Adding a second battery — Tesla finally makes it possible

When Lightning Energy installed our Powerwall 2 back in December 2023 https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Anc2vKKqZ/ it was great. Paired with our 13 kW Enphase/Jinko solar system and 10 kW inverter, it's been handling our fully electrified home in Emerald pretty well — five reverse-cycle ACs, heat pump hot water, EV charging, and grid outages lasting up to nine days. But as we've added more loads, I've been thinking about expanding battery storage. There was a problem, though. The Powerwall 2 is no longer CEC-approved for new installations in Australia. Tesla stopped taking orders for it in late 2024/early 2025, and as of January 2026 it's no longer on the Clean Energy Council approved list. So you can't add a second one. And until very recently, the Powerwall 3 — Tesla's current model — was completely incompatible with the Powerwall 2. They couldn't talk to each other. That meant anyone with a Powerwall 2 who wanted more storage faced a painful choice: rip out the existing battery and…

Incoming software update. Grok AI 🤖

Woke up to a minor but very helpful change in the Tesla app.

The house screen now includes the percentage charge of the car (shown in the screenshot at 84%). Very handy to see it all in one place, without switching to the car view.

First service call for our Tesla Model Y. Replacing our loaner wheel with a new wheel.

As you can see in our posts from a few weeks ago, we hit a pothole, damaging our left rear wheel. At the time, we only knew that we had a slow leak. We logged the problem in the Tesla app. They arranged for roadside assistance to come to us, in about an hour, to install a loaner wheel, and take ours away to diagnose. Today, Tesla replaced the loan wheel with a new wheel, costing a whopping $1319. I asked them to clean the damaged wheel and put it in the back of the car. In the photos, you can see the buckle and crack. I am wondering if it is fixable. When I booked this service in the app, I also asked them to fix the water in the light bar, and some issues with the steering wheel buttons. They replaced both. I’ll discuss the steering wheel buttons in a separate post. All covered under warranty. I had a bit of trouble figuring out where to leave the car. Several after me also mistakenly parked in front of the waiting lounge, next to a sign that probably shouldn’t be there. One of the…

Why does it seem to be utes that are predominantly aggressive on the road?

A few unnecessary and dangerous overtakes on my way home through Gippsland. Towards oncoming cars, or a kangaroo. Wildlife and police also out. A bit busy on the roads today. Glad to see that the latest software update on the Tesla now shows speed and details now on playback of videos.

Merry Christmas 🤶🎅.

Tesla’s Christmas software update arrived just in time. It seems that those of us with HW4 had to wait longer? Glad to finally have the speed recorded on dashcam footage. I was hoping it would also apply to previously saved footage, but no.

Flat tyre – part 2.

We arrived home yesterday with a slow leak in a tyre. I opened the Tesla app, tapped on Roadside -> Flat Tyre, selected which wheel, and added a note about the slow leak. I received a response with a couple of minutes. About an hour later, Alan arrived to replace the wheel. Tesla subcontracts the roadside assistance to other companies, like this one. They have a bunch of Tesla wheels ready to go. Neither of us could find the source of the slow leak, but that’s not his job. He just tagged the wheel and sends it to Tesla for inspection and repair. Pretty seamless operation. We have a replacement wheel fitted, in less time, including the call out, than it would have taken me to do it myself with a spare. And they take care of sending the original to Tesla. We have a “space saver” spare wheel. If we had taken that with us on the trip, it would have majorly impacted our storage space. But worse: we would have had to then pack the full sized original wheel into our boot for the return trip.

What to ask for, in a battery installation?

I suggest getting your installer to agree in writing that your battery installation will include: 1. Remote control via an app and/or website to monitor your battery and house power. 2. During a grid outage, the battery should provide backup for everything you need. 3. During a grid outage, solar continues to provide power. 4. The ability to curtail export of power to the grid when pricing is negative. 5. Compatibility with Amber Electric, if you might want to use them as your energy retailer. Let’s look at each in detail: 1. Using an app or website, you can: 1. Monitor power in and out of your battery, house and grid connection, instantaneous, daily and historical. 2. At any time, set your battery to a minimum charge percentage. 2. In the event of a grid outage: 1. The battery will switch over automatically. The installer should test it and show you. 2. The battery will power all of your home, up to the battery’s maximum power (which should be at least 5kW). 3. If you have three…

What do all the electricity measurements mean?

1. Australian household electricity runs at about 240V “volts”. All your power points and devices are 240V. This is basically a measure of the force used to push the electricity. 2. The “current” is basically the throughput of electricity, measured in Amps. It varies for different devices. A modern LED light bulb uses less than 0.1A (Amps). A toaster or heater will use around 8A. The typical maximum allowed by a standard power point is 10A. 3. The total power of the electricity is measured in watts. We multiply the volts by the amps (voltage x current) to get the watts. For example, if your appliance uses 5A at 240V, then that’s 5 x 240 ‎ = 1,200 W, which is 1.2kW (kilowatts). A light bulb uses less than 0.1kW. 4. The total energy used by a device is calculated as the power x time. For example, if you use an appliance running at 1.2kW for 10 hours, then it uses 1.2 x 10 ‎ = 12kWh (kilowatt hours). A light bulb could run for days on the same 12kWh. 5. When you use electricity from the…

While driving in our town of Emerald to get some Emerald Thai for dinner, I did a double…

…take when I saw a Savic Motorcycles sign, randomly on the footpath. It turns out that they were running test rides today “winding through the beautiful Dandenong Ranges”. What a great idea! Test drives at dealerships and even EV shows tend to be within urban sprawls, which doesn’t offer much of a driving or riding experience. We’ve seen Savic at a few EV shows, including the recent Everything Electric in Melbourne (pictured). I wish I had known it was on, and that we weren’t recovering from a cold right now. Hopefully next time. Savic is an Australian company building electric motorcycles.

Home Battery Introduction

Are you considering a battery for your house? Here is a basic introduction, based on our experience. I hope it’s helpful. Please comment about any errors, omissions or questions. 1. Why is there more talk lately about getting a battery for your house? 1. As of July 1 this year, the federal government will pay for 30% of your home battery purchase. This makes it 30% cheaper to buy one. 2. What’s the purpose of a house battery? 1. A battery provides power to your house, as electricity. 2. It can power anything in your home that runs from electricity, including your fridge, lights, power points, TV. 3. It can keep your house appliances running when there is a grid outage (a “blackout”). 4. If you have solar panels, a battery can store the excess power generated during the day, so you can use it at night to avoid paying for electricity. This is why it is often called a “solar battery”. 5. You can also charge a battery from the grid when electricity is cheap, and use it when electricity is…

Final day at Everything Electric Melbourne, starting and ending with Jack Scarlett.

Test drives, a panel talk about road tripping, EV conversions, and a flux capacitor, some of the highlights.

Some random shots from Everything Electric Melbourne today.

After a few years in Sydney, this is their first showing in Melbourne. It’s noticeably smaller, but understandable for the first appearance. Interesting panel talks. Informative staff at product booths. Huge variety of test drives available, including self driving Tesla cars. A few food truck offerings. They need more undercover seating (from sun or rain). We recommend the falafel wraps.

About $25k for a new BYD Atto 1.

Wow. EVs are now approaching the price of comparative ICE vehicles. Unfortunately, BYD couldn’t get their Atto 1 prepped in time for the show, but they did have the Atto 2 on the floor (pictured). At Everything Electric Melbourne.

Checking out the Farizon electric van, decked out as a camper.

Also the popular BYD Shark electric ute (plus hybrid range extender), and some towing options. At Everything Electric Melbourne.

Nice interior of the Geely EV, at Everything Electric Melbourne.

So many EV options available now.

Dancing, flipping, rolling cat robot at Everything Electric Melbourne was a crowd pleaser.

No litter box!

Nice to see some services (like Goodbye Gas) available to help homes get off has…

…upgrading to electric. Better for health, monthly bills, and clean air. At Everything Electric, Melbourne.

Some of the many scooters, motorbikes and e-bikes at Everything Electric Melbourne.

A couple of electric police cars at Everything Electric Melbourne.

A Tesla Model X and Kia EV6, I think.

Big wheels keep on turnin’, electrically!

Trying out a big rig at Everything Electric show Melbourne

Our car now drives itself!

We choose the destination, and it drives all the way there, turning left, right, indicating, changing lanes, negotiating roundabouts. It’s amazing and boringly uneventful – a combination I heard called “bore-mazing”. Tesla released FSD Supervised in Australia a few weeks ago, for purchase ($10k). This week they also started offer it as a monthly subscription ($149 = $5 per day). We subscribed for one month to try it out. Yesterday I was picking up Amber from Melbourne airport, and decided to try FSD on the way. I paid the subscription through the Tesla app. It seemed to be instantly available, with no additional software download. I hopped in the car. It read my destination from my linked calendar. I pressed the FSD button. The car started reversing out of my driveway. At our street, it failed to figure out what to do, and started heading the wrong way down our no through road, over the grass. Francis was watching from the garage, keeling over with laughter. Not a good start to my…

Our home Powerwall battery is one of a million deployed so far.

The Tesla app celebrated by listing the stats of our install, and the fleet as a whole. Our battery has saved us (and our neighbours via extension cords) from 13 days of blackouts, without any noisy smelly generator, or trips to refill it with petrol. Our solar system has generated 16MWh of energy so far, used by our house appliances, home battery, our car and exports to the grid. At an average ball park price of say 15c per kWh, that’s $2400 worth of electricity, with no ongoing running cost.

After two years in the Dandenong Ranges, we finally visited the Dandenong Ranges Botanic…

…Garden. Amazing to see in Spring. It’s a huge place. I think we covered only 20% of it. Parking seems to be extremely limited and unmarked, in a dirt section across the road, which led to highly questionable parking. Charging: Today’s trip was partly due to a frequent oddity of owning an EV. We had an excess of fuel. It feels like a shame not to use it, for free. The solar production from our roof fully powered our EV, home and house battery, and it wasn’t worth exporting any to the grid (negative feed in tariff). Fortunately, as you can see from the graph, the Amber app shut down our solar production while we were away, after our home battery was fully charged. All automated, so we didn’t have to do anything.

For those who might have seen “Massive Tesla Recall”, headlines: No, our car window does…

…not cut off my arm 😉. The car has already updated to the latest software version, a few weeks ago, including the latest fix. I do find it annoying that it is referred to as a “recall”, since that implies that the car has to be returned for some physical fix. It is just a software update, which is handled automatically. Having the fault isn’t great, in any car. But having a car that can fix a fault while I sleep, is pretty impressive.

A few updates for our Tesla.

All free, and automatic, via the first software update our new car has received. The music rave cave, with synchronised album colour and beat of the ambient lights is pretty cool. But the other updates are probably more practical.

Although it’s in the middle of nowhere, Spud's Roadhouse is a great place to stop on the…

…way to Uluru. For one, it has a few EV charging options. Now, charging should be simple, like it was for the two EVs that were here when I arrived. They each plugged into one of the two DC charging cables, walked over to get some food at the roadhouse while their cars charged. Then off they went – one towards Adelaide and the other to Roxbury. But life isn’t always so simple. I plugged into the remaining charger, which is a slower AC station. It’s only 7kW, compared to the faster DC adjacent chargers at 80-150kW. But, that’s fine – I’m staying here overnight, so I have the time, or I could have just used a fast charger when one of the other drivers disconnected. This AC charger requires your own “Type 2” (technically “Mennekes”) cable, which we have, so I plugged it into the car and EV charger. To my surprise, it immediately started charging, without using an app or tap card. I left it connected and it was at 93% after we finished dinner. I went to unplug it, which should be easy,…

In life you need goals. Today’s goal was to find a cafe we hadn’t yet tried 😉, in our…

…home of the Dandenong Ranges. Ripe Cafe in Sassafras was a great find. Guacamole (avo toast) topped with thin sliced potato crisps, and zucchini slice. Lots of cyclists out today, including this giant Saint Bernard. The local park has interesting seating, or perhaps a one turn swing set 😳. I checked in on our parked car from the Tesla app, after some dodgy parking in front of us. We love driving through the fern trees and tall timbers of the Dandenong Ranges. Beautiful all year ‘round. Charging: While we were away from home, the sun had fully charged our home battery. We returned, plugged in, and filled up the car with the remaining free energy of the day.

A couple of “space saver” spare wheel/tyre options at Melbourne International EV…

…AutoShow. Pricing ranging from $395 to about $900. We haven’t had a flat tyre during 100,000km of EV driving. If we do, we can contact Tesla via the Service option in the Tesla app. Or we can try out the pump and tyre goo we have in the car. But we’re planning to soon drive to Uluru, where a flat tyre could take quite a while for Tesla or The NRMA to sort out. So, we’re considering taking a spare.

We had an “ICE” car this morning. Wel

l, our EV was covered with ice. Cold morning near Wagga Wagga. We warmed up for dinner and breakfast at the on-site Rivergum Restaurant. We warmed up the car using the Tesla app. That melted the ice, and left it nice and toasty when we hopped in. And no fumes filling the motel.

Our first time charging at the rooftop in Wangaratta.

We stopped here to grab some shopping. Up a few ramps, the T signs pointed the way. The signs to find the chargers were good, but the signs to exit the roof by foot were hard to find. We walked towards the lone Tardis looking box, which turned out to be a lift. Other signs said that it’s all paid parking now. So, we paid 60c through the Easypark app, for 30 minutes. It seemed odd for a short stop at a shopping centre. Charging: Both the EasyPark app and Tesla app offered to show “Live Activity” widgets on my iPhone, which made it easy to check on progress. We were only stopping long enough for the toilet and shops. We returned to the car, which had charged to 96%. We unplugged and drove off. Easy.

This is probably the busiest we’ve seen our town of Emerald, Victoria. T

he Lost Woods Market draws a huge crowd. It’s a beautiful stroll through the tall trees, past numerous stalls and food outlets, with Puffing Billy Railway choo-chooing past every now and then. It’s a magical place. We parked up the other end of town, starting off with brunch at Over the Road Cafe, then walked through the jammed main road to the markets. The generators of many stalls lined the back path, filling the air with slight fumes and noise. It’s a shame they don’t have grid power. We hoped to see some stalls powered by V2L EVs, as we’ve noticed at some other markets, but none here. Charging: While we were away from home, the sun charged up our home battery. When we returned, it switched over to start solar charging our car. Win win.

We arrived back home, in Emerald Victoria. Autumn is still in full swing. 🍂

Charging: We charged up for just a few minutes in Yea earlier, since we could fill up cheaper at home. But when we arrived home, our area had a grid outage. Our house PowerWall battery kept our appliances going until the grid was restored. In an alignment of failures, our solar system also stopped producing electricity 😩. So, we can’t charge up the house or car battery from the available sun. We’ve raised a fault with our installer, Lightning Energy, who can hopefully find out what’s going on with our Enphase system. It’s not the first failure. In the mean time, the grid has reconnected, and we’ve charged up during the cheap power times in the day, when renewables are mostly powering the grid.

On our way out of Bowral this morning, we grabbed a coffee at Coffee Guru Mittagong.

Conveniently located across the road from Evie fast chargers, so we could all be charged up for our long drive to Cessnock and Seal Rocks. Charging: The Tesla’s navigation has the option to route through third party EV chargers. But it misses out on showing a lot of them. To get this one to show, we had to type “Evie” into the navigation, then select it from the list. The navigation is smart enough to even precondition the battery for this destination, but not yet smart enough to include it in the list of chargers. Hopefully a software update will fix this. The Evie Networks chargers have a great “auto charge” feature, where we can just plug in our car and walk away, like we do with Tesla chargers. No tap card, app or faffing required. Since this was our first Evie charging of this new car, however, we needed to use the app, to set up the account details. This also prompted me to remove our old car from our Evie account, so we don’t end up paying for the new owner’s travels. This site…

Stop for a late lunch, in Yass, at Kaffeine 2582.

We picked this place, because it’s opposite the Tesla Superchargers. I wonder if the cafe realises how many EV drivers now eat at their cafe 🤔. Charging: This is the first time we’ve charged the new car to 100% (or 99 ish). It estimated the range at 418km, which is the same as our previous Model 3 had, after 91,000km. The Model Y gets a bit less range due to extra weight and size. Charging was quick and seamless, except that the release button on the changing cable wouldn’t work, so we reported the issue via the Tesla app. We disconnected using the Tesla app too. Powered by the iconic Cullerin Range Wind Farm, just down the highway (pictured).

Farewell old friend. We traded in our “old” 2022 Tesla Model 3 today.

It was unexpectedly emotional to say goodbye. So many great road tripping memories. 2022 Tesla Model 3 RWD White paint + White seats + Enhanced Autopilot + Boom box and Pedestrian Warning System 91,000km We ended up just going with the Tesla trade in quote of $27k. We could possibly have got $35k if sold privately, but it would have taken time away from work. And since it’s a business purchase, trade-in was just simpler. Our car was in great condition. It runs as well as the day we bought it. It has a few stone chips, paint chips around a side mirror (from reversing against a leaning wire fence), and a bent front license plate. I used my high tech equipment to straighten the plate. But I left the rest for Tesla to spruce up, since they have all the expertise for that. They can also replace the air filter and the rear tyres, which are due for replacement. Trade-in was all managed through the Tesla app, including photos. Today they spent five minutes doing a final inspection, and gave…

Today we picked up our shiny new Tesla Model Y “Juniper” from Tesla Mulgrave. Mos

t of the process was done through the Tesla app over the past week, so the actual pickup was super sleek. We traded in our 2022 Tesla Model 3 RWD, also streamlined through the app. After we arrived, the staff just spent five minutes checking the condition of the car. No issues found. Thanks to Nathan for leading us to our new car, and sharing our excitement, since he has also ordered one. He left us to inspect the car and said to just turn on the hazard lights if we had any concerns or questions. We spent 15 minutes looking over the car and taking photos. Then we just drove out of the building, to take it home. We have new custom plates “TRIPNG”, but we didn’t get to VicRoads in time to allocate them today. So, we just used a lump of Blutac to stick one on for the photo today. In Victoria, we only pay once for custom plates, not every year. The Tesla app automatically removed our “old” car and added the new one. My driver preferences automatically appeared in the new car. Very…

Back in January, we took the plunge and ordered a new Tesla Model Y “Juniper” launch…

…edition. “Ultra Red”, white interior, 20” wheels (which was the only option for the launch edition). We chose the same battery and drive as our Model 3: RWD (rear wheel drive), LFP battery (no nickel or cobalt), 0 to 100km/h in 5.9s. The main reason for the upgrade is for the greater ease of getting in and out of the car, which has been increasingly painful on Fran’s arthritic hips. As those of you who follow our Tesla Tripping blog will know, we have looked at and test driven quite a lot of other options. The best contender was the XPeng G6. In the end we stuck with the Tesla Model Y because of the huge storage space, driving performance and the tech. The Tesla app has guided us through the whole process up to now, with registration, trade-in, insurance. Today is delivery day. The final `Start` button is still disabled in the app. I’m guessing it will enable at exactly 3pm, when we’re at Tesla Mulgrave. We are trading in our Tesla Model 3, after driving 91,000 km in 2.7 years (plus…

Rest stop at Lake Nillahcootie, near Bonnie Doon.

On our way back home from the Off-Grid Living Festival and Corowa, crossing back over the border into Victoria. To our pleasant surprise, coffee and toasties were on offer from the Kalari Kafe van in the car park by the lake. Unfortunately, the generators powering the van filled the area with noise and some fumes. Hopefully V2L EVs will soon become so common place and accessible that more food vans will be able to use them. Charging: Two days ago, we drove our EV, fully charged from solar, from home in Emerald, Victoria to a B&B in Corowa, NSW. While parked at our accommodation, we charged up from a standard power point, before driving home today. About 700km in total, with no visits to charging stations required.

Strolling around the Off-Grid Living Festival today, in Chiltern, Victoria.

Such a wide range of exhibitors. Excellent food options, but very little shade. Lots of dust, which destroyed the car wash we did a couple of days ago. Very thankful for a smoothie from the Barefoot Blender. Most of the site seems to be powered from solar, or from V2L EVs. Great to see. Less smelly and noisy generators. Even the security motorbikes are electric. Nice!

Any power point is a charging station.

We drove from eastern Melbourne, Victoria, north to just over the border in Corowa, NSW. We can walk down the road and see Victoria on the other side of the Murray River. We were in Queensland earlier this week 🤪. We’re staying at an Airbnb house for a couple of days, while we attend the Off-Grid Living Festival in Chiltern, tomorrow. Charging: We charged up the car at home from solar, for free. We drove all the way without charging, arriving with 11% charge remaining. We plugged into a power point at our accommodation (yes, we checked first with our host), which brought the tank up to 76%, more than enough for our day trip to the festival the next morning. We could have charged at several fast chargers along our route, but since we didn’t need to stop for any other reason, we just drove on and charged at our destination. So many options.

Road tripping through Europe gave us a glimpse into the future of EVs and road trips in…

…Australia. Border Regional Electrification Events invited us to talk about it in the Electrification Tent at the Off-Grid Living Festival, in Chiltern, Victoria (30 minutes from the NSW border). The audience asked some excellent questions. Thanks to all those who attended. Some of the slides from our talk, included here.

We took another test drive of an XPENG G6, this time from a new dealership in Berwick…

…Victoria, which is closer to us. Nice interior, comfy seats, great tech. The handling wasn’t bad on some windy roads, but not as sporty as the Tesla Model Y. Disappointing storage. The auto driving hesitated quite a bit around bends. The lack of full stop on one pedal driving is annoying, but they will reportedly solve that in a few weeks via an OTA (over the air) software update. The G6 includes auto parking and lane change, which costs extra in a Tesla. It has vehicle to load, but it requires some adapter plug into the external charge port, which wasn’t available. We had a chance to play with Apple CarPlay, which is great to have. But the XPeng doesn't seem to support pinch and zoom in Apple Maps, which makes it very limited. Acceleration was terrible (doesn’t move for a second), until I turned in “launch mode”. I couldn’t figure out how to enable launch mode and regenerative braking (x-pedal) at the same time, which was annoying. Later that day, we happened to watch a YouTube…

We spotted a few utes and trucks at the Everything Electric Show (Fully Charged Show), in…

…Sydney. Some conversions, some plug in hybrid (PHEV), and one large battery swap unit for a semi, in just 3 minutes. We sat in the huge frunk of the F150 Lightning, made possible because no engine is needed. Some electric utes have been popular for mining operations, so as not to poison the air in the shafts, and to avoid the need to truck in fuel to remote sites. On the way out, we spotted a BYD Shark (PHEV) parked at a fast charger on the street. Frustratingly, they hadn’t plugged in. There were a couple of parking cops who were hopefully about to post an infringement notice. Chargers are for charging, not just parking 🤦‍♂️.

Checking out electric vans at Everything Electric (from Fully Charged Show), in Sydney.

At The Everything Electric Show in Sydney (by the Fully Charged Show), checking out the…

…Tesla Cybertruck. Impressive, but ridiculously big, like most oversized utes.

The Everything Electric Show (Fully Charged Show) wrapped up in Sydney for another year…

…but will be back, for the first time, in Melbourne in November. In the car park, we walked past four guys standing around the open bonnet of a V8 ute, saying “we should have gone electric”. Very fitting end. Amber showed off her Tesla Tripping tote bag, as we said goodbye. 3000km done and 1000km to go. Car fully packed again, with the addition of four old computers we had left behind when we moved from the Central Coast, two years ago. One of the sharp iMacs showed its abandonment issues by cutting my bare foot. Next stop, for dinner, in Campbelltown. We shared a roast and dessert. Then on to Mittagong for tonight’s accommodation, booked at the last minute, as usual. Charging: Fully charged at the Superchargers in Campbelltown while we ate dinner. Well, by the time our order came, so I had to move the car. We didn't need to charge yet, but it's quick and easy to top up whenever we are parked anyway.

A few of the electric converted vehicles at The Everything Electric (Fully Charged Show)…

…in Sydney.

Just a few of the electric motorbikes at The Everything Electric Show (Fully Charged…

…Show) in Sydney. Including locally built Savic Motorcycles.