Mach-e doesn't like being in Whisper mode

[SteveE]

Found this via Google.
A touchscreen can technically "self-trigger" under certain conditions, usually due to external interference like static electricity, electromagnetic interference (EMI), or even a very sensitive touchscreen picking up stray signals from nearby conductive materials, but under normal usage, a touchscreen should not activate on its own without a physical touch.

Nope, not that either. It switches when the relevant screen isn't showing. Plus, if it was touchscreen issues, we'd see other kinds of things randomly triggered, not just this one weird thing.

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[DRCal68]

I have noticed that our 2023 switches to Engage mode from my preferred Unbridled whenever I use Fordpass to turn on the climate system before I go out to the car. If I just get in and start, it stays in Unbridled.

I now have been trained by the car to watch for the Unbridled graphic after I press Start.

 

[Schwartzcynthia]

My car never, ever does this. It has been Unbridled for over 3 years. I was not aware this problem existed.

My 2022 Premium has never done this either. It has only been in Whisper mode for 2.5 years now. Did not know this was a problem for others.

 

[lukew]

I think there could be multiple variations of this issue, I have gotten "Drive mode not available" before but not in quite a long while.

That being said, I do experience a version of this once every few months. It appears to be mostly cosmetic. I typically drive in unbridled, and the IPC keeps the unbridled theme, driving characteristics seem unchanged, but the sync screen theme and settings report Engage. When I try to change it to Unbridled, as OP states, it briefly grays out, then returns to Engage.

In this case, for me, the fix has been quite simple. Switch to the last remaining drive mode, then back to the desired one.

I suspect that, again maybe only in my case, it is sending the command to switch to another module controls that the drive modes.. which then perhaps spits back an error because it is already in that drive mode. That is to say, only the Sync screen is confused. But making some other valid choice resolves the mismatch.

 

[Ford_orr]

Mine switches to the Engage default at least once every week or two. The first year I drove the car I exclusively drove it in Whisper but it would switch to Engage as mentioned above. This last year and now, I drive almost exclusively in Unbridled and it still switches back to Engage on the same week or two schedule. I just figured it's some kind of bug and would eventually correct itself. Didn't know this weirdness was so widespread.

 

[DYohn]

Hmm. Likely because I use Engage 100% of the time I've never seen this. But today I can try Whisper and see if it fights me.

 

[ajp1023]

The same thing happens to my 2021 Premium 4x. I use whisper all the time, and 2 or 3 times a month it automatically switches back to engage. I switch it back to Whisper in the center display and it will stay that way for a while.

I also notice that about 1 out of 10 starts, the radio starts up with 'audio off'. I have to press the on/off button in the center of the volume knob to turn the audio back on. I never turn the audio off before leaving the car, I just power off the car, and I expect the audio to be on when I get back in.

 

[Smoke & Bells]

My 23 MME Ca Rt 1 also moves to Engage from Whisper by itself. The Whisper mode is recommended on icy and snow packed roads. Ford needs to look into this for none other than safety reasons.

 

[DYohn]

In my one time simple test my car did not exhibit this behavior. I wonder if it is related to system boot-up time? I know things like the sound system and sometimes seat memory do not always do what I expect on initial turn-on, mostly because I do not wait long enough for the system to completely start up before I start moving. If I am more patient, there are generally no issues.

 

[Mike G]

Ford is replacing my car inverter for that exact same issue. I’m not sure if it’s the caused but that’s what I’m being communicated with.

The replacement is taking a day and and I will update once I have my car back.

Well that's interesting since in my case and others I've seen there are zero DTCs in the system on cars this is happening to. Nothing in the system to indicate anything has happened at all. Meaning even the car doesn't even think anything's wrong when it does this. So I'm wondering how they arrived at that conclusion without any DTCs to diagnose and pinpoint one of the inverters (front or rear?).

I have had some indications from at least one person on this forum (you know who you are) that this phenomenon is well known, and the cause is understood. So why this is still happening after at least two years (that I'm aware of) is unclear.

 

[Mike G]

I haven’t noted that any such message appears, but I’ll now keep my eyes open for it….

The drive mode message has come up on my car a few times, normally when it's sitting still, like before putting it in gear, or sometimes just sitting in a parking lot running (waiting for the wife). I just re-select Unbridle and it normally stays that way for the rest of the drive. I suppose if I went for a really long drive (couple of hours) in lots of stop and go traffic it might do it more than once. But I rarely do anything other than around town running errands with the car, so it normally only happens once, sometime during my drive.

 

[Mike G]

Nope, not that. I've checked each time that I have the correct driver profile.

Seconded...I only have one profile...guest isn't used at all, but I have set the guest settings to the same as my profile just in case it did somehow revert to guest.

 

[chiendat]

Well that's interesting since in my case and others I've seen there are zero DTCs in the system on cars this is happening to. Nothing in the system to indicate anything has happened at all. Meaning even the car doesn't even think anything's wrong when it does this. So I'm wondering how they arrived at that conclusion without any DTCs to diagnose and pinpoint one of the inverters (front or rear?).

I have had some indications from at least one person on this forum (you know who you are) that this phenomenon is well known, and the cause is understood. So why this is still happening after at least two years (that I'm aware of) is unclear.

This is what on my service order. I’m not sure how they came to that conclusion but I know they had to get special authorization from Ford because it’s an expensive item. I just got my car back for a few days and the issue haven’t come back…yet. I will keep an eye out.

 

[Mike G]

This is what on my service order. I’m not sure how they came to that conclusion but I know they had to get special authorization from Ford because it’s an expensive item. I just got my car back for a few days and the issue haven’t come back…yet. I will keep an eye out.

Well good...I'm hopeful that this is the correction. There's a lot of folks who (as you have read here) are experiencing this issue.

 

[Kvothe]

My 23 RWD Premium has been dropping from unbridled to engage both at the start of a drive and sometimes in the middle for a few months now. I did get the drive mode unavailable pop up in the past but not since one of the software updates.

Now twice over the past week I’ve had the instrument cluster graphic glitch and change back to the old version with the speed in the middle and the car graphic gone. One drive it glitched back and forth between the two graphics 10-15 times for a couple seconds each time. Also seemed to lose all driver assist features as that change was occurring.

Anyone experience that second issue?

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