So, this is a little backwards timing wise. Our Audi eTron is on the way and we need to get moving on having our home EV charging stations installed. Obviously we’re going to get one at home in Washington DC, but we also need one at our house up in Connecticut. Our DC installation will be in another week or two. Connecticut, we’re up here now, so might as well get it done.
By nature I’m one of those people who over analyzes everything, window shops items ten times over, reads and tries to educate himself endlessly on any topic. Home EV charging units have been no exception to the rule. There at least a dozen different units I’ve found on the market, maybe three or four that are consistently well reviewed and have been around long enough to qualify for having a bit of street cred. The three top contenders were JuiceBox, ChargePoint and Clipper Creek. I kind of like Clipper Creek because they are probably the company with the most experience, they’ve been a round a long time and been building EV Charging Stations for years. ChargePoint has also been around the better part of decade, they are more well known for their commercial charging units, but have to assume their home units are pretty good. Finally JuiceBox seems to be a relatively new entrant, but has a lot of good reviews online, people seem happy with their units. Lets be honest, for the most part all of these things are pretty much the same, its an electric plug to push electrons into your EV – any charger will probably do a perfectly adequate job, just go with a name brand.
For our house in Connecticut I ended up going with the ChargePoint unit, the 32 amp hardwired, which I ordered through Amazon. We chose not to go with the Amazon installation service because we live in a very small rural town. I’m not sure who Amazon would recommend, but I know the local electrician in our town, he’s a super nice guy and I know I can get him on the phone when I need him. Greg came over, he took a look at our panel, we went down to the basement which is not finished, so nothing to break or open up, straight run down from the panel to the outside. Maybe an hour or two install tops, couple hundred dollars.
If you’re interested in more photos feel free to head over to our Flickr account we have an album specifically on EV Chargers and installations, most images are released under creative commons, feel free to use whichever ones you like, but we would much appreciate a photo credit.