Confirmed: Preconditioning matters

[sotek2345]

You can't, because you're not plugged in.

Correct - if you are not plugged in, the truck will just precondition the cabin for you are the assigned time.

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[hturnerfamily]

even though I'm in the deep south, west central GEORGIA, yesterday morning we had temps in the high 30s, when I went to see some customers. The guessometer was very LOW to start with, though it didn't deter me, because I've owned several Nissan LEAFS that give some similar 'cold start' feedback.
When, though, after 30+ one-way miles, and several stops at customers, I still came to almost the same overall 2.4 to 2.5 m/kwh when back home, just like most any other day. The first 10-20 miles showed only 1.8 to 1.9 m/kwh, but that all evened out in the end.

There was no preconditioning.

 

[antimatterparticle]

Unfortunately this is not an accurate view of things. The fact that the miles on the guessometer increase does not mean much. You could have achieved the same result by putting the truck on a climate controlled garage.

 

[Stlww18]

Unfortunately this is not an accurate view of things. The fact that the miles on the guessometer increase does not mean much. You could have achieved the same result by putting the truck on a climate controlled garage.

That's kind of the point....putting it in a climate controlled garage keeps the batteries warmer and increases available energy. Since I can't park in garage, I precondition the batteries, which makes them warmer and releases more available energy in storage. Given that the GOM uses the same mi/kwh in either situation, the increase in range must come from an increased amount of available energy in the battery.

 

[antimatterparticle]

That's kind of the point....putting it in a climate controlled garage keeps the batteries warmer and increases available energy. Since I can't park in garage, I precondition the batteries, which makes them warmer and releases more available energy in storage. Given that the GOM uses the same mi/kwh in either situation, the increase in range must come from an increased amount of available energy in the battery.

the issue is that is calculating based on those parameter. It really depends on how far you drive. This is beneficial on short commutes because the truck will consume a large amount of energy heating things up. But on a long drive, the gain will be minimal.

it is good to precondition in certain situations, but your way of looking at it is not accurate. (If you actually drove those 200 miles with or without preconditioning you would see why)

 

[TaxmanHog]

If I check on the Allow start when vehicle is unplugged does the truck condition only the cabin and not the battery?

 

[Pioneer74]

If I check on the Allow start when vehicle is unplugged does the truck condition only the cabin and not the battery?

I tried it once. My truck was cold and not "running" when I came out of work. So I deleted it from my departure times.

Now, Ford has an option on their ICE vehicles called Scheduled Start. It operates the same as a departure time. I would hope, if the departure time is dependent on being plugged in, we would eventually get the Scheduled Start feature.

 

[MVS87]

Correct - if you are not plugged in, the truck will just precondition the cabin for you are the assigned time.

Would preferred charge times interfere with this? For instance if I have a charge time scheduled for 12-8 but a departure time set for 8:15, would the truck start but not pull in a charge at the same time? I think that's how I may have goofed on preconditioning mine. For tomorrow I changed the charge window to end at 9 so my departure time falls within the charging window.

 

[sotek2345]

Would preferred charge times interfere with this? For instance if I have a charge time scheduled for 12-8 but a departure time set for 8:15, would the truck start but not pull in a charge at the same time? I think that's how I may have goofed on preconditioning mine. For tomorrow I changed the charge window to end at 9 so my departure time falls within the charging window.

Correct, it will not pull power outside of your charging window. Set you departure for 8am. Truck should still be fine to go at 8:15.

 

[RickLightning]

the issue is that is calculating based on those parameter. It really depends on how far you drive. This is beneficial on short commutes because the truck will consume a large amount of energy heating things up. But on a long drive, the gain will be minimal.

it is good to precondition in certain situations, but your way of looking at it is not accurate. (If you actually drove those 200 miles with or without preconditioning you would see why)

You could not be more wrong. If you do a 200 mile drive with preconditioning, vs one without, you will have a noticeable increase in range. I have posted an example with actual data.

 

[vandy1981]

You could not be more wrong. If you do a 200 mile drive with preconditioning, vs one without, you will have a noticeable increase in range. I have posted an example with actual data.

Agreed. It takes a lot of energy to warm the battery and that make a big difference in overall efficiency unless you're amortizing it over a super long trip.

Lithium batteries are most efficient around 70F-75F. A cold battery will be less efficient due to the higher resistance of the battery pack.

Preconditioning when plugged in moves the battery to a more efficient temperature before departure so that energy is not expended for battery heating on the road. It also warms the cabin, but that's arguably less important from an efficiency perspective than the battery warming.

A warm battery also allows you to recoup more regenerative braking energy.

 

[NoCharge]

Does anyone have an estimate as to how many kwh’s are used on average while preconditioning in a garage at say 35 degrees with the cabin setting to medium? My SmartCharge program through my electric co-op allows unlimited charging ($35/mo) from 9pm to 5am. My departure time would be 8am. Any charging outside of the 9-5 is considered on peak to the tune of about $.36/kWh. Would the battery cool off considerably if I set the departure time to 5am or should I just bite the bullet for the winter and pay the on peak rate for the preconditioning at 8?

 

[Fryballin]

Curious in the diminishing returns as well. Especially as many of us here in NE experience cold that would warrant preconditioning but are paying >$0.30 per kWh at home. At a certain point it won't be worth preconditioning. Obviously worth it if I'm trying to squeeze maximum range, but if I know I only have a short commute that day I will probably just remote heat the cab as you mention.

So I don't see how preconditioning the truck with a departure time costs any more money than waiting until you leave and then warming the cabin and letting the truck condition the battery pack off battery power.

Either way you choose you have to use energy to warm the cabin and condition the battery.

Lets make up numbers to show what I mean.

So if it takes 5 kWh of energy to precondition the cabin and the battery while plugged in, then its going to take 5 kWh of energy out of the battery to do the same once you leave (assuming the truck still has to get the battery temp up when the truck is started and also you set the same climate controls for the cabin temps in either scenario).

Whether the 5 kWh of energy comes from the charger during pre-conditioning in the morning or you return home with 5 less kWh (because you didn't precondition), you still have to put that 5 kWh of energy back into the battery from the home charger.

The only exception is if time of use charges apply in your area early in the morning and thus you are spending more per kWh preconditioning at 7:45 AM than you would have justing charging the battery during off peak hours.

 

[TaxmanHog]

Does anyone have an estimate as to how many kwh’s are used on average while preconditioning in a garage at say 35 degrees with the cabin setting to medium? My SmartCharge program through my electric co-op allows unlimited charging ($35/mo) from 9pm to 5am. My departure time would be 8am. Any charging outside of the 9-5 is considered on peak to the tune of about $.36/kWh. Would the battery cool off considerably if I set the departure time to 5am or should I just bite the bullet for the winter and pay the on peak rate for the preconditioning at 8?

Starting point on meter of detached garage service.

Preconditioning started with outside temps around 37º, I did not capture an image but the projected range before the preconditioning was only 250 mi, but after it increased to 253 mi.

This ran for 20 minutes from 07:55 to 08:15 then stopped.
Consuming ~1 kWh, the pace of energy consumption is about ~3kWh.

Our energy cost is $0.26 a kWh, the Charge Smart app I used does not recognize the energy used to generate a TOU credit of $0.03 because the truck was already at set SOC of 90%, so actual cost was $0.26 to precondition the truck.

If I had preconditioned while not connected to shore power, I would have lost ~2. to 2.4 miles of range depending on efficiencies, but the next charge cycle would have been covered under the TOU credit rate of $0.23, a trivial difference of 3 cents IMHO.

I'll test preconditioning Saturday morning while not connected to shore power, to see what the change of predicted range will be.

 

[RickLightning]

Starting point on meter of detached garage service.


Preconditioning started with outside temps around 37º, I did not capture an image but the projected range before the preconditioning was only 250 mi, but after it increased to 253 mi.


This ran for 20 minutes from 07:55 to 08:15 then stopped.
Consuming ~1 kWh, the pace of energy consumption is about ~3kWh.


Our energy cost is $0.26 a kWh, the Charge Smart app I used does not recognize the energy used to generate a TOU credit of $0.03 because the truck was already at set SOC of 90%, so actual cost was $0.26 to precondition the truck.

If I had preconditioned while not connected to shore power, I would have lost ~2. to 2.4 miles of range depending on efficiencies, but the next charge cycle would have been covered under the TOU credit rate of $0.23, a trivial difference of 3 cents IMHO.

I'll test preconditioning Saturday morning while not connected to shore power, to see what the change of predicted range will be.

That seems way too little. Are you sure you set a Departure Time? And, did you do it the night before? In other words, if it's 7AM and you set a departure time for 7:30AM, that's not going to work right.

Did you set a departure time for 8:15AM the night before?

I used it a few times on my Mach-E. On one trip, it used almost 5kWh and took 1:20 to complete.

It will also choose to warm the battery on very cold nights, often for 15 minutes at a time. On my Mach-E, these hits were about 1.6kWh and infrequent.

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