Portable Charger.

[Iroc34a]

I know this might sound crazy. I just bought a 23 Lightning Platinum, coming from a 2018 Chevy Volt Hybrid.
On the Volt the EVSE that came with it only had a 120 volt plug on it, that did not come off. BUT you could plug it into 220v with an adapter that was made for it, and instant level 2 charging. Now here is my question. If I plug this Lightning EVSE with the 120-v plug attached into my 220 outlet, will it work? Or does it have to have the NEMA 14-50 plug installed. I have the new outlet from Hubble on order, but has any one tried this?

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[Monkey]

The Ford mobile charger comes with the 120V and 240V plug adapters and the unit is keyed differently to them. If you use the 120V plug adapter, it will only charge the truck at 120V at 12A and a maximum of about 1.1kW. To charge any faster, you need to use the 240V (NEMA 14-50) plug and then it charges at 240V / 30A. No adapter to interface between your NEMA 14-50 outlet and the Ford mobile charger with 120V plug will change this. There are other better and more reliable mobile chargers on the market, some of which can charge at up to 40A off of the NEMA 14-50 outlet.

Also, if you’re talking about the factory charger for the Volt (the 5XB), it was 120V only. The adapter to plug it into the NEMA 14-50, as well as a few others they made available, did not give you any more power or faster charging, it was just an adapter that pulled from one leg to deliver 120V.

 

[Newton]

I don't think so, the Volt adapter was probably designed to do this. The one that comes with the Lightning is the Webasto Go and based on what the 120V and 240V cords look like I don't think that it works that way. I wouldn't want to try, frankly.

The idea of a wall adapter that puts 220V across 120V hot and neutral is pretty scary.

 

[Newton]

What kind of 220V outlet do you have? There is probably an EVSE that works for it - or you can get an adapter that will work with the Ford's 14-50 if you are careful. I have a NMEA 6-20 plug for a tablesaw and got an adapter that lets me plug in a 16A/220V EVSE that came with a 14-50 plug end. Obviously no higher power EVSE could be used with that cord. My Mom has the same outlet in her garage (the tablesaw was originally my Dad's) and I got here this. It has been working for her KIA Niro.

 

[Iroc34a]

The Ford mobile charger comes with the 120V and 240V plug adapters and the unit is keyed differently to them. If you use the 120V plug adapter, it will only charge the truck at 120V at 12A and a maximum of about 1.1kW. To charge any faster, you need to use the 240V (NEMA 14-50) plug and then it charges at 240V / 30A. No adapter to interface between your NEMA 14-50 outlet and the Ford mobile charger with 120V plug will change this. There are other better and more reliable mobile chargers on the market, some of which can charge at up to 40A off of the NEMA 14-50 outlet.

Also, if you’re talking about the factory charger for the Volt (the 5XB), it was 120V only. The adapter to plug it into the NEMA 14-50, as well as a few others they made available, did not give you any more power or faster charging, it was just an adapter that pulled from one leg to deliver 120V.

The EVSE that came with the Gen 2 Volts was dual voltage 120 or 220. It only had a plug designed for 120 v. But somewhere along the line someone adapted a pigtail to plug into 220 and it worked, I used one for quite a while, until I bought a dedicated level 2 Bosch charger. But for the Volt it is rated at 16 amps max. The EVSE for the Lightning will work fine for me. Just was wondering if the 120 pigtail is used, plugged into my 220v adapter will it charge at the 32 amps I believe its rated?

 

[Iroc34a]

I don't think so, the Volt adapter was probably designed to do this. The one that comes with the Lightning is the Webasto Go and based on what the 120V and 240V cords look like I don't think that it works that way. I wouldn't want to try, frankly.

The idea of a wall adapter that puts 220V across 120V hot and neutral is pretty scary.

Yes , I agree. But I don't have any young kids anymore, and I am the only one that used it.

 

[Iroc34a]

Yes , I agree. But I don't have any young kids anymore, and I am the only one that used it.

The Gen 2 Volt EVSE was designed for dual voltage. Whoever was the first one to try it , was nuts.

 

[Iroc34a]

Update. Here is a video of what I am Talking about for the Volt EVSE.

 

[Monkey]

The EVSE that came with the Gen 2 Volts was dual voltage 120 or 220. It only had a plug designed for 120 v. But somewhere along the line someone adapted a pigtail to plug into 220 and it worked, I used one for quite a while, until I bought a dedicated level 2 Bosch charger. But for the Volt it is rated at 16 amps max. The EVSE for the Lightning will work fine for me. Just was wondering if the 120 pigtail is used, plugged into my 220v adapter will it charge at the 32 amps I believe its rated?

Yeah, I looked it up now…. Apparently the 2nd gen charger was dual-voltage, but still topped out at 16 Amps. Crazy they designed it that way and it worked with that adapter to the same plug.

The Ford charger absolutely does not work this way.

 

[Iroc34a]

Yeah, it really worked great. I believe the 1st Gen volts you had to modify the wiring internally to get 220v . I figured the Ford wouldn't work. But I wasn't willing to try it and let the smoke out ! Lol

Yeah, I looked it up now…. Apparently the 2nd gen charger was dual-voltage, but still topped out at 16 Amps. Crazy they designed it that way and it worked with that adapter to the same plug.

The Ford charger absolutely does not work this way.

.

 

[Iroc34a]

Ok. Cool. I'll just wait for the Hubble 14-50 outlet to show up. Useing my old Bosch 16 amp level 2 charger on the Truck does work. 32 on the Ford EVSE should be just fine. Thanks

 

[CyclopsThere]

There are other better and more reliable mobile chargers on the market, some of which can charge at up to 40A off of the NEMA 14-50 outlet.

Hey, wondering if you can toss me in that direction with a brand or model? I'm about to start looking for a 2nd mobile charger.

 

[Mike G]

Wish I knew how the Ford Portable (Webasto) charger came apart so I could poke around inside and figure out why the three of them I've used in the past have always started out fine and over time ended up in a state where it showed it was overheating more than it was charging. Replacing it with a Wallbox 48A charger was the best thing I've done all year. Those Ford Webastos have something going on inside. Like something in there is wearing out or connections are getting loose over time. But without knowing how that case comes apart there's no way to check.

 

[Maquis]

After all of this rambling, the answer to your question is “yes.” You can use the 120V dongle with an adapter to charge at 12A, 240V, which gets you double the charge rate of the L1.

 

[hturnerfamily]

the Chevy BOLT supplied 120v EVSE unit can also be adapted for 240v power, too... which is fantastic, especially if you have a smaller 20amp 240v outlet already available...

sometimes you see the term "120v/240v" on a device, which is what this means. It's not common to adapt these to 240v usage, but it's possible if the need applies, and you have the proper adapter.

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