Hi there,
Sorry to send a product question to your news email but I am trying to contact EV experts who can help me and wasn’t sure how else to contact you.
I am looking for a Type-2-to-type 2 charging cable plug holder that fits the male end of the cable that goes into the house – do you know if these exist?
All the cable plug holders I have found online only fit the female end that goes into the car, and are therefore too large to hold the smaller male end that goes into the house. Having emailed a couple of online EV stores they don’t seem to be aware of any plug holders to holster the male end, so I was wondering if you guys had heard of a product like this?
Grateful for any advice you have.
Thanks
Paul
Hi Paul, Bryce here. For good or ill, I just had your query forwarded to me as it seems I’m regarded as The Driven’s resident EVSE tinkerer. (Given I have been building, modifying or installing them for over 15 years, itseems a fair call 😉)
However, given you need to secure the opposite end to the one that plugs into the car: the short answer is … as far as I can tell, holsters for the wall socket end don’t exist.
All hope is not lost though. There are at least four other options.
- Buy the actual socket for the male end and attach it to a metal plate for bolting to the wall. The sockets are relatively cheap on sites like Alibaba etc. (I am BTW going against my normally inviolable advice to never buy electrical goods directly from overseas sites, but given you won’t actually be connecting it electrically, should be fine. 😉 You would also need to make sure the socket is completely sealed on the back though: they normally rely on the back being protected inside a weather proof box.
- If you have a friend with a 3D printer and scanner, get them to scan the plug and design/print a socket to suit. Rather a lot of work for a one-off though.
- Look for a broken BYO lead charger and salvage the socket – then do step 1.
- Buy a charger cable clip (available in EV section of the usual big-box hardware chain 😉 and hang it up that way. If the end is pointing up, the rubber cap should keep the water out.
By the way, for curious readers: I did ask the obvious follow-up question of ‘Why??’ Paul’s response is below:
I have an off-street parking area which is about 5m away horizontally but also 3m up a set of steps. To reach the charging point on the car I bought a 15m, type 2 cable. That was easy to buy but hard/heavy to carry around up and down the set of steps. I have been working through how to set this cable up so it can stay outside but for the charging ends to remain protected from the rain and I don’t want to leave the smaller male end stuck in the wall charger as it completely blocks the path around the front of our house.
Paul’s response not only makes perfect sense – it suggests there may be others who have been (or may soon be) in this situation. Certainly, as BEVs roll out quietly to fill all our driveways and streets, novel situations such as these will arise more often and, like petrol stations only began some 20+ years after the horseless carriage hit the roads, we need to share ideas and solutions until they become commonplace. Part of this solution is provided by the Australian Electric Vehicle Association (AEVA) who are dedicated to promoting and supporting EVs and the EV driver. I would recommend to anyone new to BEVs to join and help support their advocacy and policy work, as well as take advantage of the benefits available to members. (https://www.aeva.asn.au/membership/ )
Another is the brains trust of readers here. Feel free to add any ideas or solutions you might have in the comments section below.
Disclosure:
Bryce is both an AEVA member and part of their Policy and Advocacy Working Group.
