The most essential difference between AC charging piles and DC charging piles is the degree of participation of on-board equipment during charging.
The AC charging pile is like a pair of chopsticks, it brings food to the mouth, but chewing, swallowing, digesting, and absorbing have to be done by the person himself. The DC charging pile is like playing glucose and hanging water, which puts energy into the human body, and can be directly used without the human body doing anything.
The AC charging pile is actually the role of a socket, which connects the vehicle with AC power, but the high-voltage battery can only store direct current, so the on-board charger on the car is required to convert the AC power into DC power and then store it in the battery. Therefore, the power of the AC charging pile is subject to the power of the on-board charger, considering the limitations of the vehicle, the volume and weight of the on-board charger are restricted, and the power cannot be too large, so the power of the AC charging pile is generally not large, generally more than ten kilowatts. In addition, the on-board charging equipped on low-end new energy vehicles is actually an AC charging pile, and its power generally does not exceed 5Kw.
The essence of DC charging pile is to integrate the on-board charger and AC charging pile together, because the charger is fixed, so there is no need to consider factors such as volume and weight, and the power can be very large. The input of the DC charging pile to the vehicle is directly the direct current required by the battery, and the vehicle does not need to be converted. Therefore, the maximum power of the current DC pile can reach more than 200 kilowatts.
Because of the difference between the two piles, the charging gun interface of the DC pile and the AC pile in the national standard is also different. Intuitively, the plug holes of the DC gun are 9, while the plug holes of the AC pile are only 7.
It can be seen from the difference between the maximum power of the AC and DC charging piles in front that the biggest advantage of DC is that it is fast. The faster the charging of the vehicle, the shorter the waiting time for the vehicle to be charged, and the more convenient it is to use the vehicle. If the DC pile can be charged 100 kWh per hour, and the AC pile can be charged 15 kWh per hour, then the service fee is 6 times the difference, so the market is still dominated by DC piles, while AC piles are mainly used by families.