L2 charging speed recently dropped 33%

[jgcom]

On the question of why the car seems to now want to throttle the charge rate for some of us at 40 A: when I took delivery in mid 2021, charging at 40 A caused the car to spool up the cooling fans to high and keep them that way. So I set my EVSE dip switches to 32 A to maintain domestic tranquility. After an OTA update soon thereafter, I was able to use 40 A again in relative peace. Now, in mid 2023, the car is choosing to never fully spin up the fans but rather to throttle the charging via the rate-switching behavior others have documented. It feels strange that that the designer's approach to this issue hasn't been fully solved yet.

I am not sure what to do next. This doesn't seem to be the kind of thing a dealer would productively handle. Too bad there isn't a way to submit issues to the engineering team. Maybe I'll just switch back to 32 A.

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[agdad]

This may not be a first.....but it's a first for me
After charging overnight at home to 90% I unplugged the car and drove a mile to dutchbros coffee and back home.......2.5 miles total
When I pulled into my garage I had 93% charging on my car !
It had gained 3% charging......how do I keep this up ?
or........
was I dreaming ?

 

[Mach-Lee]

Now, in mid 2023, the car is choosing to never fully spin up the fans but rather to throttle the charging via the rate-switching behavior others have documented. It feels strange that that the designer's approach to this issue hasn't been fully solved yet.

I am not sure what to do next. This doesn't seem to be the kind of thing a dealer would productively handle. Too bad there isn't a way to submit issues to the engineering team. Maybe I'll just switch back to 32 A.

Pretty sure it's a bug, not by design. Engineering knows about it, but powertrain fixes usually take 3+ months to deploy.

 

[kdryden99]

Pretty sure it's a bug, not by design. Engineering knows about it, but powertrain fixes usually take 3+ months to deploy.

At least they know thank you.

 

[jgcom]

At least they know thank you.

Things are getting much worse as the summer heats up:

It seems to use very little fan and only periodically opens the main cooling vents. I've reduced the EVSE setting to 32 A and will try that, followed by 24 A perhaps. Low-speed or no-speed cooling fan, together with closed vents just can't be right; it is 90 degrees in my garage here in south Louisiana. It really worked fine until the recent OtA, even in hot weather...

I may have to talk again with the dealer, but the last time I brought them my car—for different reasons—they did nothing for three days and I am still waiting to hear back about their query to Ford. (I described these other issue here.)

 

[Mach-Lee]

Things are getting much worse as the summer heats up:

It seems to use very little fan and only periodically opens the main cooling vents. I've reduced the EVSE setting to 32 A and will try that, followed by 24 A perhaps. Low-speed or no-speed cooling fan, together with closed vents just can't be right; it is 90 degrees in my garage here in south Louisiana. It really worked fine until the recent OtA, even in hot weather...

I may have to talk again with the dealer, but the last time I brought them my car—for different reasons—they did nothing for three days and I am still waiting to hear back about their query to Ford. (I described these other issue here.)

It's normal for the cooling fan to cycle on and off while charging. I was charging at 44 amps the other day in an 80's garage, and the fan was cycling on and off (pump ran the whole time). No charge throttling occurred.

 

[mkhuffman]

Over the weekend I did a 75% to 90% charge in the driveway, in the sun and 80's exterior temperature. It maintained 11 kW the entire time, no throttling. So it appears not every car has this problem. I will be paying closer attention when I charge to see if it pops up.

 

[jgcom]

Perhaps there is something awry about the way the new software handles 40 A in particular. It does much less cooling than seems reasonable. I'm certain that 40 A (in my car and garage) is different than before. 32 A works more-or-less as before. I don't have a 48 A charger to test with.

It is always possible that my hardware—charging electronics or sensors—is failing and that it was just a coincidence that it happened at the same time as the update.

Perhaps I'll stay with 32 A until I hear that something has changed, or until Louisiana cools off next November.

 

[poorlyeducated]

Both of my cars, each with the latest charging related updates are still doing steady 9.5 kW on ChargePoint Home Flex. Same as before the updates.

That said, I wonder if the latest updates introduces some new sensitivity to "noise" on the grid in some service areas. This was a problem for us early Job 1 cars in Northern Illinois back 2021. Painful memories here in this long thread:
https://www.macheforum.com/site/threads/home-level-2-charger-issues.3656/

I have the exact same setup. I'm assuming our chargers can do 50A max and are wired at 50A, but pull 40A (9.5kw) so we are in a safe range. We aren't asking it to do the max, so maybe we aren't tripping whatever temperature or amperage limits that the software is sensing?

 

[worachj]

Having the same slowdown charging problem on my 2023 SR on Power-up 4.2.4 (updated on June 15th) using a Gizzl-E set at 40amp and hardwired to a 50 amp circuit breaker. No error indications, just slower charging.

Never had a problem before. Just reporting what I believe is a software problem.

 

[Buellerbueller]

The MME’s max charge rate is about 11.5kW, but that requires a 48A EVSE.

Why does ford advertise the mobile 240v to be so much faster than it is then? Was just discussing how ford says it goes so much faster with a friend who also has a Mach-e. I understand what your saying just seems crazy that what it can do is less than half of what they say

 

[generaltso]

Why does ford advertise the mobile 240v to be so much faster than it is then?

What do they advertise it to be?

 

[Buellerbueller]

What do they advertise it to be?

this says 20mph

 

[kodiakng]

this says 20mph

that's actually pretty accurate. you might be confusing the units.

assuming you average 3 miles/kWh driving efficiency (which they note they used on the 120V input) and the mobile charger's top charging rate (32A at 240V) of ~7 kWh into the battery, you'd have ~21 mph of charging range added.

EDIT: clarified miles unit of measure

 

[generaltso]

this says 20mph

MPH isn‘t a good measure of charging rate since the miles you can drive per kWh can vary greatly.

That being said, at 6.5kW you get 6.5kWh in an hour. If you get 3.1 miles per kWh, that’s 20 miles. Which part isn’t accurate?

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