My experience with the Amina
The charger
The Amina charger is very compact.
If you want a charger that does not stand out too much, You will like it…
The charging cable is fixed to the charger.
- It’s a personal thing but I really like it because I do not need to take my charging cable out of the frunc. Just get out of the car and plug it in.
- Using a separate charging cable would make it look much bigger, because of the large connector sticking out of the charger. So the fixed cable contributes to the sleek design
- I bought an additional wall mount to store the cable when it’s not plugged in. I Prefer this over the plastic cover: easy, just push the connector in
- The cable is delivered as a loose cable and needs to be connected to the charger during install. this way you can also guide it through a small whole in the wall. I placed the charger on the inside of my fence, pushed it through a small hole, so I only have the cable on my driveway.
Controlling the Amiga
- The amina is connected via zigbee, so no cloud control. As a homey user I really like that: local control. If internet or wifi drops you can still control your charger. And no unnecessary data sharing. I have the Amina for a few month now. Did not notice any zigbee hiccups.
- The Amina is sold a a smart charger. The integration with homey works fine, connecting is easy and the app provides enough functionality.
- After installing the latest firmware (see post below) I am able to switch between 1phase and 3 phase charging. I use 1phase charging in summer: surplus charging, tuning the charger to use the surplus solar energy (which is normally lower than 16A). In winter I use the 3 phase charging: EPEX Charging, when the dynamic prices are low charge at full power.
- The Amina does not have load balancing, so that is something you need to build using homey flows (see below)
An other extensive installation review is posted on the forum here
support
The Amina support desk has good response. They even managed to provide me some new functionality (phase switching) within a few weeks time when Imasked for it.
