Battery warming when cold, and plugged into 240v

[RickLightning]

One of the interesting things to me is that EVs, made by the same company, can have totally different battery components or algorithms. This January has been abnormally cold, and I've been watching my vehicles and charging. Both vehicles are prevented from charging from 11AM to 7PM, my peak rate period.

Currently is 5 degrees outside, ceiling sensor measures 25 degrees. My vehicles are in my garage, which is not heated or insulated, but is part of my house, so it has 2 interior walls (ceiling is not insulated and there is not a room above 80% of it.

The Mach-E, which was used yesterday for a 15 mile grocery run that ended around 3:30, charged between 7PM and 8:36PM to 90%. This morning, at 5:36AM, it pulled 1.63kWh to warm the battery for 20 minutes.

The Lightning, which hasn't been used since 1/20, last warmed the battery on 1/21 from 9:16AM to 9:34AM, pulling 1.47kWh.

They sit side by side, and are plugged into identical chargers.

Over the past weeks, I have looked to see what's been happening for battery warming. Note that the Mach-E is used more often, so it is possible that on some days the battery was warmed enough that it didn't see the need to warm overnight. Of course this morning's warming seems to be the opposite of that point...

Mach-E:

1/1 - 1.55kWh
1/20 - 1.79kWh
1/23 - 1.63kWh

Lightning:

12/12 - 1.22 kWh
12/15 - 1.26kWh
1/16 - 0.6kWh
1/20 - 1.28kWh
1/21 = 1.47kWh

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[TaxmanHog]

I left mine off the cord after topping up yesterday afternoon.

Did our morning coffee run, the truck was alerting the need to be plugged in when parking.

Got home and pulled into the frigid garage, plugged in she commenced pulling energy for 11 minutes, at the rate of about 9 KW, consumed just over 2 kWh of energy to warm up the pack.

Later today I am going on a road trip to NH, departure timer set for 3:15 PM, will bump the battery the last 6% to 100% SOC about 60 minutes before leaving, the battery warming / charging & cabin prep coincide with leave time.

 

[RickLightning]

Have you ever compared the battery temp after charging vs. the ~59F after a departure time?

Yesterday I dropped my wife and her friend off with the Mach-E, no departure time, in -4F or so. Picked them up 2 hours later. Drove a total of 24 miles, did a remote start on each end. 1.37 miles per kWh...

 

[Firn]

Fwiw mine never seems to warm the battery itself when off plug, even driving highway speeds wont warm the battery up. Leaving work i have seen the battery down to 20f and it stayed there the entire 20 min drive home.

I have a nice warm garage (not usually heated but never drops below 45) so I never precondition. I have a phone permanently installed running Torque and my truck ALWAYS heats the battery to 60f when plugged in, it is the very first thing it does.

 

[TaxmanHog]

Have you ever compared the battery temp after charging vs. the ~59F after a departure time?

A couple of months ago I did a couple of samples of the temperatures, at the time values rose ~10 to 20 degrees above ambient temp's.

I'll plug the car scanner dongle later today to see what the fully prepped temperature is before I roll out, then when I get to NH, then later in the night and along the way home I need to juice up in Burlington (Tesla) which is cheaper than EA in Tewksbury. Per your experiences, I don't expect enroute conditioning to the charging station, hope the residual heat is enough to kick off a good starting charge rate.

 

[TaxmanHog]

Fwiw mine never seems to warm the battery itself when off plug,

This is by design, it will never try to warm the HVB off plug and parked.

It's supposed to heat it while routing to a DCFC station, I'd expect your 23 Pro should work properly if the pack temp get's cold enough.

 

[RickLightning]

As the temp keeps falling (-12 this morning, garage was 16 at the ceiling), warming increases:

Didn't warm at all on the 22nd. On the 23rd it warmed for 23 min using 1.95kWh, then again a little over 5 hours later for 16 min for 1.36kWh, then again a little under 7 hours later for 16 min for 1.39kWh. Will be interesting to see if it makes it does one more hit before 24 hours ends.

 

[mr.Magoo]

Have you ever compared the battery temp after charging vs. the ~59F after a departure time?

Mine ususally sits around mid 40F after a longer charge.
Here's a 40% >> 90% graph from last night, -4F outside with a battery temp of 46F when it was done charging.

4hrs later, when I went for a drive, the battery was down to 23F.

It would be great if departure time would [have the option to] control charging as well and if you then had the option of preconditioning the battery or not. The extra range you get from 46F to 68F would seem negligible in most cases.

The interesting thing in this graph is also that the initial heating is only to to get it over the freezing hump to 35F, then it lets it charge for 2hrs before kicking the heater on, waits another hour before kicking it on again and at this point enters a somewhat predictable pattern of letting it drop to around 42F before heating it up to 52F.

Not sure if they have different temperature thresholds for different SoC, maybe to prevent overcharging, or what's behind this type of behaviour.

Another example for when heating kicks in...
This time the battery was already heated up to 68F (think I just left the truck running when plugging in) and there was no heating applied until it reached 42F.

 

[Maineiac12]

I left mine off the cord after topping up yesterday afternoon.

Did our morning coffee run, the truck was alerting the need to be plugged in when parking.

Got home and pulled into the frigid garage, plugged in she commenced pulling energy for 11 minutes, at the rate of about 9 KW, consumed just over 2 kWh of energy to warm up the pack.

Later today I am going on a road trip to NH, departure timer set for 3:15 PM, will bump the battery the last 6% to 100% SOC about 60 minutes before leaving, the battery warming / charging & cabin prep coincide with leave time.

I like that graph. What charger brand/app is that?

 

[TaxmanHog]

I like that graph. What charger brand/app is that?

Emporia Vue 2 is what I have to monitor the 240v feeder to my FCSP

They now sell the Vue 3 https://shop.emporiaenergy.com/products/emporia-vue-3

 

[Firn]

This is by design, it will never try to warm the HVB off plug and parked.

It's supposed to heat it while routing to a DCFC station, I'd expect your 23 Pro should work properly if the pack temp get's cold enough.

I have never once observed meaningful heating of the battery off plug, parked or driving. Maybe, and a big maybe, when pack temps were in the 20s a trickle of heat was pushed to the battery, but heater power stayed below max and coolant inlet temp ticked up to the low 30s and pack temp went up a degree.

My DCFC sessions are rare enough that conditions may not have been right, but even with a pack temp in the low 40s it didnt trigger preheating when navigating to a DCFC station.

What's interesting to me is mine does not follow what Mr magoo said, when plogging in i immediately see the heater warm the pack to 60f, every time.

 

[mr.Magoo]

What's interesting to me is mine does not follow what Mr magoo said, when plogging in i immediately see the heater warm the pack to 60f, every time.

This is from Febuary last year, so it's not that I just updated all the modules and it's a new behaviour.

If you have your truck "running" (foot on brake, start button) when plugged in, then it will heat the battery to 60F+, at least it used to, I haven't confirmed that it still does more recently.

 

[Firn]

This is from Febuary last year, so it's not that I just updated all the modules and it's a new behaviour.

If you have your truck "running" (foot on brake, start button) when plugged in, then it will heat the battery to 60F+, at least it used to, I haven't confirmed that it still does more recently.

Very interesting.

I need to pull some of my data, although I wont have full charging data (my logger shuts off).

My standard routine is to pull in the garage and plug in. If the battery is cold I immediately here the pumps kick on once I put it on the plug. If I open the truck later the logger turns on and I can see the temp. In every instance I see it at or going up to 60f. If its been charging and I take the truck out its always at 60.

 

[TaxmanHog]

Have you ever compared the battery temp after charging vs. the ~59F after a departure time?

I'll plug the car scanner dongle later today to see what the fully prepped temperature is before I roll out, then when I get to NH, then later in the night and along the way home I need to juice up in Burlington (Tesla) which is cheaper than EA in Tewksbury. Per your experiences, I don't expect enroute conditioning to the charging station, hope the residual heat is enough to kick off a good starting charge rate.

Here are the key points from last nights trip, battery was conditioned before I left in the 60's, the SOC got to 99% by the time I pulled the truck off the FCSP and the ABRP prediction for my trip.

Arrived at the Nashua NH, battery conditions, arrived with 55% better than the predicted 48%, extra 13 miles for a quick side trip.

The HVB temp min dropped 14 degrees in 96 minutes, the motors got toasty warm, I'm sure the recirculation moved that heat to the battery to slow chilling (I hope that's what happened)

Second drive was a quick 18 mile between Nashua NH and Dracut Mass., the truck had been cooling for about 3+ hours, left the Nam Knights winter charity fundraiser, preparing for drive to Tesla in Woburn, MA.

HVB Min & Primary Motor T dropped to 26.6 degrees, secondary was a little warmer.

HVB Thermal Operations was still OFF after programming the Tesla Charging station into Google Maps, it also was OFF using Ford Nav pointing to the Tesla station by address (No pick option shows in the Charging stations options list) we need that update @Ford Motor Company

Arrived at Tesla Charger, though the PTC didn't actively warm the battery, the thermal management system did transfer heat from the motors/transmission (DC/AC 3-phase drive inverter??) HVB Min T rose ~6 degrees.

I looked at ABRP again, revised energy plan to get home, 34% arrival SOC at Tesla and 20% ending SOC at home, the algorithm predicted I should charge to 55%, so I set the one time charging limit accordingly.

The site had almost all stations occupied with Tesla's to the left and to the farthest right was a Caddy Lyriq on the furthest right point of the last station. The Tesla next over pulled out within 5 minutes opening up the option for me to score the next right most station, minimizing losses of productive spots. I pulled up close, using the second NACS adapter (other design that is longer) which @Ford Motor Company sent me after the big roll out was finished.

The energy flow might have been impacted due to the high utilization at this facility or maybe my battery temperatures?? The first chart showed 86KW, then the second after a few minutes 95.79KW, the last chart shows Hvb thermal operation mode in HEAT while the Hvb Coolant Heater Mode is OFF, wondering if that is true or flawed data, because the PTC was pulling energy to warm me in the cabin and I'll assume the HVB as well !?!

Progression of the charging: Revised the ABRP prediction for the final leg home, say's I'll get there with 21% remaining, the mid trip session cost $11.88 for 29 kWh at $0.41/kWh Mass sales tax of 6.25% included.

Arrived home with a SOC of 27%, if I had not stopped at Tesla I ~MIGHT~ have made it to the garage on fumes, better safe than stranded on the side of i95 in 9 degree weather. HVB Temp increased during the final leg to 59 degrees with the help of the motor heat recovery (good job @Ford Motor Company )

Plugged into the 80 amp FCSP, bringing the HVB back to 90% in preparation for the blizzard.

Side notes, Google Maps, was showing my predicted SOC at end point of trip legs on the map screen, but this value doesn't show on the instrument cluster as the Ford Nav does.

Ford Nav and Google Maps Nav DO NOT turn on enroute HVB conditioning within 20 minutes/miles of a high output DCFC as it does in later model years, @Ford Motor Company needs to roll out a patch for 2022's!! Please get this done before any other goofy or useless updates.

EDIT to add my monthly energy chart for January, closing the book today on that:

28.6 cents a mile for this trip including the 10% initial bump starting the trip not shown in the charging data / cost snapshots above,.

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