No heat in -15c and colder temps (partially fixed with the HVAC update)

[Guy]

For how long were you driving. This data is quite important to collect accurately so we know for sure if it’s all cars or some cars. What if is -20 or so and you don’t precondition?

Drove for 45 minutes, then parked outside for 4 hours. Remote start 15 minutes, city driving for 30 minutes then return home 45 minutes at 100-110 kph. Had to use Max AC 3-4 times for about 30-45 secs. Temp set at 21, air to windshield and feet, fan set at 3. Seat heaters at auto, steering wheel heat on. We were comfortable.

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[camdenlake]

The problem is that many want to use their heating like they did with gasoline cars. You can't there's no engine, no combustion, so the only thing that heats up the air are those elements so if your constantly bringing cold air in the car and that heater is the only thing heating the air what do you think will happen, youre only bringing in cold air. Slow down the fan and give the heater a chance. Its quite logical but we're stuck in our old ways. Trust me it works.

The problem with this idea is not taking into account temp loss in the vehicle and glass. With fan on low air feels warmer but in short time the car gets colder. Tried that last winter.

josh

-22c ambient temp.
Car at 100% .
Pre heated and departure time set.
Garage heated to 10c.
Half a km to highway, then 100kph for the next 40 mins.
Heat set to auto and 22.5.
Fine for about 10 mins.
Then I start getting a fog over the windshield as the humidity spikes and the vent temp drops.
Switch to max defrost and Ac on. ( Which doesn't actually do anything below zero degrees c. )
After that I either crack a window or wipe the windshield down.

This is a bloody joke.

I'm here monitoring vent temps with multi meters, and scan tools...
All while other members from Florida are telling me how to operate my HVAC.

From the scan tool data.. too much heat is lost by the battery bank. Heater is too small, battery is poorly insulated.

When I get to town, after another 15 mins... I get some heat back.

.

Drove for 45 minutes, then parked outside for 4 hours. Remote start 15 minutes, city driving for 30 minutes then return home 45 minutes at 100-110 kph. Had to use Max AC 3-4 times for about 30-45 secs. Temp set at 21, air to windshield and feet, fan set at 3. Seat heaters at auto, steering wheel heat on. We were comfortable.

Very interesting.
what was the ambient temp outside approx? I assume max ac you mean max defrost?

 

[kdryden99]

Drove for 45 minutes, then parked outside for 4 hours. Remote start 15 minutes, city driving for 30 minutes then return home 45 minutes at 100-110 kph. Had to use Max AC 3-4 times for about 30-45 secs. Temp set at 21, air to windshield and feet, fan set at 3. Seat heaters at auto, steering wheel heat on. We were comfortable.

The car seats and steering wheel help heat up the interior cabin to compensate for the small heater. Its not only for your hands and butt. So it sounds right

 

[kdryden99]

The problem with this idea is not taking into account temp loss in the vehicle and glass. With fan on low air feels warmer but in short time the car gets colder. Tried that last winter.

josh
.

Very interesting.
what was the ambient temp outside approx? I assume max ac you mean max defrost?

What i normally do is for longer trips, 2.5hours generally for me, is switch every so often between auto and just the windshield front defrost. If its really cold ill use the seat and steering warmer. It helps heat the cabin as well.

 

[Shayne]

The car seats and steering wheel help heat up the interior cabin to compensate for the small heater. Its not only for your hands and butt. So it sounds right

Never thought about that. You can crank the passenger seat heater up with no one sitting there. Radiant heat . Not sure how efficient that is but it should add to the heat.

 

[camdenlake]

Yes, it's undersized for Canadian winters IMO. It's the same size as in a Nissan Leaf which is a lot smaller and don't have a glass roof. Mach-E should have been spec'd with a 6-7 kW cabin heater due to greater glass area, volume, and heat loss. 5 kW PTC is a common size in the EV industry, so it was probably chosen for cost or part availability rather than being sized to the vehicle demands. The design also needs a separate PTC heater for the battery that isn't shared with the cabin.

As stated before, if you have a glass roof the heater is only powerful enough to make the cabin about 40ºC warmer than outside, if you don't have a glass roof then the heater will perform better and the cabin will be 45ºC warmer than outside. The glass roof makes a significant difference in the heat levels.

If you want more heat, I've discovered that covering the glass roof with Reflectix radiant barrier will increase the cabin temps by 3-5ºC at -25ºC. It's equivalent to adding a 550W heater.

Hey mach-Lee have you reported to transport canada recently. ? They tell files from last winter were closed after ford said they fixed it.

 

[kdryden99]

Never thought about that. You can crank the passenger seat heater up with no one sitting there. Radiant heat . Not sure how efficient that is but it should add to the heat.

im not sure you can do that, ive never tried that. The seat sensor might prevent you from doing this.

 

[camdenlake]

Never thought about that. You can crank the passenger seat heater up with no one sitting there. Radiant heat . Not sure how efficient that is but it should add to the heat.

It does seem to line up some are ok with it and have heated wheel and seats. It would make ones core warmer which makes all of you warmer. Would be interesting to data log a “ok” car and see.

 

[Shayne]

im not sure you can do that, ive never tried that. The seat sensor might prevent you from doing this.

Not looking for heat just thinking out of the box. Seen it on after a passenger was out and had to shut it down but not sure. Wonder if reducing the fan speed also reduces fresh (outside) air volumes?

It does seem to line up some are ok with it and have heated wheel and seats. It would make ones core warmer which makes all of you warmer. Would be interesting to data log a “ok” car and see.

You need to dress right just like we were taught in grade school.

At your location this can not be a deal breaker right? With the heated seats and the hvac there is something for all. This car does not frost up on me and no credit card scrapper required.

I would like to see a dedicated battery heater as that is what matters the most to me. I want 15 winters and can put up with a couple days of the year. I put up with a lot with ICE also when it was cold none were instant or perfect. Nothing likes the cold. Maybe those in -15C sunny and out on the shoe snowing trail is an exception.

 

[camdenlake]

Not looking for heat just thinking out of the box. Seen it on after a passenger was out and had to shut it down but not sure. Wonder if reducing the fan speed also reduces fresh (outside) air volumes?



You need to dress right just like we were taught in grade school.

At your location this can not be a deal breaker right? With the heated seats and the hvac there is something for all. This car does not frost up on me and no credit card scrapper required.

I would like to see a dedicated battery heater as that is what matters the most to me. I want 15 winters and can put up with a couple days of the year. I put up with a lot with ICE also when it was cold none were instant or perfect. Nothing likes the cold. Maybe those in -15C sunny and out on the shoe snowing trail is an exception.

This winter has been an exception we usually get dec and Jan routinely below -20c. I have never dressed for winter driving any vehicle. I hang my coat on the rear passenger hook and go. My 2001 f350 diesel has no issues making heat neither has the 20+ vehicles I have owned. Owners should not be mitigating and tinkering to get heat. We get a humid cold usually here with the Great Lakes. I get the frost. Working with my mechanic we have identified a dangerous flaw in the software that prevents humidity removal on all Mach e’s. Ford could care less so far so it’s transport canada.

 

[Shayne]

This winter has been an exception we usually get dec and Jan routinely below -20c. I have never dressed for winter driving any vehicle. I hang my coat on the rear passenger hook and go. My 2001 f350 diesel has no issues making heat neither has the 20+ vehicles I have owned. Owners should not be mitigating and tinkering to get heat. We get a humid cold usually here with the Great Lakes. I get the frost. Working with my mechanic we have identified a dangerous flaw in the software that prevents humidity removal on all Mach e’s. Ford could care less so far so it’s transport canada.

You guys in Ontario's Florida have it tough. You want to be in a tee shirt and shorts when you drive. Problem understood. Maybe put a diesel engine in your MME? My diesel has no cab but I dress for that.

 

[MME Farmer]

Hi all,

Trying to get a baseline of information for those in the colder areas of the world as I have an open customer care case with Ford Canada and my vehicle is still trying to be diagnosed at the dealership. Tech helpline is trying to flag a plugged heater core but I'm disagreeing with this.

-12c to -15c I get lukewarm/tepid heat when on max defrost setting only.
-16c and colder I get ice cold air on any setting leaving the vehicle partially undriveable as the interior fogs up.

They allowed me to take a new MME identical to mine home to test it as they keep getting customers in for this issue, this one was built in October 2022, Mine was built in March 2022. Same situation even with preconditioning and plugging it in.

I was told by the dealership that everyone that experiences these issues should make a customer care case as they provide you with a free rental, and if they cant find another EV for you to drive they reimburse your fuel spent. Just save the receipts and submit to your customer care rep.


*EDIT: I totally forgot to state the recall/HVAC update was done on my vehicle. They did it twice to no avail.

Let me know your experiences!


EDIT 2:
Tough luck for me and everyone else with this issue.

My shop foreman just reached out saying the field service Engineer said, in shorter terms, "too bad." That this is how the vehicle is supposed to work. Even after the supposed recall that I was told only slowed down the coolant in the system so it heated up more.

The shop foreman said the FSE is entertaining suggestions from techs on fixes for this as they are as stumped as we all are.

This is a design flaw. Through and through. This is not able to be mended by a software update. And to suggest lowering my fan speed and praying my front windshield doesn't fog up is not a fix.

I will be reaching out to Transport Canada on this and I implore others to do so as well. This recall did not fix the issue.

Knowing better, I gave it one last try the other night after a meeting where my only choice was to remote start as early as I could. It was -17F and after trying all sorts of settings I could not get comfortable. I will drive something else in these temps. Ford needs to can whatever engineer couldn't figure out what size heater was needed. I would have much preferred that they would have taken some of the wattage from the seats that make the occupants well-done in a short trip and added it to the heater. If Ford is concerned at all about customer satisfaction they should come out with a retrofit bigger element or an auxiliary heater. Most owners could care less about this issue so it seems it wouldn't be that many owners that they would need to correct this issue with. One other comment, since new my GOM was very accurate and now since the update it is very optimistic and goes down at over 2miles/driven mile and then gets more accurate as it gets to lower battery %. Wondering if anyone else had this happen.

 

[slimothyjames]

So weird some people's vehicles have this issue. I think it's a software issue of some kind, a glitch of sorts.

I have had no issue with mine. I park outdoors plugged in overnight.

My climate controls are set to 20°C with my heated seat and steering wheel as auto.

I remote start my vehicle anywhere from 5-10 min and I find the cabin comfrotable.

Even last week when temps reached -27°C I had no issues. I've never felt uncomfortable/cold in my MME.

 

[kdryden99]

Never thought about that. You can crank the passenger seat heater up with no one sitting there. Radiant heat . Not sure how efficient that is but it should add to the heat.

you can heat up the seat next to you just tried it

 

[Womps]

I live in Fairbanks Alaska and have been pleasantly surprised so far this winter. I will say all of my driving is around town but varies from 60 to 35 MPH for the most part. I have a metal roof which I am think may make quite a difference. I have tried running climate control on auto but it has always been disastrous for me so I just run manually. I have never had the windshield fog up and as soon as the side windows begin to fog up I just switch to defrost and, for me, it clears right up. I have never set the heat above 72 and have been fine but I should see how it feels if I set it a bit higher during defrost. For those of you that the heat does not work well for I hope something can be done but the reality is that if everything is working as it is supposed to then there is not much Ford can do for your car to get better heat. Maybe they can improve the heat in a next generation model but that will not help your case. It will be interesting to see if anything can be done for existing vehicles.

I am fully convinced a metal roof instead of my glass roof would make a big difference.

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