Zero Warning... the recall software update did not work! SECOND HVBJB FAILURE. Stop Safely Now my sequel.

[Electric Goat]

Well... I figured that my replacement HVBJB was going to fail sooner or later. My first failure occurred this past February which is well before there was even a revised/more robust part available. It looks like my failure ended up happening sooner.

My car is now stuck facing forward in my low clearance alleyway garage in the city. I though that I'd be safe parking the car in my garage and that the software update would give me a warning before the High Voltage Battery Junction Box (HVBJB) failed. It did not.



My first failure occurred Feb 2022 with about 4500 miles on the odometer on a cold day here in Minnesota when the wind chill temperature was about -10°F. I still have PTSD from being stranded outside and getting minor frostbite. Back then it took the dealership 6 weeks to get my car back to me.

Right now there's ~9500 miles on the garage and I've only DC fast charged the car 3x in 5000 miles. Level 1 & Level 2 only.

Fortunately it's not winter and there's now a new HVBJB available. Now I'm just really hoping that a tow truck can get the vehicle out of my garage without damaging the car and/or my garage.

It really really really sucks that @Ford Motor Company isn't proactively replacing these bad parts.

It looks like I'll be spending my Saturday trying to figure out how to get this car out of my garage and to a competent dealership.



If I partially take apart my garage door then that will give me about 8 inches of clearance. Will a tow truck driver be able to get dollies underneath with such little clearance?

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[DevSecOps]

Somehow I'm not surprised. Sorry to hear this.

If I partially take apart my garage door then that will give me about 8 inches of clearance. Will a tow truck driver be able to get dollies underneath with such little clearance?

If you get it into tow mode you can just push it out of the garage. I've also seen them use the front tow locations to pull the car backwards if the garage slopes down and the cable won't hit the back of the car. They can get a little creative, just don't hook onto the battery.

 

[mwtechy]

multiple repeat failures by different owners? I would expect repeat failure rate to be far lower than the overall reported failures unless driving patterns/route or another isssue causes the failure? Very confusing IMO.

 

[Southern92]

I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) his replacement part was NOT the beefier one? If so then I would expect the failure rate to be the same as the general population. Possibly higher if there is some as-of-yet undetermined basis for why some cars fail at a higher rate.

 

[heisnuts]

Wow, sorry to hear of another second failure.

I am also on my second failure too, as it looks like I missed the updated part by a little more than a week of release on the first failure. Be prepared for a little bit of a wait. My dealer is giving me an eta of about two weeks before the updated part comes in right now. Can you imagine the wait if it was a full recall to replace all of the parts on all of the cars at once?

I’m surprised the recall software didn’t alert you. I assume you just tried to start the car and it won’t start with a stop safely now message on the dash?

 

[jbooth]

If it takes a while for the tow, you'll quite likely also have a dead 12V battery. Spend the time on youtube, looking up how to pull your frunk trim out. The tow truck operators may be scared of doing so. Youtube and my willingness to rip parts off the car is the only reason my failure (not yet clear what exactly failed) got towed successfully. I looked up 3 minutes of youtube on my phone and did it in the dark (dead parking lot light where I was).

If you have a 12V jump pack, make sure it is charged and take it with you. The tow operators pack jumped me to get in e-tow twice (once onto the truck, once off the truck) but was dead-dead and could not jump me to get it in park once I rolled off the flatbed. My friend's car, doing shuttle service for me, was the final jump to put mine in park.

Know where your e-tow via the settings menu is, in case your shifter is locked (likely, given your symptom). I believe it was settings -> vehicle -> scroll down, the entry below "reset EV driving data" was "press and hold to enter emergency tow mode."

You can DM the FoMoCo you tagged the thread to get a case started. To save you a round trip with them, include your dealer name, VIN, your full name, the vehicle owner's full name and your relation to them (if applicable), your zip code, email, mobile phone number, mileage (fordpass has this, save your 12V).

Edit: you probably know all this, but in case you didn't. Also for the poor saps who stumble upon it via google who haven't been on the forums before.

 

[Mach1E]

I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) his replacement part was NOT the beefier one? If so then I would expect the failure rate to be the same as the general population. Possibly higher if there is some as-of-yet undetermined basis for why some cars fail at a higher rate.

This^^

Some people think the failure rate was close to 1 in 1000. Which would make the repeat rate 1 in a million.

Clearly it’s not. With multiple failures in the same vehicle……….something else is going on.

Which means they have NOT found the cause nor the solution yet.

It can’t just be a bad HVJB, something else is causing them to fail.

And I also don’t believe Ford’s stance of “blame the driver” for DC charging and flooring the car.

 

[Regulus7]

Isn’t it odd to get this failure with no warning whatsoever following the new software update ? I am almost always parking front facing as I am worried about this happening although my car is new and just 2k miles. I did a few too many WOT last few days and drag races a Macan on the hiway at 100mph for 10-15 mins on Friday early morning. Uh oh!!

 

[spacecowboy]

Mine is also in “after” the update. I reached out to ford through this forum back when I was having charging issues.
I took the ME in to the dealer After ford contacted me and set up the appointment. They diagnosed as the cable. Coincidentally, even though I did the OTA update, the app was telling me the update was incomplete. I told the dealer this and they said they would make sure all updates were completed.

on the day that I was going to go to the dealer to pick up my new charge cable (after they did the updates) I received two errors. High voltage error and an all wheel drive error.
I left the ME with the dealer to diagnose. They said they had to order a junction box and it would take 3-4 days. After a couple of days I asked for ford to cover a rental, which they did. But it’s been 3 days and no part in sight so far.

after what I have read, I expect this is not going to be a quick fix. I am not interested in owning a vehicle that I have to always wonder where and when I am going to get the next failure. I have zero range anxiety, but I do have software anxiety.

 

[RickMachE]

Mine is also in “after” the update. I reached out to ford through this forum back when I was having charging issues.
I took the ME in to the dealer After ford contacted me and set up the appointment. They diagnosed as the cable. Coincidentally, even though I did the OTA update, the app was telling me the update was incomplete. I told the dealer this and they said they would make sure all updates were completed.

on the day that I was going to go to the dealer to pick up my new charge cable (after they did the updates) I received two errors. High voltage error and an all wheel drive error.
I left the ME with the dealer to diagnose. They said they had to order a junction box and it would take 3-4 days. After a couple of days I asked for ford to cover a rental, which they did. But it’s been 3 days and no part in sight so far.

after what I have read, I expect this is not going to be a quick fix. I am not interested in owning a vehicle that I have to always wonder where and when I am going to get the next failure. I have zero range anxiety, but I do have software anxiety.

Yours appears to have gone EXACTLY as it should have, the software told you of the problem and let you drive to the dealer.

 

[HuntingPudel]

Bummer this happened. So sorry. ??

Since it’s in your garage, do you have a 12V battery charger? You could hook up the charger to your 12V to keep it from going flat until the tow gets there, then put the car into Tow Mode to push it out of your garage. ?‍?

 

[Electric Goat]

I'm hoping that the car just glitched out and that this thread is a false alarm.

Another member PM'ed me and I explained that my FordPass app gave me a charge fault error. I was advised to unplug the car, let the car reboot itself and try to start it up later. Apparently just because I received a Stop Safety Now message doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad HVBJB.

Soooo.... I unplugged the car last night then went to bed. I'll get back out to the garage soon and I'll see what happens. ?

 

[scoopman]

Well... I figured that my replacement HVBJB was going to fail sooner or later. My first failure occurred this past February which is well before there was even a revised/more robust part available. It looks like my failure ended up happening sooner.

My car is now stuck facing forward in my low clearance alleyway garage in the city. I though that I'd be safe parking the car in my garage and that the software update would give me a warning before the High Voltage Battery Junction Box (HVBJB) failed. It did not.



My first failure occurred Feb 2022 with about 4500 miles on the odometer on a cold day here in Minnesota when the wind chill temperature was about -10°F. I still have PTSD from being stranded outside and getting minor frostbite. Back then it took the dealership 6 weeks to get my car back to me.

Right now there's ~9500 miles on the garage and I've only DC fast charged the car 3x in 5000 miles. Level 1 & Level 2 only.

Fortunately it's not winter and there's now a new HVBJB available. Now I'm just really hoping that a tow truck can get the vehicle out of my garage without damaging the car and/or my garage.

It really really really sucks that @Ford Motor Company isn't proactively replacing these bad parts.

It looks like I'll be spending my Saturday trying to figure out how to get this car out of my garage and to a competent dealership.



If I partially take apart my garage door then that will give me about 8 inches of clearance. Will a tow truck driver be able to get dollies underneath with such little clearance?

Congratulations on joining the two-time junction box failure club! The good thing is that the revised part #3 seems to be holding up better so far....

I agree with Neal, there's something (more power draw? Heavier satin metal covered right foot?) to have two failures, mine was only 1700mi after the first, but it was damaged not complete failure for second one.

As Todd mentioned, you should be able to push the car out of your garage if that's possible. Just don't hook those holes on the sides or back.

I'd spend your weekend charging your 12v battery. That's what I did and had plenty of 12v time for my car even with a tow from hell. You might want to check the thread I made for other tips.

Since you have time perhaps you can find a local exotic car tow company... Or one who caters to Tesla owners. Ford will reimburse for towing and you gotta think one that specializes in exotic cars or one who tows cars with batteries will be more careful than the guys Ford Roadside sends out.

 

[scoopman]

I'm hoping that the car just glitched out and that this thread is a false alarm.

Another member PM'ed me and I explained that my FordPass app gave me a charge fault error. I was advised to unplug the car, let the car reboot itself and try to start it up later. Apparently just because I received a Stop Safety Now message doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad HVBJB.

Soooo.... I unplugged the car last night then went to bed. I'll get back out to the garage soon and I'll see what happens. ?

Having a code reader is a pretty good idea for our finicky cars.

 

[heisnuts]

I'm hoping that the car just glitched out and that this thread is a false alarm.

Another member PM'ed me and I explained that my FordPass app gave me a charge fault error. I was advised to unplug the car, let the car reboot itself and try to start it up later. Apparently just because I received a Stop Safety Now message doesn't necessarily mean that it's a bad HVBJB.

Soooo.... I unplugged the car last night then went to bed. I'll get back out to the garage soon and I'll see what happens. ?

I was thinking it might be something other than a HVBJB failure. The recall software is pretty good at giving advance warning of a failure so I would be pretty surprised if it just bricked the car without warning. Like Scoop said above, having a code reader is almost a necessity with these cars. It should really come as a standard accessory from Ford ?

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