Larry, I figured it out - value charging, Mrs bc read also

[rbort]

Last night I got home and played around with value charging.  You have to create a value charge location and its easiest to do when the car is at the location you want to value charge.  

 

So you click on "view all" with value charging in the bottom right of the front page and then you select create a value charging profile.  From there you select the location that the car is at now plugged in, (should come up by default if that is the case), and then after going through the power company options, I chose add a custom charge window.  

 

This is where I modified the hours of low cost so that the charging started at 6am and made it stop at 9am hoping I'd get a half charge.  Larry the car started charging right away because it sees that it needs to be done by 9am, so what the car does is charge now until its within 3 hours of full charge and then stop and wait to charge for the last 3 hours from 6 to 9am window.

 

I found this out by changing the window from 6am to 12pm and the car stopped charging started waiting to charge as it had enough window to charge during the value window.  Then to test it further I made the window smaller from 7am to 12pm and the car started charging again.  I let it go and when it reached a charge % that was enough to go from there to 100% in the 5 hour window, it stopped by itself and started waiting to charge.

 

So Larry when your car was charging, one possible cause is that the value charge window was too small to complete the charge.   That may not have been the case with you since you use 240v charging, but I thought to mention it anyways.

 

Mrs bc, try it and if you have questions let us know.

 

Bear thanks for the tip, I wish I could make it stop charging by closing the window early, but the car resists that and starts charging if the window is too small.  I haven't figured out a work around, if you find a way to make the car stop charging at 60% let me know and many thanks.

 

-=>Raja.

Edited June 4, 2015 at 06:37 PM by rbort

[Blastphemy]

I set two different Go Times, one for midnight and one for noon. I also set the TOU rate period from 9pm to 1am. My car now reliably charges from 9:00pm to 11:45pm every night during the lowest LADWP electric rates, and then from 9:00am to ~11:30am at work on the parking lot charger (even though it's not a TOU rate). So I'm very happy!

[rbort]

OK, so I'll try the 7am to 9am window, and then put another from 2pm to 6pm and see if that works in preventing the car from charging some the night before, thanks for the tip.

 

By the way, plugged in hanging around waiting to charge uses 67 watts.  I plugged it in now and even though I didn't drive the car at all today the fan is running all the time "cooling the battery" which may or may not be at the ambient around 70F.

 

-=>Raja.

Edited June 4, 2015 at 07:58 PM by rbort

[larryh]

The car will always attempt to charge the HVB before the next Go time, even if it has to use times with higher rates.    Between now and the next scheduled GO time, it chooses the windows with the lowest rates.  It may not have a choice and have to use the highest cost windows.  If there is not enough time to complete charging, it will stop charging at the Go time and recalculate the charging schedule, again selecting the windows with the lowest rates before the next Go time.  If the next Go time is more than 24 hours away, it will assume you want the car charged within 24 hours.

 

Suppose you plug in the car at 6:00 pm.  If you want to charge the car from 3:00 am to 6:00 am, set a low cost charge window for those times.  Since it takes about 6 hours to charge with the 120 V charger, set another low cost charge window from may 12:00 pm to 4:00 pm (make sure it provide adequate time so it can charge only in the lowest cost windows).  Now select the next Go time at 4:00 pm the next day.  The car will now charge in the two lowest cost charge windows.  You will need to unplug the car before noon so it doesn't actually charge from 12:00 pm to 4:00 pm.

 

In general, it doesn't cool the battery much more than if the car were unplugged.  But my battery is not been all that hot lately.  It might do more if the battery were hotter. 

Edited June 4, 2015 at 08:32 PM by larryh

[rbort]

Hey Larry,

 

I don't have any go times set.  I just checked again the the watts dropped to 56, maybe the cooling fan slowed down a bit.  Plugging it in and leaving it plugged may only be good if the battery is thought to be hot, its a waste today burning 60 watts running fans for nothing.

 

I have to go out now, will charge it outside at the public charger while I run my errands as I need it tomorrow to go to Natick.

 

-=>Raja.

Edited June 4, 2015 at 08:42 PM by rbort

[larryh]

If you don't have an Go times, it will charge it within 24 hours.

[Hybridbear]

The car will also allow the battery to get warmer when it's warmer outside. The hotter it is outside the hotter the HVB can be before the fan turns on. The other day with air temps in the mid-70s the car let the HVB reach 96.8 F before the fan came on while driving. When we plugged in the fans went into high speed mode and cooled the HVB down to 84.2 while the HVB charged. The fans were running around 3000 RPM each time I checked on the car (plugged in & waiting to charge, while charging & back to plugged in & waiting to charge because charging didn't complete due to my Go Time setting & Value Charge profile combination, just like I wanted).

[Blastphemy]

OK - here's a real newbie question: is there any way to force the car to charge immediately from MyFord Mobile or the MFM website when I've plugged in outside the Value Charging and Go Time periods? In Los Angeles, we get the lowest time-of-use rates all weekend, and normally I only need to charge at the times I have set in the schedule. But today I needed an extra charge, and couldn't find any way with the mobile app or website to force the car to start charging. I had to go to the car, turn it on, then go to the energy screen and press charge now (which, I assume, now means the car is forever in 'charge now' mode until I remember to change it back).

 

On the mobile app, if I tap the battery image, the screen adjusts and shows a slider at the bottom that shows either Value Charge or Charge Now, but no amount of pressing that back and forth actually caused the car to start charging. All it did was sync the value charging profile with the car over and over.

:gaah:

[larryh]

You could set a Go time when you plan to leave.  The car will attempt to make sure the car is fully charged before the Go time regardless of the value charge settings..

Edited June 7, 2015 at 11:36 PM by larryh

[Blastphemy]

I meant is there a way to initiate a charge without changing my Go Time schedule?

 

In my Chevy Volt and Cadillac ELR, I could log into the mobile Remote Access app and press the "charge now" button to force the car to start charging outside of the programmed value charging schedule. But I can't find that functionality on the MFM app or website.

 

If I were to happen upon a free public charger during a time that is normally peak electric rates and not a Go Time, I'd want to take advantage of that opportunity to charge while I shopped. But since plugging in at 1:00 p.m. on a Wednesday isn't in my value charging schedule, I'd need a way to initiate the charge. Right now, the only way I've found to do this is the take the car off of 'value charge' and put it in 'charge now' mode - hopefully not forgetting to set it back before I get home.

 

It's not an extreme inconvenience, but it sure would be nice to have it in the mobile app. That way, if I'm well into the shopping mall and realize I never set the car correctly, I wouldn't have to walk all the way back to get the car to start charging.

[murphy]

Charge profiles are location dependent.  If you are not at home it should select the default profile.  Hopefully you didn't program the default profile for use at home.  The default profile should be a charge it now profile.  For Home create a new profile called Home and configure it how you want it to work at home.  It will only be in effect when you are at home.  You must be at home when you create the home profile.

[Blastphemy]

The problem with being at home is the weekends - LADWP has the lowest TOU rates from 8:00 p.m. Friday through 8:00 a.m. Monday. Normally, I only use the programmed charging on weekends, so it works fine. But on those days I want to charge at home on Sunday at 1:00 p.m., the MFM app and website don't give me a way to do that. I've submitted the suggestion to Ford, so hopefully that functionality will be added to a future release.

[Hybridbear]

Charge profiles are location dependent.  If you are not at home it should select the default profile.  Hopefully you didn't program the default profile for use at home.  The default profile should be a charge it now profile.  For Home create a new profile called Home and configure it how you want it to work at home.  It will only be in effect when you are at home.  You must be at home when you create the home profile.

You don't have to be there to set it up. You just go to "My Charge Locations" and configure the location there. The car can be anywhere when you do this.

 

The problem with being at home is the weekends - LADWP has the lowest TOU rates from 8:00 p.m. Friday through 8:00 a.m. Monday. Normally, I only use the programmed charging on weekends, so it works fine. But on those days I want to charge at home on Sunday at 1:00 p.m., the MFM app and website don't give me a way to do that. I've submitted the suggestion to Ford, so hopefully that functionality will be added to a future release.

Have you tried setting your Home Value Charge profile to all be $ cost on the weekends? That may get the car to charge immediately anytime you're at home on the weekends. If that isn't what you want, then a Go Time is the easiest way to get the car to charge immediately when you don't normally want it to charge immediately.

 

For example, we don't have TOU rates but choose to charge at night for three reasons:

1. Lower overall demand means less fossil fuel based electricity
2. Waiting until the early AM hours allows the HVB the most time to cool before charging
3. Waiting until the early AM to charge means the least amount of hours at a full charge which should have a positive impact on HVB health

Normally when we plug in the car at home it will say "Plugged in, waiting to charge" and it will show that it will start charging at 3:00 am. However, if we need the car to charge faster I will usually set a Go Time for when we want the car to be finished charging and it will figure it out. Sometimes I change the Home profile to "Charge Now" because it's easier than configuring Go Times. You can change this anytime in the MFM app or in your web browser but you can only change it in the car when you're at the location of the Value Charge profile.

 

Your two last used Value Charge profiles show up on the home screen in the web browser like this:

 

If you click "View All" you will be able to see all your Value Charge profiles.

 

Edit: in the MFM app go to the triangle symbol and then to charge settings and you can do the same thing.

 

The easiest might be to just go into the app and change your Home Value Charge profile to "Charge Now" when you want it to charge now. I'll usually do this in the car right before getting out when arriving home or on my phone after I get inside.

Edited June 8, 2015 at 07:27 PM by Hybridbear

[murphy]

That display took me by surprise until I realized it is your Focus.

[Hybridbear]

That display took me by surprise until I realized it is your Focus.

Haha yes, with multiple cars in MFM it defaults to showing whichever vehicle you were last viewing in the app/web browser. Since I was last viewing the Focus it came up with that when I opened MFM and I didn't bother to change it before taking the screenshot.

[murphy]

You don't have to be there to set it up. You just go to "My Charge Locations" and configure the location there. The car can be anywhere when you do this.

 

That would be true if the map was correct.  When I put in my address the result is at least 1/4 mile from where my house is actually located.

[Hybridbear]

That would be true if the map was correct.  When I put in my address the result is at least 1/4 mile from where my house is actually located.

I'm not quite sure I follow... The first time you charge at a location it goes into your Saved Locations. Even though the address may be wrong, that's where the car thinks it is charging, so you take that location and use it to create the Value Charge profile. My parents' C-Max Energi quite often thinks it is at a different address since they live in the inner city with small lots and their garage is on the edge of the alley and at the boundary with the neighbor's property. I believe their Value Charge profile address assigned by MFM is actually their neighbor's address. Sometimes the key log in MFM will show the address of their neighbor just to the north or their neighbor across the alley as the address where the trip ended, but the car still recognizes that it's "home" from a Value Charge profile perspective.

[murphy]

My point was that you can't set up a charge location, if you have never been there to charge, if the map address is wrong.  By trial and error I have figured out that the car thinks I live at 360 when I actually live at 312.  The master map is wrong and I gave up trying to get it corrected 6 years ago.  When I go to the Here web site, that map is correct but they have never bothered to put the current web site map into the SD card.

[Hybridbear]

My point was that you can't set up a charge location, if you have never been there to charge, if the map address is wrong.  By trial and error I have figured out that the car thinks I live at 360 when I actually live at 312.  The master map is wrong and I gave up trying to get it corrected 6 years ago.  When I go to the Here web site, that map is correct but they have never bothered to put the current web site map into the SD card.

Can you set up a Value Charge profile before you arrive at a location? I don't know how to do this.

 

I think MFM uses a different map system than the navigation in the car. The map on MFM says Mapquest on it.

[murphy]

The map on the SD card comes from Here.com.

 

Maybe a value charge can't be set up unless the car is at the location.  I don't use value charging since my electricity comes directly from the Sun and my power company rate is the same 24 hours per day.