Guss-E 2021

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Ford sent the following to my Ford Pass inbox. Leaving it plugged in all the time would still draw current and electricity is expensive enough as it is for me already. Most everything else seems like common sense. Though I thought the heated seat and steering wheel was an interesting suggestion. Not much help for rear occupants though 😏

Ford Mustang Mach-E Ford's Cold Weather EV Tips (do you follow these?) -- "Your EV Deserves a Little TLC" Message Screenshot_20221119_075344_FordPass
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Leaving it plugged in all the time would still draw current and electricity is expensive enough as it is for me already.
Only periodically to warm the battery if it is really cold (and that is an assumption); otherwise it won't draw anything.
 

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Ford sent the following to my Ford Pass inbox. Leaving it plugged in all the time would still draw current and electricity is expensive enough as it is for me already. Most everything else seems like common sense. Though I thought the heated seat and steering wheel was an interesting suggestion. Not much help for rear occupants though 😏
Plugged in it doesn't use juice UNLESS the battery needs to warm (or cool) or you set a Departure Time or you Remote Start. We have a JuiceBox smart charger, so I block usage during peak hours unless I choose to override, like for a Departure Time. Of course you can simply unplug in peak rate periods.

Lmao. Who turns off the heater while DCFC? Great way to get more EV adoption. The colder it gets, the slower it chargers, and the colder you get sitting in your car for 45 minutes while it chargers at 35kw on a 350kw charger!
We do. If your car is warm already, and you have the seat heaters on, there really isn't a need for heat except in the coldest of weather. And, by turning it off for the first minutes of charging, the battery gets warm from the charging. Also - the main reason they mention it is because at full blast you are pulling 5kW, and if you're over 80% and still charging that's pulling 12.5% of what you're getting, slowing you down.

They're recommendations. Don't follow them if you don't want to.
 


kdonnel

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I don't live in an area where it really gets cold enough to matter so my experiences might not be relevant.

This will be the first winter for my MME so I am not sure how aggressive it will be about battery warming.

My wife is the one who commutes every day and she does that in the Chevy Bolt. In winters past it has only drawn power over night to warm the battery a couple times during winter.

When I first got the Bolt I participated on a message board very much like this one. There were suggestions for maximizing range. I followed all the advice. Turns out my wife hated all that advice. She found the windows fogged up on the way to work to a dangerous level. When she finally said something I remembered turning off some settings that maximized range back when I had a bad case of range anxiety. I turned the settings back to their defaults and the windows stayed clear but the car lost 2-3 miles of range. So now instead of having 170 miles left every day the car only had 167 miles left. The horror!

I have realized that if I am cold I turn up the temp, if I am hot I turn down the temp. If I need to charge, I charge.
 

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When I first got the Bolt I participated on a message board very much like this one. There were suggestions for maximizing range. I followed all the advice. Turns out my wife hated all that advice. She found the windows fogged up on the way to work to a dangerous level. When she finally said something I remembered turning off some settings that maximized range back when I had a bad case of range anxiety. I turned the settings back to their defaults and the windows stayed clear but the car lost 2-3 miles of range. So now instead of having 170 miles left every day the car only had 167 miles left. The horror!

I have realized that if I am cold I turn up the temp, if I am hot I turn down the temp. If I need to charge, I charge.
That's the key to EV success.

Ford sending out RECOMMENDATIONS is a way to inform the uninformed. Of course a significant number of owners probably can't even navigate to the message...

There are many car owners, both ICE and EV, that are totally clueless. One of my son's early girlfriends ran her car dry of oil. When she told him this, he asked "didn't you know it needs to be checked regularly?" and her answer was "I didn't even know it used oil, nor how to open the hood". Note I said "early girlfriends"...

People go on trips and complain about 12 hour charging, because they went to a level 2 charger. People complain their battery is defective. And so on.

My wife refused to put the PHEV we had into reserve mode on the highway so it didn't use battery until she exited for local driving, thereby killing the efficiency. Such is life.
 

4sallypat

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Don't follow a single thing except the common sense tire pressures.

Never gets cold here in sunny So Cal....
 

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Lmao. Who turns off the heater while DCFC? Great way to get more EV adoption. The colder it gets, the slower it chargers, and the colder you get sitting in your car for 45 minutes while it chargers at 35kw on a 350kw charger!
The cabin heater does not warm the battery; it's the opposite in fact. In addition to the resistive heater for the cabin, there is a common loop with the battery and cabin conditioning - so with the heat on you are potentially drawing heat away from the battery. The idea with the suggestion is to maximize the natural heating of the battery when DC fast charging, as well as not use power for the resistive heater to put it all into the pack.

As for it being a "negative" suggestion: sure, but generally when I am on a road trip I go into the nearby store or whatever to kill time anyway so there's no need to heat an empty cabin. If you like to sit in your car in 20 degree weather, then by all means keep the heat on. It's only a suggestion after all
 
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I got the message too but my MME has been at the dealership for more than two weeks. I think the dealership decided to follow the instructions. The car had been parked outside for several days at below 32 F at night. Yesterday, the car was moved into a garage and plugged in ready for 20's F temperature overnight with some precipitation. The latter could be the main concern since my MME was brought in for lift gate leaks.
 
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Guss-E 2021

Guss-E 2021

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Only periodically to warm the battery if it is really cold (and that is an assumption); otherwise it won't draw anything.
Anything left plugged into a socket draws current no? I don't leave my Ford Mobile charger plugged into my NEMA socket when I'm not using it for example.
 
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Guss-E 2021

Guss-E 2021

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Also - the main reason they mention it is because at full blast you are pulling 5kW, and if you're over 80% and still charging that's pulling 12.5% of what you're getting, slowing you down.
See, that sort of thing is good to know. Thanks Rick.
 

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Anything left plugged into a socket draws current no? I don't leave my Ford Mobile charger plugged into my NEMA socket when I'm not using it for example.
That's not a great idea. Why? Because unless you paid for a $100 industrial socket, the daily unplugging and plugging wears the contacts.

My JuiceBox 48 uses 2kWh per month of electricity when on standby. That's about 30 cents. Not an issue.
 

kdonnel

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Anything left plugged into a socket draws current no? I don't leave my Ford Mobile charger plugged into my NEMA socket when I'm not using it for example.
Smart EVSE like the ChargePoint Flex and JuiceBox have an idle draw of around 2.4W/h or 2 kilowatt hours per month. A dumb EVSE like the Ford Mobile charger will have an even lower draw.

Leaving the Ford Mobile EVSE plugged in probably costs $.15 or less a month.

The repeated plugging and unplugging however probably is wearing out the outlet. 14-50R are generally not rated for very many plug/unplug events.

It would probably be better if you left it plugged in for fire safety reasons.
 
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Guss-E 2021

Guss-E 2021

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And for the record, I'm not at all obsessive about any of this. We just hit a streak of ~20F degree nights here in NH, so the mornings are cold. However, I park the car in a garage that essentially never goes below freezing. I set departure times for my comfort more than battery conditioning. Honestly, the cabin, seats and steering wheel heat up so quickly, I may not even keep up with that. Lastly, my average daily drive is around 30 miles, maybe 40 with extra errands. I could lose 60% of my range and still go for days without charging. Life is good.
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