Cold weather range penalty

[Scottie’s MachStang]

I am sure that our northern brethren will chuckle - but it got COLD here in Florida this week, down to the low 40's.

The other day, on my way home, I realized that the G-O-M was reflecting about 18% use on my trip home, that is usually closer to 8%.

100% seems like a pretty substantial "cold weather" penalty - but this is my first experience in the cold (I picked up the car last March when it was already getting warmer).

What has the collective experience been - is this normal?

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[RickMachE]

Dozens if not hundreds of threads on this.

You didn't experience a 100% penalty...

You can look at the miles per kWh on the trip odometer to do the math. In low 40s, I would expect a reduction of about 20% at most.

 

[Sikkun]

https://www.consumerreports.org/car...e-affects-electric-vehicle-range-a4873569949/

~25% loss at 17F.

 

[scoobybri]

One thing that I noticed with both my MME and Lightning, the closer to 50% you get the more inaccurate the GOM is. Let's say at 50%, the GOM shows 120 miles. That means I would theoretically get 240 miles at 100% but if I charge close to 90-100%, the total range on the GOM will be much closer to 300 miles than it was showing at 50%. This seems to be a Ford specific quirk of their range guessing software. I did not have the same issues in my Teslas or Chevy Bolts before that. Ignore GOM range and use battery percentage as your guide. If I could, I would hide the range and solely use battery charge like I could do in my Teslas. I had zero range anxiety in my Teslas when I could only see %. Charge gets low enough, you charge. That's the way fuel gauges have worked for 100 years.

 

[rcechinel]

It's January all right! Happy winter everyone, including the Florida guy! ?

 

[thenew3]

One thing that I noticed with both my MME and Lightning, the closer to 50% you get the more inaccurate the GOM is. Let's say at 50%, the GOM shows 120 miles. That means I would theoretically get 240 miles at 100% but if I charge close to 90-100%, the total range on the GOM will be much closer to 300 miles than it was showing at 50%. This seems to be a Ford specific quirk of their range guessing software. I did not have the same issues in my Teslas or Chevy Bolts before that. Ignore GOM range and use battery percentage as your guide. If I could, I would hide the range and solely use battery charge like I could do in my Teslas. I had zero range anxiety in my Teslas when I could only see %. Charge gets low enough, you charge. That's the way fuel gauges have worked for 100 years.

Part of that is because Ford doesn't actually display a linear %. For example, when my car displays 100% charge, using car scanner app, it shows actual battery % at 95.xx %. But when the displayed % is down to 10%, car scanner will show the battery at 15.xx% So the display vs actual is not linear drop.

 

[eponey]

the cold zaps the heat out of your battery the only solution is a heat pump. heat pumps give you free range in the cold. heat pump.

 

[Doobster6]

I am sure that our northern brethren will chuckle - but it got COLD here in Florida this week, down to the low 40's.

The other day, on my way home, I realized that the G-O-M was reflecting about 18% use on my trip home, that is usually closer to 8%.

100% seems like a pretty substantial "cold weather" penalty - but this is my first experience in the cold (I picked up the car last March when it was already getting warmer).

What has the collective experience been - is this normal?

It’s been around 18-30 degrees here in SE PA for the past few weeks. My ‘this trip’ app tells me that a total of 50% of my energy when driving (not highway) is going to outside temps (affecting battery temp) and interior climate control. Admittedly, because I suffer no range anxiety driving within 25 miles of home 95% of the time, I don’t scrimp on our comfort and usually have the temp set to 72, so I could save some juice by using the seat heaters and steering wheel warmer to drop temp to say, 65 of so. And my GOM has been suggesting that my implied range (miles / percent charge) has dropped anywhere from 15-25% in this weather. So your numbers seem somewhat pessimistic, but not outlandishly so.

 

[spartan]

Ford recently published a great list of winter driving tips for EVs:

https://media.ford.com/content/fordmedia/fna/us/en/news/2024/12/12/ev-winter-driving-tips.html

 

[Snakebitten]

I too experienced my first Gulf Coast frigid morning and witnessed some GOM hilarity.

Temps had warmed during the day and on my return leg home, the GOM started at 75 miles left.
When I arrived home 24 miles later, the GOM showed 74 miles left. ?

 

[Maquis]

I too experienced my first Gulf Coast frigid morning and witnessed some GOM hilarity.

Temps had warmed during the day and on my return leg home, the GOM started at 75 miles left.
When I arrived home 24 miles later, the GOM showed 74 miles left. ?

GOM…..”For entertainment purposes only!” ?

 

[AKgrampy]

And we are above average temps thank goodness! - 15F - range as expected!

 

[ChehRob]

I needed about 170 miles, almost all freeway, range, and only about an 85% charge for the two-leg trip, temp below 40 degrees. At the end of the first-leg it showed only an extra 13 miles for going the second leg. I decided to 'risk it', there were charging points available, so kept seat warmers on for wife and me, but turned off cabin heat and drove 6-10 mph slower than normal, also temp up to 46 degrees. It cost me 10 minutes extra driving time, but ended with 11% of battery and GOM of 30 miles range at arrival back home. No stop to charge, figured saving at least 20 minutes, more likely 35. I did get a 'low battery' alert at 11%. Only question, did I really have 30 miles of range when the alert came (I was a mile from home at that point)? Battery- 85, 45, 11%

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