CHARGING IN THE WINTER

[Firn]

Are you stuck with a constrained TOU window?
If not, try shifting the charging period closer to drive time.

No, can charge at any time.

In the end though regardless of when it charges I have no use for the heat in the battery. If it helps or protects the battery i can see it, but otherwise I just wish it kept the battery cold and charged it up.

Probably another thing that would be nice to have more manual control over

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[Maxx]

No, can charge at any time.

In the end though regardless of when it charges I have no use for the heat in the battery. If it helps or protects the battery i can see it, but otherwise I just wish it kept the battery cold and charged it up.

Probably another thing that would be nice to have more manual control over

It is true that using the battery (taking power) when it is below zero is not as bad as charging at that temp (which cause lithium plating and permanent damage). But it is good to remember when you drive away your truck cold, every time you hit the brake, you are charging it. And with most brakes, especially when it is in sport mode you are fast charging it. So heating the battery before leaving has two benefits; 1 you protect it from permanent damage. 2 - you get more miles out of stored energy (you get some of the power you put in to heat it back).

 

[RickLightning]

below, brake, brakes...

 

[PJnc284]

I looked at my unofficial (dated) service manual, no pictorial diagram of where it's located, suspect it's down stream of the PTC or the near the diverter valve.

I'm guessing it's pretty close to the heater. Cranked up the heat and the coolant heater power jumped up from 0 to 8kW and the engine coolant temp went from 80F to 120F in about 15-20 seconds.

 

[Firn]

It is true that using the battery (taking power) when it is below zero is not as bad as charging at that temp (which cause lithium plating and permanent damage). But it is good to remember when you drive away your truck cold, every time you hit the brake, you are charging it. And with most brakes, especially when it is in sport mode you are fast charging it. So heating the battery before leaving has two benefits; 1 you protect it from permanent damage. 2 - you get more miles out of stored energy (you get some of the power you put in to heat it back).

I dont disagree, however I also dont see any benifit to me.

I could set a charge time closer to my departure time however it would still be heating at the beginning of the cycle and cooling off before I drive it, so wasted BTUs.

I could set a departure time, but then I'm heating the battery just to throw more btus into the environment when I get to work 20 minutes later.

I could initiate a short charging session before I leave, but here again I dont need the range and I would just be throwing away BTUs 20 min later when the truck sits at work. If I'm buying those BTUs I would very much rather have them in the garage

Ultimately my first drive of the day usually to work, there it sits and cools to ambient. If we drive the truck heavy that day its into the evening so there was no benifit from heating it 10 hrs earlier.

No matter how I cut it I might only see a benifit for a short drive to work, when I dont need it. After that any benifit of heating the battery is lost.

 

[TaxmanHog]

Last night was mild rainy evening, the day time temps hit low 50's so pack wasn't as cold, no call for spontaneous warming, but I did program an early morning charging session starting at 0500 am, I needed 29% to get back to 90%. The Session lasted 2 hours 35 minutes.

The conversion loss was on point at 9%, this number tells me that the pack was not directly pre-heated or in processes heated by the PTC.

The Car Scanner stat's about 2 minutes before the charging session completed ~ 7:33 am, the heat in the pack is from charging activity, transmission & motor temps were warm also, I suspect the circulator and diverter values runs the excess heat through all systems to help dissipate the heat, avoiding the need for the active chilling system to run. The DC/DC & LVB was trickle charging the 12v system.

Energy consumed for the charging session : per Emporia, Ford App & FCSP log:

The Charging session losses calculation

The weekly energy needed including prior days of spontaneous warming and on the plug remote start warming of cabin for 46 miles driven so far this week:

Weekly view of data from Emporia & FCSP logs

 

[mr.Magoo]

Here's some OBD data from a "spontaneous" heating event that occured at 3.30 this morning.
I can't tell for how long the temperature was at 30F before triggering the event, but I moved the car outside last night to connect it to the charger around 9.30 and at that point it heated it up to 41F. (my logger monitors the 12V to trigger when to log and when not to, so I'm not polling any modules in "stand-by" nor do I manually need to start anything, so this is all the truck on it's own)

As you can see, during this "spontaneous" event 41F also seem to be the shut-off and the interesting thing is that 3hrs later when I turned on the climate control, it's still at 37F despite 20F outside, so it seems to retain the heat pretty well. Other than that, pretty uneventful really.... as it should.

Top chart is the event at 3.30 and me turning on climate control 3hrs later.
Middle chart is my iotawatt energy monitor on the charger circuit.
Third is just the heating event zoomed in.

 

[PJnc284]

Well left the truck unplugged last night and didn't see any evidence of preconditioning after setting a route in google maps on AA this morning. Outside temp was 14F with min hvb temp of 23F and max of 28.4F. Thermal op mode stayed on EQ and coolant Heater power was 5-7kW the entire 30min trip.

 

[mr.Magoo]

Well left the truck unplugged last night and didn't see any evidence of preconditioning

Unless your destination was a fast-charger it won't (pre) condition the battery while driving?

The only time I've seen that happen otherwise is when my battery was in the single digits SoC and it was pretty cold out, at that point, for whatever reason, it decided to sacrifice battery energy to warm up the battery, effectively giving me more capacity/range. No navigation set, no nothing, just on my way home from work.

 

[PJnc284]

Yeah had about 50% battery. Set a route to some random place and had a charger added that was about 5 miles passed the office or about 30min away. Didn't notice any reduction in regen so guess it just wasn't cold enough. Even tried sport mode and didn't notice any difference in the coolant heater power. Either wasn't cold enough or sport mode only helps with cooling.

 

[mr.Magoo]

Here's some OBD data from a "spontaneous" heating event that occured at 3.30 this morning.
I can't tell for how long the temperature was at 30F before triggering the event

Caught another one of these events last night (my logger should have been off, but for some reason it wasn't).

The interesting thing here is that it only called for / used shore power for about 2 min out of the full 10-12 min heating cycle and it looks like the SoC went over 80% (which is what I have it set at) as a result of the battery getting warmed up and that's when it stopped calling for shore power, but kept warming the battery to the same 41F before stopping.

The battery temp at the start of the event was 24F compared to 30F last time I logged it.
The coolant heater peaks at 10.7kW but the "steady" line is 9kW until it shuts off.

 

[TruckRider]

I had the same issue last winter. What worked for me was just using a hair dryer to warm up the charging port and the plug.

 

[msingh]

I live in Michigan and recently bought an F-150 Lightning Flash. I typically charge overnight and, unfortunately, I have to park outside. After a recent snowfall, I went to leave for an appointment and couldn’t get the charger unplugged. The release button wouldn’t budge, so I assumed it had frozen. Even the manual release in the frunk didn’t help. I eventually got it disconnected, but I’m not sure how to prevent this from happening again.


Do you have any suggestions? I’ve seen some of those charging-port covers online, but I’m not sure how effective they really are. Any advice for dealing with freezing chargers when you have to park outside?

I bought one of these things. Plugged it into the bed power, and between the simple protection from the cover and the added ability to plug in-works great.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FPCZKL6P?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title

 

[dpwmc93]

I bought one of these things. Plugged it into the bed power, and between the simple protection from the cover and the added ability to plug in-works great.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FPCZKL6P?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title

Thanks for the tip. I ended up using a sock and a winter water Spicket cover and it’s been working like a charm here in Michigan.

 

[mr.Magoo]

I logged a preconditioning event yesterday.
Outside temperature was 5F and departure time was set to 6.45am

Preconditioning started at 5.55 and ended at 7.02, the following event at 7.30 is me remote-starting it.

The interesting thing is to me is that it's heating the cabin to 87F degrees !? even though my settings are "medium", the following remote start seems more normal at 68F (which is what I have it set to in the truck).

It's also a bit strange that it keep both diverter valves closed after the pack has reached 55F, while still keeping the heater/PTC on, guess I have to look at some flow/service diagram to figure out what's going on.

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