Frustration with charging windows

[saturnschildren]

I'm posting this mainly hoping that somebody from @Ford Motor Company reads this. I am very aware that my circumstances are not typical, I live in an off-grid house and for 9 months of the year I create a surplus of solar power which is thrown away once my house batteries are full. The battery bank of the truck is actually larger than the one in my house so I only want to charge during the day while the sun is out and the batteries are being replenished - essentially using the surplus solar that I would be throwing away to charge the truck. If the truck keeps charging over night it can severely drain my house batteries (this has happened twice now).

I have set up a charging window tied to my location of 8am - 6pm weekdays and weekends. The problem is that I'm only charging using 110V and so I don't get up to my max charge setting (85%) - and I don't care, I work from home, I have no departure times set, I am quite content for it to take multiple days to hit that max-charge level. The way the truck charging seems to work though is that if the max-charge setting isn't reached the truck keeps charging past the 6pm deadline.

I am aware that I could go down to the truck every day and plug/unplug it, I'm aware that I can use the Fordpass app to stop and start charging (though at least once now I have done this and for reasons I cannot figure out it has re-started charging in the middle of the night), it makes no sense to me that if there is a charging window and no departure time that the settings are not respected. It's possible I have set something incorrectly but I have been through this section of the manual multiple times and I'm pretty sure that I have it right.

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[Maquis]

I’m pretty sure that’s how it works - reaching the specified charge level has higher priority than the schedule.

Since you’re only using level 1, a cheap 15 amp timer switch could be used, set to shutoff at 6:00 PM. You will get a charge fault notification when it shuts off.

 

[saturnschildren]

I’m pretty sure that’s how it works

I'm sure that's how it works too, I just think how it works is dumb. I can see folks having a similar issue if they lived somewhere that had vastly different day and night electricity rates. Such a person might be perfectly content to have the truck take multiple nights to get up to a "full" charge, but without manual intervention they'll end up paying the higher rate for a chunk of the charging. In my opinion the default behaviour should be the opposite, respect my settings unless I say otherwise.

 

[beatle]

I know that I'd rather prioritize my SoC than a ToU rate. I'd hate it if I were planning a trip and the vehicle said "sorry, you're outside your window! Hope you don't mind DCFC a little more on the way!"

Why not install a 240v circuit? This would let you more easily charge inside your sun window. It is also far more efficient to charge than 120v so more energy actually makes it into the battery. I can't imagine having a vehicle with a 131kwh battery and charging it on 120v. Heck, I have a battery half that size now and it takes forever to fill on 120v.

 

[VTbuckeye]

I'm sure that's how it works too, I just think how it works is dumb. I can see folks having a similar issue if they lived somewhere that had vastly different day and night electricity rates. Such a person might be perfectly content to have the truck take multiple nights to get up to a "full" charge, but without manual intervention they'll end up paying the higher rate for a chunk of the charging. In my opinion the default behaviour should be the opposite, respect my settings unless I say otherwise.

I agree you. Charging on 120V would let you charge through a timer, but the truck should do that. We have an evse that has a charging schedule and you can adjust the amp available. I get a small discount 0.045 per kWh when charging between 9pm and 1pm. I can limit charging outside of that window and inside the window I can adjust the power available from 6amp to 30amp. We are getting grid tied solar with a 20kw battery this summer. When we over produce in the daytime in the summer I'd like to charge the cars, though not working from home means that it can't change on weekdays when the sun is out.

The charging schedule on the truck should be more important in priority than getting a full battery. Maybe they need a warning that you accept saying that vehicle battery may not be full based on the charging window, but if you tell it to charge between 8am and 6pm, then it should start at 0800 and stop at 1800 whether it is at the target charge level or not. The charge window should not mean start charging btwn 6 and 8 and stop when full (3 days later). That would be like telling a builder that you want a window 36 inches wide from here to here only to find half of your wall missing.

 

[RickLightning]

This has been an issue with Ford EVs/PHEVs for years. It's not going away.

The fix, as noted, is an outlet timer. I used a WiFi outlet and set it for the off-peak hours. In fact, I didn't get a charge fault as I recall.

The reasoning behind this is that people aren't smart enough to understand that the vehicle won't reach its desired level of charge by the designated time, so it has to start charging earlier (or immediately). If they gave a prompt and told you that, you'd have to either be in the car or look at the app. So instead, it just starts charging.

 

[saturnschildren]

Why not install a 240v circuit?

I have one installed - the issue is that the draw from the mobile charger far exceeds what my inverter can supply. I have looked at the aftermarket chargers but haven't found one yet that can dial the draw down low enough (~2.5 - 3A) to not cause my inverter to panic - especially when other incidental loads come online (like my 240V water pump).

 

[beatle]

Ah, in that case it sounds like a smart outlet like RickLightning suggested that can be turned on and off with a schedule is your best bet to set your window. You can even set those up to turn on and off with sunrise/sunset.

 

[RickLightning]

The benefit of using a WiFi outlet is the ability to change the hours, or programming, remotely (assuming there is WiFi there). If not, it still allows a schedule, and can be set, as noted, to things like Sundown, Sunrise, or even "15 minutes before sunrise".

 

[vandy1981]

I'm posting this mainly hoping that somebody from @Ford Motor Company reads this. I am very aware that my circumstances are not typical, I live in an off-grid house and for 9 months of the year I create a surplus of solar power which is thrown away once my house batteries are full. The battery bank of the truck is actually larger than the one in my house so I only want to charge during the day while the sun is out and the batteries are being replenished - essentially using the surplus solar that I would be throwing away to charge the truck. If the truck keeps charging over night it can severely drain my house batteries (this has happened twice now).

I have set up a charging window tied to my location of 8am - 6pm weekdays and weekends. The problem is that I'm only charging using 110V and so I don't get up to my max charge setting (85%) - and I don't care, I work from home, I have no departure times set, I am quite content for it to take multiple days to hit that max-charge level. The way the truck charging seems to work though is that if the max-charge setting isn't reached the truck keeps charging past the 6pm deadline.

I am aware that I could go down to the truck every day and plug/unplug it, I'm aware that I can use the Fordpass app to stop and start charging (though at least once now I have done this and for reasons I cannot figure out it has re-started charging in the middle of the night), it makes no sense to me that if there is a charging window and no departure time that the settings are not respected. It's possible I have set something incorrectly but I have been through this section of the manual multiple times and I'm pretty sure that I have it right.

Do you have a smart EVSE? Emporia makes an EVSE that has TOU management and the ability to meter charging based on solar surplus. I think it also supports 120v.

 

[tls]

It would be difficult to arrange with the mobile charge cord Ford offers (because they offer only 120V, 20A and 240V, 30A adapters), but, you could purchase a Gen1 or Gen2 Tesla UMC, a 240V, 15A adapter (these will limit current to 12A and hopefully avoid overloading your system), and a Jdapter Stub, TeslaTap, or similar. Then you could convert an existing 15A or 20A 120V circuit to 240V using the exact same wiring already in place and charge about 50% faster.

You could also use something like the Enbrighten 40A indoor/outdoor smart switch to control that 240V load so you could turn it on and off remotely.

These are silly workarounds you should not have to resort to, in my opinion, because Ford should throw away the charging functionality currently implemented in the car and app UIs and tell a better software engineering team to just make it work exactly like Tesla's does before changing anything. The Tesla UI makes everything you're after possible with none of these hacks.

 

[jefro]

If the OP said it continues to charge past schedule on L1 then I'd question if that is a feature of L2 and L1.

 

[Aces_Over_Kings]

I note all the proposed workarounds, but I do think this is good feedback for Ford. OP won't be alone with this request, and having a toggle switch in the software to choose between <prioritize SoC> or <prioritize charge window> seems fairly approachable as a solution.

 

[RickLightning]

I note all the proposed workarounds, but I do think this is good feedback for Ford. OP won't be alone with this request, and having a toggle switch in the software to choose between <prioritize SoC> or <prioritize charge window> seems fairly approachable as a solution.

As I said, this has been an issue for at least 4 years. Not something they'll likely change.

 

[Aces_Over_Kings]

As I said, this has been an issue for at least 4 years. Not something they'll likely change.

Probably true. But they're about to get a boatload of new EV customers. Tesla certainly has a headstart with software, so it'll be interesting to see if their sensitivity / responsiveness to feedback increases proportionally as they further invest in this space. OP seems a fringe case now, but solar has certainly risen in popularity lately. As more folks speak up, you never know.

Hope springs eternal, and all that.

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