The outdoor socket and the monster that is the Skoda Mode 2 cable

We got a new (to us) car because a truck liberated us from the one we bought a year ago. Since this one is a plug-in hybrid, I wanted to charge it from an outdoor socket using the official 3 pin cable. Apparently it's not this simple.

tl;dr

Do not buy super expensive EV rated socket plates, they are a rip-off, cheap, safe ones exist.

For outdoor charging your car with a Mode 2 cable, buy the BG WP211, outdoor, EV rated socket. B&Q sells it at £10.602. If your car charger cable has a normal size cable (like a hair dryer) and a normal size plug, you're done.

If not, get a Wessex Electrical SFG06 outdoor box as well. Toolstation sells it at £11.493 . Then move the EV rated plate from the WP21 into the SFG06.

The longer version

Last year we bought a 2019 Skoda Octavia and we were happy with it. Then mid March 2025, a lorry decided to make it a Cat-S write-off. Thankfully nobody got hurt, and we even received a dashcam footage to prove it was not our fault, but we still lost our car.

Our old, 2004 Toyota is not in a good shape at all, so couldn't afford to wait for the perfect car to come up, and ended up buying an Octavia plug-in hybrid, aka IV.

When we moved to our house in 2019 we had to have the whole house re-wired. At that time I had a 32A cable on it's own breaker (the whole house is on RCD at this point) installed at the front, but so far, it was just a socket, with the circuit breaker off, never used.

Given everything is ready, I started looking at type 2 chargers. Wow.

Apparently I'd be paying well into £700+ despite having the RCD, cabling, everything ready. Then there's the interoperability question, because why, oh why, would there be a single system for this - chargers are either OVO, Octopus, or nothing smart compatible. So I decided to sit this one out for a while.

Looking at a few forum posts, and given the battery in the car is a meager - in EV terms - 13kWh , 3 pin charging overnight is a viable option. I learned a lot refers to this a "granny" charging, but I think this is quite rude, so I prefer not to use it.

Since our car came with a 3 pin plug, I gave it a try. But... that 3 pin socket and the cable diameter is monstrous.

Skoda Mode 2 3 pin charging cable - image from Skoda website
Skoda Mode 2 3 pin charging cable - image from Skoda website

At first I tried replacing the switched socket with an unswitched one so the cable would be at the middle. It didn't help much, and if it would have, I would have made it dangerous, see later.

Notice how the tail of the plug already doesn't fit in the grey plastic at the bottom, and this is with an unswitched socket - with the switched, which is the one you must use, it's even worse
Notice how the tail of the plug already doesn't fit in the grey plastic at the bottom, and this is with an unswitched socket - with the switched, which is the one you must use, it's even worse moto g(6) plus, 4.2 mm, f/1.7, 1/306 sec, ISO 50 ⋅ CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0
This is the max it can be closed - not quite IP66.
This is the max it can be closed - not quite IP66. moto g(6) plus, 4.2 mm, f/1.7, 1/288 sec, ISO 50 ⋅ CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0

On the SpeakEV forum, someone mentioned a Wessex 4 box which was large enough for their cable, so I gave it a go. The problem is: this is not EV rated.

I've learned that 13A rated sockets can't actually maintain even 10A load for many hours for many months. Many overheat and burn, which is not really what you want with your electrical socket, your expensive charging cable, and your expensive car.

The BS1363 standard was updated, and now there's a BS1363/EV or BS1363-2 that actually can do what you one would expect by specification from any socket made in the past few decades.

unswitched socket - normal BS1363
unswitched socket - normal BS1363 moto g(6) plus, 4.2 mm, f/1.7, 1/399 sec, ISO 50 ⋅ CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0
switched socket - BS1363/EV
switched socket - BS1363/EV moto g(6) plus, 4.2 mm, f/1.7, 1/242 sec, ISO 50 ⋅ CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0

I looked around and found a BG WP21, which is EV rated - but it was the same size of that I already hat. I had to also buy the Wessex and the replace the plates.

Well... nearly. Because the socket is not in the middle I did have to chip away a small, black, quite sharp, and barely visible piece of plastic.

Get rid of these. There's 4 all together: top and bottom, on the top and bottom of the rubber.
Get rid of these. There's 4 all together: top and bottom, on the top and bottom of the rubber. moto g(6) plus, 4.2 mm, f/1.7, 1/376 sec, ISO 50 ⋅ CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0

There's the size comparison:

BG WP21 on the left with an unswitched plate and Wessex Electrical SFG06
BG WP21 on the left with an unswitched plate and Wessex Electrical SFG06 moto g(6) plus, 4.2 mm, f/1.7, 1/306 sec, ISO 50 ⋅ CC-BY-NC-ND-4.0

There: a large enough, EV rated, outdoor socket.

Cost of electric charging at home

The car can do about 30miles on electric, and it takes 13.5kWh to charge. My current electricity is locked at £0.24, so it's ~£3.24 to charge the car - £0.1 per mile.

On petrol, I'll assume it does around 40mpg. With petrol prices at the moment at ~£1.5/l that would give me £0.33 per mile, meaning the electrical charging is at least half, if not one third of the petrol price.

  1. https://www.bgelectrical.uk/uk/wiring-devices/weatherproof-storm/13a-sockets/WP21-02↩︎

  2. https://www.diy.com/departments/bg-13a-grey-1-gang-outdoor-weatherproof-switched-socket/54148_BQ.prd↩︎

  3. https://www.toolstation.com/wessex-ip66-13a-dp-switched-socket/p64139↩︎

  4. https://www.toolstation.com/wessex-ip66-13a-dp-switched-socket/p64139↩︎

(Oh, by the way: this entry was written by Peter Molnar, and originally posted on petermolnar dot net.)

⋅ CC-BY-4.0 ⋅ ⋅ https://petermolnar.net/article/skoda-ev-3-pin-outdoor-socket-size/