Ford Quality

[ClevelandBeemer]

Sorry but that randomness DOES sound like it could be a 12v battery or 12v system issue.

I think it’s worth a conversation. If my monitoring method shows 13.1 to 13.3v when parked and the truck off for hours, how’s that misleading?

Also how is the 15v when running misleading? Does that not mean that the dc to dc inverter is charging the battery as it should?

FYI, I have a trickle charger which I’ve placed on the 12v before, just to rule out this very thing. Guess what still happens? Through this forum and other sites I’ve also received feedback that other non-EV Fords have this same issue. Ford’s that have much more robust 12v batteries. Is it possible in all cases, the 12v could be low? Perhaps. Is it likely? No.

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[Dahveed]

I think it’s worth a conversation. If my monitoring method shows 13.1 to 13.3v when parked and the truck off for hours, how’s that misleading?

Also how is the 15v when running misleading? Does that not mean that the dc to dc inverter is charging the battery as it should?

FYI, I have a trickle charger which I’ve placed on the 12v before, just to rule out this very thing. Guess what still happens? Through this forum and other sites I’ve also received feedback that other non-EV Fords have this same issue. Ford’s that have much more robust 12v batteries. Is it possible in all cases, the 12v could be low? Perhaps. Is it likely? No.

My 2020 Ranger that I had before the Lightning did the same thing, like you just mentioned. Just one of those things, I guess. I never put a lot of thought into it. It shuts up so quick that I wasn't too concerned about it.

 

[chl]

I think it’s worth a conversation. If my monitoring method shows 13.1 to 13.3v when parked and the truck off for hours, how’s that misleading?

Also how is the 15v when running misleading? Does that not mean that the dc to dc inverter is charging the battery as it should?

FYI, I have a trickle charger which I’ve placed on the 12v before, just to rule out this very thing. Guess what still happens? Through this forum and other sites I’ve also received feedback that other non-EV Fords have this same issue. Ford’s that have much more robust 12v batteries. Is it possible in all cases, the 12v could be low? Perhaps. Is it likely? No.

1) Terminal voltage is not the same as voltage under load and the terminal voltage will "settle down" as someone else mentioned above some time after the charging - read the thread that I posted the link to about the nuances of AGM batteries if you want more info

2) 15v may be charging the 12v but will it top it off to 100% - not necessarily and probably not

3) Which Fords? Do they have as much parasitic draw as the Lightning? Do they use a BMS like the Lightning and other F-150's?

Yes it is an EV issue - my 2012 Nissan Leaf is always on a maintainer after the first time it ran down too low to start the Leaf a month or two after I bought it in 2011 - yes that 12v battery is now 14+ years old and still starts the Leaf and things run fine - because it is always on a maintainer when not in use.

But it is also an F-150 ICE issue - plenty of YouTube videos about it.

The trouble seems to be the 12v system BMS - it never really tops off the battery, and then as a result, sulfates can become permanent and over time build up on the plates, and when charging, because the BMS let the battery get so far discharged, the charging currents are very high which can lead to venting and loss of water, both of which lead to early demise of a battery that could last 14 years (like my Nissan Leaf AGM).

A battery maintainer will top off the battery using a trickle of a charge 1A for example, so it will result in sulfates NOT becoming permanent and charging currents NOT being excessively high.

Using a maintainer once in a while is not necessarily good enough.

Like I said, it might be the 12v battery - it could also be another problem in the 12v system, like the broken/shorting or disconnected wire mentioned in post 14 of the thread that @chriserx mentioned.

Of course it could be the HVB battery management system or some other component in the mix.

All I meant was determining the real SOC and SOH of the 12v battery is difficult and probably unreliable with sensing every 5 minutes or so. Would have to take it out and load test it to be sure it is healthy.

 

[ClevelandBeemer]

1) Terminal voltage is not the same as voltage under load and the terminal voltage will "settle down"

2) 15v may be charging the 12v but will it top it off to 100% - not necessarily and probably not

3) Which Fords? Do they have as much parasitic draw as the Lightning? Do they use a BMS like the Lightning and other F-150's?

Yes it is an EV issue - my 2012 Nissan Leaf is always on a maintainer after the first time it ran down too low to start the Leaf a month or two after I bought it in 2011 - yes that 12v battery is now 14+ years old and still starts the Leaf and things run fine - because it is always on a maintainer when not in use.

But it is also an F-150 ICE issue - plenty of YouTube videos about it.

Hey there! Tis been a long week but I’m finally circling back to this.

1. Yep, I understand voltage sag under load. That said after scouring my logs, I can’t find any voltages lower than 12.6v. It seems to update fairly quickly, potentially as little as every 15 seconds based on me rapidly updating my tracker. In fact, I see that the battery is currently at 15.4v with the truck plugged into its EVSE in for about 30 minutes or so.

2. You are 100% correct. Scanning via OBDII just shows the SoC the BMS thinks the 12v battery is at. That said, it’s the data point I have. The BMS has to be semi-accurate or we’d see more 12v catastrophic failures of Motorcraft 12v batteries.

3. I’ve seen people mention the ICE F150, Mach E, and 2024 Escape.

Again, I’m not sure this is a 12v issue. I don’t doubt, that a 12v with super low SoC could cause such goofy behavior, yet all signs point to adequate SoC from my 12v battery. I’ve driven German cars for over 29 years and I’m hyper familiar of the electrical gremlins that surface when the 12v SoC is too low. In the three times I’ve experienced this, I’ve been able to meter the battery at 11v or lower. That’s not the case with my current battery.

 

[PJnc284]

In fact, I see that the battery is currently at 15.4v with the truck plugged into its EVSE in for about 30 minutes or so.

When the truck is actively charging the hvb, it will charge the 12v. Yours must not sit very much if you're usually seeing 13.1. I barely saw that immediately after shutting the truck off much less now that I have a hardwired dashcam.

Yesterday I drove to work, didn't charge, went to lunch and then went home. Looks like it dropped about 12.5V-12.6V overnight. Was 18F when I left this morning. Went to work this morning and charged where the voltage was floating around 13.5V. My drives are fairly short so doesn't do a great job of keeping the 12V topped up. At this point the battery is a little over 2 year old.

 

[ClevelandBeemer]

When the truck is actively charging the hvb, it will charge the 12v. Yours must not sit very much if you're usually seeing 13.1. I barely saw that immediately after shutting the truck off much less now that I have a hardwired dashcam.

Yesterday I drove to work, didn't charge, went to lunch and then went home. Looks like it dropped about 12.5V-12.6V overnight. Was 18F when I left this morning. Went to work this morning and charged where the voltage was floating around 13.5V. My drives are fairly short so doesn't do a great job of keeping the 12V topped up. At this point the battery is a little over 2 year old.

Nice! Out of curiosity what are you using to track voltage?

One important detail I’ve left out is my battery is only 1 year old. I have nothing aftermarket that’s drawing power from the battery with the truck powered off sans the tracker.

 

[PJnc284]

It's an el-cheapo monitor from Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MT4583U

 

[chl]

Hey there! Tis been a long week but I’m finally circling back to this.

1. Yep, I understand voltage sag under load. That said after scouring my logs, I can’t find any voltages lower than 12.6v. It seems to update fairly quickly, potentially as little as every 15 seconds based on me rapidly updating my tracker. In fact, I see that the battery is currently at 15.4v with the truck plugged into its EVSE in for about 30 minutes or so.

2. You are 100% correct. Scanning via OBDII just shows the SoC the BMS thinks the 12v battery is at. That said, it’s the data point I have. The BMS has to be semi-accurate or we’d see more 12v catastrophic failures of Motorcraft 12v batteries.

3. I’ve seen people mention the ICE F150, Mach E, and 2024 Escape.

Again, I’m not sure this is a 12v issue. I don’t doubt, that a 12v with super low SoC could cause such goofy behavior, yet all signs point to adequate SoC from my 12v battery. I’ve driven German cars for over 29 years and I’m hyper familiar of the electrical gremlins that surface when the 12v SoC is too low. In the three times I’ve experienced this, I’ve been able to meter the battery at 11v or lower. That’s not the case with my current battery.

1) 12.6v for an AGM is not fully charged, but more like 85%.

2) the real question is how long can it hold that charge...so to determine that you generally need to wait an hour or so after a charge and measure the drop in terminal voltage that occurred, if more than a few tenths of a volt, the battery is suspect.

3) maybe the battery is ok, and it is a different 12v system issue, like a bad wire causing an intermittent connection, or some module connected to the BMS gone south?

4) there have just been so many issues like this that turn out to be the battery or some connector/wiring, that is where I always start.

5) I keep my battery on a maintainer whenever it is not being used, and I have never had any of these issue since I started doing that - maybe just luck, or maybe it is an effective preventative. like taking vitamins every day?

Anyway, hope you get to the bottom of it and let us know what was wrong!

 

[ClevelandBeemer]

1) 12.6v for an AGM is not fully charged, but more like 85%.

2) the real question is how long can it hold that charge...so to determine that you generally need to wait an hour or so after a charge and measure the drop in terminal voltage that occurred, if more than a few tenths of a volt, the battery is suspect.

3) maybe the battery is ok, and it is a different 12v system issue, like a bad wire causing an intermittent connection, or some module connected to the BMS gone south?

4) there have just been so many issues like this that turn out to be the battery or some connector/wiring, that is where I always start.

5) I keep my battery on a maintainer whenever it is not being used, and I have never had any of these issue since I started doing that - maybe just luck, or maybe it is an effective preventative. like taking vitamins every day?

Anyway, hope you get to the bottom of it and let us know what was wrong!

1. 12.65 is an outlier and by far the lowest I’ve seen. 95% of the time the 12v SoC is 13.1v or higher.

2. My truck has been parked outside and off plug for 3+ days. The current 12v SoC is 13.1v.

3. Totally possible. The system is certainly susceptible to this. I was getting low battery alerts and low voltage intervention within the first month of having the truck. This also coincided with the exterior button of the frunk intermittently not working. Turns out water got into the button harness causing a short. Once the harness was replaced, the low voltage issues went away.

4. I totally get it. I just try to encourage people to be aware of confirmation bias.

5. I’ve thought about doing this, but I don’t want to mess with connecting the truck daily to my maintainer. My feeling is these issues are always going to be present due to all the modules being utilized. Ford switching to a more unified compute strategy will solve most of the tech issues with this truck.

 

[chl]

5. I’ve thought about doing this, but I don’t want to mess with connecting the truck daily to my maintainer. My feeling is these issues are always going to be present due to all the modules being utilized. Ford switching to a more unified compute strategy will solve most of the tech issues with this truck.

Some of us owners on this forum have made it easy to plug in a maintainer by putting a wire near the CCS1 charge port - no harder to mess with than plugging in the CCS1 plug - actually easier!

I have my NOCO Genius1 plugged in inside my garage and run a 10ft SAE extension cable along side the CCS1 from my FCSP to the truck (the NOCO needs and adapter bc they use a proprietary connector):

The plastic bag kept the charge port area free from rain ice and snow. Below is a close up without the CCS1 FCSP plug and plastic:

That SAE fused cord is about 4-5ft long and connects to the battery - easy to route it from the charge port area to the battery compartment with the frunk open:

BYW, the other two wires added to the 6mm posts are for a different 12v charge outlet that I put inside the Frunk which I had been using before I ran a wire to my charge port. Just decided it'd be better not to leave the Frunk open to charge/maintain the 12v battery.

So... I think I am NOT going to have the "issues" of a dead battery leaving me stranded, warnings about power shedding, other weird warning and error messages and power downs, and failed OTAs that others have been seeing as their AGM battery slowly sinks below the voltage horizon of no return.

So far, so good.

As I have mentioned b4, I have a flooded battery that is still good (80% SOH) after 13.25 years - always on a maintainer except when driving the 2012 Nissan Leaf.

 

[proprepper]

One of things that really drives me crazy about this truck is when it reverts its bings and bongs back to the 8-bit or whatever the old school profile the truck is reverting to. (See video link below.

No I don’t believe it’s not a 12V issue, at the time when this clip was filmed the system was running at 15V and the 12V SoC was 100%.

Does anyone have any insight on why this happens? Perhaps @Ford Motor Company? In over 20 years of driving German I’ve never experienced so many software/hardware bugs in a vehicle…..

Video Link

My German designed, Mexican assembled 2004 VW Beetle has less bugs than this thing. Agreed !!

 

[Kansan]

2. My truck has been parked outside and off plug for 3+ days. The current 12v SoC is 13.1v.

There is something wrong with your voltage monitoring system if it’s reporting 13.1v after 3 days. Are you having to turn the truck in to see the voltage? Are there settings that you can adjust?

I use a Bluetooth battery monitor similar to what others have mentioned. I have one on every vehicle, including two current generation F150s. The Lightning rarely gets the at rest voltage to 13.0, it’s usually 12.9. The background load will draw down the battery every day. This is what a normal voltage graph looks like on a Lightning.

Your discussion is all centered around the idea that your battery is at a high SOC, but it is clear that it is not.

 

[ClevelandBeemer]

There is something wrong with your voltage monitoring system if it’s reporting 13.1v after 3 days. Are you having to turn the truck in to see the voltage? Are there settings that you can adjust?

I use a Bluetooth battery monitor similar to what others have mentioned. I have one on every vehicle, including two current generation F150s. The Lightning rarely gets the at rest voltage to 13.0, it’s usually 12.9. The background load will draw down the battery every day. This is what a normal voltage graph looks like on a Lightning.

Your discussion is all centered around the idea that your battery is at a high SOC, but it is clear that it is not.

I’m sorry, but your sample size of 1 does not suddenly mean my data is inaccurate…. Not long after my reply to Chl the voltage dropped to 13.0 and right now it’s sitting at 12.9v. Also keep in mind the first two days parked saw temps in the 50’s where the last two days the temps have dropped into the 20’s.

 

[Kansan]

I’m sorry, but your sample size of 1 does not suddenly mean my data is inaccurate…. Not long after my reply to Chl the voltage dropped to 13.0 and right now it’s sitting at 12.9v. Also keep in mind the first two days parked saw temps in the 50’s where the last two days the temps have dropped into the 20’s.

Just trying to help you get to the answer. I gave you accurate information - whether you believe it or not is up to you.

 

[ClevelandBeemer]

Just trying to help you get to the answer. I gave you accurate information - whether you believe it or not is up to you.

Saying my 12v SoC is not accurate because your 12v is different is not helpful. My multimeter readings have confirmed my monitors accuracy multiple times.

It’s important to note that your battery will likely be a lower voltage because it’s older than my battery. I have a 2025 and I see you have a 2024.

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