just my opinion. Still loving my Tesla Universal Wall Connector & CP Home Flex.
Why on earth would a company ship a unit that exceeds recommended amperage rating is beyond me. Tells me their 50A model ($100 surcharge) is the same as NEMA 14-50 model Over amperage is a massive fire hazard, hope they have a lot of insurance.
I see sparks flying in the future. Those input cables are really close together. Also the bare conductors thru the current sense coil.
That Mornsun inverter on the left is band for sale in the USA. Something about selling to Russia
The over-amp charging situation, I'm willing to bet was caused by the fact that the 40 amp and 48 amp units are the same?
And they just forgot to change the default hard setting at the factory to 40 amps....
Yeah, it could very well be. That's why I sent emails to ask about it.
@@StateOfChargeWithTomMoloughney Please get back to me when you get a response. I'm curious if my guess was right or not? Thanks for the feedback.
@@StateOfChargeWithTomMoloughney by the way they might not want to be a direct or correct answer.... Since buyers could use the presumably cheaper 40 Amp as a 48 Amp evse.
That’s poor quality control and unit should never leave the factory with wrong dip switch settings.
"should"? Show me the company that has never had a recall or has never made an error? That world only exists in the minds of YT experts.
Plus, personally I wouldn't mind getting a 48 amp unit for the price of a 40 amp unit. But to each their own.
Something I find should be considered in your evaluation is ergonomics and efficient use of space. I have a 2 car car port with my Tesla charger on the wall to the left of the vehicles. The more flush mounted a charger and its plug are to the wall the more room we have to circulate. So many chargers (like this one) have the plug sticking out from the front face of the charger which to me is a draw back.
You might consider getting a J1772 tester, you would see off the bat that the PWM was indicating 50A setting and maybe other issues with other chargers. See the TeslaTap J1-80M
Another thorough review! Thank you!
One nit: "cyan" has a soft C, not hard, so it's pronounced "sigh-ann", not "ky-ann".
Pa-tay-to, pa-taa-to...😁
@@StateOfChargeWithTomMoloughney Sorry, I couldn't help myself. I used to work for a printing company, and if I tried to order "cayenne" ink from HP, they'd be very confused. (We used industrial inkjet printers that had 5 litre ink tanks. The typical home printer cartridge from HP contains less than 10 millilitres!) :😃
@@ronten-hove2777cayenne ink helps prevent the dog from eating your homework.
love what you do but very confused how you can recommend a product so highly that has that massive safety flaw. i’m glad you talked about it in such detail but shouldn’t the fact that it’s a fire starter risk disqualify it?
Yes, the chargerator scoring is seriously flawed if it can give something that's totally unacceptable a score above maybe two stars. I appreciate that there's also a personal score in addition to the mechanistic one, but both are way too high for something that has a fatal flaw. Perhaps a safety score needs to multiply the other score, rather than adding.
Setting either the internal dip switch or the app to the 40-amp limit corrected the issue. I might not expect the average person to open the unit and change the dip switch, but I would expect most people to set it in the app to the correct output, but I accept your comment.
Tom, as you can clearly see the unit is a 48 amp charger. It’s just that it’s shipped with a Nema 1450 and your correct that the internal dip switches should’ve been set to position for Shipping. However, that being said, as you stated several times in the review, you can hardwire the unit and in that case, it would be reasonable to set it back up to 48 A. as you should be in my opinion, calling this at 48 amp unit and therefore not dinging it for value and also not dinging it for max charging power.
I agree with Tom’s critique because vendor Quality Control Dept should have set the dip switches properly. Once a plug is attached to the unit, maximum amperage is 40 per NEC code.
They sell three different units; the 40a plug in that I asked for in the review that costs $599, a 40a hardwired one that doesn't have the plug for $559 and a 50a hardwire for $699. I specifically emailed the company about the power output setting asking if I needed to change anything out of the box and was told no, the unit will be set to deliver the maximum of 40a in the default setting because its a 40a unit. The instructions say the same.
So I personally don't care if they want to send out 50-a units to everyone, but they need to make sure the output is set correctly, or it can be a huge problem for a lot of folks.
@@johnpoldo8817not only should they have shipped it properly, but when he asked them about it, they should have given the correct instructions for where it should be set. And the instructions should be clear about that as well. Unacceptable.
17:05 interseting, that power supply/DCDC conevrter is mornsun, a recent addition to the sanctions "entity list" due to their dealings with russia, either this charger will disappear from US shores very quickly, or they'll be swapping out for a different brand sharpish... or just leave it and hope they don't get caught
keen eye..... Apparently?
@@nc3826 apparently? i just know about it because a lot of 3D printers and 3D printer kits use Mornsun PSUs and many have to swap to meanwell or other units, the entity list is real
@@Mobile_DomI added 'apparently' since I wasn't going to do the research, to confirm it on my own..... Thanks for the backstory details....
Have you heard anything when GM will be allow to use supercharger. Two weeks ago GM kept saying real soon but, nothing since. It is pretty maddening.
I keep emailing them but just get "soon"
@@StateOfChargeWithTomMoloughney Sounds like some kind of problem right now they are having. It would so nice they would be more open about a time line.
The LED color codes are ridiculous. No way most people will memorize this. How about a cheap display that simply says what the problem is? The logic and message circuitry should be pretty cheap now days. Or at least send the info to the App.
Anyone think this company will still exist by the time the 5-year warranty ends? I don't see why I would want to buy this over a Tesla Wall Connector.
For one, it doesn't fund an overpaid, egomaniac, narcissist....
@@nc3826, so you'd rather fund China?
@@zroger73 Honestly, we are all funding China on a daily basis. Do you realize how much of the high tech (and non-high tech) products that Americans buy are made in China? For example: cell phones, TVs, solar panels, lithium ion batteries, kitchen cooking devices like toasters, food processors, pots and pans, utensils, garden hoses, lawn mowers.......the list is never ending. I would like to fund China less, but it is pretty much impossible to do that unless you live in a cave and farm your own food.
@@zroger73 Wrong again, I'm free to buy any EVSE..... Not just an Elon approved one ....
@@barryw9473 people like zroger73 are all in a state of denial, when it comes to what they buy from China.... which makes their hypocrisy, so amusing ....
I'll stick with my Grizz le 40 amp made in Canada, not Communist China.
I second dale's comment
China is not manufacturing it.... just like socialist Canada, is not manufacturing the Grizzl-e line....
Sorry to interject rational thought....
I said it was made in Canada, not that the Canadian Government was manufacturing it. So here is some rational thought for you Einstein; businesses pay taxes to the governments in which they operate. Hence the Chinese businesses taxes go to support a communist regime, I'd rather not support that business.
@@nc3826 I said it was made in Canada, not manufactured by the Canadian Government. Here is some rational thought for you Einstein, businesses pay taxes to the governments in which they operate. , Therefore buying a product from a business in Communist China supports Communist China, I'd rather not do that.
I love watching all your videos, could you please one day rate orange charger, I think that nowadays, abnb and apartments condos residential L2 are looking for a way to install chargers with the ability to pay while you charge please check this link
www.orangecharger.com
There is another company with similar method, but even more affordable when it comes to service fees
Shinepay
shinepay.co/ev
that just looks like the Enphase/ClipperCreek unit with a different backend
Thanks for the shameless ad.