Lightning Bluetooth Behavior Not Too Smart-Holds Onto Phone Connection When Driver Not In Truck

[Jim Lewis]

Again, my truck charges the LVB while it is plugged into the level 2 charger at home without me leaving the truck running. I park it and the LVB is around 85% at 6pm and in the morning the LVB is at 92-96% regularly.

OTH, If you don't drive your truck much, like me, it won't need to charge the HVB much and parasitic drain will win out and deplete the LVB. No different than an ICE vehicle in this regard. It's like the old high school algebra problem about the rate of bath tub filling vs. the draining rate and which wins out in the long run.

You brought this up originally in post #7 above and I have the same reply in post #10 as here.

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[Henry Ford]

So, if Apple includes the accessibility option in its upcoming AirPods to always route audio output to the AirPods but overrides this in various vehicles, there may be more disgruntled iOS users than just little old me. Ford (or Apple) should offer the option to turn off automatic phone audio routing to its vehicles.

It's Apple so they'll program AirPods to work perfectly in all situations and every other device to glitch continuously.

 

[husky10101]

Was gone for a bit over a month, left my truck plugged into my Ford charger while I was gone and the 12V battery was still fully charged at the same level when I got home as before I left. I checked both times to see if it was loosing charge when gone, and apparently the charger kept the 12V battery charged when I was gone.

 

[Jim Lewis]

Was gone for a bit over a month, left my truck plugged into my Ford charger while I was gone and the 12V battery was still fully charged at the same level when I got home as before I left.

Last time I checked, the truck LVB maintenance worked as follows:

The truck will drain the LVB charge for parasitic maintenance functions like security. When the LVB SOC drops to 40%, the truck will schedule a recharge for within 48 hours. If the LVB SOC drops to 30%, the truck will recharge the LVB immediately.

Online, the word is that it's not good for AGM lead acid batteries to go below 50% SOC. Staying at at least 70% to 80% is better. Ford recommends that for long-term storage of the truck, you actually disconnect the LVB so you don't have to go through the drain/recharge cycles (and drain the HVB slowly at the same time).

It's likely you just arrived home after your truck recharged the LVB to about the level you had when you left home.

I drive so little that my truck is essentially in storage. I keep it charged to 50% (charge to 80% for trips to Austin) and try not to go below 20% HVB SOC, and that works fine for me with no need for DCFC charging - haven't used it at all so far.

Postscript: I'm due for a BMS sensor replacement under the Ford CSP. Went into the dealer on 1/11/24 or so. Sensor on backorder. Contacted dealer in March. Still on backorder. Haven't heard from the dealer since...

 

[Jim Lewis]

That's the limitation of Bluetooth unfortunately. Bluetooth is archaic and is problematic across the spectrum of devices. It uses less energy than other current options and is so entrenched in society that it will be a long time before it goes anywhere.

....

Well, I've discovered some interesting things that I don't fully understand, but I'll come back to the idea that it's not a Bluetooth thing (simply the wrong, easy, convenient whipping boy...). Rather, it's a Ford/Apple programming decision that flies in the face of standard iOS procedures.

For one thing, my hearing aids and iPhone do not use standard Bluetooth protocols to communicate (amongst major hearing aid manufacturers, only Phonak and its related companies use standard Bluetooth SIG protocols in their HAs; classic BT audio is too energy-consuming in small devices like HAs that have small batteries). GN Resound developed a special proprietary low-energy 2.4 GHz communication protocol with Apple that all other HA OEMs except Phonak soon adopted (ReSound and other MFi HAs can't directly connect to standard BT source devices). The Made For iPhone (MFi) protocol came out in 2014. The iPhone will communicate with other devices, including Phonak HAs, using classic BT 2.x. So, my accessibility choice of ALWAYS HEARING DEVICES for phone and media audio is supposedly a restrictive choice if my HAs are connected to my iPhone only to use the MFi protocol and NEVER switch to iPhone routing. If I chose my iPhone as my routing choice, only then can the iPhone supposedly route the sound where it might otherwise want to go, e.g., to a wired headset or BT SIG output to a connected BT sound sink device.

The other thing is the choice of audio output is ostensibly regulated in iOS by AirPlay. You can go into Settings, General, AirPlay & Handoff, and under the menu choice "Automatically AirPlay," pick NEVER. The phone in the truck blithely ignores that setting when CarPlay is in operation on the truck SYNC screen and still sends all audio to the truck rather than my hearing aids as if the AirPlay NEVER switch choice to switch was meaningless.

Despite the above settings, Waze still plays through the truck's audio system.

Also, when CarPlay is in operation, it doesn't seem like Bluetooth is involved. Presumably, CarPlay and any iPhone apps are being wirelessly Wi-Fi projected to the SYNC screen by Ford's wireless app projection scheme. Even if Bluetooth was turned on under the SYNC screen Connectivity tab when CarPlay is operating, you'll find BT turned off there, and if you turn Bluetooth on again, the SYNC screen will announce that CarPlay will be rendered inoperative.

And sure enough, if you go to the Phone List tab and look under your phone, CarPlay is no longer selected, and it's gone off the SYNC screen. If you opt for phone connectivity on the Phone List, the BT signal appears on the tab for your phone, and the CarPlay icon goes off if it was on.

So, this is not a fault of Bluetooth behavior. It's a conscious decision by Ford and Apple based on the assumption that you bought this Ford vehicle with its expensive multi-speaker audio system. No one in their right mind would want to use another audio output device, so we can save ourselves some programming effort by not worrying about how accessibility choices for hearing devices are supposed to work or how AirPlay should work under iOS in a Ford vehicle.

After all, Henry Ford himself introduced the world to the concept that you can have any color of Model-T you want as long as it's black...

Since other folks in this thread have mentioned that other vehicles grab phone audio output, maybe it's a general auto industry trend, an offer Google and Apple can't refuse. If you want your OS in our vehicles through Android Auto or Apple CarPlay, you don't confuse our customers by making them choose audio output connections. You put our vehicle and its audio system front and center.

Postscript: A final thought might be to say that given the truck/phone electronics, it's just not possible to have an app visually displayed on the SYNC screen and have the phone route the appropriate corresponding audio via MFi to one's hearing devices or earbuds.

Contrary to that thought, I don't know how I did it, but last night, I actually had Waze displayed on my phone and my SYNC screen, and the audio was going to my HAs. I somehow arrived at a state where I could go to the Phone List and turn off CarPlay, but the Waze app did not disappear from the SYNC screen, and the sound was then routed to my HAs. Same for the MEDIA button in the Phone List for my iPhone. Pressing it on sent phone sound to the truck speakers, and turning it off routed phone sound to my hearing aids. I haven't been able to reproduce that state. But I think it shows with the right programming, phone audio output doesn't have to go to the same place that phone video output does. Also, if it's only audio output being routed, accessibility routing choice could and should be respected.

 

[Henry Ford]

After all, Henry Ford himself introduced the world to the concept that you can have any color of Model-T you want as long as it's black...

Funny, I don't recall saying that. These days I'm partial to Rapid Red.

Contrary to that thought, I don't know how I did it, but last night, I actually had Waze displayed on my phone and my SYNC screen, and the audio was going to my HAs. I somehow arrived at a state where I could go to the Phone List and turn off CarPlay, but the Waze app did not disappear from the SYNC screen, and the sound was then routed to my HAs. Same for the MEDIA button in the Phone List for my iPhone. Pressing it on sent phone sound to the truck speakers, and turning it off routed phone sound to my hearing aids. I haven't been able to reproduce that state. But I think it shows with the right programming, phone audio output doesn't have to go to the same place that phone video output does. Also, if it's only audio output being routed, accessibility routing choice could and should be respected.

Did you have it plugged in instead of connected wirelessly?

 

[Jim Lewis]

@Henry Ford. Very funny on the Rapid Red vs. Model-T black.

My TLDR summary should be that it seems the truck audio systems are allowed to seize phone audio output, whether by Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, regardless of iOS hearing device accessibiliy and AirPlay Automatic Switching settings that might normally restrict audio output to a designated device, e.g., hearing aids or earbuds, for example.

The night before and last night, I tried wired and wireless connections. The night before, I was operating wirelessly when I somehow managed to get Waze audio output directly to my hearing aids, but I still had the routing visuals actively playing on my SYNC screen. I had cellular data enabled on my iPhone.

The following page in the 2023 Lightning Owner's Manual for the 15-inch SYNC screen seems to imply it's possible to directly project an app from the iPhone screen to the SYNC screen without using CarPlay (top right of the image below). Despite what the text says, I couldn't get it to happen without turning on CarPlay via the SYNC screen Phone List settings. But it occurred to me that I might have somehow stumbled upon the direct projection option the night before when I momentarily had Waze sound output doing directly to my hearing aids rather than the truck speakers.

So that's why I said in my previous post that I've discovered a bunch of things I didn't appreciate before, but I barely understand what I'm stumbling across...

 

[Henry Ford]

I'm an Android user so anything I say is a guess. I had no idea there were Sync compatible apps and I really don't have a use for them.

I was hoping there was a workaround for you, @Jim Lewis. Maybe there is. Apparently, USB vs Bluetooth isn't the solution, or at least the whole solution.

 

[invertedspear]

I'm an Android user so anything I say is a guess. I had no idea there were Sync compatible apps and I really don't have a use for them.

I was hoping there was a workaround for you, @Jim Lewis. Maybe there is. Apparently, USB vs Bluetooth isn't the solution, or at least the whole solution.

Are there sync compatible apps? I can't find a list of them anywhere. The closest thing I found is stumbling. For example the Ford Alexa app will work over sync.

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