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[zerovolt]

Thanks Brian.

[Electric Terry]

must have the bike  powered on all the time during charging process when i have only elcon charger ?

No, you don't need to keep the bike powered on. The Elcon sends a signal through the accessory port that keeps the bike in charge mode, but it can't initiate charge mode through the accessory port.

Right, on the Elcon it's the part that Hollywood Electrics adds that allows it to do this, otherwise you need to leave the key in the bike and in the "on" position while charging with the Elcon alone.

Killroy, you can definitely get the actual Elcon less expensive in other places, but the time one would spend to figure out, do and make everything that Hollywood Electrics does to make this work with the Zero and all the testing and refinement, is well worth the time most people on this forum would spend and in the end still not have something as quality is my guess.  The other thing is if you do something wrong, you could mess up the bike by blowing the charge fuse, or not adhering to the BMS signal while the bike is on and overcharge causing damage to the batteries.  If you feel comfortable doing all this on your own and know the risks and accept them then go for it sure! But I'm definitely recommending most people on this forum just buy the plug and play kit from Hollywood and have peace of mind it isn't going to malfunction and leave you stranded.

[zerovolt]

I agree with you Electric Terry , i am sure Hollywood Electrics is the best.
But i think if you use always the onboard charger first and after you plug one or 2 Elcons without bms ' connection, you will have the  battery' bms proctection . If you have overvoltage or overheating ' problems , the bms will open the contactor.  The risk is low.

It is my opinion, i am not a specialist.

[dukecola]

Got my elcon last week. Won't be using it till spring though but have a hookup question since it came with no instructions. There are 2 connectors on the output side,one for the aux port and a round one. Where does the small round connector go? TKS.

[Killroy]

must have the bike  powered on all the time during charging process when i have only elcon charger ?

No, you don't need to keep the bike powered on. The Elcon sends a signal through the accessory port that keeps the bike in charge mode, but it can't initiate charge mode through the accessory port.

Right, on the Elcon it's the part that Hollywood Electrics adds that allows it to do this, otherwise you need to leave the key in the bike and in the "on" position while charging with the Elcon alone.

Killroy, you can definitely get the actual Elcon less expensive in other places, but the time one would spend to figure out, do and make everything that Hollywood Electrics does to make this work with the Zero and all the testing and refinement, is well worth the time most people on this forum would spend and in the end still not have something as quality is my guess.  The other thing is if you do something wrong, you could mess up the bike by blowing the charge fuse, or not adhering to the BMS signal while the bike is on and overcharge causing damage to the batteries.  If you feel comfortable doing all this on your own and know the risks and accept them then go for it sure! But I'm definitely recommending most people on this forum just buy the plug and play kit from Hollywood and have peace of mind it isn't going to malfunction and leave you stranded.

I get the risk vs reward of the Hollywood Electric Elcon, but for the good of Zero owners, I think we should have a better value option.

The Hollywood Electric Elcon with J1772 adapter is $1700 plus tax and shipping.  For that price, I would rather have the clean looking, easy to use Zero Charge Tank.

A 1 hr Fast Charger like the Diginow would be great, but I still think $3000 is steep and that whole effort has stalled out for Version 2 to come out.  Also, the one person that I know that has the Diginow will not let go of his Elcons because of Diginow issues. 

[BrianTRice@gmail.com]

I get the risk vs reward of the Hollywood Electric Elcon, but for the good of Zero owners, I think we should have a better value option.

All of these options have tradeoffs. Even the Eltek Flatpack builds exist within this space of tradeoffs - sure, they're inexpensive and can be made reliable if you have the skills, but hardened for vehicle travel they're not!

The Hollywood Electric Elcon with J1772 adapter is $1700 plus tax and shipping.  For that price, I would rather have the clean looking, easy to use Zero Charge Tank.

The Zero Charge Tank is not available for that price - it's available for $1000 more (possibly not including dealer installation). But I'm not criticizing your preferences - they're absolutely valid. The Elcon 2500 packaging was created before the Charge Tank and has less investment put into it. In exchange, you get a simpler product that works for a different (less convenient) use case. It's just market differentiation.

A 1 hr Fast Charger like the Diginow would be great, but I still think $3000 is steep and that whole effort has stalled out for Version 2 to come out.  Also, the one person that I know that has the Diginow will not let go of his Elcons because of Diginow issues. 

The effort stalled because the V1 arrangement did not scale, more or less, which explains both issues. It's not a coincidence that Elcon was chosen for the newer effort - Elcon seems to manage quality in a very reasonable way because they target forklifts and light trucks. I think V2 will have a different story even if the price point doesn't change.

I, too, am keeping my Elcon 2500 until I have a reliable replacement, which is very likely one or two of DigiNow's V2 chargers; this is partly to have a backup and partly to use two J-plugs at the same time.

And I think the price point per power density / convenience relationship will not change for a while. It's just very expensive to get engineer person-years dedicated to make these products and get them fully tested and built right to last on vehicles, and to ensure that the manufacturing run is large enough to spread out the risk (again, a very good reason that the best parts of a Zero get tested first on the forklift and light industrial truck market).

For what it's worth, I decided to start elaborating on these options on the wiki. Eventually it should be a straightforward product comparison:
http://zeromanual.com/index.php/Zero_Aftermarket#Level_2_AC

[zerovolt]

Is it possible to plug 2 differents chargers in the auxiliary port at the same time with Y adaptor, like 1 elcon 2500 and 1 delta quick charger ?

[benswing]

Is it possible to plug 2 differents chargers in the auxiliary port at the same time with Y adaptor, like 1 elcon 2500 and 1 delta quick charger ?

Yes, I have been using 2 Elcons connected via a Y-adapter for 3 years now.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[zerovolt]

thanks, but can i plug 2 chargers with different KW , one 1000Watts and one with 2500 watts with y-adaptor in the aux. port ?

[Lenny]

I agree with you Electric Terry , i am sure Hollywood Electrics is the best.
But i think if you use always the onboard charger first and after you plug one or 2 Elcons without bms ' connection, you will have the  battery' bms proctection . If you have overvoltage or overheating ' problems , the bms will open the contactor.  The risk is low.

It is my opinion, i am not a specialist.

As far as I know there is no "real" communication possible in between external chargers and the BMS. The only thing which can be done with the additional ports on the auxiliary charge port, is to send a 5V signal relative to B- to it, to get the contactor closed to establish the connection to the battery.

So even if you are connecting something which the BMS considers as not suitable, it should be able to open the contactor at any time to protect the battery.

[Ndm]

I've done it with two dissimilar sized homemade chargers, one at 1200 watts and the other at 2000 watts, no issues after a year of use

[zerovolt]

I've done it with two dissimilar sized homemade chargers, one at 1200 watts and the other at 2000 watts, no issues after a year of use

Ok Thanks

[Killroy]

The Zero Charge Tank is not available for that price - it's available for $1000 more (possibly not including dealer installation). But I'm not criticizing your preferences - they're absolutely valid.

I checked with Zero/BMW and they said that the Charge Tank installation is $200 and the advertised price is $2000, so if someone likes the clean, OEM look that is a good value. 

Now if Zero would double the charge rate, now we are talking! 

[BrianTRice@gmail.com]

The Zero Charge Tank is not available for that price - it's available for $1000 more (possibly not including dealer installation). But I'm not criticizing your preferences - they're absolutely valid.

I checked with Zero/BMW and they said that the Charge Tank installation is $200 and the advertised price is $2000, so if someone likes the clean, OEM look that is a good value.

Oops, I thought of the Power Tank cost, not Charge Tank. My bad.