Range Reduce due to Lamps

[MrLoganRoss]

Has anyone seen this message in the Pic? Not sure what it means or how to check. Thanks!

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[Gloff]

Either your parking lights or you hazard lights were left on. Check the headlight panel, the parking lights are the second from the top:

 

[MrLoganRoss]

Thanks!

 

[rreddy3]

Thanks!

It turns out that for 2023 MY MME the online pdf manual has the information message you questioned Chris, and the action Sean quoted, under “Maintenance 12V Battery-Information Messages”, of all places. I only found that because my MME obsession du jour has been 12v battery health. So, I decided to cruise through the manual, and there it was. Of course the information I really wanted to X check was not there. To those of you very knowledgeable about these cars, the location may make perfect sense. To me, not so much. Obviously I have a gargantuan learning curve to climb!

 

[luckie]

Has anyone seen this message in the Pic? Not sure what it means or how to check. Thanks!

interesting that they say “Electric range reduced” when it really is a 12V battery issue.

 

[rreddy3]

interesting that they say “Electric range reduced” when it really is a 12V battery issue.

True enough. But I wonder, is it a range issue incorrectly discussed under 12v battery?

For what it’s worth, I’ve noticed in other online MME manual searches I’ve done that the pdf and HTML versions for MY 2023 are not always consistent.

We all have pet peeves. Currently mine is the adequacy of Ford’s for the MME.

That said, I know technical writing on sometimes complex subjects is hard, painstakingly detailed work. I mean no
disrespect to those tasked with writing these manuals.

Perhaps the mothership in Dearborn doesn’t provide adequate resources to those in the trenches who’ve been tasked with preparing these manuals. A IMHO, at the end of the day the completeness and organization of the manuals is a less than satisfactory customer experience.

Manuals I’ve had for other cars are better. Granted none of them were more or less motorized, as in motor vs. engine, computers. That fact probably made writing their manuals easier.

And, again, no disrespect to the troops in the trenches writing the manuals. It’s a hard job and not one I could do.

 

[RyZt]

interesting that they say “Electric range reduced” when it really is a 12V battery issue.

If the 12V battery is very low while the vehicle is off (and HVB charge level is above a certain threshold), a special circuit will turn on to charge the 12V battery with the High Voltage Battery. This is a fail safe mechanism to prevent a dead car.

Not all EVs can do this. Mach E can.

 

[MrLoganRoss]

I think I know what I did. I was working on my DSP in the driveway. I turned the lights off (or so I thought I did) to avoid the headlights bothering the neighbors. My LV battery was at 100% this morning so maybe the lights forced the HV to charge it overnight.

 

[Mach-Lee]

Has anyone seen this message in the Pic? Not sure what it means or how to check. Thanks!

When did you see that message? When you turned on the parking lights, or the next morning when you turned on the car?

 

[MrLoganRoss]

The next morning

 

[rreddy3]

If the 12V battery is very low while the vehicle is off (and HVB charge level is above a certain threshold), a special circuit will turn on to charge the 12V battery with the High Voltage Battery. This is a fail safe mechanism to prevent a dead car.

Not all EVs can do this. Mach E can.

Not to beat this to death, but trying to think it through a bit, i guess the warning is a “blended issue.”

If the car is off but the lights are on, the lights have to get power from somewhere. That somewhere must be the LVB since the car is off. Then, as RyZt points out, when the LVB is drawn down fo some level a special circuit wakes up and draws juice from the HVB to restore LVB to what I presume is a safe and satisfactory level. But that process results in loss if range because electricity was removed feom the HV “traction “ battery.

personally, if I were editing the manuals I’d probably put the warning in three or four places to try and make sure users get the cause and effect and warning.

keep spinning that out for all the interrelated systems and dependencies in this car and the manual runs the risk of being so huge and cumbersome to wade through that it defeats its own purpose.

I’m done whining about the manuals.

 

[apwelsh]

interesting that they say “Electric range reduced” when it really is a 12V battery issue.

Not that odd if you think about it. When the 12V battery is low it must be charged. How do you charge the 12v battery? While driving… which puts extra load on the high voltage battery, and thus reduces the range.

 

[Reality Check]

Yes, there’s no free lunch. The energy (watt-hours) to run LED parking lights or flashers has to come from, and ultimately be replenished from, somewhere. If you’re not plugged in during LVB recharging (such as when driving) then it’s coming out the HVB. But the kwh capacity of the 12v LVB is minuscule vs. the HVB’s, and the energy needed/used to move the car is so relatively huge, that the range diminishment should be practically, imperceptibly minuscule.

We could easily calculate a good approximation of this minuscule range hit if we knew how many additional wh per minute running the flashers draws from the LVB. (Since it’s a pulsed load, it’d have to be measured over a time period … like a minute.)

 

[Hammered]

That's pretty funny.
"You left your lights on overnight, you now have 1 less mile of range"

Thanks car, thanks

 

[MrLoganRoss]

I don’t mind the reduction notice, however, I would have preferred a notification on my phone that told me my lights were on two hours after I came in the house

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