16A Charging Cable - Do I need to buy Mitsubishi brand?

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owentom

New member
Joined
Nov 14, 2018
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3
Hi, I recently bought a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV and am looking to buy a 16A charging cable to charge at public charging stations. If I buy direct from a Mitsubishi dealer, the cable costs £310. Looking online there seem to be several companies selling generic charging cables at approx. 1/3 of the price (around £100). Are there any potential issues with buying the generic cables that people have experienced or are aware of? Many thanks!
 
Assuming they are decent quality, there is no reason whatsoever why you couldn't use other brands. Keep in mind, tethered stations do not come with Mitsubishi cables either ;-)
 
Owen, I think you do not need to buy a cable. All public charging stations should have the cable already - if they haven't I would suggest they are broken and the cable has been taken away. I could be wrong but these would be very much the exception to the rule. Your car has a "type 1" port and Chademo so this is all you're looking for, Mitsubishi hasn't invented it's own port.

The only time really you need to consider buying a cable is if you have a home charger installed. I have one and it only decreased the charge time from 5 hrs to 3.5hrs so not really worth it in my mind.
 
anko said:
Assuming they are decent quality, there is no reason whatsoever why you couldn't use other brands. Keep in mind, tethered stations do not come with Mitsubishi cables either ;-)

Thanks Anko, the Mitsubishi dealer told me that if the charging cable caused a problem with the car, damaging the battery for example, that the warranty would be invalidated because it isn't a Mitsubishi cable. But when I spoke to the generic cable company they told me that the car has self-protection built in so that it will always detect an external fault and will not start or cease charging if there is a problem, so the car could only be damaged by charging equipment if there was already a fault with the on-board software / hardware which should be covered by the warranty... This is my only concern I think.
 
VillageIdiotDan said:
Owen, I think you do not need to buy a cable. All public charging stations should have the cable already - if they haven't I would suggest they are broken and the cable has been taken away. I could be wrong but these would be very much the exception to the rule. Your car has a "type 1" port and Chademo so this is all you're looking for, Mitsubishi hasn't invented it's own port.

The only time really you need to consider buying a cable is if you have a home charger installed. I have one and it only decreased the charge time from 5 hrs to 3.5hrs so not really worth it in my mind.

Thanks for your reply. There are four ZeroNet (7kW 32A Type 2 Mennekes) charging stations in the town that I live in and none of them are tethered, not sure about elsewhere, that's the reason I was thinking to get the cable.
 
owentom said:
..., so the car could only be damaged by charging equipment if there was already a fault with the on-board software / hardware which should be covered by the warranty... This is my only concern I think.
Indeed. In the end, the car is in control of how fast / to what level it charges that battery, taking into account a maximum current advertised by the cable / charge station. In theory the charger in the car could ignore the advertised maximum current and draw to much power and damage the cable and / or charge station or trip a fuse, but not the other way around. The charge station / cable cannot make the car do something it doesn't want to do.
 
owentom said:
There are four ZeroNet (7kW 32A Type 2 Mennekes) charging stations in the town that I live in and none of them are tethered, not sure about elsewhere, that's the reason I was thinking to get the cable.
Of course I don't know about the UK, but over here, tethered stations are very uncommon, other than on peoples driveways. Main reason is that not all cars use a type 1 plug. Some use a type 2 plug. And a tethered station can only service one of them. Hence untethered stations: you bring the cable that suits your car.
 
owentom said:
Thanks for your reply. There are four ZeroNet (7kW 32A Type 2 Mennekes) charging stations in the town that I live in and none of them are tethered, not sure about elsewhere, that's the reason I was thinking to get the cable.

Ah, my bad, understood. I'm just learning myself and was keen you didn't buy if you didn't need it.
 
VillageIdiotDan said:
Owen, I think you do not need to buy a cable. All public charging stations should have the cable already - if they haven't I would suggest they are broken and the cable has been taken away. I could be wrong but these would be very much the exception to the rule. Your car has a "type 1" port and Chademo so this is all you're looking for, Mitsubishi hasn't invented it's own port.

The only time really you need to consider buying a cable is if you have a home charger installed. I have one and it only decreased the charge time from 5 hrs to 3.5hrs so not really worth it in my mind.
I don't know about the UK, but I have never seen a tethered charging station...
 
All of the charging stations here in BC, Canada, have either a type 1 plug attached (is that what you mean by tethered?) or both type 1 and Chademo. I've never seen a station that would require you to have your own cable.
 
Type1, Yazaki, is developed in the USA. Type2, Mennekes, is the most common one outside the USA. On the European continent all public charging stations require a separate cable, in the UK and USA the cable is attached to the charger. For UK car owners who want to charge on the Continent a cable is needed. Private chargers can be of either type.

Here is a list of plugs for various car brands:

https://www.delaadkabelshop.nl/laadkabels/welke-stekker-heeft-mijn-auto/
 
In the UK, "rapid" chargers, i.e. the 50kW DC chargers, have their own cable attached (actually, usually 2 or 3 cables, including one which is ChaDeMo). Practically all other types (usually 7kW or 22kW AC = "fast") have a Mennekes 'type 2' socket, so in order to charge our cars, which are type 1, we need a 'type 2 to type 1' cable....
 
jdsx said:
In the UK, "rapid" chargers, i.e. the 50kW DC chargers, have their own cable attached (actually, usually 2 or 3 cables, including one which is ChaDeMo). Practically all other types (usually 7kW or 22kW AC = "fast") have a Mennekes 'type 2' socket, so in order to charge our cars, which are type 1, we need a 'type 2 to type 1' cable....
Public DC chargers are ALWAYS tethered. Also on the continent.
 
anko said:
Public DC chargers are ALWAYS tethered. Also on the continent.
I know, anko, I was just being a pedant when replying to jaap who said "On the European continent all public charging stations require a separate cable"...;-)
 
jaapv said:
in the UK and USA the cable is attached to the charger.
I'm afraid this is 99% wrong. I have only seen 1 charger with an attached cable. Every other one has required an appropriate cable to charge via AC. Of course DC Chademo chargers have their own cable tethered.
 
BCbackroader said:
All of the charging stations here in BC, Canada, have either a type 1 plug attached (is that what you mean by tethered?) or both type 1 and Chademo. I've never seen a station that would require you to have your own cable.

Same here in California. The type I plug charging stations are free of charge at the train stations & airports. They charge you an arm & leg at the shopping center or somewhere else.
 
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