Here at Linus Media Group, we believe that offering free electric vehicle
charging not only helps to save our employees' wallets, but also helps to
save our planet. Unfortunately, we were
the victims of copper thieves who cut the cables from our chargers. Oh, hey
Linus. Okay, two questions. One, when did this happen?
And two, how long have you been in my trunk? Longer than I care to share. And
in response to your first question, about a week ago. The police were able
to offer their moral support, but when it comes to the costs of the repair,
that basically falls on you, buddy.
You know what? My car's not the only thing that needs a recharge.
I'm going on vacation.
What am I supposed to do? You're a smart guy.
You'll figure it out. But what about our sponsor? That's no
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And just like that, we've got all new chargers from Ubiquiti, Mahika. But
wait. Why did we have to get new stuff? Couldn't I just go and buy some cables
from an electrician supply store and fix the chargers? Where's the DIY? Where's
the tech tips? >> I totally agree and I'm going to
explain. Because EV chargers really should be easily repairable. [music]
After all, this isn't an isolated incident. EV chargers are increasingly
targeted whether it's for copper thief or ideological reasons. And if you just
open up the panel, you can see the wiring on our level two charger is
actually really simple. From a 240-V breaker, we run power to these terminals
which connect to the charger's electronics that talk to EVs when
plugged in. That communication activates the big switch called a contactor and
sends current through the charging gun and the car. Or doesn't when nothing's
plugged in, which is why the thieves were able to cut that hunk of copper
without being electrocuted. Both cables could be replaced by an end user really
easily, but when we called Grizzl-E to ask about getting new charging guns, we
were told to detach the hardwired
chargers, send them in at our expense, and buy a replacement cable and charging
gun for 200 Canadian dollars plus the cost of their labor. Now, it seems
Grizzl-E used to offer replacement charging guns that end users could
install themselves. And other third parties and OEMs still do sell these
standard replacement plug heads in our region because the use of standard parts
like this J1772 charging gun is a
requirement for our local rebate program. But, they're still around 200
dollars, so we'd just be saving on the labor and shipping costs if, of course,
we value our time at zero. sourcing the odd four-core EV cable
isn't easy either. At our local electrician supply store, they told us
to just talk to the charger manufacturer. >> [music] >> Guess it isn't as easy as wiring up a
few LTT True Spec cables.
They're 240-W cables, guys, not volts.
Who wrote this? So, fixing this is almost half the cost of these 500-dollar
boxes. And with government rebates already covering some of the cost if we
buy new stuff, it's just not really worth it.
Time to break the news. I beg your pardon. It costs how much?
Insurance isn't covering it. All out of pocket?
And we're replacing every charger?
Uh, no, I don't think I want it anymore.
Shh. Fortunately, there is a silver lining to
all this. When we first bought our Grizzl-E chargers, we wanted to go with
Ubiquiti's UniFi EV Station Light. But
they weren't covered under BC's rebate program at the time. Now, they are. At
700 dollars, they cost a little more than our Grizzl-E chargers, but Ubiquiti
was good enough to send over all the replacements we need. Even if we'd had
to pay for them, they do integrate better into our larger UniFi network.
And they solve a few of the gripes we had with the old system. So,
what were those gripes? Well, the scheduling system for the Grizzl-Es went
through ChargePoint and it was not the greatest. The only way to prevent people
from using the chargers on the weekend [music] was to set the lowest possible
charging time at a random time during the day. So, I believe I had it set for
15 minutes at like 5:45 to 6:00 a.m. And
that's because you can't turn it off completely. These new Ubiquiti ones,
because we're already on the Ubiquiti ecosystem, everybody uses Ubiquiti to
get into the building. You just tap in when you want to charge and it keeps our
neighbors from using the chargers while they're waiting for the children.
>> The Ubiquiti chargers also have a stock power output that's 10 amps higher than
the Grizzl-E chargers, which should translate into 20% faster charging if
our breakers were 70 amps instead of 40.
>> [music]
>> We've said this is a really simple install, and it is. >> [music]
>> But we're not electricians, so we brought in some professional contractors
to help with the install.
We've also discovered another opportunity here. Ubiquiti sent over
seven of their UniFi EV Station Light chargers, so we're going to replace all
six of the Grizzl-E chargers including two that weren't cut. I guess there's
just a limit to what a grown man can carry on his BMX bike. And finally, we
have this Tesla charger here, came with the building. We're going to leave it in
place, meaning we have one extra Ubiquiti charger. Hallelujah. So, we're
here at the studio building where we're going to put in a new [music] charger,
which is so awesome because we've had a crazy EV charging bottleneck over here.
People have to move their cars [music] around, sucks. We didn't have the capacity to install more chargers here
before, but there's a new transformer here now from a round of shop equipment
upgrades. So, now we can. The actual
charger we have over here is this older Siemens one which is getting kind of dated, so we're going to take [music]
the Grizzl-E ones that weren't damaged that are now available cuz we put
Ubiquiti's there over here to replace [music] it.
Aside from the new install, these new systems were really easy to put in.
>> Wow, thanks. This is great.
Oh, it's not working. Maybe a sensual massage?
Oh, thanks. I knew you could do it, James.
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Thanks for watching, [music] guys. If you liked this video, maybe check out the one where Linus installed an EV
charger >> [music] >> at his house, in his garage.
That was a good one and for now,
my work here is done.