Neighbors in parking garage keep unplugging my Prius

That's darn terrible.

I'm sorry to hear you are having these issues.


Maybe try to park as far away as possible while still near a plug? Ie. bottom floor in the far corner..?

Could it be the apt staff doing the unplugging?

 

It may be the apartment complex manager.
Have you worked out an arrangement with somebody about the electricity that you're using?

Usually if you ask nicely whoever owns the garage might give you written permission (I've made arrangements at work for this) otherwise the person that's unplugging your car might think that you're one of THOSE EV enthusiasts that go around stealing electricity.

Then, I'd get a sign saying "YOU'RE ON CAMERA!" and put it inside a window and point a dash cam out the rear window.
It doesn't have to be actually running, but a blinking red light might also be handy.

Good Luck!

 

welcome! move to a nicer neighborhood?

 

I also think it's the apartment manager. Nobody should get free electricity without permission. If kids were bored and doing it, they would take your 50ft cord too.

 

Tying the knot around the car is imaginative, but it might be less mysterious if the apartment manager just put a plug lockout on the end of your cord, and waited for you to stop by the office with your proposal to pay for the juice.

-Chap

 

I think any reasonable person in that situation would just NOT plug in when he could not do it without creating a safety hazzard for the others using the garage.

Or did I miss something ??

If I was in a building where that happened more than once, you would find your cord in about 10 pieces.

While you are thinking about that, talk to the building's management about dedicated electric parking spaces.

P.S. People generally don' t hate Prius's but obnoxious owners sometimes are a different matter. This sounds like a pretty good example of that to me.

 

i think people generally do hate prius's.

 

...is this happening in Cali or TX?
PiP does not really use much juice if that helps to explain to someone.

 

Step #1: Look in the mirror and ask yourself:
- Did I get permission to plug my car in?
- Did I check the apartment rules first?
- Am I paying, or make any effort to pay, DIRECTLY for the additional electricity being used?
- Am I sure that the outlet that I plugged into can handle the electrical load?
- Did I create a tripping or electrocution hazard by running the cord across the garage floor?

Step #2: If the answers to any of the above questions are "no / no / no / no / yes", then STOP PLUGGING IN and resolve all of the above before ever plugging in again.

Step #3: If you can't resolve those issues, then move or sell the vehicle.

Step #4: Look in the mirror again.

 

Now that I think about it more I have to agree ^^^^^


I live in a townhouse that I own, not a rental property, and owning a plug in in not feasible currently. I guess I could if I ran a rediculously long extension cord from my house to the parking area but that would traverse other peoples property as well as common area and would cause a tripping hazard for the young ones and old folks alike leaving me open to lawsuits. Actually I'm not even sure if they have a policy about that. I'm pretty certain it would not be tolerated though as they have confiscated Christmas lawn decorations out past the alloted time. Lol.

So yeah as others have stated. Ask for permission, if the authorities that he say no that's that!

 

You're lucky he did not steal your charge cable. That go for $300+ easy on eBay. The dealer do not recommend using extension cord to charge the plugin. If you do, make sure power cord is heavy duty. Otherwise you can feel the heat going to the line and could damage the Prius

 

And while visiting to get permission, ask whether or not the garage has security cameras.

 

No cameras in the garage?

 

I work at an apartment complex and whenever we find people using power they do not pay for we unplug the cords and wrap them up and place them near the vehicle or front door. You can't just plug wherever you feel the need. You need permission. I'm almost certain its management doing it and not some one else. They see a long extension cord on the floor plugged in to an outlet and technically you're stealing power. If I kept catching you doing it after a few times I would write you a ticket and hand you a 7 day notice to stop or I will file for a 3 day notice for eviction.

 

why else would there be outlets in a parking garage? block heaters and ev's.

 

Plenty of other reasons too. The local electrical code may well require it. Garage outlets existed for all of the 20th Century, despite no EVs beyond the infancy of the automobile era.

Plug-in cars require some circuit and load planning. A single EV charger consumes the entire allowed load capacity of many circuits, so must not share a circuit with any other significant load. If some garage circuits were not built with that in mind -- and most existing garages were built before the modern EV era -- then they are not appropriate for EV charging.

Just because a circuit breaker or fuse doesn't blow, doesn't mean the charger is OK in that outlet. The owner or manager or facility supervisor needs to check, then give permission. And if significant other loads are already on those circuits, they should decline. The car really ought to have a special dedicated circuit, not shared with anything else -- including with other car chargers. Each charger should be on a separate circuit breaker.

 

Actually?
They do.
I've heard that they draw something like 12a.That's a non-trivial load!
Think: Hair drier on high speed or about 10 40" LED TVs

Maybe some Pip EE can provide more detail but 12 amps (@ 120v) seems like a ballpark figure.
The Pip has a smallish battery so it's just not going to take as long to reach a full charge.

Two or three important issues come to mind.
1. Is the receptacle GFI protected? Is this protection necessary?
2. Is the electrical cord in good shape and rated for 15a?
3. How is the person charging the Pip paying for the electricity?

BTW......if the Pip draws 12a while charging then you're very marginal for capacity with the typical 14gauge outside electrical cord @ 50-feet.
NEC hacks would probably insist on either getting a 25 foot cord @ 14gauge or clubbing up to a 12gauge cord.

If you're stealing electricity, you probably ought to use a small and less obvious cord anyway.

 

i think he's talking about electricity cost to the complex.

 

That's important to discuss as well.
I was just being PC by pretending to think that the safety aspect of stringing an electrical cord around parked cars in a garage might be more important to discuss than the economic impact of electricity theft.
I've been told that it "only" costs $0.25 to charge a Pip.
We'll presume for ease of discussion that the OP is not plugging in during peak use and we'll also presume that an apartment complex pays for electricity at residential rather than commercial rates:

Gas is was $2.02 the last time I filled up.
128 fluid ounces to a gallon works out to about a 16-ounce bottle's worth of gas.
Somebody will no doubt check my math and rat me out if these presumptions are out of line.

How about I siphon a water-bottle's worth of gas out of my neighbor's car every day and tell them not to worry about it because "It's only about a quarter's worth."
Now......
CAN and SHOULD an appartment complex offer electrical outlets to residents as a benefit or a perk to renters????
Yes.
I would.
BUT there's a huge fundamental difference between your landlord offering you a cool drink of water, and you taking a bottle of water out of his or her office.

The reason that I'm slightly impassioned about this is because I've actually come to be something of a big fan of dual-fuel vehicles.....and I drive a Prius every day.
You know what a Pip looks like to 99.999999999-percent of non eco-geeks?
A Prius.
I think that PHEVs and BEVs have something of a bright future here in America.
I think that early adopters can be justifiably proud of leading the charge (puns almost unintended) to bring affordable BEV's into economic viability.
Let's not let a few creeps give them a bad name.