Thank you kindly. That helps. The whole enchilada it is then! ??
That's fair. Let's see if they put their money where their mouth is. ?
Thought: Have we considered that the Rivian home charger will be like the 3rd edition of the Tesla version that has a WiFi connection direct to Tesla built into the charger. There may be important reasons for Rivian to have that for diagnostic and other reasons.
I can't imagine it would be worth the effort/expense for them at this time. Only a limited percentage of buyers will get the Rivian EVSE since third party equipment is readily, and probably less expensively, available. How much data could they get and how representative of the overall Rivian population would it be?
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Considering the vehicle will already be connected, the only benefit of the EVSE being connected would be to support diagnostics or firmware updates of the EVSE itself. This could be handy if the EVSE was going to be "smart" and support things like off peak charging but that could also be supported from the vehicle. I'm not sure what features the Rivian EVSE could support that would be truly unique to Rivian making their EVSE any more compelling than other products on the market.
An EVSE is really nothing more than a switch that feeds AC power to the charger in the vehicle. It knows nothing about the vehicle itself and there is nothing in the J1772 interface that would allow any communication of that type of info.
To be specific: When I have a problem with charging on one of our chargers - one stopped working properly after a current surge - Tesla wants to know from me when it happened - so they can check what happened and fix it or tell me how I can fix the issue. All this data flowing to Tesla about the charger comes from either the direct WiFi connection to the car or from the wifi connect to the charger or from both. Do we know how this works?
We don't know anything about Rivian's home charging system outside of what Rivian mentions on their web site (see my earlier post in this thread for a screen shot of that info). In a nutshell, we know it will charge the vehicle but that's about it.
P S the 3rd gen Tesla charger will not charge until the wifi connection of the charger is fully connected to Tesla, they call it “commissioned”, a fairly complex process.
Will there be good reasons to get the Rivian charger instead of a generic charger? We do not know is the answer here, correct?
We assume you are talking about Gen 3. They have WiFi and thus can connect to the Mother Ship for things like commissioning, diagnostics and firmware updates. As when fully functional individual EVSE can be commanded to different levels it is clear things like load and other status data are available over WiFi. In many cases like this if a fault is detected that is logged. Whether that is in the unit itself or at the Mother Ship I don't know but it's probably in the unit itself. Thus when you report a fault they ask when and then upload the logs from the faulty unit. Please note that I am not asserting that this is how it works but it is very probably something like this
The Gen 3 EVSE can tell the car that it can draw as much as 48 A and that's fine if it be connected to a 60 A breaker. But if it be connected to a 30A breaker it must instruct the car to draw no more than 24 A. Thus it is necessary that someone commission the unit with the correct setting before it is allowed to supply current. In the older HPWC this was done by setting a rotary switch under a cover fastened with security torx screws which allowed Tesla to at least claim that they satisfied NEC requirements with respect to who can set the current capability. With the Gen 3 it looks as if anybody with the setup instructions can do that via the app.
The only reason to get the Rivian charger, IMO, is to get the Rivian logo on it if you want to have a strong Rivian theme in your garage. The trucks are designed to work with any J1772 compatible charger (including Tesla HPWC). I suppose it is possible that there is some WiFi based Rivian unique feature that works with the Rivian App but I doubt it. I expect charging schedule setup and such will be available through the vehicle screens and the app even when connected to a minimalist J1772 EVSE.
I just installed a 60 amp breaker and 14-50 outlet to run a 48amp Open Source plug-in EVSE, to be delivered today. In time to get 2020 tax credit and $250 electric company rebate.
Potential problems here. A 48 A plug in charger does not meet code for EVSE in the US and would require a 14-60R plug and outlet in any case (e.g. if you were going to plug in a welder). Assuming you have the proper wire size for the 60A circuit you would need to cut off the plug on your existing unit and hard wire it to comply with NEC 2020. That is, a 48A charger behind a 60A breaker is kosher if hard wired. If you are in Canada I think you would be OK with the proper NEMA 14-60R receptacle. But you shouldn't be listening to me. You need to get in an electrician familiar with whatever codes apply in your state or province.
