Solution to avoid range anxiety - Carry a generator

Toyota Rav4 EV Forum

Help Support Toyota Rav4 EV Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
I don't buy that Jason, but it looks like all you naysayers were right. But why did the same generator work at 120V, but not 240V? Afterall, if it does not put out a "pure sinewave", that would be the case whether it was outputting 240V or 120V, no?

One thing I noticed with THIS generator, it does not regulate the AC frequency very well. At no load the output frequency is way too high approaching 70hz! Under full load it drops to 58hz. However, it does produce a nominal 60hz output when at approximately half its continious power rating. Btw, I added a tachometer meter on the generator to monitor frequency.

"Better quality" generators have something called automatic idle control. I would think ALL generators have a variable throttle control and speed governor that "regulates" RPM in proportion to the load. Apparently, my generator does not have this particular feature. If it did, I don't know if it would solve the problem of charging my RAV4, but it certainly couldn't hurt.

Aside to Tony . . . thanks for the feedback about the J1772's PWM control band. You're right, at 6A (or less) my EVSE simply would not initiate a charging session. At 8A or higher it would, but the generator did not seem up to the task; at least not at 240V. However, it worked on my VOLT up to 10A at 240V with the same generator and EVSE. It even worked at 14A, but not continuously. At 14A, every 2 minutes or so, it kept dropping out of charge temporarily as I mentioned earlier. At 230V, ~14A, the generator could have been trying to operate right at its overload threshold. I called the manufacturer and was told not to go over 13A at 240V. Frankly, the OEM's call center did not seem all that knowledgeable. Another factor is that the JB's current sensor/limiter is probably only accurate to +/-1A. Do you think I should still try the resistor ground spoofer even though I had a solid copper wire connection to the generator's Earth ground terminal?
 
Back
Top