Have you ever seen your motor or battery temperature gauges move?

[Texas Dan]

My gauges always indicate right in middle regardless of how far I've driven, how much and what speed I've charged or what the temperature outside is. The owner's manual really says nothing about these gauges other than they exist. Are these gauges just a placebo designed to make us think we know what the battery and motor temperatures are?

There has been a lot of talk about pre-conditioning the battery pack. How do we even know that the battery pack needs pre-conditioning if the battery temperature gauge does not tell us the battery is cold? Is there a switch or something I didn't turn that will make my gauges work?

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[TaxmanHog]

My gauges always indicate right in middle regardless of how far I've driven, how much and what speed I've charged or what the temperature outside is. The owner's manual really says nothing about these gauges other than they exist. Are these gauges just a placebo designed to make us think we know what the battery and motor temperatures are?

There has been a lot of talk about pre-conditioning the battery pack. How do we even know that the battery pack needs pre-conditioning if the battery temperature gauge does not tell us the battery is cold? Is there a switch or something I didn't turn that will make my gauges work?

If everything is working well on the truck it generally stays smack dab in the middle, more likely the case for folks in the south this time of year.

I've noticed a few screen grabs from folks in the north where the battery temp is showing slightly below midpoint after cold soaking without being plugged in.

 

[GDN]

Only once or twice in the summer after a DCFC charging session I've seen the battery go a bit beyond half way. For the most part they don't move. Truly leads you to believe they don't work as we know that battery temp in the winter start up isn't the same as it is in the middle of summer after driving a few hundred miles.

 

[Phineas Magliozzi]

Four days after my previous Lightning was returned to me after a couple of battery module replacements, my motor temperature shot up and initiated the requisite bells and whistles. Back to the dealer it went, evidently it took four days of driving and a couple hundred miles to move a bubble of air through the hydronic system. They topped up the system and everything was fine after that.

 

[Heliian]

I can tell you that the gauges work and so does preconditioning.

You will only start to notice it around 5degC and it really shows below 0degC

Once the battery gets cold enough then the available power reduces to 95, 92, 89, 88, 82 percent. At that point you'll see the batt temp gauge below the nominal line.

The motor temp shows low when its cold but that system stabilizes real quick.

 

[Monkey]

Ì have only seen my temp gauges move a wee bit after being parked for several hours temps well below freezing. Perhaps I’d see more if the truck was not kept in our garage. So I’m not really sure what the point of the gauges is. It would be nice if they were more sensitive or indicative of temps that truly affect range. The truck does a great job in its battery usage graph showing how much is lost to cold weather. It’s not like the data isn’t there.

 

[Lightning Rod]

The gages work. I was pulling a camper trailer (about 8300 lbs) and I didn't tell the truck that I'd attached a trailer. I drove it about 60 miles until I looked down at the dash cluster (no audible warning ) and saw that the battery gage was at about 80-85 percent, and it had an amber color instead of the normal blue.

There's a lot more to the story, but I'll tell it in a full thread, soon.

 

[Ekiehn]

Only time for me was in the middle of summer, around 100 something degrees outside, after a long drive and about a 30 minute DCFC charging session... Battery temp went up a pretty good amount.. Got back on the highway and probably about 5 minutes later was back to normal...

 

[queuewho]

In the home assistant integration that outputs a lot of the numbers behind the gauges, it seems that the coolant temp is bogus and stays at exactly 59.0 F.

The battery temperature data point seems to be real, however, and it moves around a fair bit.

 

[brewski]

No. I'm in the south.

 

[brgzls]

My coolant temp has always stayed the same in the middle since I received my truck but I did have my battery temp almost hit the top when I was towing over 9000lbs in Arizona summer with temps over 120F after DCFC. Did not get a warning but noticed that I was not getting full power throttle midway and looked at the cluster and saw that it was amber. I pulled over safely, turned off the car, waited exactly 1 minute and it went back to normal. Continued trip as nothing had happened and had no problems since. As for normal driving, have not seen any of the gauges move.

 

[ridgebackpilot]

The gages work. I was pulling a camper trailer (about 8300 lbs) and I didn't tell the truck that I'd attached a trailer. I drove it about 60 miles until I looked down at the dash cluster (no audible warning ) and saw that the battery gage was at about 80-85 percent, and it had an amber color instead of the normal blue.

There's a lot more to the story, but I'll tell it in a full thread, soon.

At the risk of hijacking the thread, how do you tow a trailer legally without the truck knowing it?

Whenever I plug a trailer into the truck, the Lightning automatically goes into towing mode. Did you disable that system, and if so, why? Or did you just tow the trailer without the lights plugged in?

 

[PreservedSwine]

Gauges on most modern cars are not an accurate representation of the current temp status, although after reading a few replies perhaps the f150 lightning may buck that trend. Most modern temp gauges are nothing more than glorified idiot lights. The electronic t-stat accurately interprets the resistance from the thermistors, but then the gauges are not programmed to go up and down according the the variation in temp- but rather stay in the middle until a pre-programmed threshold is crossed- then the gauge will skyrocket to high.
I understand why manufacturers do this- I’m sure if your neighbors/family members identical car is always reading different than yours- but within manufacturers spec- people will call and ask about it.
There’s usually a simple evaluation tool to see the actual numbers.

 

[cowboys1870]

My battery temp gauge will read just a bit high of center when it’s ~100F, even after being parked for hours, and will remain so until ambient temperatures decrease.

The temp it gets too seems to not be hot enough to trigger cooling.

 

[Wattsgas]

I've wondered about these gauges too. Especially after our Rivian enabled tracking motor and battery temperatures. There seems to be a lot of changes to both. I have seen the Ford gauges move after fast charging. I also saw a little move in the battery temperature when the truck was parked overnight outside in 30 degree weather. But it only went off center about a 1/16 of an inch. I have been wondering if anyone has seen the changes with an auxiliary plug in monitor. The gauge seems to be a little bit more like the idiot lights of the 60s and 70s.

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