POST Recall Software HVBJB Failure

[ZuleMME]

Keep in mind the 500A rating is only valid for 7.5 minutes (which they somehow denote as continuous) and worse, it's in a enclosed space that I imagine has no air flow. Lots of guesses here. I'd really love to see pics of the B or C parts close up enough to read part numbers off the contactors. We are doing an awful lot of guessing about failure modes. The truth is this could legitimately be an accurately designed part that just had some buggy out of spec parts produced and built (we need Out of Spec Studio's to dig in for sure).

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[MGHTYDX]

Here's the profile for CA-73:

It's another steep 6% grade like the grapevine, just much shorter, 3 miles up vs. 15 miles for the grapevine. Shouldn't be a problem for a modern vehicle. The hills would heat things up a little bit. Just a theory, but driving to work on this route everyday could have gradually damaged the weak contactors over time? Or it's just sensitive? I'm really curious to see how things go after you and scoopman get your car back and drive it normally for a few weeks.

I go rid of my VW Jetta in 2014 because it just did not like going north on the 73.

 

[Mathington]

Keep in mind the 500A rating is only valid for 7.5 minutes (which they somehow denote as continuous) and worse, it's in a enclosed space that I imagine has no air flow. Lots of guesses here. I'd really love to see pics of the B or C parts close up enough to read part numbers off the contactors. We are doing an awful lot of guessing about failure modes. The truth is this could legitimately be an accurately designed part that just had some buggy out of spec parts produced and built (we need Out of Spec Studio's to dig in for sure).

Hopefully we can get some photos from someone in a dealership or someone with the new HVBJB version B and C parts.
I would be very interested to know what is actually different. I would also be interested to see a photo of what a failed part looks like.

 

[JSW]

[/QUOTE]

Totally disagree ... limping down a 75mph freeway is far more dangerous that not being able to turn on the car after picking up a Twinkie at 7-11. I have no idea why so many people are acting like HVBJB failure (pre-software) was equal to being bricked in the middle lane on the autobahn.

90% of the people who are saying "just drive to a dealer" are probably either retired or have a job where they can "just drive to a dealer" without worrying about their kids being picked up, their job or other obligations. If a proper recall was done people could schedule these events in their lives. Burdening us with this software is not right and so many people are falling for it.

Example - Proper recall - Scoop schedules the recall prior to his vacation - Result: Enjoys Vacation
Example - Software BS - Scoop updates his car, it fails - Result: Vacation Hell

I just don't understand why people can't see that.

I definitely disagree with your position, both in terms of relative risk of total failure versus limp mode, as well as relative inconvenience of scheduling a dealership visit versus having it forced upon you in the moment (and my position is also held by NHTSA).

I do very much agree with you that a full recall of the insufficiently robust part is the preferred course of action.

For me, the software eliminates the risk of getting stuck in a parking garage (or my garage) or being towed by a truck that jacks-up my ride — I know you’ve seen multiple posts by members on each of these issues. I definitely prefer limping into the dealership on my own.

 

[Mathington]

I created a new poll HERE to gather feedback and try to track the failures before/after the 22S41 update.

 

[BigHandHandyMan]

Stupid question of the day - How does one "open a case with Ford"?

My car has been at the dealership for two days already as it crapped out on Monday with the Powertrain and battery warnings.

 

[Rich_Maine]

I can admit that I'm probably a little over the top on the "f-this software", but it's because of what I know was supposed to be done. It's upsetting to me that it's essentially smoke and mirrors to placate people. To me, a bricked HVBJB, is a bricked HVBJB regardless of driving to a dealer or unable to start at work. I feel like there's a lot of apologists here that keep saying this is a win for us. I just don't think that one bit. A win would be Ford doing the right thing and replacing our HVBJB's before they fail, not giving us software to let them fail.

Couldn't agree more! The SW fix is band-aid. It needs a HW recall but Ford is trying to obfuscate the facts.

 

[Rich_Maine]

Well, it was finally my turn it seems. I completed the recall software updates via FDRS last week and noticed nothing adverse after the updates and then today I got the dreaded “Service Vehicle Soon” message.

For background, I never DCFC and never have with my GTPE. I purely level 2 charge to 90% every night.

I have a very short commute to work of about 15 miles that is 90% highway and slightly hilly, but nothing really crazy like @scoopman experienced. If anyone is curious, it is the 73 toll road in Orange County.

The failure occurred on my way home from work after my car sat all day in my office’s parking structure that kept it pretty cool. Ambient temps were in the low to mid 70’s on my way home. I had used BlueCruise the whole way set to 75 and had only “gassed it” slightly at the toll booth when BC disengages.

I then exited the freeway and “gassed it” one more time, from roughly 30 mph to 40 to pass someone. Shortly after the pass I received the SVS message and my power was severely limited to the same as @scoopman

Please note, neither of the power events were in anyway pedal to the metal or anywhere close to maxing my power meter.

I ended up going home as it was after 5pm. I turned it off and on a few times and was able to drive with the same messages and power limits in place. I just tried it again and am getting the same. Hopefully it works tomorrow.

I called a few dealers and got nowhere. They all said they’re booked out for weeks. I tried explaining but the appointment people wouldn’t budge. I emailed and left a voicemail for the GM of my preferred dealer, Tuttle Click Ford in Irvine, and hope I’ll hear from him or else I guess I just call Ford corporate and see what they can do?

Pretty bummed it finally happened to me but am also happy I’ll get the beefier part. The only concern is if I can get service! Pretty crazy this is gong on and Ford hasn’t told dealers to get people with issues like this in pronto.

Please make sure you file the nhtsa.gov complaint as described in another post.
This is not a SW fix.

 

[scoopman]

Stupid question of the day - How does one "open a case with Ford"?

My car has been at the dealership for two days already as it crapped out on Monday with the Powertrain and battery warnings.

+1-800-392-3673 -- 24/7 they will give you a case number and a human will reach out eventually.

 

[Neil4Real]

UPDATE: I was able to get my car in, GM called me back. Service manager is personally handling it, thankfully they took my word to get started quickly and are calling the Ford hotline right away. They are still VERY clueless about this. Even when mentioning the recall, they're like yeah we know about the software, but that's it. They kept asking how I know it is the HVBJB, if they can get parts now or have to wait, etc.

I tested out the "limp mode" a bit before I took it in. I wouldn't really even call it a limp mode actually. On streets, it is exactly the same, still had passing power, etc. On the freeway, it was similar to an ICE getting to speed, obviously a non-performance ICE, but had no problem getting there. At 70 mph, it still had some passing power, but not much.

Everything worked still - BlueCruise, one pedal, etc. The funniest thing... Unbridled Extended actually worked with the huge power reduction and my SoC being low 70% (didn't charge last night, didn't want to jinx it).

I did a couple of max power hits on the freeway and just met the typical power wall that the GTs have, obviously way sooner than normal, but no adverse effects.

I am confident that the software is trying to catch it before the fail takes place and, whether it is a false positive or not, definitely kept me from being stranded and I personally think is in a still safe condition. When I first had the service vehicle soon message, I did NOT experience a loss of power or anything while driving, it just kept on going. Maybe if it happens while flooring the pedal, you'd see that reduced, but I don't anticipate normal driving to see any effect when the messages pop up.

I 10000% agree with @DevSecOps that Ford needs to make this right and start replacing the parts now. There is no need for this. As stated, I've never even DCFC and had this problem, so clearly GTs out of the gate are going to get this error like crazy, as we're starting to see. And this is BEFORE Ford has even sent owner letters or anything! At the very least, they need to get dealers up to snuff on this so there is a clear path to getting vehicles serviced when the issue happens. Insane.

 

[scoopman]

UPDATE: I was able to get my car in, GM called me back. Service manager is personally handling it, thankfully they took my word to get started quickly and are calling the Ford hotline right away. They are still VERY clueless about this. Even when mentioning the recall, they're like yeah we know about the software, but that's it. They kept asking how I know it is the HVBJB, if they can get parts now or have to wait, etc.

I tested out the "limp mode" a bit before I took it in. I wouldn't really even call it a limp mode actually. On streets, it is exactly the same, still had passing power, etc. On the freeway, it was similar to an ICE getting to speed, obviously a non-performance ICE, but had no problem getting there. At 70 mph, it still had some passing power, but not much.

Everything worked still - BlueCruise, one pedal, etc. The funniest thing... Unbridled Extended actually worked with the huge power reduction and my SoC being low 70% (didn't charge last night, didn't want to jinx it).

I did a couple of max power hits on the freeway and just met the typical power wall that the GTs have, obviously way sooner than normal, but no adverse effects.

I am confident that the software is trying to catch it before the fail takes place and, whether it is a false positive or not, definitely kept me from being stranded and I personally think is in a still safe condition. When I first had the service vehicle soon message, I did NOT experience a loss of power or anything while driving, it just kept on going. Maybe if it happens while flooring the pedal, you'd see that reduced, but I don't anticipate normal driving to see any effect when the messages pop up.

I 10000% agree with @DevSecOps that Ford needs to make this right and start replacing the parts now. There is no need for this. As stated, I've never even DCFC and had this problem, so clearly GTs out of the gate are going to get this error like crazy, as we're starting to see. And this is BEFORE Ford has even sent owner letters or anything! At the very least, they need to get dealers up to snuff on this so there is a clear path to getting vehicles serviced when the issue happens. Insane.

I'm glad you found a good dealer to take your car -- if they pull the DTC for your VIN they should see that for the contactor DTC, the only remedy is to replace the HVBJB. See if they're getting you the B or C part!

 

[heisnuts]

I'm glad they got you in right away. Sometimes it takes the service manager getting involved to make things happen. Once engineering gets involved, I suspect things will start moving quicker. I suspect once engineering knows that your car already has the update, they will be even more interested in your case and will probably be sending out a field engineer to work with the dealer on this repair.

 

[DevSecOps]

UPDATE: I was able to get my car in, GM called me back. Service manager is personally handling it, thankfully they took my word to get started quickly and are calling the Ford hotline right away. They are still VERY clueless about this. Even when mentioning the recall, they're like yeah we know about the software, but that's it. They kept asking how I know it is the HVBJB, if they can get parts now or have to wait, etc.

I tested out the "limp mode" a bit before I took it in. I wouldn't really even call it a limp mode actually. On streets, it is exactly the same, still had passing power, etc. On the freeway, it was similar to an ICE getting to speed, obviously a non-performance ICE, but had no problem getting there. At 70 mph, it still had some passing power, but not much.

Everything worked still - BlueCruise, one pedal, etc. The funniest thing... Unbridled Extended actually worked with the huge power reduction and my SoC being low 70% (didn't charge last night, didn't want to jinx it).

I did a couple of max power hits on the freeway and just met the typical power wall that the GTs have, obviously way sooner than normal, but no adverse effects.

I am confident that the software is trying to catch it before the fail takes place and, whether it is a false positive or not, definitely kept me from being stranded and I personally think is in a still safe condition. When I first had the service vehicle soon message, I did NOT experience a loss of power or anything while driving, it just kept on going. Maybe if it happens while flooring the pedal, you'd see that reduced, but I don't anticipate normal driving to see any effect when the messages pop up.

I 10000% agree with @DevSecOps that Ford needs to make this right and start replacing the parts now. There is no need for this. As stated, I've never even DCFC and had this problem, so clearly GTs out of the gate are going to get this error like crazy, as we're starting to see. And this is BEFORE Ford has even sent owner letters or anything! At the very least, they need to get dealers up to snuff on this so there is a clear path to getting vehicles serviced when the issue happens. Insane.

What people should take away from this is ... let's wait and see how more of these play out. I say this because according to Ford, the data from Scoops car said that he was very close to the point of welding the contactor closed. If we are able to obtain the data from Neil's car and it shows it's not even close then the two experiences vary to a great degree.

I would be willing to bet that if Scoop had another 4k incline, even with reduced power at 90F ambient, he would have probably welded it.

My point is that all this information is amazing and good to have, but trying to draw conclusions from 2-3 incidents isn't doing everyone else any favors. There's too many unknowns still. I'm really curious about the post software incident rate.

@Neil4Real thanks for posting the update!

 

[ARK]

UPDATE: I was able to get my car in, GM called me back. Service manager is personally handling it, thankfully they took my word to get started quickly and are calling the Ford hotline right away. They are still VERY clueless about this. Even when mentioning the recall, they're like yeah we know about the software, but that's it. They kept asking how I know it is the HVBJB, if they can get parts now or have to wait, etc.

I tested out the "limp mode" a bit before I took it in. I wouldn't really even call it a limp mode actually. On streets, it is exactly the same, still had passing power, etc. On the freeway, it was similar to an ICE getting to speed, obviously a non-performance ICE, but had no problem getting there. At 70 mph, it still had some passing power, but not much.

Everything worked still - BlueCruise, one pedal, etc. The funniest thing... Unbridled Extended actually worked with the huge power reduction and my SoC being low 70% (didn't charge last night, didn't want to jinx it).

I did a couple of max power hits on the freeway and just met the typical power wall that the GTs have, obviously way sooner than normal, but no adverse effects.

I am confident that the software is trying to catch it before the fail takes place and, whether it is a false positive or not, definitely kept me from being stranded and I personally think is in a still safe condition. When I first had the service vehicle soon message, I did NOT experience a loss of power or anything while driving, it just kept on going. Maybe if it happens while flooring the pedal, you'd see that reduced, but I don't anticipate normal driving to see any effect when the messages pop up.

I 10000% agree with @DevSecOps that Ford needs to make this right and start replacing the parts now. There is no need for this. As stated, I've never even DCFC and had this problem, so clearly GTs out of the gate are going to get this error like crazy, as we're starting to see. And this is BEFORE Ford has even sent owner letters or anything! At the very least, they need to get dealers up to snuff on this so there is a clear path to getting vehicles serviced when the issue happens. Insane.

This is actually really good. This might be an unpopular opinion, but here it goes:

Ford messed up big with the HVBJB. But given where things are, there is no quick solution - look how long it has taken to go through the windshield/panoramic roof recall for everyone, another recall affecting a huge portion of the Mach-Es sold. Ford will not be able to get a new HVBJB into 20,000 cars in the next six weeks, it's just not happening. They have no choice but to somehow stagger it.

If the software update staggers it by prioritizing people particularly at risk of a HVBJB failure with a Service Vehicle Soon message, that's a pretty reasonable way of handling it.

If the downside is, the Service Vehicle Soon turns the Mach-E into something like say a 7.0 second 0-60 car due to the software limit to prevent welding and a full-blown failure, that's not a crazy limitation under the circumstances, and could let people basically operate normally until they can get the new part in (though without enjoying enhanced performance that our cars should have, particularly for the GTs).

By comparison, something like a Prius is a 10+ second 0-60 car. You feel it if you want to push it, but otherwise don't in day-to-day driving.

But Ford could go a long way by confirming if this is actually the case. Most importantly, how much leeway owners have to keep driving their Mach-Es normally, including on roadtrips, if a Service Vehicle Soon message pops up for this issue.

 

[Neil4Real]

Ford will not be able to get a new HVBJB into 20,000 cars in the next six weeks, it's just not happening. They have no choice but to somehow stagger it.

I still don't understand when people say this. It is fine to have the software with the recall AND say to call your dealer to schedule a service visit to replace the HVBJB. There is no way they'd have to do all 20,000 cars in 6 weeks or whatever timeframe. This is the same as the roof/windshield recall, most dealers were scheduling people super far out or making them wait, etc. They didn't get all cars with the recall done in a month, they probably still have a good amount outstanding, I'd wager.

The correct approach was to stick to what seemed to be their original plan, based off the very first notice to dealers about the vehicle hold, which was to do a software update and/or parts and actually do parts. They communicate to dealers to prioritize the software updates if they cannot accommodate the full part replacement ASAP, but to schedule the part replacement visit when they bring the car in for the update. Or people wait for OTA. Then those that get a failure message from the update get priority on the fix, as Ford's opinion is obviously that not all of them are going to need replacement immediately when they get the update.

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