Five Steps to Prepare Your Home for an Electric Vehicle

Electric vehicles are becoming more popular in Covington and with good reasons. Battery technology has improved greatly in the past few years. More and more public charging stations are coming online around Dyersburg and everywhere in North America. Many automakers have made great strides in researching electric vehicles' power plants and motors.

One concern you may have is how long it takes to charge an electric car. Fear not! Our guide from Express Dyersburg Chevrolet explains more about charging an electric vehicle, such as a Hummer EV or Silverado EV.

If you haven’t already done research on types of electric vehicle charging stations, now is a good time to start. As a refresher, most home car charging systems fall into Level 1 or Level 2. Here’s more information about electric vehicle charging batteries:

• Level 1 EV charging often takes days to fully charge an electric car.
• Level 2 EV charging often takes several hours to fully charge an electric car. You can often get between 60-200 miles of range in just 20-30 minutes with Level 2 DC charging, though. For this reason, most people intermix daytime “top-off” charging with overnight charging.

If you haven’t cleaned out or organized your garage, now is the time to do that before installing an electric vehicle home charger! Make sure that you get your garage ready for an EV before you take delivery! You may wish to clean out clutter first if your garage has been used as a storage space for a long time.

The power panel in your home distributes electricity throughout the entire building. It should be rated for a maximum amount of current flow measured in Amperes. Most new homes come with a 100 Amp power panel, but there should be an amperage rating printed on your main circuit breaker.

Next, you’ll want to get a handle on how much electrical energy you consistently use in your house by performing a self-assessment of your electricity use before you install an electric vehicle charging station system. You do not want to overload your electric distribution panel.

Next, hire an electrician. You can discuss any concerns you have about your power consumption and adding EV charging. You can also have them install a dedicated 240-volt plug or add a hardwired circuit back to the power panel. Usually this costs a couple hundred dollars, but could be up to $1,000 or $3,000 if it’s found that your power panel is not sufficient as-is and requires upgrading.

If you haven’t already researched and purchased an EV charger at this point, it would be the time to do so and have it professionally installed by the electrician of your choice.

Once you know how to prepare your home for an electric vehicle, it’s time for the fun part—choosing your EV at Express Dyersburg Chevrolet! Our EV inventory is growing all the time with electric versions of some of your favorite Chevy and GMC models. Contact us or pay a visit to experience what a Chevy or GMC EV has to offer you!