Ford's Important Tip For Driving Your Lightning in the Cold: Preconditioning / Pre-Heat Your Battery

[TaxmanHog]

Which product do you use to retrieve this data?

Thanks.

Monitoring 240v power feed to my FCSP
Emporia Vue Home Energy Monitor with individual appliance meters – Emporia Energy

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[Danface]

One thing I've noticed when the battery is cold that it warms up quickly if I accelerate, coast and repeat for about 15 minutes (little hills in the road help too). It makes sense to me that this "surging" would do that but I wonder if it messes up the battery. I'd suppose that's unlikely seeing how "that's how it was built" so to speak.

 

[Grumpy2]

I have seen youtubers doing that prior to DC charging. Another example of why we need a "precondition now" option.

 

[RickLightning]

I call that "Grandma Mode". My Grandmother would step on the gas, then come totally off, then step on the gas, then come totally off. Great case of whiplash when you went for a ride with her.

 

[mags]

Monitoring 240v power feed to my FCSP
Emporia Vue Home Energy Monitor with individual appliance meters – Emporia Energy

I'm getting a Leviton panel this summer and can't wait to geek out on circuit-level monitoring

 

[Maxx]

One thing I've noticed when the battery is cold that it warms up quickly if I accelerate, coast and repeat for about 15 minutes (little hills in the road help too). It makes sense to me that this "surging" would do that but I wonder if it messes up the battery.

My guess is, it does mess up the battery. Even without winter condition considerations some manufacturers limit number of hard acceleration to protect the battery. When you accelerate hard, sometimes you will have to decelerate hard too which heats up your batter more but hi current charging (regen) a cold battery causes Lithium plating which over time can result in thermal runaway. How much time it takes for the stuff to hit the fan is a function of your pack and your luck. I try not to push my luck too much.

 

[Danface]

My guess is, it does mess up the battery. Even without winter condition considerations some manufacturers limit number of hard acceleration to protect the battery. When you accelerate hard, sometimes you will have to decelerate hard too which heats up your batter more but hi current charging (regen) a cold battery causes Lithium plating which over time can result in thermal runaway. How much time it takes for the stuff to hit the fan is a function of your pack and your luck. I try not to push my luck too much.

I don't accelrsted quickly, more like "pulsing" rather than "flat" acceleration when driving and even going a little quicker up small hills and coasting down.

 

[Maxx]

I don't accelrsted quickly, more like "pulsing" rather than "flat" acceleration when driving and even going a little quicker up small hills and coasting down.

This is power going in and out of my battey in 1.5 hr drive on a warmer day. I don’t believe Ford limits any of these in cold days. You can see regen is like DCFC hitting 100 KW. and in one occasion acceleration pulled 260 KW. I don’t remember how much flooring it pulls. Just wanted to give you some numbers for reference.

 

[WoodduckMN]

Wish @Ford Motor Company would allow us to set charging to be completed for a set departure time like Tesla and Chevy do. Then the battery would be warm at the time of departure. Rather than setting a charging start time, set the daily departure time and let the computer in the truck determine when it needs to start charging to be ready for the departure time. Works great on my Bolt and Tesla.

 

[Danface]

Thanks! It would be interesting to log the change of battery temperature as it relates to different driving "styles". I now have my charger hooked up so I let that maintain the battery in the winter.

 

[Danface]

Wish @Ford Motor Company would allow us to set charging to be completed for a set departure time like Tesla and Chevy do. Then the battery would be warm at the time of departure. Rather than setting a charging start time, set the daily departure time and let the computer in the truck determine when it needs to start charging to be ready for the departure time. Works great on my Bolt and Tesla.

Add to that a "Condition the battery now" button and I would use the Ford app! It would be like "hmmm, we're leaving in 15 minutes so maybe ready the truck?"

 

[Maxx]

Thanks! It would be interesting to log the change of battery temperature as it relates to different driving "styles". I now have my charger hooked up so I let that maintain the battery in the winter.

I just did a 25 min drive. I put a DCFC in the navigation and this is the change in my battey temp. I think a little rise may be due mostly to driving (acceleration and deceleration) not Navigation but I can't think of a way of knowing for sure other than repeated experimentation.

 

[SmoothJ]

What I find fascinating is that different manufacturers have different guards in place. We have two OpenEVSEs, and I am able to tracks the power output. The F150L doesn't take a little bit at a time, it just warms it up at the full 30+Amps for X minutes and turns itself off. While my Wife's Bolt take a bit each time every few hours.

Outside temp ~5F.

The first jump is heating up the battery pack, while the second large jump is the pre-con.

EDIT: I just realized that some of my values are off regarding the AMP draw. Regardless, my Wife's Bolt conditions more frequently regardless.

This is the pre-con zoomed in: