Can you point us to the posts where this occurs and how to do a power cycle in case this happens?
I'm not finding a post specifically about turning it off and back on for this exact error, but this is a common first step for people who have encountered sudden unexplained errors (hello, IT. Have you tried turning it off and back on again?).
I'll bet you're a whiz at Tetris!Cargo Space:
Robust underfloor storage. Details below.
I'll lead with an apology here, I really dropped the ball on taking pictures of the car fully loaded or in car camping mode (future post) without us in it, and I'm mostly trying to avoid posting personal pictures. That said, I wouldn't mind recreating our setup if you ask nicely, it's less a matter of time than it is that I'm currently enjoying a very clean car. Below is a probably too thorough catalog of all items packed in the various (and ample) storage areas this car provides:
Underfloor:
Trunk (rear seats folded):
- Left well
- Two person tent
- Double inflatable sleeping pad
- Table cloth
- 24A Splitvolt charger w/ TT-30 adapter
- Inflatable seat pad
- Disc golf discs
- Against rear seats
- Camp chair
- Hiking poles
- Cookware set
- Backpacking burner
- Right well
- Picnic blanket
- Hammock
- Paper towel roll
- Fuel for burner and stove
- Bowls, mugs and Utensils
- Built-in styrofoam well
- Ford Mobile Charger
- Tire kit
- Emergency jump kit
- Headlamps
- Power banks (phone size)
- Gloves
- Duct tape
- 10" folding hand saw
- Camp stove
- Folded luggage cover
- Side Pockets
- Bug spray
- Sun screen
- Toilet supplies
- Garbage bags
Rear foot well:
- Four large crash pads
- Soft ice chest
- Wife's bag of clothes
- Bag of bouldering gear
Frunk:
- My bag of clothes
- Sleeping bags, blankets, pillows
- Narrow channel of open space directly behind the rear air vent. This was more accessible than our ice chest, and proved a good spot to keep our next bottles of water etc. cool while driving.
- Microfiber towels for cleaning bugs off the front while fast charging (seat pockets)
Doors:
- 7-gallon water jug with that high quality PNW tap water (narrow form factor, the more square type is juuuuust too wide).
- Day packs
- Spare shoes
- Dirty clothes and towels
Despite all that, we still had full visibility out the back and for the driver's side blind spot out the rear window. We lost about the bottom half of the rear passenger window to a crash pad, but between the mirror and the blindspot monitoring system, I didn't feel inhibited.
- Thermoses
- Rolled up towels
- Park maps
Zoom in. Enhance. All I have of the fully loaded trunk is this view cropped from the rear view mirror. We ended up wedging the pads on the left and right in a bit better to achieve full visibility out the rear window.
Maybe a sense of scale for one of these crash pads. L2 Charging as we wait for ice cream at Tillamook Creamery, OR.
A note for fellow hikers, campers and climbers:
Being able to fit pads, tents and other bulky gear in was a surprisingly important criteria for choosing the Mach-E over other, smaller EVs, and our particular setup worked better in the ID.4 and Mach-E than it did in the Model Y. With the floor dropped, we're able to fit all four pads in with one rear passenger and no lost visibility, or three pads with two rear passengers. We've also fit 5 people with full hiking and overnight gear for a St. Helens trip. Not bad for a Mustang..
Can you comment on ground clearance of your MME, it is low, did you ever scrap the bottom off pavement or over speed bumps?Adverse Conditions:
Desert Heat:
Zabriske Point in Death Vally NP, CA.
I'm including Death Valley here on reputation only as the temperature hadn't yet crept out of the 90s in the early morning hours as we passed through. DVNP will make another notable appearance later in this post though. Each of our 6 full days through California and Utah reached temperatures in the mid 100s in the late afternoon. That said, we did not see a major reduction in range (attributable to external temperature or climate conditioning) over this time. We were once greeted with the message to kindly plug in while not in use, but did not see our driving modes restricted or any other known ill effects of the heat. The highest I saw on the temperature sensor was 116° in Southwest Utah. We were plugged into an EA charger at the time on a session which eventually ended in a charger fault, which may or may not be related. Some brief highway driving and plugging into a charger near our hotel got the car back down to a cool 108° (ambient air temp, at the time). There were a few occasions in which I initiated a remote start while we were parked in direct sun and not plugged in to initiate active cooling and help keep the cabin temperature down, but I wasn't exactly scientific about applying this measure, so I'm not sure how effective it was.
Unpaved Roads:
Petroglyphs in Californa after many miles on sand and gravel roads
For what it's worth, I think the Infinite Blue MME wears a dusty coat remarkably well. I'll let you reach your own conclusions from the picture though. We had a couple of prolonged spells on unpaved roads, probably totaling near 100 miles traveled. We all know the suspension is tight on the MME, even after removing the transport locks, so the washboards will toss you around a bit. That said, with the absence of major potholes and significant clearance issues, we were comfortably keeping up the Subaru Outback ahead of us on the way to Buttermilk Boulders near Bishop, CA. The rear washer is invaluable for restoring visibility when entering back into civilization, particularly with an extended wiper blade. On rough and unpredictable roads, I like to bump up to a higher driving position for more front visibility and to turn off One Pedal Driving for smoother acceleration. I never felt that I had lost traction, even when braking hard for wildlife at night on the 30 miles of gravel leading up to City of Rocks, ID. On that topic, I was very impressed with the illumination provided by the headlights and high beams.
Mountain Passes:
Atop Tioga Pass: 15% battery spent climbing ~3000ft in 11 miles.
At least qualitatively, elevation change seemed to be a much stronger factor in range reduction than speed, heat and wind. Even with the regen on downhills, the net loss was higher than I expected. Ford's built in navigation doesn't do a great job of accounting for this either, and started adding chargers when the GOM briefly went upside-down as we crested Steven's Pass in Washington (despite the 4000 foot descent and long, flat road ahead). I guess I can see where Ford is coming from here, erring on the side of not leaving you stranded, but ABRP's estimates were much more reliable, if a bit pessimistic, in terms of Mountain Pass performance.
Despite our efforts (reduced speed on straightaways and whisper mode for less aggressive regen), we encountered the dreaded One Pedal Drive Fault on the steep, winding descent into Death Valley. This was accompanied by a lurching feeling and the kind of clunk/rattle described in @Mach-E VLOG 's video. We were perhaps more cautious coming down Tioga pass without the pressure of Death Valley heat bearing down on us as the sun crept over the mountains, but a few minutes rest on a pullout gave the car a chance to cool off, reset and return to normal. It's worth noting that we had many other notable descents on the trip with no issues- notably right after this bombing down the endless straight that marks the final descent to Death Valley.
First descent is an occasionally rather steep and consistently winding road down a canyon wall- problem. Second descent is steeper on average, but a long, straight shot down- no problem.
Staring down the red dot on the highlighted route above. The second descent into Death Valley looks a lot like this, but with less up at the end. The constant speed on these straights likely eased pressure on the regen system, probably benefited from some air braking as well.
Who wants to try General's Highway at Sequoia NP or Going-to-the-Sun Road at Glacier NP for me in the glorious name of science?
Wildfire Smoke:
Cows outside the passenger window as the red sun rises in Eastern Oregon.
Smoke was a permanent fixture during this trip. Sometimes materializing as little more than atmospheric haze, other times manifesting as falling ash or as a thick, odorous fog. We began the trip with the stock cabin air filter, and planned to swap for the Pureflow Cabin Air Filter (PC99542X) we had picked up in anticipation for heavier smoke and highway odors. Anecdotally, the stock air filter did not block the smell of smoke nearly as well as the Pureflow filter did as we drove down and later back up the eastern edge of Oregon. On our last night, faced with the poor air quality in this region, we opted to sleep in the car (more on this subject later) rather than in our tent. I'll be curious to see how Ford's recently unveiled Refresh95 air filter will measure up, but we were generally quite happy with the Pureflow.
I suppose it's time for 100 questions now.
It is low, but that hasn't really been an issue for us. I guess there's another side of the coin on the tight suspension: even fully loaded with passengers and gear, it may bounce you around, but it won't sag. We have a fairly steep driveway that has kissed the front end of a sedan or two, speed bumps of all shapes and some aggressive road construction on our suburban streets, but have never bottomed out here. The one time I did hear a scrape was on a particularly nasty pothole after snow melt on a mountain road. Those are what you need to watch out for, and can usually avoid unless you're on the road up to Mt. Pilchuck. Built Ford tough and all, but I wouldn't want to put my MME through that punishment even if it did have 8+ inches of clearance.
This was truly an impressive and wonderful series of posts, @ebeponyan. I will read them again, perhaps a couple of times. Sharing your experiences and feelings, not just about your EV or Mach E experience, but the nature of the trip itself, regardless of transport mode. As a youngster, 50 to 60 years ago, my family of 7 did numerous camping and a cross country trip in a red Ford Station Wagon. I was usually the navigator, starting with our migration from Minnesota to California when I was 7 years old and the Ford Country Squire was brand new. Thanks for sharing!!!
