New to At Home Charging - Frustrated

[cpwilliams]

Hello all. I recently purchased a 2024 Mustang Mach e Rally edition in grabber yellow. I love the car. I've only had it for a few weeks and I thought I had at home charging all figured out but I have continuous problems. Primarily with preferred charging time.

My lowest electricity rates are from Midnight until 3:00 PM everyday. So, I have my home location saved as a location. I've named it "Home" and I've set my preferred charge times. However, quite often, but not always, the vehicle completely ignores those times set when I'm at home. Instead it will often charge as soon as plugged in.

I've suspected that departure times that I've set interfere with the preferred charging times, so I've turned them off. Problem is, departure times keep showing up whether or not I have turned them off. They just keep turning back on without me doing it. Sometimes immediately after I have turned them off.

Finally, I'm currently doing all of this with 110V charging. I bought the car because it was the right car at the right price, not because I was ready for it. I'm expecting to resolve that next month while solar is also being installed at my home.

My suspicion is that with the slow charge rate the car is just saying, "Oh man, we're never going to charge this overnight so we might as well start charging immediately."

Could that be correct?

Let me know what you think. Thanks!

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[SpaceEVDriver]

If the charge rate isn’t high enough, the vehicle may charge outside of the preferred charge times to meet the departure times. If you don’t need the car to be at the maximum charge level you’ve set, you might try decreasing that maximum charge level so the vehicle doesn’t charge outside your preferred time windows.

To erase departure times, it’s usually most effective to edit them in the vehicle rather than using FordPass. There’s a bug in the app that doesn’t update the database properly.

 

[markboris]

Hello all. I recently purchased a 2024 Mustang Mach e Rally edition in grabber yellow. I love the car. I've only had it for a few weeks and I thought I had at home charging all figured out but I have continuous problems. Primarily with preferred charging time.

My lowest electricity rates are from Midnight until 3:00 PM everyday. So, I have my home location saved as a location. I've named it "Home" and I've set my preferred charge times. However, quite often, but not always, the vehicle completely ignores those times set when I'm at home. Instead it will often charge as soon as plugged in.

I've suspected that departure times that I've set interfere with the preferred charging times, so I've turned them off. Problem is, departure times keep showing up whether or not I have turned them off. They just keep turning back on without me doing it. Sometimes immediately after I have turned them off.

Finally, I'm currently doing all of this with 110V charging. I bought the car because it was the right car at the right price, not because I was ready for it. I'm expecting to resolve that next month while solar is also being installed at my home.

My suspicion is that with the slow charge rate the car is just saying, "Oh man, we're never going to charge this overnight so we might as well start charging immediately."

Could that be correct?

Let me know what you think. Thanks!

Hi Craig, and welcome to the forum!
Living in CA, I have the same times for my lowest electricity rates but I mainly charge on excess solar (like 99%). I never use my car or the Ford app for charging. My EVSE takes care of that. I have the Emporia charger and it will charge on excess solar only or from midnight to 3:00 pm or whatever custom schedule you want. I have two of these chargers going on 4 years and they have never skipped a beat. I get a monthly report from the Emporia app of my charging statistics. There are a few other chargers out there that will charge on excess solar and I would really look into getting one of these.

 

[devmach-e]

You have correctly guessed things: you are charging on 120V and the car is charging outside your normal hours in order to get to your target charge level.

Once your solar is installed, and a 240V Level 2 EVSE is installed, your problems will go away. I'm guessing you are a PG&E customer...

 

[ChrisO]

That is what some people have said on here, that it is in the prediction.
But that didn’t make any sense when I was using the mobile charger on 120v since even when it had plenty of time to get it charged it would still do it.

What I ended up doing it putting it on a smart plug and programmed it to only be on during the lower price times.

I eventually found though that my garage door was on the same circuit, which is very bad since the Ford mobile charger on 120v draws almost the maximum current for that circuit. So, make real sure there isn’t any else on yours.

I ended up putting in a 240v circuit, and even with the same Ford mobile charger it now properly hours the schedule. My guess is it doesn’t even try to use the schedule if on 120v.

 

[cpwilliams]

If the charge rate isn’t high enough, the vehicle may charge outside of the preferred charge times to meet the departure times. If you don’t need the car to be at the maximum charge level you’ve set, you might try decreasing that maximum charge level so the vehicle doesn’t charge outside your preferred time windows.

To erase departure times, it’s usually most effective to edit them in the vehicle rather than using FordPass. There’s a bug in the app that doesn’t update the database properly.

OK, this is kind of what I was expecting. Thank you for the tip.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

OK, this is kind of what I was expecting. Thank you for the tip.

I second @markboris comment about the Emporia with Vue 3 EVSE when you’re ready to move to a L2 charge rate. It’s fantastic.

 

[cpwilliams]

Hi Craig, and welcome to the forum!
Living in CA, I have the same times for my lowest electricity rates but I mainly charge on excess solar (like 99%). I never use my car or the Ford app for charging. My EVSE takes care of that. I have the Emporia charger and it will charge on excess solar only or from midnight to 3:00 pm or whatever custom schedule you want. I have two of these chargers going on 4 years and they have never skipped a beat. I get a monthly report from the Emporia app of my charging statistics. There are a few other chargers out there that will charge on excess solar and I would really look into getting one of these.

I will look up that EVSE for future use. Thanks!

 

[cpwilliams]

What I ended up doing it putting it on a smart plug and programmed it to only be on during the lower price times.

I think this will help with my immediate problem. I'm sure I have an unused smart plug around here.
Thanks!

 

[E90alex]

120V charging takes way too long. Like 1% an hour. So if the car can’t reach the charge within your window then it will start charging immediately.

Using a smart plug/timer is kind of pointless. Sure it may prevent you from charging outside your desired times but unless you hardly drive anywhere you will not be able to gain enough charge and end up needing to fast charge. Which will likely cost more than your peak electric rates.

 

[cpwilliams]

120V charging takes way too long. Like 1% an hour. So if the car can’t reach the charge within your window then it will start charging immediately.

Using a smart plug/timer is kind of pointless. Sure it may prevent you from charging outside your desired times but unless you hardly drive anywhere you will not be able to gain enough charge and end up needing to fast charge. Which will likely cost more than your peak electric rates.

It's a bandaid until I can get my 240v installed.

Most days overnight gives me the charge I need for the day. I do hit a fast charger when I need to get ready for a longer trip. I know I'm paying for convenience.

 

[ChrisO]

120V charging takes way too long. Like 1% an hour. So if the car can’t reach the charge within your window then it will start charging immediately.

Using a smart plug/timer is kind of pointless. Sure it may prevent you from charging outside your desired times but unless you hardly drive anywhere you will not be able to gain enough charge and end up needing to fast charge. Which will likely cost more than your peak electric rates.

Personally I believe that the "it starts because it can‘t charge in the amount of time” is a myth put out by people that have never even tried it.

I used 120v for a couple of months without any problems. It all depends on how much you are driving a day and what kind of driving you are doing.

For city driving I get about 4.4 miles per kWh. I was getting a charge rate of about 1.2 kWh. So that is about 9.6 kWh in 8 hours, or about 42 miles.

A typical day for us is only about 30 miles, so well within 15 hours (we have the same low rate schedule), but never would it obey the schedule when on 120v, but with the same Ford mobile charger on 240v, it works fine.

 

[E90alex]

Personally I believe that the "it starts because it can‘t charge in the amount of time” is a myth put out by people that have never even tried it.

I used 120v for a couple of months without any problems. It all depends on how much you are driving a day and what kind of driving you are doing.

For city driving I get about 4.4 miles per kWh. I was getting a charge rate of about 1.2 kWh. So that is about 9.6 kWh in 8 hours, or about 42 miles.

A typical day for us is only about 30 miles, so well within 15 hours (we have the same low rate schedule), but never would it obey the schedule when on 120v, but with the same Ford mobile charger on 240v, it works fine.

I switch off between 120V and 240V since we have two EVs, so I’m very well familiar with 120V charging. I have my preferred schedule set to charge between 10 pm and 9 am.

My 50 mile commute takes 15-18%. It cannot charge back to my limit over night on 120V so it will start charging immediately when plugging in. On 240V it will wait until 10 pm to start.

On my days off where I might only use like 5%, it will still obey the charge schedule even on 120V.

So there must be some threshold where it will obey the schedule if it’s 100% sure it can finish within the allotted time.

Because on 120V even small fluctuations can drastically increase charge time. Like line voltage drops or if it needs to heat or cool the battery.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

Personally I believe that the "it starts because it can‘t charge in the amount of time” is a myth put out by people that have never even tried it.

Maybe try reading the manual, which is where the screenshot I posted earlier is from.

If the state of charge is low enough compared with the target state of charge and the charge rate can’t get the state of charge up to the target state of charge during the preferred charge times, it will charge outside of the preferred times. There’s no myth about it. It’s simple programming. Ford has decided that the target charge is a higher priority than the preferred charge times.

I know this from both the manual and from living with an EV on L1 for 14 months and another four months with two EVs sharing that L1 charger.

 

[Teslaeata]

Hello all. I recently purchased a 2024 Mustang Mach e Rally edition in grabber yellow. I love the car. I've only had it for a few weeks and I thought I had at home charging all figured out but I have continuous problems. Primarily with preferred charging time.

My lowest electricity rates are from Midnight until 3:00 PM everyday. So, I have my home location saved as a location. I've named it "Home" and I've set my preferred charge times. However, quite often, but not always, the vehicle completely ignores those times set when I'm at home. Instead it will often charge as soon as plugged in.

I've suspected that departure times that I've set interfere with the preferred charging times, so I've turned them off. Problem is, departure times keep showing up whether or not I have turned them off. They just keep turning back on without me doing it. Sometimes immediately after I have turned them off.

Finally, I'm currently doing all of this with 110V charging. I bought the car because it was the right car at the right price, not because I was ready for it. I'm expecting to resolve that next month while solar is also being installed at my home.

My suspicion is that with the slow charge rate the car is just saying, "Oh man, we're never going to charge this overnight so we might as well start charging immediately."

Could that be correct?

Let me know what you think. Thanks!

I found from the outset, 14,030kWh of charge ago that the car’s onboard charge time programming, as was not reliable enough for me.

Departure time is also a bit unreliable on occasions but that’s another story though may be a connected issue.

Therefore, I use the wall box’s timer settings for my off-peak charging and that works just fine every time without fail

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