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CHAdeMO to SAE J1772 DC (Combo) charging adapter

40K views 15 replies 12 participants last post by  Phazoni 
#1 ·
Bolt is coming out with optional SAE J1772 DC (Combo) fast charging adapter that is the least popular in the USA at this time.
Nissan Leaf CHAdeMO DC fast charging stations are more popular that SAE combo adapters.
Tesla has their own DC charging plug / protocol and, from my point of view, Tesla has the best fast charging infrastructure at this time; However, only Tesla's can access it at this time.
Tesla already created CHAdeMO to Tesla Adapter that can be bought for $500.
I would love to see Chevy engineering CHAdeMO to SAE J1772 DC (Combo) adapter and sell it for $500 or so a piece. From engineering point of view - there is not much to it: need 1x CHAdeMO female, 1x SAE combo male adapter and a $20 embedded board to bridge the communications protocol, with some software work. Charging protocol ICD's are public.
This would sure expand fast charging station availability for Bolts and Spark EVs and BMW electrics.
If any Chevy or LG engineers or marketing people are reading this, I hope you take and run with this idea :cool:.
 
#2 ·
The SAE CCS DC fast charging standard is on the Bolt EV and all new worldwide BEVs, since the CHAdeMO is only accepted as a standard for the Nissan Leaf. So it is logical to add the SAE CCS to all present CHAdeMO stations, instead of just an adapter.
 
#8 ·
Soul EV too. And if GM ever wants to sell the Bolt EV in Japan, they will need a CHAdeMO capability.

At the Drive Electric event in Cupertino last fall, I had a long discussion with Tony Williams about it. (Tony dislikes CCS for a variety of reasons. Just ask him. Then be prepared for a diatribe...) He said just building the molds for the adapter would be very expensive. Even figuring you could sell a few hundred of them, they would still cost north of $1k each. In the meantime, most of the new DC charging sites - outside of dealer parking lots at least - support both standards with two different cables.
 
#3 ·
I think this would be encouraging the CHAdeMO charger network, which I doubt that GM is interested in expanding. GM is pretty much committed to the SAE standards, which is what they build into their vehicles. Maybe a third party might be interested in marketing an adapter for sale or rental, but it would be a pretty small customer base.

Tesla really has no choice but to provide adapters as they only sell BEVs and without the expanded infrastructure they would struggle to develop their products. Yes they are building a SC network, but they still need to be able to utilize the other networks to keep from stranding their owners. Particularly since they decided to go it alone with their plug interface - still a bad idea in my mind.

VIN # B0985
 
#4 ·
Is that even possible? I mean besides making an adapter that physically fits into a Chademo plug, aren't there other issues that need to be addressed in order for a CCS-equipped EV to use a Chademo charging unit?
 
#5 ·
If you have full specifications for both standards on hand, I don't even think it'll be that hard. In both cases, the charger is providing DC on two wires at a voltage specified by the car for the important part. The rest is just the communications protocol - making the car's requests understandable to the charger and vice versa.

I'm not sure the "$20 chip and some software" description is adequate, but it should be fairly easy to do for any company with real engineering capability and possession of both sets of standard descriptions.
 
#14 ·
J1772 is a pretty simple state machine logic for negotiating with the car. And it doesn't control voltage or current once energized. The charge controller is in the car. ChadeMo and CCS, on the other hand, directly charge the battery, controlling both voltage and current, and are much more complex and expensive (the outside the car part). But given a ChadeMo station, agree, wouldn't be that difficult to make a ChadeMo to CCS. The question is, is there a need? I might throw $100-$200 at a Tesla L2 to J1772 adapter, but not $200-$500 at a ChadeMo to CCS.
 
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