Schlagwort: EV Charger

  • Creating a low-cost EV charging station with Arduino

    Creating a low-cost EV charging station with Arduino

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    The high cost of EV (electric vehicle) chargers may lead you to believe that they’re complex systems. But with the exception of Tesla’s Supercharger, that isn’t true. They’re actually quite simple — basically just glorified switches. All of the nitty gritty charging details are the responsibility of the car’s onboard circuitry. With that in mind, EV owners may want to follow Pedro Neves’ guide on building an affordable Arduino-based EV charging station.

    Because the car deals with all of the particulars of charging, the only purpose of the “charger” is to provide a connection to the electrical grid. “Charger” isn’t even the right word, as this is more accurately EVSE (electric vehicle supply equipment). For safety reasons, the car and the EVSE communicate with each other. The car can tell the EVSE when it is safe to provide power and the EVSE will then connect a switch between the charging plug and the electrical grid. It really isn’t any more complex than a $15 smart outlet and most of the cost of an EVSE is the heavy-gauge wiring. 

    Here, Neves proves that with a DIY EVSE designed around an Arduino UNO Rev3 board. It has a custom shield with relays for switching power and to power the Arduino itself with mains voltage. A few LEDs act as status indicators. EVSE protocols are standardized, so Neves was able to program the Arduino to communicate with any connected car. Once the Arduino receives permission from the car, it switches the relays to provide mains voltage. A heavy-duty 3D-printed enclosure contains those components, with a breaker switch and weatherproofing.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZR548_tpS-c?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

    The post Creating a low-cost EV charging station with Arduino appeared first on Arduino Blog.

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  • This EV charger packs an Arduino-based DIY solution in a commercial enclosure

    This EV charger packs an Arduino-based DIY solution in a commercial enclosure

    Reading Time: 2 minutes

    Arduino Team — April 29th, 2022

    The rapid adoption of electric vehicles over the last decade has required the installation of additional infrastructure to support them, namely high-voltage chargers that can deliver enough current to the batteries for fast recharging. But due to their potentially high cost, James Fotherby decided to design and build his own 7.2kW charging solution that was simultaneously cheap, simple, and safe to operate.

    For the safety component, Fotherby had to ensure that any potential fault, such as a loose wire coming into contact with the car, would be detected in time so that power could be cut immediately. His design incorporated a coil that measures the amount of current heading to the car and the amount returning. If the two values don’t match, then an alert is triggered, and the relay switches off the power. Controlling the relay was accomplished by integrating an Arduino, which receives 5V via a series of two step-down converters.

    After creating and assembling a PCB, Fortherby found a “showroom” Zappi EV charger that lacked the internal electronics but still had a decent enclosure and connector. The system allows for an LED to indicate the current state of the charger, and the inclusion of a self-test circuit means that faults can be simulated and caught within 100ms to ensure safety.

    To read more about Fortherby’s DIY charger, you can check out its write-up on Instructables here. And of course, because this project deals with high voltages and current, don’t attempt this on your own without the requisite experience.

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  • DehneEVSE is a custom, Nano 33 IoT-controlled EV charging station

    DehneEVSE is a custom, Nano 33 IoT-controlled EV charging station

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    Arduino Team — April 7th, 2021

    Sebastian Dehne decided to build a custom electric vehicle (EV) charging station for his Nissan Leaf from scratch, as what he calls “a real full stack project.” He notes that creating your own gives you total control over the system, and it’s both fun and cheaper than purchasing a ready-made device.

    The aptly named DehneEVSE is based on an Arduino Nano 33 IoT for control and current/voltage sensing, and connects via WiFi to a server that handles charging logic. UI consists of a web app that uses WebSockets to listen for real-time updates and display power consumption for all three phases. Aside from the stats, the app enables Dehne to turn charging on/off or to a low-cost setting, which regulates charge depending on the price of energy at a particular time.

    A short demo of the DehneEVSE can be seen in the video below, while more details on the station including links to the files and code are available in Dehne’s blog post.

    [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5hRH6UQRbQ?feature=oembed&w=500&h=281]

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