Door chime, SYNC audio, auto wipers, and other LVB? issues

[jwb02]

Hey all, first off I wanted to thank everyone for their contributions here. I've been lurking in this forum since purchasing my truck in early Jan '23, and have learned way more about Lighting electrical systems than I ever intended. I also wanted to preface that besides the issues I'm about to list, I have enjoyed the Lightning. Coming from a Tesla Model 3, there are definitely things I miss about the Tesla(software and reliability) but also things the Ford excels at (versatility and comfort).

The unique issue with my truck (or seemingly so - I have not seen others post about ) is that the door and alert chimes are the higher pitched "old school" sounds that emanate from the dashboard. I have only heard the correct speaker-oriented sounds after pulling the #28 fuse (performed while initially troubleshooting the modem). After pulling this fuse, the truck will play the correct speaker-oriented chimes until the next time it is power-cycled. Then back to annoying dashboard chimes... The SYNC system is sporadic also. The start-up graphics are often glitchy. And on two separate occasions, my Carplay audio came exclusively through the dashboard speaker! During both instances, performing the steering wheel button Sync reset fixed the issue.

Like many of the '23 builds, my Platinum also suffers from modem issues. The 23-2050 TSB was performed by my dealer a couple weeks ago and did not fix the issue. I understand that the 4.2.1 OTA is supposed to fix it. But like many others have expressed, I don't think my truck is capable of getting OTA's... The last one it "received" was 4.1.1 in January. I'm still on the old version of Sync as well.

And not sure if this is related, but my rain-sensing windshield wipers do not work either. The dealer attempted to fix those also while it was in for the 23-2050, but no dice...

I am not sure whether all or some of these issues are related... But based on my extensive research of forum posts, I'm guessing that I have a LVB issue and/or an APIM issue. The door chime issue seems uniqur to my Lightning and is more prevalent on the ICE F-150's. Many of the ICE forum guys have speculated that it's due to a drained LVB or a faulty APIM.

I have tried to troubleshoot all of the issues above, including many battery disconnects, manual trickle charges, fuse pulls, and one LVB BMS reset. But no dice...

My dealer has been responsive to getting me in for service, but my troubleshooting knowledge of this truck seems to be far greater than theirs at this point... So in the interest of not wasting my time dropping off the truck again without giving them some direction, I'm looking to the Lightning owner's hive for advice here!

Appreciate everyone's insights in advance!

-JB

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[4Reeley]

For the rain-sensing wipers, did you check that the sensor was affixed properly?
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/“rain-sensing”-wipers-don’t-work.12199/page-2

I also notice the "old school" chime from time to time. It always resets itself after a start stop cycle. I've been trying to figure out what triggers the chime to change but I have not pinpointed the issue. I have never done any SYNC reset, LVB disconnect, or fuse pull - everything seems to fix itself at the next start cycle. I've had 3 instances where my drivers side speakers weren't working for any audio - CarPlay, radio, etc. They also came back after the next start cycle. I also have experienced glitchy 15" screen (going black and restarting) as well as dash screen (vertical discolored lines), once again this resolved itself after a start stop cycle.

 

[carys98]

Hey all, first off I wanted to thank everyone for their contributions here. I've been lurking in this forum since purchasing my truck in early Jan '23, and have learned way more about Lighting electrical systems than I ever intended. I also wanted to preface that besides the issues I'm about to list, I have enjoyed the Lightning. Coming from a Tesla Model 3, there are definitely things I miss about the Tesla(software and reliability) but also things the Ford excels at (versatility and comfort).

The unique issue with my truck (or seemingly so - I have not seen others post about ) is that the door and alert chimes are the higher pitched "old school" sounds that emanate from the dashboard. I have only heard the correct speaker-oriented sounds after pulling the #28 fuse (performed while initially troubleshooting the modem). After pulling this fuse, the truck will play the correct speaker-oriented chimes until the next time it is power-cycled. Then back to annoying dashboard chimes... The SYNC system is sporadic also. The start-up graphics are often glitchy. And on two separate occasions, my Carplay audio came exclusively through the dashboard speaker! During both instances, performing the steering wheel button Sync reset fixed the issue.

Like many of the '23 builds, my Platinum also suffers from modem issues. The 23-2050 TSB was performed by my dealer a couple weeks ago and did not fix the issue. I understand that the 4.2.1 OTA is supposed to fix it. But like many others have expressed, I don't think my truck is capable of getting OTA's... The last one it "received" was 4.1.1 in January. I'm still on the old version of Sync as well.

And not sure if this is related, but my rain-sensing windshield wipers do not work either. The dealer attempted to fix those also while it was in for the 23-2050, but no dice...

I am not sure whether all or some of these issues are related... But based on my extensive research of forum posts, I'm guessing that I have a LVB issue and/or an APIM issue. The door chime issue seems uniqur to my Lightning and is more prevalent on the ICE F-150's. Many of the ICE forum guys have speculated that it's due to a drained LVB or a faulty APIM.

I have tried to troubleshoot all of the issues above, including many battery disconnects, manual trickle charges, fuse pulls, and one LVB BMS reset. But no dice...

My dealer has been responsive to getting me in for service, but my troubleshooting knowledge of this truck seems to be far greater than theirs at this point... So in the interest of not wasting my time dropping off the truck again without giving them some direction, I'm looking to the Lightning owner's hive for advice here!

Appreciate everyone's insights in advance!

-JB

The old school chime seems to happen if the Sync system is slow to boot up. I had the same issue with my ‘18 ICE truck and I’ve seen it on the Lightning. If I start the truck without my seat belt on the first couple of chimes would be old school but then it would switch. I’ve never seen the other audio problems you describe with the audio.

Do you have an OBD adapter? The one I linked below works well with the Lightning along with the Car Scanner app. With that you can monitor the LVB and see if things are working as expected. I also posted another thread about the 12V battery you can read here:

https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/ota-updates-and-the-low-voltage-battery.14887/

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[carys98]

This is a screen I created in Car Scanner to monitor the LVB (ignore the values, it is in demo mode so it puts random numbers in). The top box is the SOC, the second shows if the inverter is on and charging the LVB, and the bottom two show the current on the 12V side and on the HVB side of the inverter.

 

[jwb02]

For the rain-sensing wipers, did you check that the sensor was affixed properly?
https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/“rain-sensing”-wipers-don’t-work.12199/page-2

I also notice the "old school" chime from time to time. It always resets itself after a start stop cycle. I've been trying to figure out what triggers the chime to change but I have not pinpointed the issue. I have never done any SYNC reset, LVB disconnect, or fuse pull - everything seems to fix itself at the next start cycle. I've had 3 instances where my drivers side speakers weren't working for any audio - CarPlay, radio, etc. They also came back after the next start cycle. I also have experienced glitchy 15" screen (going black and restarting) as well as dash screen (vertical discolored lines), once again this resolved itself after a start stop cycle.

I did check the sensor... It was installed correctly. The dealer also looked at it and claimed to have fixed it.

My chime has been incorrect since I bought the truck. The only time I heard the correct chime was after I fulled fuse #28. It went back to the dashboard chime after the next start stop cycle.

As far as my screen, it's glitchy nearly ever stop/start. I really think these problems may be APIM-related.

 

[jwb02]

The old school chime seems to happen if the Sync system is slow to boot up. I had the same issue with my ‘18 ICE truck and I’ve seen it on the Lightning. If I start the truck without my seat belt on the first couple of chimes would be old school but then it would switch. I’ve never seen the other audio problems you describe with the audio.

Do you have an OBD adapter? The one I linked below works well with the Lightning along with the Car Scanner app. With that you can monitor the LVB and see if things are working as expected. I also posted another thread about the 12V battery you can read here:

https://www.f150lightningforum.com/forum/threads/ota-updates-and-the-low-voltage-battery.14887/

OBDLink CX Bimmercode Bluetooth 5.1 BLE OBD2 Adapter for BMW/Mini, Works with iPhone/iOS & Android, Car Coding, OBD II Diagnostic Scanner
https://a.co/d/2G2xVax

I did see your thread earlier this week and it gives me some hope! The only troubleshooting item from your list that I have not performed is to completely remove and trickle charge the LVB and re-install. I do have an ODB. And it never dawned on me that I could check the LVB charge with it..

Although now that 4.1.2 is out, I may give the dealer another shot at manually installing that and see if that fixes the issue.

 

[urbanstyles]

Lending my experience to this issue. I too have the old school chimes and have had all except for a single instance in my two months of owning my '23 Platinum. I have software version 4.2.2.2 and the issue still remains. I tried pulling fuse #28 as suggested and that worked, for two start/drive/stop cycles and then things reverted back to the old tones from the gauges again.

I'll continue to pull the fuse and see if I can narrow things down at all as to a cause.

 

[jwb02]

Still no fix for me on the door chimes several dealer trips later. The other day, I connected a trailer (and its wiring) and briefly heard the correct chimes, but otherwise haven’t heard them unless fuse 28 is removed. It definitely seems to be a LVB system issue…

FWIW, I am also still on 4.1.1. No OTA updates since Jan 23rd. Something seems to be clearly wrong with the truck there. Although the last trip to the dealer did fix the FordPass connectivity. And auto windshield wipers were also fixed.

Really, really wish I had the new Sync UI. The camera inaccessibility within the old UI that I’m stuck with is maddening, especially given the fact that it is fixed with an OTA update for others. I’ve been pretty patient so far with getting these issues fixed, but pretty disappointed with the lack of urgency or transparency Ford has shown.

 

[MickeyAO]

Still no fix for me on the door chimes several dealer trips later. The other day, I connected a trailer (and its wiring) and briefly heard the correct chimes, but otherwise haven’t heard them unless fuse 28 is removed. It definitely seems to be a LVB system issue…

FWIW, I am also still on 4.1.1. No OTA updates since Jan 23rd. Something seems to be clearly wrong with the truck there. Although the last trip to the dealer did fix the FordPass connectivity. And auto windshield wipers were also fixed.

Really, really wish I had the new Sync UI. The camera inaccessibility within the old UI that I’m stuck with is maddening, especially given the fact that it is fixed with an OTA update for others. I’ve been pretty patient so far with getting these issues fixed, but pretty disappointed with the lack of urgency or transparency Ford has shown.

Have you thought about updating it through FDRS? I wasn't getting updates (kept getting failed notices in Oasis) so I went the FDRS route to get the updated UI. After catching up on all the module updates, I started to get OTAs these last two days and just got updated to 4.2.4

 

[astricklin]

It definitely seems to be a LVB system issue…

Get a new one and see if it resolves the issues.

 

[Labs4Lightning]

Still no fix for me on the door chimes several dealer trips later. The other day, I connected a trailer (and its wiring) and briefly heard the correct chimes, but otherwise haven’t heard them unless fuse 28 is removed. It definitely seems to be a LVB system issue…

FWIW, I am also still on 4.1.1. No OTA updates since Jan 23rd. Something seems to be clearly wrong with the truck there. Although the last trip to the dealer did fix the FordPass connectivity. And auto windshield wipers were also fixed.

Really, really wish I had the new Sync UI. The camera inaccessibility within the old UI that I’m stuck with is maddening, especially given the fact that it is fixed with an OTA update for others. I’ve been pretty patient so far with getting these issues fixed, but pretty disappointed with the lack of urgency or transparency Ford has shown.

@jwb02 like @MickeyAO suggested.

my experience:

truck started assembly a year ago last week.
last successful update November 2nd: 3.5.4
December 19th DTE update statrted failing something 77 times before it did not re download from Ford. The download expired and it should have downloaded again with new expiration. Ford‘s help in this area was not helpful.

ota dept showed error and ford pass did too.

dealer was told not to update, my error “would just go away and downloads would happen.

nuttin’ honey. Spent 55 days at dealer over 5 visits. hmmmm. Sent home with error message.

did not want to lose more days at dealer.

picked up Mongoose interface from Amazon and 2 day FDRS license from motorcraft. Documented well here in forum.

did all the updates. Probably close to 5 hours in all. The sync update required usb drive to install and that took 40 minutes to xfer to usb stick. ( ran into a small hiccup here: windows 10 & 11 use an updated way of marking the drive, i got usb not recognized by truck - took about 20 minutes for me to research and make it compatible with truck)

had an error message during sync update, which turned out to be server issue, cleared later in the day. Nice guy in forum was super duper helpful, otherwise easy but time consuming.

have updated Sync interface and error message cleared.(4 months with error)

FYI they aren’t labeled 4.1.x nor DTE etc. . . . But they are the updates.

about $550 for the mongoose and $53 for the fdrs license. I completed updates on 4/21.

oh and don’t forget sizeable battery charger. No trickle charger here.

 

[TaxmanHog]

The sync update required usb drive to install and that took 40 minutes to xfer to usb stick. ( ran into a small hiccup here: windows 10 & 11 use an updated way of marking the drive, i got usb not recognized by truck - took about 20 minutes for me to research and make it compatible with truck)

Which drive formatting method was used on the USB drive that made it work with the truck?

 

[jwb02]

Lending my experience to this issue. I too have the old school chimes and have had all except for a single instance in my two months of owning my '23 Platinum. I have software version 4.2.2.2 and the issue still remains. I tried pulling fuse #28 as suggested and that worked, for two start/drive/stop cycles and then things reverted back to the old tones from the gauges again.

I'll continue to pull the fuse and see if I can narrow things down at all as to a cause.

did you ever find a solution to the "old school chimes" by chance? As if they aren't bad enough as-is, mine are also sounding distorted lately... The chimes, and my truck's inability to download the updated GUI, are downright maddening after nearly a year of ownership.

 

[urbanstyles]

did you ever find a solution to the "old school chimes" by chance? As if they aren't bad enough as-is, mine are also sounding distorted lately... The chimes, and my truck's inability to download the updated GUI, are downright maddening after nearly a year of ownership.

I did not. My anecdotal experience gave me the new updated chimes maybe 1 in 50 start cycles. This was regardless of how much time I gave the Sync system to start up or didn't. I've given up on it and just gotten used the old chimes. Having to patiently wait to start and drive the truck isn't workable. I unlock, get in, start the truck and am in reverse out of the driveway in less than 5 seconds. It's frustrating that the tech in this truck can't keep up with that.

 

[jwb02]

Yep, exact same experience… dealer tells me it’s “normal.” Yet every other Lightning I’ve ever been in has the newer chimes every time. Is your truck getting OTA updates? Mine has not had one since May. Old Sync GUI also.

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