New EV'er on board

[theterminator93]

Good evening all,

 

My wife and I picked up a used '17 FFE the weekend after Thanksgiving. We had been saving up to replace her 2007 Fusion for a little while, which we gifted to my parents after we took possession of the Energi.

 

I hadn't intended to get an Energi, or even a hybrid at all while we were saving. I would periodically hop onto the web to take a look at what was available to ensure our savings goal was still realistic, and get a feel for the local market to determine what a "good deal" was as we got more serious/closer to the time to buy. Then I happened across the sale post for the 17 Energi and the prospects of the EV only operation for her commute (only 4 miles each way) to save on the fuel costs, as well as the improved economy/range over what we are used to getting piqued my interest. Plus, the price point was only a few grand higher than what a comparably equipped ICE Fusion would have cost. It just spoke to me, and the wife agreed.

 

"My" cars consist of a 1998 Lincoln Mark VIII LSC with the 4.6L 32v V8, and a 1997 Thunderbird with the 16v V8 (thought the Thunderbird is modified for "fun" use) - so I've been living with 23-26 MPG vehicles for quite a while up until now.

 

The mother-in-law bought a 2010 (or 2011, I can't remember lol) Fusion Hybrid new, which I found fun to drive in a way different than my big V8s - trying to squeeze the best MPG out of the thing! I think my best trip was about 56 MPG, according to the trip computer. So the prospect of transitioning to the Energi was an easy step for me - given the "unique" feel of the CVT and regenerative braking these cars exhibit over a traditional ICE set of wheels. I'm managing driving scores in the high 90s and the wife is usually 90+ as well, which is encouraging.

 

I've been doing my fair share of reading here to get to know the car better. A lot of the experiences and advice shared have proven invaluable so far in helping us get comfortable with our new-to-us car. The battery and car seem to be in like-new condition as far as I can tell, though I have yet to hook up my OBD-II scanner to read some of the battery specific PIDs. In-town EV only range with temperatures in the mid-30s with heat off seem to be about 20 miles, give or take. With the heat on, well, as has been said here many times, that drops to 10-14 miles.

 

The car gets a spot in the attached garage overnight and I have it set to precondition the cabin for her prior to her departure, which has worked well despite only having 110V service for the convenience charger. She's been able to make the 4 mile commute to work on less than 1 KWh of energy - though the trip home is less forgiving due to the car soaking in the cold throughout the evening.

 

I've had the chance to take the car on a pair of longer distance highway day-trips, and it seems to get about 35 MPG while using gasoline 100% at the high (75 MPH) freeway speeds in the more rural areas around here. I'm guessing that will edge up towards 40 as temperatures return to more comfortable levels in spring and summer. I'm also looking forward to seeing what the EV only range does then too.

 

We're at just a bit over 43,000 miles. Looking forward to seeing the numbers we get from this thing as conditions change.

Edited December 10, 2020 at 02:08 AM by theterminator93

[muzicman61]

Welcome to the forum and congratulations on your purchase.  I'm sure you will find the 17 FFE much improved over the 2007.  As time progresses, if you are like me, you won't even pay attention to driving scores or KWs used.  Not sure where you live or what you pay for electricity but I'm sure you will see savings in your commute costs regardless.

[theterminator93]

I'm near Cleveland, OH - the electric rate is usually between 10 and 11 cents per KW/h - so about 3.5 cents per EV mile. I was doing some number crunching to find out where the cost per mile of driving the car like a hybrid, using gasoline, became cheaper than using EV operation based on the price of gas. Here is what I came up with (c/p from an earlier post of mine on a different automotive message board):

 

 

I am using 17 miles per full EV charge of electric-only operation, which is 6 KWh of electricity based on my Kill-a-Watt's readings from last night's full charge. Electric rates for me are such that it's about 65 cents in electric to go those 17 miles. That shouldn't really change much, so 3.8 cents/mile is my "price to beat" for gasoline hybrid mode.

For hybrid operation I'm seeing anywhere from 35-45 MPG on trips in town, so I'm using 40 MPG average at the moment. To achieve 3.8 cents/mile or less, that means the price of gasoline needs to be at most, $1.52/gal.

The car is primarily my wife's for her commute and errands, for which she always stays in town. Her driving style is not as honed as my own to take full advantage of the technologies in the car, so her hybrid economy is probably going to be at most 35 MPG (short trips with cold starts). That means a price per gallon of $1.33 or less for hybrid mode to be as cheap (or cheaper) than EV only mode.

To consider another facet, with her driving habits and a much shorter EV only range of, let's say 12 miles, that's 5.4 cents per mile in electricity. At 35 MPG hybrid, that converts to gas prices of $1.89 or less for hybrid mode to be cheaper than electric only mode.

Given the current price of fuel, it's pretty much a wash as far as whether she uses EV or hybrid. However, given her relative lack of experience with hybrids/EVs, she needs to "practice" her driving style a bit to take advantage of what tools/technologies she has available. Not having the EV battery charged is detrimental to that cause, and it will be difficult for her to improve her EV only range that way. So I'll keep charging the car every night and keep tabs on her EV only range to come up with a better "cutoff point" for not charging the car if/when gas gets much cheaper.

At the end of all that calculating though, what I can say is gas prices can only go so, and be so low for so long. We saw that with the first COVID lockdowns in March/April and into May; we saw gas as cheap as $0.99/gal briefly (which I can't remember seeing since probably the late 90s). Typically the lowest it will go is $1.5x-$1.7x at the end of the calendar year, then it inches up after January hits and peaks in the mid $2 range. Obviously the higher the price of gas, the more the cost advantage to EVs presents itself.

[jsamp]

As you have noticed, the EV vs ICE cost per mile is largely dependent on the costs of electricity and gasoline.  Since electricity tends to be pretty steady, it really depends on the highly variable price of gas. 

 

For me in CA electricity is quite expensive, but so is gas.  If gas gets much below $2.95 per gallon, it becomes cheaper to drive on gas.  But there are other advantages to EV driving, so I maximize the EV use whether it is costlier or not.  Besides, gas doesn't get much below that anyway (currently 2.79 at Costco which is typically the cheapest in town).

 

Welcome to the forums.

[theterminator93]

Thank you. Hope to be able to contribute in some way as I learn more about the car.

 

I absolutely agree to the advantages of EVs being more than simply a cost savings over traditional ICE transportation. It's a help to me though, being such a numbers driven guy (I work in IT, where "data driven decisions" is quite the catch-phrase), to see the tangible financial benefits in front of me. ?

 

I'm already thinking down the line for the next [likely] EV purchase needing a 240V outlet. I finished my basement not long ago and have the ability to relatively easily run a new 10/3 (I assume a 240V EV charging station would best be 30A, not 20A?) from the load center... it's just finding the impetus to fish the cable through the ceiling.

[murphy]

The maximum current an Energi will draw from a 240 volt outlet is 16 amps.  Bigger wire is always better since it reduces the voltage drop across the wire.

I have a 2013 Energi.  I don't know if any of the later model years made a change in the charging profile but I doubt it.

 

[theterminator93]

Thanks for that bit of info, that helps. I will probably upsize then and go with an 8-3 cable for 40A, so I can use a 32A charging station down the road on future EVs that will happily take the additional current! Anything bigger than that and I don't think I'd be able to fish the cable through the basement and keep my head on straight...

[theterminator93]

While looking for info on how the eCVT in these cars operates (beyond a generic overview), I found that there were some generic eCVT discussions but nobody had found videos specific to our cars. I was able to find a series of videos that do a great job of comprehensively explaining the transmission in this car (the HF35) along with the battery and associated electronics. Obviously the battery in our cars is much larger than the 1.4 kWh battery in the Hybrid, but it's still a great technical overview.

 

I don't know if they've been listed here before, so I apologize if this is a repost. If not, here they are for anyone interested:

 

 

There is also a nice video that outlines the differences in the varying generations of eCVT found in Ford's hybrids since 2005, including the HF35 found in our Energis.

 

[theterminator93]

With the recent warm spell of 70s and even low 80s, I've had a chance to see what happens to my EV only range with a warmer vehicle. This will largely reflect other experiences shared here in the last several years, so I'm just adding to the pile. These measurements are for round trips (or close to it) which should essentially negate the effects of wind and elevation changes, which can have a significant impact on EV range.

 

For comparison, with heat off and temps in the teens and 20s, I could get anywhere from 18-20 EV only miles. I usually get 98 or 99 for the driving score in MFM, so I am driving this thing like an old man to get this range. MFM's estimate of battery capacity seems to show that it has suffered noticeably since it was new. In the winter it would report about 4.4 kWh for EV mode. Now that it's warmer it has gone up, but only about 10% to a tad under 5 kWh - that's about 10% total battery degradation (6.9 kWh of the original 7.6 kWh full capacity) after 4.5 years and 46,xxx miles and a reuction of EV only capacity by 14% (5.6 kWh to 4.84 kWh). It's not bad, but I would be happier to see 5.1-5.2 kWh consistently in EV mode with a vehicle of this age and mileage.

 

On a side note - anyone know if an old SCT XCal2 can interface with the PCM to get the battery capacity PIDs?

 

Based on driving today in a cloudy 80 degrees, with no A/C and the sun roof cracked, I went 24.3 miles on 93% of the EV only charge. MFM reported 4.5 kWh used, so that works out to a full EV charge of about 4.84 kWh and a full EV only range of 26.2 miles. Not bad considering that's on only 86% of the new EV only capacity; that would mean with a new battery I would be getting over 30 miles to a charge. My personal best so far is 26.3 miles before the ICE kicked on; maybe I can get to 28 miles? ?

[jsamp]

7 hours ago, theterminator93 said:

Based on driving today in a cloudy 80 degrees, with no A/C and the sun roof cracked, I went 24.3 miles on 93% of the EV only charge. MFM reported 4.5 kWh used, so that works out to a full EV charge of about 4.84 kWh and a full EV only range of 26.2 miles. Not bad considering that's on only 86% of the new EV only capacity; that would mean with a new battery I would be getting over 30 miles to a charge. My personal best so far is 26.3 miles before the ICE kicked on; maybe I can get to 28 miles? ?

 

It seems you are mixing your measurement methods?  You are measuring kWh based on the EV only portion of the battery (good move), but your distance per charge is until the ICE kicks on.  Those are two different measurements.   I get ~28.7 miles from EV only, but over 32 miles when I go until the ICE kicks on.  Like you that is when I drive like a granny.

[theterminator93]

At the very end there, yeah. I listed my "time to ICE" separately from the "EV" range, since they are indeed two distinct metrics.

[theterminator93]

Instead of starting new threads, I'll just keep this one going on until I lose all momentum after completely jumping the tracks. ?

 

I did the HVB drain test yesterday in the low 70s. I managed 26.5 miles in EV only mode before it switched to hybrid mode. Trip odometer showed 4.9 kWh used for a bit before it ran out, so my estimate is 4.95 kWh to empty. Pretty close to my earlier estimate, and I'm glad to see the degradation isn't quite as bad. I was worried for a bit before because I was adding up MFM kWh totals and only coming up with low 4s for a while...

 

It's been in the upper 80s here lately; rather unseasonably warm. I've noticed the radiator cooling fan has turned on while the car has been sitting in a warm (mid-80s) garage, while plugged in and charging. It was on this evening after our last trip of the day (no go times) so I can only assume it's doing one of 2 things: cooling the inverter hardware under the hood or it's running the a/c to cool the cabin temperature to aid in HVB cooling.

 

In any case, it's been a good opportunity for me to dial in some dog-days-of-summer best practices to help minimize HVB degradation due to charging while it's hot. I set up some value charge profiles to have the car charge in the early hours of the morning while it's coolest outside (6-9am preferred, 9-12 if needed) which works great since the wife doesn't need it until about 12:15 for work. Time will tell how that pays off, but for now, it's the best thing I can think of that doesn't involve just leaving it unplugged all the time.

 

Edited May 24, 2021 at 04:40 AM by theterminator93

[theterminator93]

Because the price of copper has been on a free-rise trajectory over the last year-ish, I've held off on running the 6/3 for my new 40A charging station. However, a few weeks ago I had a bit of an epiphany.

 

I have a 12/2 dedicated circuit to a single 120V outlet in the garage already, which doesn't get used for much aside from a battery tender for the Thunderbird in the winter. It occurred to me that I could just rewire it for a 6-20P outlet and replace the breaker at the load center with a DPST 20A tandem breaker to get 240V, 20A service. Perfect for a 16A EVSE!

 

After investing $30 in electrical supplies and $180 in an EVSE, I've got my level 2 charging station for the FFE up and running. When we take the plunge on a BEV I'll be motivated to install the 40A charging station again, but now there's no longer a desire to do so. The greatly reduced charging time and vastly more effective Go-Time preheats are well worth it! Not to mention saving about 1 kWh in electricity for every full charge due to the more efficient charging of L2 vs. L1.