12V battery usage (volts) for various functions & situations in Mach-E

[methorian]

Thanks for the help. Your story would be great but wonder why Ford says different? Exact same build/rev as mine. So you think they manage different components with various different software/firmware. How would we even know the revision numbers of all the non-media oriented components if everything is working/installed independently. I guessed the OS upgrades the non-media oriented components if required and the system works in conjugation but really not sure.

Did yours go to the speedway? Did you get the recall notice (production date)? Do you have wi-fi hooked up, Bluetooth, FordPass/phone as a key?

There is no two ways about it I was using FordPass and in and out of the vehicle in the first week learning it more often than I see myself doing for the rest of its life. Maybe I just exhausted it and when it was schedule to come on to maintain the 12V it was too late? That is not what the Ford email or the original post state but then it may go to sleep (off) but wake back up with no one around to see it? You would think Ford would explain that a bit clear. My 12V died twice while plugged in. Went into a deep sleep and never woke up. It was cold -19F which I am sure did not help.

Guess all I need is Ford to tell me what you did and all is good. That is not the case at this point.

I can't really say on software revisions and relation to the Sync version info, I was just speculating. I guess we'll find out once OTA's actually start happening.

Mine did not go to Speedway. No recall notices. Wifi works great. Bluetooth/PaaK setup, PaaK mostly works well enough, though sometimes there's a slight delay to unlocking.

Mine is garaged, temps inside the garage are probably around 40-50F. I get in to play around in mine quite a bit in the garage while plugged in as well.

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[Shayne]

Your info from Ford also doesn't seem to match with what is stated in the owner's manual.

The question is under what conditions or states (all states) that manual clip is true. Agree the email from Ford kind of states differences under different states. It may not be happening when they state When the plug-in charging is completed the modules should go to sleep/rest and the 12v battery will no longer be maintained/charged. . I am willing to give it another shot give me my MME back. Does it do it at -19F is also a question? Welcome to the Smithers Winter Test Center. Hope they did not bring theirs into a cozy warm garage every night when they were testing. Guess I can just unplug the thing or does it go into a sleep/rest again (Jamie's says yes) email does not touch that? But.

The email says (while Jamie got 15V at a 12V accessories plug?) it is not charging the 12V in KOEO. Therefore it is kind of like your old ICE one click accessories you have windows, radio, wipers all off the 12V. Start appears to be the way to sit and wait so you are not running off the 12V? Guess if you leave someone in the vehicle you can give them the accessory's without a key/start.

 

[Shayne]

I can't really say on software revisions and relation to the Sync version info, I was just speculating. I guess we'll find out once OTA's actually start happening.

Mine did not go to Speedway. No recall notices. Wifi works great. Bluetooth/PaaK setup, PaaK mostly works well enough, though sometimes there's a slight delay to unlocking.

Mine is garaged, temps inside the garage are probably around 40-50F. I get in to play around in mine quite a bit in the garage while plugged in as well.

What production date?

You are right Sync is just the phone OS and the way it runs is updated only by and at Ford Service Centers and not over the air. Per my service guy and I learned something. Says they will keep mine for the weekend and monitor. Was told since the firmware upgrades to the modules it has been good. Maybe the 12V was a bit weak from sitting. What I was doing was correct. No problems to leave it plugged in when it tells me to and will maintain the 12V to 12V. It will drop to 12V and than start which was new for him (they were monitoring). The Ford email this morning was incorrect and not complete I guess? Just something to mess with me .

 

[Jimrpa]

Ok, it sounds to me like Ford may have some strategy issues when it comes to the 12V battery and the vehicle in general. Way back in a past life, I worked with systems that were pretty reliant on their batteries, and couldn't risk losing their batteries (spacecraft). Since this 12V battery is critical to the vehicle, non-redundant, and there's no backup, here are my thoughts:

• Aggressive load-shedding - continuously monitor the 12V battery and if it appears to be dropping below a threshold, begin aggressively shutting down anything that it's powering, assuming you can't condition and charge the battery.
• Send an alarm if the battery condition continues to deteriorate - let the owner know through FordPass that there's something wrong with the car and the owner should check in with the car before it becomes a brick.
• Have the vehicle go into some kind of "failsafe mode" - right now, the car just becomes a brick you can't enter without a lot of trouble. Just before the 12V battery completely fails, send one last alert through FordPass, and pop the front trunk and one of the doors.

These are pretty basic steps that a lot of our consumer devices do today. laptops will dim their screens then tell users to plug in to chargers when the battery begins to run low. Apple watch with enter a "Power Reserve" mode. To my mind, there's no reason why this car should become a brick without at least making an effort to let the owner know there's something amiss and making an effort to do something about it.

 

[Shayne]

Ok, it sounds to me like Ford may have some strategy issues when it comes to the 12V battery and the vehicle in general. Way back in a past life, I worked with systems that were pretty reliant on their batteries, and couldn't risk losing their batteries (spacecraft). Since this 12V battery is critical to the vehicle, non-redundant, and there's no backup, here are my thoughts:

• Aggressive load-shedding - continuously monitor the 12V battery and if it appears to be dropping below a threshold, begin aggressively shutting down anything that it's powering, assuming you can't condition and charge the battery.
• Send an alarm if the battery condition continues to deteriorate - let the owner know through FordPass that there's something wrong with the car and the owner should check in with the car before it becomes a brick.
• Have the vehicle go into some kind of "failsafe mode" - right now, the car just becomes a brick you can't enter without a lot of trouble. Just before the 12V battery completely fails, send one last alert through FordPass, and pop the front trunk and one of the doors.

These are pretty basic steps that a lot of our consumer devices do today. laptops will dim their screens then tell users to plug in to chargers when the battery begins to run low. Apple watch with enter a "Power Reserve" mode. To my mind, there's no reason why this car should become a brick without at least making an effort to let the owner know there's something amiss and making an effort to do something about it.

I was wondering why the 12V battery and not a power supply like a PC? It takes 120V AC and feeds the components of the computer. Not that knowledgeable and there may be limitations. You no longer need the cranking power the 12 V supplies?

 

[methorian]

What production date?

You are right Sync is just the phone OS and the way it runs is updated only by and at Ford Service Centers and not over the air. Per my service guy and I learned something. Says they will keep mine for the weekend and monitor. Was told since the firmware upgrades to the modules it has been good. Maybe the 12V was a bit weak from sitting. What I was doing was correct. No problems to leave it plugged in when it tells me to and will maintain the 12V to 12V. It will drop to 12V and than start which was new for him (they were monitoring). The Ford email this morning was incorrect and not complete I guess? Just something to mess with me .

Production info is in my signature ?

It’s my understanding that almost all systems in the Mach-E are OTA updatable. I would almost guarantee that he Sync system is OTA updatable.

 

[Woeo]

Can I ask a stupid question. Why leave it plugged all the time? Unless you need a full (90% or whatever) charge for a long trip.

Why unplug after a charge if you are not moving the vehicle? Leaving it plugged in allows you to increase the charge or precondition the cabin without returning to the car.

 

[back_at_it_19]

Why unplug after a charge if you are not moving the vehicle? Leaving it plugged in allows you to increase the charge or precondition the cabin without returning to the car.

Totally agree, but when I return with plenty of mileage left, I don’t usually plug in. Precondition for me in the Seattle area really only saves mileage (it’s not that cold), and if there’s plenty “in the tank,” I don’t charge for days.

 

[Shayne]

Production info is in my signature ?

It’s my understanding that almost all systems in the Mach-E are OTA updatable. I would almost guarantee that he Sync system is OTA updatable.

Updatable but was told not OTA. My bad blind; built over a month after mine. Hoping I get the software you have and things go a bit more as expected this time.

 

[sockmeister]

I was wondering why the 12V battery and not a power supply like a PC? It takes 120V AC and feeds the components of the computer. Not that knowledgeable and there may be limitations. You no longer need the cranking power the 12 V supplies?

12V is a standard that's left over from back in the day and it's sort of vestigial in nature, but at the same time everything is designed to work on 12V.
PC power supplies commonly provide 12V DC, too; at least desktop computers do.

 

[louibluey]

Accessory mode, not plugged in: 14.8V (interesting either DC-DC isn't set to 15V in this case or there is significant draw).

This may have been covered already. I am in the habit of using accessory mode (past EVs) when doing a snack stop at some place like Dunkin Donuts. First time in MME, after a few minutes, I noticed the red 12V battery warning, and immediately shut the car off and restarted with the brake press, and all was fine. So, I'm guessing unplugged, accessory does not get the benefit of DC-DC converter operation.

Just an aside, taking off my winter coat, somehow I apparently rotated the gear selector out of P. I noticed it some time later. Fortunately in OPD nothing happened, and I just put it back in P. That is one of the reasons I prefer to rest (bask in the sun a bit) in accessory mode.

 

[Metal_Horses]

This may have been covered already. I am in the habit of using accessory mode (past EVs) when doing a snack stop at some place like Dunkin Donuts. First time in MME, after a few minutes, I noticed the red 12V battery warning, and immediately shut the car off and restarted with the brake press, and all was fine. So, I'm guessing unplugged, accessory does not get the benefit of DC-DC converter operation.

Just an aside, taking off my winter coat, somehow I apparently rotated the gear selector out of P. I noticed it some time later. Fortunately in OPD nothing happened, and I just put it back in P. That is one of the reasons I prefer to rest (bask in the sun a bit) in accessory mode.

I'm pretty sure that red battery is normal, just like with an ICE car when you turn on the accessory. Just saying that you're using 12v battery power.

Nice think about the gear selector is if you're in gear and open the door it will flip to P automatically.

 

[BillPitman]

I'm sure it would work but don't need to run stuff like the power steering pump and other drive functions for 3+ hours.

Even in my Sync 3 cars it's a pain. Every 30 minutes it shuts off and you have to cycle it on again and the lights come on. Used a towel to cover up all the bright dash stuff.

This may have been covered in a later post, but I haven’t yet finish this thread-
Accessory mode is turned on when pressing the start/stop button, and NOT stepping on the brake…. Bill

 

[BillPitman]

Appears my mistake was to think it was maintaining the 12 V (charging it) when it is plugged into an L2 but not charging the pack. Page 149 of the manual say the pack charges the 12V when not plugged in. My mistake was to think it would do that also when plugged in. The dash monitor tells you it is cold outside make sure it is plugged such that it will not maintain/charge your 12V? Its all my fault for misunderstand when the darn thing charges the 12V. Need to be spelt out a bit clear in the manual I believe. To me it should maintain the 12V when plugged in and not charging. If not just unplug it in -30C and see how it does the 12V should be good per manual then. We will see what Ford officially tells us.

Thanks

I was gonna start another post but,
I was just in my garage, first time using an OBDLINK MX+ Adapter w/ car scanner pro. Car plugged in, not charging, car on, 17*out, spent 38 minutes testing-
LVB voltage- 15v, so battery being charged
LVB SOC- 90%
dc/dc contactor state- 1
by the time I was done w/ testing,-
LVB reading 13.3 volts
LVB SOC was 91%, That seems to be the sweet spot….
dc/dc contactor state now- 0
This was with car plugged in, plan on doing same testing w/o being plugged in, to see if LVB is maintained….would think so, no……

Other testing done-
HVB temp being maintained at 33.8*
HVB coolant inlet temp at 44*
Was also monitoring the HVB coolant heater in KW’s, min. was 1.7kw, don’t remember max. seen

More to follow if people are interested….. Bill. FYI- Got my Mach-e this past Tuesday.

 

[Shayne]

Thanks

I was gonna start another post but,
I was just in my garage, first time using an OBDLINK MX+ Adapter w/ car scanner pro. Car plugged in, not charging, car on, 17*out, spent 38 minutes testing-
LVB voltage- 15v, so battery being charged
LVB SOC- 90%
dc/dc contactor state- 1
by the time I was done w/ testing,-
LVB reading 13.3 volts
LVB SOC was 91%, That seems to be the sweet spot….
dc/dc contactor state now- 0
This was with car plugged in, plan on doing same testing w/o being plugged in, to see if LVB is maintained….would think so, no……

Other testing done-
HVB temp being maintained at 33.8*
HVB coolant inlet temp at 44*
Was also monitoring the HVB coolant heater in KW’s, min. was 1.7kw, don’t remember max. seen

More to follow if people are interested….. Bill. FYI- Got my Mach-e this past Tuesday.

My post was from last February (about a year ago). You maybe better to post your finding in an active thread.

This may interest?

Looking at MME LIN BUS - 12V BMS Intelligent Battery Sensor

Congrats on your new MME enjoy.

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