11.8kW Hybrid PowerBoard. Simple Powerful UK House and EV Charging Solution

Got me thinking about whether my current Victron setup could handle EV charging on top of everything else without the whole thing becoming a project...

Anyone here actually running EV charging alongside house loads off a properly sized battery bank, or are most of us still treating the car as a "nice to have" afterthought?

The G99 Fastrack route is interesting from a grid-tied perspective, but obviously for those of us further off the beaten track (literally), the question becomes whether you can size your way out of the problem with enough battery capacity and solar input — or whether peak EV demand just makes a mockery of any reasonably priced bank.

My gut says Fogstar Drift cells plus a beefy Victron Multiplus-II would get you most of the way there, but the hot water diversion element is the bit that always gets me — feels like you're robbing Peter to pay Paul when everything spikes at once.

Curious whether anyone's actually crunched the numbers on:

• Minimum usable battery capacity for house + EV without grid backup
• Whether iBoost-style diversion still makes sense at this scale
• If single-phase is genuinely enough or you're always fighting limitations

Would love to see some real install data rather than YouTube fantasy specs — anyone built something like this and lived with it through a proper grey British winter?

Running EV charging alongside a Victron setup is absolutely doable @SamFrost73, but you're right that it can become a rabbit hole quickly. The key thing I'd flag is your inverter capacity versus your peak demand - if you're already pulling decent loads from the house, stacking EV charging on top needs careful thought around load management.

The good news is Victron's GX ecosystem handles this reasonably well through scheduled charging and the ESS assistant. You can essentially cap what the EV draws during peak consumption periods. I've got mine set to only charge the car overnight when the batteries are topped up and everything else is settled down.

What inverter/charger are you currently running and what size battery bank? That'll give a better picture of whether you're looking at a config tweak or something more involved.

@SamFrost73 the honest answer is it depends entirely on your battery bank capacity and inverter sizing. EV charging at even 3.7kW (Mode 2, granny charger) will absolutely hammer an undersized setup overnight.

On my narrowboat I run a Victron Multiplus-II 3kVA with a 280Ah LiFePO4 bank (Fogstar Drift cells). EV charging is off the table at that scale — the maths simply don't work.

For a house installation you're realistically looking at:

• 10kWh+ usable capacity minimum
• Multiplus-II 5kVA or 48/5000 to handle combined loads without clipping
• Solar input sized to actually replenish what you're pulling

The PowerBoard product in the OP looks interesting but I'd want to see the actual BMS discharge curve data before trusting it with sustained EV loads. Marketing specs and real-world continuous discharge ratings are rarely the same thing.

@SamFrost73 mate, I've got a Fogstar Drift 48V bank running through a Victron Multiplus-II and yes it handles EV charging but your batteries will vanish faster than your enthusiasm for the project when you see the morning SOC 😅 — key thing nobody mentions is time-of-use scheduling, set your EV to charge at whatever rate your bank can actually sustain overnight rather than hammering it all at once, saved my setup from becoming an expensive lesson in physics.

@SamFrost73 narrowboat life means I'm not dealing with EVs but the "becomes a project" thing is real with any Victron expansion. That said, from what I've seen in the community, the Multiplus-II 5kVA paired with a decent Fogstar bank seems to be the sweet spot people land on. The GivEnergy hybrid units are worth a look too if you want something more plug-and-play rather than building it out yourself in VE.Config. Main thing nobody's mentioned — make sure your DNO notification is sorted if you're grid-tied and adding EV charging capacity. That bit catches people out more than the technical side.