Mach-E Web Series Part 2: SYNC 4A

[nivlem]

I've never paid a dime for communications between my vehicle and FordPass app, and my personal cellular plan is not part of the equation, so my answer is 'yes' to both of your questions.

Thanks, I appreciate your help.

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[SnBGC]

Should you not charge it more than 80% on a regular basis

It doesnt matter. You can just let the computer manage the charge level on it's own. Ford added that feature because people asked for it which I think is perfectly fine. If people think that setting the charge level to 80% of the available charge level is helpful then go ahead and let them.

The only reason I can think of to limit SOC is when paying for the charge. In that case it would be nice to set the charge level to 20% or whatever you need to get to your normal or preferred charging destination. I see two charge times on the menu. If you could set the first session to 25% during peak rates and then let it finish the remaining 75% off peak then that would be cool.

 

[Jolteon]

Thanks Jolteon and jparduhn. Are you saying that communications between the Mach E and the cloud with your driving data, intelligent routing info, charging station status, OTA updates, ect will be thru the Mach E modem at no cost? Personal cellular data is not involved?

Phone -> Cloud -> Car, the Cloud -> Car is free over AT&T on Ford's dime. Whether your personal data on your own phone to ping the cloud is free is dependent on your own plan, obviously.

Car -> WiFi Hotspot -> Phone requires an AT&T subscription you pay for.

 

[Jolteon]

It doesnt matter. You can just let the computer manage the charge level on it's own. Ford added that feature because people asked for it which I think is perfectly fine. If people think that setting the charge level to 80% of the available charge level is helpful then go ahead and let them.

The only reason I can think of to limit SOC is when paying for the charge. In that case it would be nice to set the charge level to 20% or whatever you need to get to your normal or preferred charging destination. I see two charge times on the menu. If you could set the first session to 25% during peak rates and then let it finish the remaining 75% off peak then that would be cool.

I'm sure Ford doesn't want to scare customers and outright warn against going to 100% like Tesla does, but may be including a subtle nudge to get us to think 80% is normal and helping us save our own batteries even a bit more stress than necessary.

 

[SnBGC]

I'm sure Ford doesn't want to scare customers and outright warn against going to 100% like Tesla does, but may be including a subtle nudge to get us to think 80% is normal and helping us save our own batteries even a bit more stress than necessary.

I think the Tesla battery cell architecture lends itself to that concern which is probably where the idea started. The cells in other brand EVs is much different and thus not as much of an issue.

That being said....certainly wont hurt any if the owner doesnt want to charge fully. Even the standard battery size MME is 6 times the range needed per day for the average driver. Some can only charge to 25% each night and still be totally fine.

 

[Jolteon]

I think the Tesla battery cell architecture lends itself to that concern which is probably where the idea started. The cells in other brand EVs is much different and thus not as much of an issue.

That being said....certainly wont hurt any if the owner doesnt want to charge fully. Even the standard battery size MME is 6 times the range needed per day for the average driver. Some can only charge to 25% each night and still be totally fine.

It's a lithium-ion inherent design thing. iPhones also like only going to 80% instead of 100%. Ford hasn't removed that barrier of the technology, if Ford recommends 100% they're either doing it for customer comfort, or they made the customer buy much more battery than they can use in the first place - which is what I think happened.

Polestar (LG Chem cells like Ford) advises 90%. Tesla advises anywhere between 50-90%, labeled "daily" and 90-100% labeled "trip."

 

[timbop]

I think the Tesla battery cell architecture lends itself to that concern which is probably where the idea started. The cells in other brand EVs is much different and thus not as much of an issue.

That being said....certainly wont hurt any if the owner doesnt want to charge fully. Even the standard battery size MME is 6 times the range needed per day for the average driver. Some can only charge to 25% each night and still be totally fine.

As @Jolteon said it is a function of all Li-ion batteries. here's just one article of many that you can find detailing how SOC/depth of discharge can significantly affect longevity of a battery. There are plenty of others that show the most stress on a Li-ion is when SOC drops below 20% and goes above 80% of the true capacity of the battery. Since Ford hides roughly 10% of the battery as a buffer (so you can't truly charge to 100% or discharge to 0), that probably means the "safe" range to use is 15%-85%; that is you will get better longevity out of the battery if you keep the state of charge in the 15% to 85% range, although you probably shouldn't let it sit below 20% for days at a time.

I think this chart from battery university says it best

 

[I.Adams]

Here is the week 2 webinar about SYNC 4A. Once again, the "meat" of the video was the Q&A after the presentation.

The presenters were -
Darren Palmer: Global Product Development Director
Husein Dakroub: Supervisor, SYNC Software

Enjoy!

Hi Patric!
I‘m a German reservation holder and I#m not invited to be apart of these ‚Nicht-events‘ (looking from Germany ). Is it possible for you to position questions for me? The German community has so many questions and Ford is in Germany really, really quiet.

Thank you.

 

[Mach-E VLOG]

Hi Patric!
I‘m a German reservation holder and I#m not invited to be apart of these ‚Nicht-events‘ (looking from Germany ). Is it possible for you to position questions for me? The German community has so many questions and Ford is in Germany really, really quiet.

Thank you.

Sure! And that's a great idea. I'll collect questions before the next webinar this Thursday. There is no guarantee they will answer any of them. I'm this past session, I asked 4 questions and only one got answered.

What questions do you have? The next webinar is about the interior design and then the final one is about the performance.

 

[SnBGC]

As @Jolteon said it is a function of all Li-ion batteries. here's just one article of many that you can find detailing how SOC/depth of discharge can significantly affect longevity of a battery. There are plenty of others that show the most stress on a Li-ion is when SOC drops below 20% and goes above 80% of the true capacity of the battery. Since Ford hides roughly 10% of the battery as a buffer (so you can't truly charge to 100% or discharge to 0), that probably means the "safe" range to use is 15%-85%; that is you will get better longevity out of the battery if you keep the state of charge in the 15% to 85% range, although you probably shouldn't let it sit below 20% for days at a time.

I think this chart from battery university says it best

I get what you guys are saying but I suppose my message isnt coming through. I am saying it doesnt matter enough to worry about. I dont believe the user can manage the SOC more effectively than the computer enough to make a significant difference to offset the two primary causes of "wear". Which is thermal management and total amount of electrons that pass between the cathode and anode in the course of the product life.

These have an 8 year/100k mile warranty. I plan to just use my vehicle and not worry about the battery until I approach those limits. By that time the car would have paid for itself anyway.

 

[dbsb3233]

One thing I do know that I hope they address next week is. The mache could have been around 3,000 to 4,000 cheaper if ford would have gone with one screen and that was a 10inch display.

I myself I'm glad they didn't.

The driver display is a huge addition vs Tesla, IMO.

Actually I shouldn't refer to it as an addition, since it was really a subtraction on Teslas. The norm is very much to have a driver display (instrument cluster) directly in front of the driver. I'm still shocked that Tesla leaves that out. That's an immediate turn-off to me. Can't even imagine not having it. And it sounds like Ford is doing some really great stuff with it too.

I think that display will be a much bigger difference-maker than people have been giving it credit for.

 

[ChasingCoral]

Safe? Yes. Necessary? Maybe not. Let's wait for the manual or official report from Ford to learn if Ford feels the reserve they have held back is sufficient protection for the battery.

I’d rather be conservative with the batteries when I can until we get more data. I’ll save 100% for road trips.

 

[GoGoGadgetMachE]

I’d rather be conservative with the batteries when I can until we get more data. I’ll save 100% for road trips.

I really am confused about, well, where the confusion is coming from here.

While this is Ford's first "full range" BEV, it's not the first time they are shipping a vehicle with a battery, a charger, a computer, etc. The Fusion Energi, C-Max Energi, and Focus Electric were/are all exactly the same with respect to charging - let it charge to 100%, let it drop to 0% (although in the Focus that obviously wasn't practical like in a PHEV), it's fine - the computer holds back capacity and has your back as a result. Those of us with these vehicles have said on here multiple times that you just don't need to worry about it in a Ford.

For all the talk in other threads about "technology vs. Tesla" etc. etc., the fact is that as a consumer, you having to care about limiting charge is idiotic. You don't have to worry about how much gas you put in to an ICE vehicle, do you? No, of course not. An owner should not have to worry about "filling up" their BEV too much, either. Ford has, across multiple models and nearly a decade of experience, made the decision to not make you care.

There's zero evidence the MME will be different. We know there's a large buffer, in fact.

So just plug it in when you want and charge when you want (if there are "value" charge times where you live, take that into account, if you care), and don't worry about 80% or some other such nonsense. The car is better than that. It's smarter than that. It has your back.

It's crazypants that any other manufacturer even makes this an issue for the owner. The owner should never have to worry about this and in the MME, you don't.

 

[dbsb3233]

I’d rather be conservative with the batteries when I can until we get more data. I’ll save 100% for road trips.

I likely will be too, but mostly because it's easy to do, not because I really feel like I need to baby the battery.

With at-home charging nightly, it's just so easy to set the %. And we normally drive very few miles around home (~100/week). So we're not compromising to just charge to 85% or something most of the time.

But at the same time, if we drove a lot more, I wouldn't hesitate to charge to 90%, 95%, even 100% regularly.

 

[Jolteon]

I really am confused about, well, where the confusion is coming from here.

While this is Ford's first "full range" BEV, it's not the first time they are shipping a vehicle with a battery, a charger, a computer, etc. The Fusion Energi, C-Max Energi, and Focus Electric were/are all exactly the same with respect to charging - let it charge to 100%, let it drop to 0% (although in the Focus that obviously wasn't practical like in a PHEV), it's fine - the computer holds back capacity and has your back as a result. Those of us with these vehicles have said on here multiple times that you just don't need to worry about it in a Ford.

For all the talk in other threads about "technology vs. Tesla" etc. etc., the fact is that as a consumer, you having to care about limiting charge is idiotic. You don't have to worry about how much gas you put in to an ICE vehicle, do you? No, of course not. An owner should not have to worry about "filling up" their BEV too much, either. Ford has, across multiple models and nearly a decade of experience, made the decision to not make you care.

There's zero evidence the MME will be different. We know there's a large buffer, in fact.

So just plug it in when you want and charge when you want (if there are "value" charge times where you live, take that into account, if you care), and don't worry about 80% or some other such nonsense. The car is better than that. It's smarter than that. It has your back.

It's crazypants that any other manufacturer even makes this an issue for the owner. The owner should never have to worry about this and in the MME, you don't.

I'll tell you that in my C-Max Energi, I had battery degradation by 20,000 miles. The PHEV had a very small top buffer, 100% displayed was 97% actual battery SoC, and mine degraded when always fully charged.

To me, it's all about customer expectations.

Use a hypothetical 100 kWh car that gets 250 Wh/mi as an example.

I can sell it to a customer and say "charge to 100%, no problem" but then I have to software lock out 15% of the capacity so when the customer sees 0% it's at 5%, and when they see 100% it's actually at 90%. Now my customer is happy they "don't have to worry about" managing their battery, but they paid for 15% more battery than they get to use, and as a result our hypothetical car has a usable battery of 85 kWh and range of 340 miles.

Alternatively, I can sell that exact same car and exact same battery and allow the customer to use, say, 95% of the capacity, so when they're at 100%, the battery is at 98%, and when they're at 0% displayed, it's at 3% actual SoC. No change in battery technology, at all. But by saying "please don't go above 90% unless you really need it" to the customer, I've given then access to 15% more kWhs that they actually still paid for in the other scenario, at the cost of forcing them to do some extra thinking. In this scenario, our customer can use 95 kWh if they want to, so their 100% range is 380 miles, but their "daily" 90% range is the same roughly 342 miles as the other car.

I would much rather have the second scenario, which is what Tesla and Polestar does.

Set it to 90% for daily use, 100% only if you need it, because when you do need it, it's very nice to have that extra buffer. It's like a "unlockable" extra battery for road trips.

Nobody (well, nearly nobody) needs even 50% of a Mach-E's battery daily. I don't see why managing battery charge limit would be at all stressful to anyone. Having owned both a PHEV that didn't allow it and a BEV that did, it just seemed seamless and logical to manage charge limits myself in the BEV.

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