My Zoom meeting with many Ford Mach-E engineers/employees

[shutterbug]

The relmote is what I was referring to. They are still physical buttons.

My point is that virtual buttons for frequently accessed commands is simply not a good idea in a moving vehicle. They are just fine on a tablet or phone where you are not in charge of a rather large projectile. The climate controls really should have physical counterparts Since they are accessed pretty regularly while in motion.

While not ideal, the knob could serve as a physical control. It’s already there, so we are not getting rid of it in the 2021 model.

There is already a physical control for volume. On the steering wheel. There is no currently physical control for any of the climate functions. You belive that Ford will somehow make the the big ugly dial modal and use it for temperature control, fine. I'll believe it when I see it. I reserve judgement for whether it is functional and intuitive or not. FWIW, I don't futz around with climate controls all that much. That's the whole advantage of climate control over old fashioned A/C. You set the desired temperature, and you're done.

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[shutterbug]

This has just gotten stupid. You don't like the dial, fine. You think it's ugly, fine.

Thank you. I was beginning to think that I wasn't allowed to think.

Apparently, you only drive in your car alone. Passengers often want to adjust the volume as well, and grabbing the steering wheel to do it isn't a good solution.

I had to let this wash over me for a while. What about back seat passengers? They may want to adjust the volume as well?

Incidentally, I am not opposed to physical controls. I just don't like how the big ugly dial takes up a huge chunk of space on the screen.

 

[Birger]

- Most wanted features. The forum took a great poll on this a few weeks ago. There were some clear winners. I plan to specifically plug making the volume dial more versatile and making the 360/front cams more useful for parking. Nobody was clamoring for the “intelligent charging” feature currently being beta tested to the early access folks - it wasn’t even included in the poll.

I have not tested PAAK extensively yet, but for the next week I am going to go fobless and record my observations. If it is problematic, I’ll mention that, too.

Overall I will tell them that I love the Mach E but there are some frustrating things that are taking a frustratingly long time to fix and I wish Ford had a more direct pipeline between its beta testers (us) and the engineers. To that end, I really appreciate the zoom meeting.

Maybe mention the strange and unnecessary double icon to open and lock the car in FordPass. It should be one icon and then it should toggle from open to locked and locked to open.

 

[Alan]

That's the whole advantage of climate control over old fashioned A/C. You set the desired temperature, and you're done.

Quite often, like when tooling around the neighborhood in moderate weather, I like my windows down. And, my AC off. Othertimes, my windows are up and the climate control is great. Just need an on/off switch for the climate control.

 

[shutterbug]

Quite often, like when tooling around the neighborhood in moderate weather, I like my windows down. And, my AC off. Othertimes, my windows are up and the climate control is great. Just need an on/off switch for the climate control.

Fair enough, but how often do we have moderate weather in Phoenix area? You get 7 months of summer, 4 months of winter, and the 2 weeks of nice weather in autumn and spring. This morning driving to work at 6:00 AM, it didn't even occur to me to shut off climate control. That's how bad it sucked.

 

[IMDIDOC]

Got the same message for my s 20 fe "phone not compatible". After my 4th try to setup and same message I tapped on continue setup and was able to setup my s20 fe as a key and after a month it's just working better and better. Try tapping on continue and good luck.

Thanks for the suggestion. I don't know if the Android update I received helped, but yesterday I tried again, and it went okay first try. Just strange that you have to awaken the phone, navigate to the app and wait for a Bluetooth to connect. No fast getaway here. Now I'm living dangerously as I left the key at home. The emergency pass code works, so I should be good.

 

[macchiaz-o]

Fair enough, but how often do we have moderate weather in Phoenix area? You get 7 months of summer, 4 months of winter, and the 2 weeks of nice weather in autumn and spring. This morning driving to work at 6:00 AM, it didn't even occur to me to shut off climate control. That's how bad it sucked.

I drive with the ac off probably 35% of the year. And on some of those days I want ac on or off depending on time of day.

 

[Mirak]

Maybe mention the strange and unnecessary double icon to open and lock the car in FordPass. It should be one icon and then it should toggle from open to locked and locked to open.

LOL - I never even thought about that, but you’re right. That’s kinda dumb, isn’t it?

 

[Jimrpa]

That does not work for me. When I’m in reverse I can’t access HVAC controls or even adjust music volume. Maybe another bug with my particular software.

There are two ways to adjust volume in reverse:

• The way cool volume knob
• The volume control toggle on the right side of the steering wheel.

 

[Jimrpa]

After 3 months, I've not received any OTA updates. Those that did receive them can't really say what if anything the changed. Ford is certainly keeping mum. If Ford does add some mythical functionality to the volume dial, won't they have to add some capability to change the mode? They can either bury it in the menus (is that really useful?), or take additional screen space to make this work.

Incidentally the screen on my TV and my laptop and my phone don't have a giant ugly dial glued to it, and I managed to live without it.

Just how close do you sit to your TV that a dial on it would be of any use?

And meet theMicrosoft Surface Dial

Now, you were saying? ?

 

[Gino_A]

As I posted a few weeks ago, I received an email invitation to have a Zoom call with Ford engineers; I had it scheduled for this morning.

They got my name/info from an email survey I filled out a while back; I've filled out lots of surveys, so I don't know exactly which one it was.

Throughout the course of 70 minutes, while sitting in my car using my phone to Zoom (at their request), I spoke with at least ten Ford folks, each with their expertise. There were engineers and employees (each in their own time slot) asking about everything from the car's interior's , the exterior, charging at home/away, marketing, using the big screen in the car, comfort, driving experience, braking(!).

All in all they were all very nice, and thanked me for me thoughts.

One of my "thoughts" was that they need to give you two key fobs- that Ford expert said instead I really need to use PAAK all the time, and said to set up the ability to start the car on the screen.

Another item I pointed out is that if you're trying to use the owner's manual on the screen, and try to do what the instructions may be for your task, you have to either have a good memory, write down the instructions, or go back and forth between the manual and the task. I said we need a real owner's manual.

I said there should be an easy way to take out the frunk divider.

They hadn't heard from anyone else that the air conditioning comes on, sometimes, when you turn on warm air. They had asked what there should be buttons for, instead of having to use the screen... I said that having to go through the motions to turn off the unwanted cold air, while driving, warranted a button.

I also told them at least three times, that Ford has to up their game with their charging network!

I'm sure there was more, but these seem like the highlights.

I had my Zoom meeting with Ford engineers/representatives today, June 14, 2021. The meeting lasted 90 minutes and I spoke with nine Ford personnel. They all seemed very interested and appreciative of my input. Below is a summary of the topics and discussions we had.
1) PAAK: I stated that I tried PAAK but stopped using it because it is not 100% reliable yet. I was told that there was an update to PAAK I could get at the dealer. I asked if the update could be done OTA and was told that the OTA update will be available late in the year. I think I will wait for the OTA update.
2) Home charging only preferred times: The Ford engineer confirmed my presumption that charging would occur outside of the preferred times if the target SOC was not reached at the end of the preferred time. Since I never want to charge outside the preferred times I set, I was told I could accomplish this by not setting a departure time. By doing this charging would only occur during preferred times.
3) Customer experience with Options: I informed the Ford representative that my dealer had difficulties with Options because (according to the dealer) their system was not updated to process an Options deal yet. I explained I had to wait hours while the dealer worked with their Ford finance contact to jury rig my dealer's system to produce a deal equal to the Options deal.
4) Towing: I stated that I would like to tow with my Mach-E without voiding my warranty. I stated that I would like to tow about 2,000 pounds. I mentioned that I am aware and okay with towing reducing my range.
5) Non-linear Brakes: I complained that the brakes seem non-linear and too sensitive to me and my wife. I notice this more when driving in whisper mode and 1 pedal drive off.
6) Re-gen: Since I don't usually use 1 pedal drive, I mentioned that a regen paddle on the steering wheel would be nice. This is one of the features I always use in my Bolt.
7) EA Plug and Charge: I mentioned that my first few experiences with plug and charge were disasters. However, during my last road trip in May plug and charge worked flawlessly.
8) HVAC Controls: I complained that when I just try to turn on the fan for ventilation, the heat and/or AC also turn on. Then I have to go to the HVAC controls to turn the heat and AC off. They mentioned that they are aware of this bug and are working on a fix.
9) Physical HVAC Controls: I mentioned that I would like to see physical knobs/buttons to control HVAC.
10) Heads Up Display: I mentioned that I would like to have a heads-up display. It would be especially useful for me to see if adaptive cruise control and lane-centering were working or not without having to look away from the road. They asked me if I had a recommendation for a heads-up display. I told them I never had one so I didn't have a recommendation.

 

[Jimrpa]

Maybe mention the strange and unnecessary double icon to open and lock the car in FordPass. It should be one icon and then it should toggle from open to locked and locked to open.

You’re very trusting. I want an affirmative command that I’m locking my car, not just that I’m toggling from one state to another. Sometimes, people may not pay attention to which state they’re toggling from/to, or they may accidentally toggle twice, or the toggle may not have gone through. On things like locking the vehicle, separate lock and unlock makes sense.

 

[Birger]

You’re very trusting. I want an affirmative command that I’m locking my car, not just that I’m toggling from one state to another. Sometimes, people may not pay attention to which state they’re toggling from/to, or they may accidentally toggle twice, or the toggle may not have gone through. On things like locking the vehicle, separate lock and unlock makes sense.

Not so much and I think you are wrong.
Just checked my app now, and by looking at the icons there is now way of seeing if the car is locked or not. Neither on iPhone(3.23.0) nor Android(3.24.0).
The one symbol should clearly state if the car was locked or not. Preferably in a signal color if it was unlocked.

 

[Jimrpa]

Not so much and I think you are wrong.
Just checked my app now, and by looking at the icons there is now way of seeing if the car is locked or not. Neither on iPhone(3.23.0) nor Android(3.24.0).
The one symbol should clearly state if the car was locked or not. Preferably in a signal color if it was unlocked.

That is my point. The app does not display current vehicle state. With separate lock and unlock buttons, I can affirmatively command the vehicle to lock itself, regardless of its lock or unlock state. If I only had a toggle, I wouldn’t necessarily know what the vehicle state is when hitting the toggle until and unless the vehicle responded. Consider the following scenario: I want to lock the vehicle but the vehicle is locked. I don’t know that, so I send the toggle command, the vehicle receives the toggle, unlocks, and sends back a status of unlocked. In the meantime, I’ve gotten into an elevator, so I never know that I’ve just unlocked my car and now the thieves enter my car and steal all my precious rolls of toilet paper.
With separate lock and unlock buttons, the above scenario can’t occur.

 

[GoGoGadgetMachE]

That is my point. The app does not display current vehicle state. With separate lock and unlock buttons, I can affirmatively command the vehicle to lock itself, regardless of its lock or unlock state. If I only had a toggle, I wouldn’t necessarily know what the vehicle state is when hitting the toggle until and unless the vehicle responded. Consider the following scenario: I want to lock the vehicle but the vehicle is locked. I don’t know that, so I send the toggle command, the vehicle receives the toggle, unlocks, and sends back a status of unlocked. In the meantime, I’ve gotten into an elevator, so I never know that I’ve just unlocked my car and now the thieves enter my car and steal all my precious rolls of toilet paper.
With separate lock and unlock buttons, the above scenario can’t occur.

MyFord Mobile didn't have a "locked" state either so I never really thought to have it here, for kind of similar reasons - it makes sense to me that lock and unlock are different buttons, just like they are in the actual car.

that said I could see value in a "locked" state indicator, but it would have to be live - which means the car would have to tell "the cloud" each time the car lock state was changed. certainly doable, but the risk is that if the car isn't able to send that, you could be back in your situation of "the app is telling you the wrong thing" (*) and that's less helpful than the app not saying anything to you at all. The best it could do is indicate based on the "last updated" timestamp that's already in the app... which I guess is sort of better than nothing but if it's not live, I'm not sure there's a point. ?‍

(*) I first typed "the app is lying to you" but by definition lying means it knows the truth and in this case, it doesn't - it's telling you what it believes to be true

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