2017 energi platinum ev later mode

[nuspi32]

I have a 2017 energi platinum  and I have read a lot of posts on ev later mode saying , "With the EV Later button, you can conserve all of the battery power that you have for later use."

this cannot be correct I use ev later mode a lot and it drains the ev battery. even though the engine does come on and does some recharging after driving about 40 miles I am having to 

recharge the ev battery back up. as stated I thought ev later mode conserves all battery power for later use. just wondering why this is not true. I guess I am not understanding this mode.

thanks.

[jsamp]

EV Later mode is like a "hold mode".  When you put it in EV Later, no matter how much charge you have or have used, it sets the current battery charge % as the set point.  From that set point, it will go up by as much as 2% to down by as much as 5%*.  It will use the gas engine to maintain this range.  This is like locking it in hybrid mode at any charge level.  As long as it stays in EV Later, it will keep that number. 

 

* two notes:

1) It will go above 2% up only if there is excess regen to capture, ie: long down hill or long braking.  But with the car driving normally, it stays in the range of +2/-5%

2) if the battery is completely full (100% on the screen) it will only allow a set point of 95% as it wants to have some buffer above the set point for regen from hills or braking.

 

What you are describing sounds more like Auto mode.  In that mode it will prioritize electric use and only use the gas when demand requires it (up hills or hard acceleration).  Note that when you are in EV Later, every time you shut off the car and restart it, it will put it back into Auto mode.  You have to manually put it back into EV Later every time you start the car if that is what you want.

 

Edited March 29, 2020 at 04:27 AM by jsamp