Has anybody been contacted by Toyota Corporate?

[Ampster]

I got a call today from a guy named Spillane who said he worked for Toyota and was contacting RAV4EV owners.

The only question I could think of was the one about Phantom loads (I called them Vampire Loads) on the 12 volt system. He said he would talk to the tech people and get back to me. I also gave him the name of this forum so he could get a sense for the issues concerning other RAV owners.

 

[Dsinned]

I was contacted last week. He asked me a LOT of questions about my RAV4 EV. Mostly, the kind of questions like "on a scale of 1 to 10" or "from least likely to most likely" . . . probably around 25 to 30 questions total. Seems like Toyota is really interested in new owners' opinions.

Btw, Ampster, I see from the info at the bottom of your posts, you have a 2.5kW solar system on your roof. Can you eloborate on the system you have . . . **** what is your average monthly electric bill? How much does your system save you per month? How much did it cost? Did you lease or buy? Warranty?

I have a survey appt next week after Christmas scheduled with Peterson and Dean Roofing & Solar System company. They have a "special" on a low end, 1.5kW system (to buy) for $5500. I have a 43 year old, two story home, with about 1800 square feet, not counting a two car, attached, garage. My monthly bill is relatively low, on average about $40 to $50 in the warmer months, but it should go up higher now during the colder months, this time of year, because of my forced air central air heating furnance is running much more often now, and I have added a 2nd EV to my Leviton EVSE L2 charging station.

I'm on PG&E's special "E9-A" rates for EV owners, which are very low during off-peak hours. I was averaging about 450kWh/mo, but I expect that to go up to more like 500 or higher from now till Springtime, when the weather warms up again.

A 1.5kW system would result in 6 3x5' solar panels added to my roof.

Here's a sample of my whole house home energy electric power consumption with a lot of statistical data and history graphs that are updated every minute, which selectable graphs for periods of 3 hrs, 6 hrs, 12 hrs, 24 hrs and 48 hours, including a histogram of total consumption for years, months, weeks, days, and hours. I started collecting data only a few months ago to present, but I can see a rising trend this month (December) that should put me over 500kWh going forward.

https://www.enerati.com/Electricity/ConfigDashboard.aspx?param1=NjE4&param2=NDY2&param3=ZW5lcmF0aTg4ZWQ3NGEwM2E3YjYwMjY1MTcyY2E2MjE=

Any comments, recommendations and advice would be appreciated.

 

[TonyWilliams]

Here's my solar:

http://enlighten.enphaseenergy.com/public/systems/Ukwf22392

8kW DC, 6.7kW AC system

It provides 100% of household needs, but not the EV(s). Those are on a separate utility meter. The good news is that when I add more panels, it's easy with the Enphase micro inverters. I predict with two EVs at 400wh/mile consumption from the wall and 40,000 miles per year equals 16 megaWatts, or slightly more than double my current 14 megaWatts of production.


http://enphase.com/products/microinverters/m215/


35 - 228w SunPower Serengeti panels

http://www.enviro-friendly.com/sunpower-serengeti-228w-panel.pdf


Unirac mounts

http://unirac.com/residential/residential-products/solar-mount-residential

 

[Dsinned]

Wow, you have 35 solar panels? You must have a fairly large house (how many sq-ft?). Did your system cost a fortune?

And btw, did it comes with the monitoring software I saw at the first link you provided? That's really neat how you can watch a time progression of how the PV panels slowly increase and decrease in output production.

Thanks for the info.

 

[Ampster]

I was contacted last week. He asked me a LOT of questions about my RAV4 EV. Mostly, the kind of questions like "on a scale of 1 to 10" or "from least likely to most likely" . . . probably around 25 to 30 questions total. Seems like Toyota is really interested in new owners' opinions.

Btw, Ampster, I see from the info at the bottom of your posts, you have a 2.5kW solar system on your roof. Can you eloborate on the system you have . . . **** what is your average monthly electric bill? How much does your system save you per month? How much did it cost? Did you lease or buy? Warranty?

.............
Any comments, recommendations and advice would be appreciated.

I also got the survey earlier. This guy may have been following up because I answered some questions in the middle range and when asked what else I would have like on the car, I responded that I would like a SOC meter with details about KW used and charged.

I did some research on my system and discovered that it has a capacity of 2.8KW. Today was a clear day near the winter soltice and I generated 11KW which is about 4 hours of equivalant sun.

The system cost me close to $20.000 8 years ago and I did the installation myself with the help of some friends. I have 20 BP Solar cells which cost me $15,000 back then and I understand that the prices have come down. I connected it up and forgot about it for a long time because I was getting a zero bill. Then Southern California Edison changed the meter to one which does not go backwards so I was paying for night time usage which was costing me $14 per month. My electric water heater is programmed to go on during the day and I changed to an electric dryer which I only use during the day. In October, after I got the RAV my bill went up to $40 and since I was traveling during most of November it dropped back down to $20. I have finally dug up the paperwork and am going to finally submit the interconnect agreement so I can have the benefit of my daytime generation being used at night. I used to have a PC hooked up to my Xantrex inverter but it kept crashing so I just ordered the Current Cost meter so I can have a more reliable sense for what I am using.

There are a lot better choices today and the panels with the integrated inverters allow you to scale up your system if you want to add more. My is limited by the capacity of the inverter which is 3KW per hour. Also there are leasing alternatives where someone else does the maintenance. A friend of mine did one of the lease deals but he put up enough money that he gets all the savings and the company is on the hook for maintenance.

 

[Dsinned]

Thanks for the info.

I'm thinking about going with something like this: http://www.powersaverseries.com/

The price seems low enough to be advantageous now that I have TWO EVs to be regularly charged at home.

My month electric bill is averaging about 450kWh, but my PG&E E9-A rate is fairly low resulting in less than $50/mo. Most solar companies are soliciting homeowner paying a lot more, so I'm not so sure I am a good candidate for even a lower cost solar system.

Comments? Recommendations?

 

[TonyWilliams]

Wow, you have 35 solar panels? You must have a fairly large house (how many sq-ft?). Did your system cost a fortune?

And btw, did it comes with the monitoring software I saw at the first link you provided? That's really neat how you can watch a time progression of how the PV panels slowly increase and decrease in output production.

4100 square feet, two story.

$43,000, less 30% federal tax deduction, and several thousand state money. Net cost was in the high $20k area.

Enphase provides the monitoring system called Envoy with their inverters.