Initial experiences from a new Mach-E owner

[generaltso]

I read his post before mine and saw nothing whatsoever about his phone. I just reread it even and didn't see it without searching for the word "phone" but then I did... bad morning I guess.

That's okay, I'll let you off with a warning this time. But next time I'll expect you to write yourself a ticket

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[GoGoGadgetMachE]

That's okay, I'll let you off with a warning this time. But next time I'll expect you to write yourself a ticket

I'm off duty. Was called out for too many tickets ???

 

[Ford49]

I am wondering what network they connect this car to in Canada? In the US I believe it is AT&T, which is not available. Sounds like your car is not connected at all ( eg no navigation)

 

[SoCalPony]

I read his post before mine and saw nothing whatsoever about his phone. I just reread it even and didn't see it without searching for the word "phone" but then I did... bad morning I guess.

That said, that would mean that it's likely not the car at that point per se. But again it's really on the dealer to figure it out with Ford.

The kinds of things that you then run into is that Ford has the car in the shop and maybe everything works perfectly. Owner drives the car home and the WiFi still isn't working. Then you have Ford, or the owner, having to work through the specific problem that the individual owner is having. And there are only 5,983,654 possible combinations of hardware, software, and firmware involved. And the standards all evolve over time. I sleep easier at night knowing that's not my job

Reminds me a bit of when L3 chargers starting rolling out, by various providers. Phone apps, credit card readers, EVSE to vehicle handshakes, made charging a real adventure. Then you get ISO 15118 (Plug & Charge) which makes this all supposedly seamless, then you just have to figure out of your car supports ISO 15118, and whether the EVSE you are trying to use also supports it, and whether your navigation routine app knows which networks support the standard, etc. If I remember correctly, this is why Tesla developed their proprietary system versus waiting for ISO 15118 which is only now rolling out.

SCPony

 

[CP-Mach-E]

I am wondering what network they connect this car to in Canada? In the US I believe it is AT&T, which is not available. Sounds like your car is not connected at all ( eg no navigation)

Not sure what it connects to, but the Connected Services are working fine. The Ford Pass app on my phone can get status information from the car, lock and unlock doors, start the car, etc.

 

[Shayne]

I can't try anything right now because Ford has my Mach-E to investigate the issues.

It is not a signal strength issue. I installed a Wi-Fi AP in my garage a while back, which was directly above my Mach-E while trying to connect.

I was able to connect the Mach-E to my phone when I turned on my phone's Wi-Fi hotspot, so there is no doubt that car is capable of connecting to Wi-Fi, and there is something unique about my home setup that the car does not like, but we have countless Wi-Fi devices in our house that are connected and functioning fine. We've never run into a compatibility issue before, so there no good reason that the car should not be able to connect.

I won't bother going through all of the troubleshooting steps that I performed, but suffice it to say there is little that has been suggested here that I didn't already try.

The issue is almost definitely a bug in the car's software, however I will say that my network setup is definitely more elaborate than your typical homeowner's, so there is a good chance that most people trying to connect to a basic Wi-Fi router will not run into it.

I suspect that the issue is actually with the DHCP server, and not with the Wi-Fi itself. I'm running a DHCP server on my Synology NAS. I've been using this setup for years, and it has always worked reliably. I suspect the DHCP server because I tried connecting the car to both of the Wi-Fi access points in the house, and they both failed. The only thing in common between the two is the DHCP server.

Possible that you may have to trouble shoot it yourself if it is your nas and your addressing setup that is the problem and not the cars wi-fi network card. If it connects to other networks and your home signal is strong enough then your setup that can be tweaked to fix it. Fords techs connecting to their simple router may not help fix your particular problem? Have no idea how many setups Ford will eventually conform to but in the long run it may be quicker just you make your network MME friendly at the beginning. Assign at static IP was mentioned. Take your nas out of the loop and connect to your gateway router, start you isolate. Always best when things just work but it is when they don't we learn something. Kind of sucks you are the first and not much info; but then again not .

 

[EVS]

I am still trying to figure out what people do by connecting the car to the home network! Aren't we supposed to be driving when in the car? So why connect to the home network? Is it mainly to download new OTA updates? Or is it to use the Mache dash as a computer while parked at home or something bigger?

This tech stuff always gives me a headache, even though I am in software. May be I am too old for these.

 

[KAustin]

I am still trying to figure out what people do by connecting the car to the home network! Aren't we supposed to be driving when in the car? So why connect to the home network? Is it mainly to download new OTA updates? Or is it to use the Mache dash as a computer while parked at home or something bigger?

This tech stuff always gives me a headache, even though I am in software. May be I am too old for these.

It's for the OTA updates. Faster download.

 

[CP-Mach-E]

I am still trying to figure out what people do by connecting the car to the home network! Aren't we supposed to be driving when in the car? So why connect to the home network? Is it mainly to download new OTA updates? Or is it to use the Mache dash as a computer while parked at home or something bigger?

For me the main reason is for OTA updates. In theory the Ford Pass app could talk directly to the car if your phone and the car are on the same network (instead of going trough the Ford servers), but I suspect that it is not implemented that way.

 

[JellyBelly]

I am still trying to figure out what people do by connecting the car to the home network! Aren't we supposed to be driving when in the car? So why connect to the home network? Is it mainly to download new OTA updates? Or is it to use the Mache dash as a computer while parked at home or something bigger?

This tech stuff always gives me a headache, even though I am in software. May be I am too old for these.

it is mostly for OTA updates

 

[TheVirtualTim]

I suspect the DHCP server because I tried connecting the car to both of the Wi-Fi access points in the house, and they both failed. The only thing in common between the two is the DHCP server.

I had a friend who had this issue ... turns out his DHCP pool didn't have enough addresses (he was using an AT&T router that came with his home internet).

A home network will typically be a class C block (256 addresses available). Of those, one will be used as the default router's IP and one will be the broadcast IP. The rest *should* be usable. But the DHCP pool may only reserve ... perhaps 10 or 20.

In the case of the friend I had to help... he was using all his DHCP addresses and the pool had no addresses left to offer. I had to reconfigure his router.

When I create the network, I tend to set up a DHCP pool of around 100 IP's ... and for all the devices that regularly need to use the network I generally create a DHCP reservation ... and then set up my DNS server so I know the name of the device that uses that particular address.

I ALSO try to hard-wire everything that can be hard-wired (to avoid needless WiFi congestion). This really helps the devices that can only use WiFi.

Lastly... I scan the WiFi channels and manually configure my access points to use the channels with the least amount of traffic. I've never seen a WiFi access point that actually scans for least-busy channel when you pick the "automatic" setting. They typically just pick some default channel (based on brand) and it's usually a pretty heavily used channel. Basically "automatic" is probably the worst choice you could make.

 

[CP-Mach-E]

When I create the network, I tend to set up a DHCP pool of around 100 IP's ... and for all the devices that regularly need to use the network I generally create a DHCP reservation ... and then set up my DNS server so I know the name of the device that uses that particular address.

Funny. That's exactly how I have mine set up. The address pool is set up for addresses 100-199, and I have numerous reservations set up below that. Only about 1/4 of the pool is currently allocated.

 

[generaltso]

A home network will typically be a class C block (256 addresses available). Of those, one will be used as the default router's IP and one will be the broadcast IP. The rest *should* be usable.

Technically, one will also be used as the network address. In a class C (/24) the network address has 0 in the last octet and the broadcast address has 255 in the last octet. The router often uses 1 in the last octet, but it doesn’t have to. That leaves 253 addresses that could be assigned to clients.

But I really don’t think that’s his problem. He seems to know what he’s doing.

 

[KAustin]

@CP-Mach-E Have they updated you on the status of the car and what the issue(s) were?

 

[kdryden99]

Funny. That's exactly how I have mine set up. The address pool is set up for addresses 100-199, and I have numerous reservations set up below that. Only about 1/4 of the pool is currently allocated.

Even if you add space in the pool i have seen devices just unable to obtain an ip via dhcp. It ends up getting a default IP until you restart the dhcp, or the device your trying to connect or manually assigning it in the device itself. You seem to be on the right track so hopefully itll work when you get the car or at least you know where to look when you get it back. Hope it gets resolved quickly.

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