Stop Safely Now - Fixed Itself?

[jaminfrog]

Bought a 2023 Mustang Mach-E Premium just yesterday, and it was the happiest 100 miles of my life! My whole family loves it.

Drove school carpool this morning and then stopped by a DC fast charger to get some juice, since I don't yet have a faster charger installed at home.

On the way home after charging to 80% I got the dreaded "Stop Safely Now" and the car died. After rolling to a stop, I turned off the car and got out for about 5 minutes while I called roadside assistance and the sales manager at the dealership.

I got back in, tried starting the car, and voila! The car showed no error messages and enabled me to drive a seemingly normal drive back to my house. (I was only driving on side streets at that point so probably didn't get the car above 55 mph.)

I've read the incredibly helpful HVBJB post from @DevSecOps and many other posts and am thankful to have found this community, and wanted to ask -- has anybody experienced the SSN error and then had no further issues?

The sales manager wanted me to drive the car into the dealership, but I was a little wary about that because I didn't want to get another SSN message while cruising down the freeway if there's really an HVBJB issue. He sent a tow truck and so my sweet baby has just been towed to the dealership after just 100 miles.

He is suggesting it may just be a "reset the system" kind of thing so I'd love to know if the SSN message ever resolves itself that easily. The fact I had just gotten a charge at a DC fast charger makes me suspect there's a bigger problem, and I have shared a lot of the info I have found here with him.

Thanks for the great community and any advice! We really loved the evening and morning with the car and look forward to getting it back at full health, hopefully somewhat soon.

Sponsored

 

[AzCoronaDog]

Yes, my wife got the 'stop safely now' error a couple of times in out 2021 that magically self corrected. In our case, the car did not quit driving, but had 'reduced power' until it reset itself. Not sure if in all cases it reset on the very next start or not.
However, we have had it happen twice where it did not reset, and it had to go to the dealer and the HVBJB was replaced.

 

[Murse-In-Airy]

Not all pop-up warning messages are indicators of catastrophic failure. Sometimes it’s a glitch in the matrix. If you’re wanting to be able to tell the difference, having an OBDII reader to check error codes (DTCS) is the way to go.
it’s kind of a pain honestly that we still have to be our own tech support. But honestly these things operate like Windows vista. Sometimes the need to be turned off and back on again. Sometimes you need to do a hard reset to clear the L2 cache. And sometimes your power supply is fried. The only way to tell is for sure is to cross reference the error codes.

 

[azerik]

Those last few sentences triggered me. Havn't heard L2 cache in long enough.

 

[jaminfrog]

Not all pop-up warning messages are indicators of catastrophic failure. Sometimes it’s a glitch in the matrix. If you’re wanting to be able to tell the difference, having an OBDII reader to check error codes (DTCS) is the way to go.

Thanks, definitely going to get one of those readers whenever I get the car back. I am tech support for all other electronics in my house, so I guess I've just added another gadget to my maintenance list ?

 

[Mach-Lee]

This is the reset: Try This First - Powertrain Malfunction / High-Voltage Battery Warning / Service Vehicle Soon While Charging

My guess is just a glitch. Send your VIN for a code check.

 

[jaminfrog]

Quick update…the dealership towed the car in and took a look at it. They said it was likely an issue with the DCFC I had used that day. They tested charging and drove it around the block without issue, so they delivered it back to me. I asked them what codes the car threw but they never told me. I drove the car with no issues last night and plugged it in all night on the AC super-slow charger that came with the car.

This morning I started the car and immediately got the Service Vehicle Soon as well as the powertrain malfunction and high voltage battery warnings in my Ford app.

Called my new best friend the sales manager at the dealership, and he is working on taking the car back and swapping it for a different Mach-E. I don’t think this dealership has had a ton of experience with the HVBJB but the manager is doing his best to take care of me. He said he pulled Oasis on the car and it looked like a hot mess so he doesn’t want me to have to work through the repairs on it.

Hopefully the next one will be all good but it sounds like this is all a big roll of the dice!

 

[Mach-Lee]

Quick update…the dealership towed the car in and took a look at it. They said it was likely an issue with the DCFC I had used that day. They tested charging and drove it around the block without issue, so they delivered it back to me. I asked them what codes the car threw but they never told me. I drove the car with no issues last night and plugged it in all night on the AC super-slow charger that came with the car.

This morning I started the car and immediately got the Service Vehicle Soon as well as the powertrain malfunction and high voltage battery warnings in my Ford app.

Called my new best friend the sales manager at the dealership, and he is working on taking the car back and swapping it for a different Mach-E. I don’t think this dealership has had a ton of experience with the HVBJB but the manager is doing his best to take care of me. He said he pulled Oasis on the car and it looked like a hot mess so he doesn’t want me to have to work through the repairs on it.

Hopefully the next one will be all good but it sounds like this is all a big roll of the dice!

Your car has a bad battery current sensor (started to fail at 11 miles). Because the BECM can't accurately read the current entering or leaving the battery, it shut down everything resulting in a stop safely now fault. The battery pack would have to be dropped out of the car to replace the HVBJB (the current sensor lives inside it), the BECM, and or the pack wiring harness unless a wiring fault can be identified. So that would be a major repair that would likely require the assistance of Ford's field service engineer. Yes there are a lot of cascading codes that occurred.

The DC charger had nothing to do with it. That set it's own fault caused by the station or you unplugging in the wrong order.

Here is a picture of the current sensor (black thing) around the positive bus bar in the HVBJB:

 

[jaminfrog]

Your car has a bad battery current sensor (started to fail at 11 miles).

Wow, thanks for the insight.

It had exactly 11 miles on it when I drove it off the lot. The sales guy had it plugged in to a charger they had at the dealership and I recall him saying, “this charger sucks, we can never get it to work.” Was the battery sensor just bad to begin with and that’s a coincidence, or did the dealership’s charger have something to do with it? If the latter, I want to warn the sales manager not to plug the next Mach-E coming for me into that charger!

I’ll share your explanation with the dealership in the hope that it’ll educate them a bit about what’s up.Thanks for your help!

 

[BalsaDust]

And yes, another reason to be part of this Forum! the help found on here is more than you would ever get from a dealership!

Tony

 

[HuntingPudel]

I am glad your dealer is doing you well. A lot of them would just service the car and you would be without your new car for weeks or months (depending on parts availability, scheduling, etc.). Have they found you another MME yet? ??

 

[jaminfrog]

Have they found you another MME yet?

Yep, the sales manager is a genuinely awesome guy and has really worked hard on this.

He says they’re getting one in 2 weeks and he’s putting my name on it. They had one with an extended range battery but he couldn’t put another $7k into the deal ?

Now I have two weeks to decide if I want to roll the dice again! It was seriously the best 200 miles of my driving life but I’m not sure I want to go through another HVBJB situation. It’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all I guess!

 

[Kmp14]

Stick with it, it's a great car! Definitely get a replacement though and don't let them service the one you already have. I have a 2023 premium with extended battery, took delivery in December of 2022. I have almost 8,000 miles on it, and not a single problem that required a trip back to the dealer. Yes, I have lots of minor quirky software glitches like everyone else but otherwise it's a lot of fun.

 

[Mach-Lee]

t had exactly 11 miles on it when I drove it off the lot. The sales guy had it plugged in to a charger they had at the dealership and I recall him saying, “this charger sucks, we can never get it to work.” Was the battery sensor just bad to begin with and that’s a coincidence, or did the dealership’s charger have something to do with it? If the latter, I want to warn the sales manager not to plug the next Mach-E coming for me into that charger!

Probably bad to begin with.

 

[ThatGuyLando]

Not all pop-up warning messages are indicators of catastrophic failure. Sometimes it’s a glitch in the matrix. If you’re wanting to be able to tell the difference, having an OBDII reader to check error codes (DTCS) is the way to go.
it’s kind of a pain honestly that we still have to be our own tech support. But honestly these things operate like Windows vista. Sometimes the need to be turned off and back on again. Sometimes you need to do a hard reset to clear the L2 cache. And sometimes your power supply is fried. The only way to tell is for sure is to cross reference the error codes.

I dunno the car turning off while driving seems like a pretty big f'in glitch. I'd take that to the dealer ASAP to get it checked out.

Sponsored