larryh

When you look at the EV Info display on the MyFord touch screen in the car when the car is running, what does it say for the next start charge time on the bottom left before you plug the charger in? Does it say at plug-in or does it specify a time? At plug-in means that Value Charge is not selected. If the time is not 12:00 am and you have selected Value Charge on the screen, then your home value charge profile is not set up the way you want. It is supposed to select the minimum cost charge window first. If it says the current time, then it thinks that now is the lowest cost time to charge. If it specifies 12:00 am and it looks like the charger is charging, it is either waiting to charge and consuming 60 watts of power until midnight, or it is actually charging (which you can determine by monitoring the EV info window which will indicate that it is either "waiting to charge" or "charging" and you can see if the percentage charge is increasing). If the charge if below 10%, then you will have to see if charging stops at 10%. Note that the default profile already has the value charge window set for 12:00 am to 6:00 am. If you did not modify this profile, you can use it in your home profile by checking the use Generic Value Charge Window when setting up the weekday and weekend charge profiles. Also, be sure to make sure that the charger is set correctly in the default profile for 120 or 240 V. Note that the value charge profile that is being used is determined by the main screen in MyFord Mobile at the top left where it says where you car is. It lists the name of the profile that is being used in blue.

Plugging the 120 V charger into the car before plugging into the car is similar to power being restored after a power failure or using a timer. The charger only draws 2.2 watts initially until it negotiates charging with the car. One should not unplug the charger from the wall while the car is charging and drawing high current. These are the instructions from the C-Max Energi's quick reference guide which contradict the owners manual: 3. Plug the charging coupler into the vehicle’s charge port, making sure the button clicks to latch into the port. Plug the three-prong electrical plug into a standard, 110-volt outlet.

This past weekend I tried the same experiment again. The first time I plugged the 120 V charger into the car before plugging the charger into the outlet. Nothing happened. The second time, I plugged the 120 V charger into the outlet and then plugged it into the car. The charger topped off the HV battery as it did last week and then continued to charge the 12 V battery for another two hours. Normally, when I plug the charger into the car before plugging it into the outlet, the charger initiates charging. It seems, however, that when the battery is nearly 100% charged the order in which you plug things in matters. I'm not sure why. I would think the car could not tell the difference. I was thinking that if you had a timer that turned the charger on and off periodically, it could be used to maintain the charge on both batteries if the car was not being used for an extended period of time.

I haven't subscribed to the ChargeWise program yet. I am considering various 240 V chargers at the moment. The charger must be on a separate submetered circuit. I will have to pay for the installation of the submeter (about $150). Timers for a 40 amp, 240 V circuit must be hardwired. They can't be plugged into a 240 V socket. If I were to buy a Charger with a delay feature, the cheapest I could find is from Blink for $700. But they won't be available for some time. Otherwise, Siemens and Schneider makes ones for $850. I can get a charger without the delay feature for about $500. It would cost about $100 to install a simple mechanical timer.

The fan probably also cools the on-board electronics in the battery control module. Yes--a timer should work. You won't be wasting energy while the car is waiting to charge.

The most noticeable thing is improved voice commands. When you use voice commands, it now brings up a window with suggestions on what you can say. I haven't had time to fully explore it. You will have to re-pair the phone and restore your settings. It takes a long time to install. You have to disable the auto engine turn-off option on the console so that the car will not turn off before installation is complete. DA5T-14D544-BD The latest SYNC® update includes all of the improvements from previous updates, plus additional benefits, such as: Information display on the homescreen for HD, Sirius (if equipped), and FM radio sourcesSimplified graphics and improved usabilityEnhanced voice destination entry for SD Card Navigation (if equipped)Improved Navigation vehicle positioning (if equipped)Rear view camera guidelines set to ON by default (if equipped)Updated SYNC/device compatibility informationThe installation of this update will take up to 30 minutes to complete. Be sure to keep your engine running, not in accessory mode, throughout the entire installation process. Turning off your vehicle during the update installation will disrupt the process. Although your vehicle must be in park when you begin the installation process, you may drive your vehicle while the update is downloading to your SYNC system. If your vehicle is equipped with the Intelligent Access with Push Button Start feature, you will need to temporarily disable the Automatic Engine Idle Shutdown (AEIS) component before beginning the installation in order to prevent your vehicle from timing out and shutting off the engine before the software update is complete. To disable this feature, use your steering wheel controls to navigate to the Settings menu on your left-hand Instrument Cluster LCD display. From there, select Vehicle >Auto Engine Off >Off. (If you do not see this setting, there is no need to make any changes before starting the update.) Alternatively, after initiating the installation, you may drive the vehicle during the update process to avoid the engine shutting off. The AEIS will automatically reset to "On" the next time you start your vehicle. Please note: During the update installation, SYNC will temporarily appear to not recognize your mobile phone or media device. This is normal. When your system has been successfully updated, SYNC will display a notification saying, "Installation complete."

You can see my post regarding this at http://www.fordfusionenergiforum.com/topic/821-leave-it-plugged-in/?p=4422. If I were to select the ChargeWise program from my electric company, the rates would be $0.0585 during off peak and $0.3785 during peak hours. I contacted MyFord Mobile about this and explained to them how using Value Charge would cost me more money rather than saving me money. They simply noted my comments. I am going to have to install a timer to prevent the charger from charging during peak hours or I am going to have to get a charger with a delay feature to delay charging until off peak hours.

Note that the car sometimes overrides the value charge settings and starts charging the car immediately anyway. If the battery is depleted, it immediately charges the battery up to 5% or 10%. Also, you can't go by the charger to determine if the car is charging or not. You have to look at the EV info screen on MyFord Touch and see what it says. Value charge is working if it says the start time is during the low cost value charge time window. Otherwise, it will say that it will start charging at plug-in.

The only problem I had with value charge profiles is initially setting them up. There is no manual to tell you how to do it. I had to use trial and error to figure it out. Once I set up the profile, I have had no problems with it. Your home value charge profile should remain as you set it until someone resets it. I actually have two different profiles, for each of the places I regularly charge. You will have to setup up your home profile again and check it once in a while to make sure it is what you expect it to be. There are a lot of steps to setting of value charging. I would have to look at all your settings to see what is going on.

When you say deleted, I am not sure what you mean. If you click on view all under Value Charge Profiles, do you see your home profile that you set up? If you click on the edit link for your home profile, you should see the schedule that you set up. Below is my schedule. The lightest green region is the lowest cost charge window. The darkest green region is the highest cost charge window. So if I plugged my car in during the weekday at 5:00 pm, it would start charging at 9:00 pm (the lowest cost window from 9:00 pm to 12:00 am). I have the 120 volt charger. So it won't finish by midnight. So it is going to have to continue charging in the second lowest cost window starting at 12:00 am until charging is complete. Note that you must make each of the five different charge windows a different height, or it will do it for you and you probably won't like what it did.

I downloaded it and successfully installed Gen2 - V3.6.2.

Yes, Value Charge works correctly for me, but it takes some effort to figure out how it works. For help on setting up value charge windows, see my post: http://www.fordfusionenergiforum.com/topic/1016-new-myford-mobile-release/?p=4991. You need to have GO times set up so that it knows when to schedule charging and make sure the clock is set correctly on MyFord Touch (be careful of AM vs PM). Value Charge will try to select the highest priority (lowest cost) windows to charge. When you plug the car in, it determines the charging schedule so that it will complete charging by the GO time making sure it fills up the lowest cost charge windows first, i.e. charging only during those windows. Note that while waiting to charge, it will consume 60 watts of power for the on-board electronics, so you will see the light on the charger indicating that it is charging, when it is really not charging yet. To make sure the charge settings are what you want, you can always go to the MyFord Touch EV info screen and select the wrong charge setting and then select the correct charge setting. Hopefully, it will then do the charging method that you want. Make sure to set MyFord Mobile to the correct charge settings first so that it does not override what you just did.

Did you notice if the threshold gradually fell from 4 marks to 2 marks or it did it jump from 4 to 2 marks in the Empower screen? If you start (or remote start) the engine and turn on the AC with the car plugged in, it will use energy from the wall outlet to initially cool down the cabin. From then on, the AC generally uses less than 0.5 kW of power, That would reduce your EV range by less than a mile (depending on the length of the commute). It might even increase EV range since the battery is more efficient at 78 degrees. So I wouldn't be afraid to use AC. You might want to set the temperature to 72 F for the AC. The cabin temperature is generally much warmer than what you set the temperature to. Make sure the vents at the back of the console are open and directed toward the rear deck. If you don't notice any air entering the intake on the rear deck, then something strange is going on. If the battery was warm and you had the AC on, it should be taking in air from the passenger cabin.

MyFord touch includes the climate control settings when estimating the EV range of the car. The car does not send the climate control settings to MyFord Mobile. So the estimate in myFord Mobile does not include the climate control settings. Climate control will reduce the range of the car. That is why you see the discrepancy. You might want to look at page 244 of the manual for the procedure to restore settings once the 12 V battery loses power.

Did you look at the EV Info Screen on MyFord Touch? It should have given a reason for the ICE coming on. But it sounds like the battery temperature is too warm. The more power you use from the battery, the faster it warms up. Charging contributes to warming it up. It takes a long time to cool down once it gets warm. I don't know if using more AC would help cool it down, if thats the problem. Have you tried driving with EV auto to see if you get the same results? You could try using the AC during the commute. Someone mentioned elsewhere there are two different fans for the battery. One that uses outside air and one that uses inside cabin air. They claim it uses the inside cabin air fan when the AC is on. I don't know if this is true or would make a difference. If you really wanted to determine if the battery is truly too hot, you would have to set the AC to a very low temperature and turn the car on for a while. Use Max AC to speed up the process. You could leave it plugged in while it is running so it does not drain the HVB and further warm up the battery. I can't guarantee that the ICE won't turn on, so leave the garage door open and watch the car.

When entering Engineering Test Mode without using the brake, the console display shows 14.0 and the battery monitor shows 14.4. So the battery is still being charged.

I just tried it. Engineering test mode showed 13.8. The battery monitor showed 14.45. So it isn't showing the actual battery voltage. I haven't noticed anything unusual with my battery yet.

But won't the car then be on? If it is charging the battery, then you will see that voltage instead?

If the 12 volt battery really was low on charge, then it would take a couple of hours to fully charge up the 12 volt battery. I don't think it can happen in 15 minutes--that was just topping off the HVB. I would leave the charger plugged in for a couple of hours at least. Does the light on the charger indicate that the battery is still charging? Wait till the charger light goes out. When I topped off the battery last Sunday, I observed the charger still charging the 12 volt battery for two hours after topping off the HVB (http://www.fordfusionenergiforum.com/topic/874-12-volt-battery-test/?p=6191). Hopefully you haven't unplugged the charger yet. Otherwise, I don't know if it would resume charging the 12 V battery if you plugged it in again. Note that the voltage on my battery was only down to about 12.45 V. You might want to get a battery monitor to monitor the battery voltage.

If you look at the notifications in MyFord Mobile, what was the time/date of the last notification. Click on the caption just to the left of My Account at the top and then select view all. That should tell you the last time a notification was sent to MFM. Unfortunately, I don't think the list includes any of the notifications that MFM synchronized settings changes made at MFM web site with the car. Do you remember if you got any sync messages when you were modifying the value charge settings yesterday? Maybe MFM and the car were not communicating so the charge locations were not updating. I think you need to charge the car after deleting the charge locations before your home charge location will show up.

There is an auto update button when you select the my account tab at the top of the screen at the web site. It is under MyFord Mobile Settings. Mine is currently set to Off.

You observe that MFM contacts the car for an update when you log onto the web site? I have never observed MFM connecting to the car for an update when I log onto the website. The update button is immediately available to be pressed. When I press the update button or change settings, I can clearly observe the voltage dropping on the battery monitor when the phone contacts Ford's cloud servers. But I don't see that when I log on. Also, the battery icon at MFM shows when it has been last updated. Does yours always show 0 minutes when your first log on? Mine usually shows many hours have passed.

For help on setting up your home value charge profile, you can read my post at: http://www.fordfusionenergiforum.com/topic/1016-new-myford-mobile-release/?p=4991. You would want to set a value charge window from 3:00 am to 6:00 am (assuming you can charge in 3 hours). The window must have the highest priority (lowest cost). You are stuck with four other windows. Each must have a different priority (cost) and the priority must be lower (cost must be higher) than the 3:00 am window. You then have to set up a go time for when you wish to leave in the morning. The car is connecting to MFM every time you turn the car on/off or start/finish charging. The MFM app itself connects to Ford's cloud servers. It should not initiate any communication with the car unless you press the update button or change settings. Whenever the car is plugged in and before charging completes, it has the capability to charge the 12 V battery. So you should be able to change settings and press the update button any time before the HVB charging completes without depleting the 12 V battery. Note that the 12 V battery is also charged, if necessary, when value charge is selected and the car is awaiting the value charge time at which to start charging. So you don't have to wait until 3:00 am to connect.