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Which adapters do you actually use?

Considering the price of the car, and I didn't want to be tied, I just ended up buying both adapters. I tested out a Tesla Supercharger just to make sure it worked, and it was easy; plugged in and it just started charging.

Sure, I'll aim for CCS, but it's nice to know that I can basically charge anywhere.
 
Aka-none said:
Of course there are chargers using nacs that are more than 50kw, IIRC
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Yes, you're correct. There are currently seven Tesla superchargers in the country that offer both V4 power cabinets and stalls and thus could offer more than 50kW for my Lucid Air Touring. The closest is eight hours away from me. If many more true V4 stations are built, then buying a NACS to CCS1 adapter might be worth it for me. But even then, there will almost certainly be many more CCS1 options available (EA, EVgo, Ionna, etc) so I doubt it.
 
Well here is a reason to get the NACS to CCS1. Last night I made my first trip to the fast chargers near my house. Six CCS1 stations with three unattended cars plugged in and a wait for the other chargers.
Behind these chargers was a row of perhaps 20 tesla super chargers that was perhaps half full.
I’ll likely wait a bit before getting the second adapter as I will only be using the fast chargers for trips once my wall unit gets installed in two weeks or so. But it does show the use case for having one in the car.
 
Golfhack said:
Yes, you're correct. There are currently seven Tesla superchargers in the country that offer both V4 power cabinets and stalls and thus could offer more than 50kW for my Lucid Air Touring. The closest is eight hours away from me. If many more true V4 stations are built, then buying a NACS to CCS1 adapter might be worth it for me. But even then, there will almost certainly be many more CCS1 options available (EA, EVgo, Ionna, etc) so I doubt it.
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Noob here - and sorry for the very basic question- but are all other Tesla chargers throttled to 50kwh? That would certainly impact my calculus
 
Golfhack said:
Yes, you're correct. There are currently seven Tesla superchargers in the country that offer both V4 power cabinets and stalls and thus could offer more than 50kW for my Lucid Air Touring. The closest is eight hours away from me. If many more true V4 stations are built, then buying a NACS to CCS1 adapter might be worth it for me. But even then, there will almost certainly be many more CCS1 options available (EA, EVgo, Ionna, etc) so I doubt it.
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Rhinoww said:
Well here is a reason to get the NACS to CCS1. Last night I made my first trip to the fast chargers near my house. Six CCS1 stations with three unattended cars plugged in and a wait for the other chargers.
Behind these chargers was a row of perhaps 20 tesla super chargers that was perhaps half full.
I’ll likely wait a bit before getting the second adapter as I will only be using the fast chargers for trips once my wall unit gets installed in two weeks or so. But it does show the use case for having one in the car.
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Exactly why I went ahead and purchased A2Z NACS to CC! adapter. For years I assumed I'd never need one and therefore didn't purchase one when I had my Equinox EV. But now that I see iONNA and Walmart have both configurations onsite, I figured it would be prudent to keep one in the car in the event I arrive at a station and all the CCS1 are taken but NACS are available. I've seen it happen in reverse at an iONNA. All the NACS stalls were taken, so a Kia EV6 used is CCS1 to NACS adapter to use a CCS1 stall.
Rhinoww said:
Noob here - and sorry for the very basic question- but are all other Tesla chargers throttled to 50kwh? That would certainly impact my calculus
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I've often wondered if iONNA and Walmart NACS chargers operate at different current than Tesla NACS chargers. It's the current specification that has Tesla chargers limiting the charge rate on Lucids. Both iONNA and Walmart use Alpitronic chargers. Walmart also uses ABB.
 
Rhinoww said:
Noob here - and sorry for the very basic question- but are all other Tesla chargers throttled to 50kwh? That would certainly impact my calculus
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martinjlm said:
...

I've often wondered if iONNA and Walmart NACS chargers operate at different current than Tesla NACS chargers. It's the current specification that has Tesla chargers limiting the charge rate on Lucids. Both iONNA and Walmart use Alpitronic chargers. Walmart also uses ABB.
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Guess if I was truly interested I would just ask my friendly local AI bot, right?

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So it seems that using iONNA / Walmart NACS chargers should yield similar results as using Tesla V4, and BETTER results than using Tesla V3 and lower.
 
martinjlm said:
Guess if I was truly interested I would just ask my friendly local AI bot, right?
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The issue is voltage, not current. Lucid Air cars' charging circuitry only supports 50kW of power when stepping up a 450V charging connection to 800-900V to match the battery potential.
No step-up is needed on a 920+ volt charging station, so the 50kW limit is no longer a cap.

Gravity vehicles have a more powerful step-up circuit that is capable of maxing out a 450V station at its 500 amp limit, or about 225kW
 
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I have to say, this whole NACS "standardization" thing is not working out so far.

Had my Air for four years. Never needed any adapter.

Had my Gravity for two weeks. Use adapters 90% of the time.

All the chargers at work, and my charging options at home, are J1772.

Not all Tesla Superchargers accept non-Teslas here. And there's zero speed OR price advantage for a Gravity Touring at Tesla vs any other station. So rather than figuring out which Tesla station to use, I've mostly stuck with the EA stations near me, which are all CCS.

I'm sure in 10 years this will all sort itself out. But the "promise" of NACS eliminating charging adapters so far has turned out like all the rest of Tesla's promises.

If I were advising any buyer of an EV, I'd tell them "Forget the port type. You'll get a set of the right adapters and be fine."
 
@joec it really depends on where you are. In some places (like where I am in Oakland CA area there is basically a DCFC wasteland. Even Tesla doesn't have many locations (one near the Oakland Coliseum and a second in Emeryville near the Emeryville Marketplace). The EA and EvGO locations aren't much better and are typically much smaller than Tesla locations (sometimes as few as three ports). On Interstate 5 from the Bay Area to Los Angles the Tesla charging network is so far superior to any other charging network it is laughable. Add in that Ionna locations have both CCS1 AND NACS charging ports and using NACS on a Gravity really shouldn't be that unusual. In fact the only time I use CCS1 at a DCFC station is when I go to the closest EvGO station in the bay area. Otherwise I'm completely using NACS, even at home (Lucid 50A cable which came with the Gravity)
 
ke2 said:
@joec it really depends on where you are. In some places (like where I am in Oakland CA area there is basically a DCFC wasteland. Even Tesla doesn't have many locations (one near the Oakland Coliseum and a second in Emeryville near the Emeryville Marketplace). The EA and EvGO locations aren't much better and are typically much smaller than Tesla locations (sometimes as few as three ports). On Interstate 5 from the Bay Area to Los Angles the Tesla charging network is so far superior to any other charging network it is laughable. Add in that Ionna locations have both CCS1 AND NACS charging ports and using NACS on a Gravity really shouldn't be that unusual. In fact the only time I use CCS1 at a DCFC station is when I go to the closest EvGO station in the bay area. Otherwise I'm completely using NACS, even at home (Lucid 50A cable which came with the Gravity)
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On I5 between SF and LA, I stop exactly once, at either Kettleman or Harris Ranch. Both EA. Neither one has ever given me an ounce of trouble or has been full.

Don’t need more than that, since one stop is all you need in any Lucid for that trip.

Maybe there are ten Tesla stations in between there. No idea. No need.

If I ever get to Harris or Kettleman and EA is full, I’ll be glad to have the backup Tesla stations there, I suppose. But like I said, there’s zero speed advantage, and the Supercharger network is more expensive.

Gravity is great for having both options, thanks to the voltage conversion. But until Tesla gets way more stations with 1000v architecture, I’m not seeing any good reason to favor them.
 
Ionna begins (?) rolling out NACS-only charging installations, as did Rivian some time ago:
evchargingstations.com

Ionna Launches Its First All-NACS Charging Sites (No CCS1)

This week brought surprising news that Ionna opened its first charging stations with exclusively NACS (SAE J3400) charging connectors.
evchargingstations.com evchargingstations.com
 
martinjlm said:
So it seems that using iONNA / Walmart NACS chargers should yield similar results as using Tesla V4, and BETTER results than using Tesla V3 and lower.
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I can confirm- with an NACS>CCS adaptor and a non-Supercharger NACS charger (Ionna in my case), the Air will charge just like you plugged into a CCS. 200kw+, subject to the usual charging curve. No apparent loss due to the adaptor though MAN that thing was hot after going 7-70%.
 
JimmyBreeze said:
I can confirm- with an NACS>CCS adaptor and a non-Supercharger NACS charger (Ionna in my case), the Air will charge just like you plugged into a CCS. 200kw+, subject to the usual charging curve. No apparent loss due to the adaptor though MAN that thing was hot after going 7-70%.
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Were you using Lucid's adapter, or another brand?
 
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