Preferred charging window and departure issue

[Fryballin]

So I’ve had my lariat 511A for over a year and a half now, I’ve got over 31k miles on it and have done 99% of my charging at home with the FORD charge station pro.

I recently started a new job traveling about 5 hours each day so I’m needing my truck to be as close to 100% as possible by my departure times but I don’t really want the truck sitting at 100% for 6-8 hours each night to make this happen.

So I’ve been setting a departure time and then a preferred charging window that will give the truck time to get to 100% about 1 hour before I would leave which should then allow the truck to also precondition my cabin for the maximum range possible.

Here is the issue. The truck and charge station pro go into some kind of loop where the charge station makes a clicking noise, wakes up the truck (indicated by the charging port lighting up) then the blue ring may flash once as if the charge is starting, and immediately the charging stops and then there’s a few more clicking noises from the truck and the charge station pro before finally the truck seems to go back into sleep (indicated by the charge port light going out) and then this cycle starts over again almost immediately. It takes about 1 minute to go through the cycle and there is really only about 10 seconds between cycles.

the issue is that I’m pretty sure this is draining my 12 volt battery because a few nights that I’ve tried this without knowing this was happening, I get a 12 volt battery low message, and also a message about a third party accessory possibly draining the 12 volt (which I have none of and never get these messages except on nights this process has happened for probably 4-5 hours before charging was able to begin due to the preferred window)

can anyone else confirm if theirs does this or if there’s something I am doing wrong?

my solution has been to set an alarm to wake up and use the FordPass app to charge to 100% but that’s annoying, unnecessary and asking for me to either not get my truck charged or miss my wake up alarm to get up for the day.

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[TaxmanHog]

Try two changes:

Reduce the SOC stop point from 100% to 95%.

Eliminate the departure schedule for now,

Use remote start in the morning while you're getting ready for the work day.

If you optimize within about an hour the goal of reaching 95% the battery should still be comfortably warm for efficiency purposes, test this routine for a few day's, hopefully the missing 5% won't be crucial, if it is then increase SOC back to 100% but still do not use departure timer, see if that mitigates the switch/cycling.

If you can live with the 95%, then add back the departure schedule, see how that impacts operations.

BTW, what is the version of your most recent OTA?

 

[TaxmanHog]

One more tip, before leaving for work for the day, unplug the truck, wait one minute to allow the data log to report to the cloud and the morning reboot (WHITE LIGHT) on the FCSP to cycle back to blue.

Then switch off the breaker feeding the FCSP for the morning/afternoon.

When you get home, turn it back on let it idle for 30-60 minutes to ensure that it has rejoined your wifi network and downloaded or installed any firmware updates.

Resume using the FCSP

 

[Pioneer74]

The FCSP isn't waking up the truck, the truck keeps waking up and making the charger click.

I've had it happen numerous times. I can't tell you for certain why it's happening, but my best guess is, it's doing it because the truck, in the window you've given it, is on the edge of not reaching it's charge goal.

My advise is to either raise the amperage the FCSP is delivering or to increase your window until the cycling stops. What I do when it happens is click Charge to 100% in the app, then stop charging. When my window opens up I click resume schedule.

This only happens to me when I return home at a lower percentage than normal.

 

[Fryballin]

The FCSP isn't waking up the truck, the truck keeps waking up and making the charger click.

I've had it happen numerous times. I can't tell you for certain why it's happening, but my best guess is, it's doing it because the truck, in the window you've given it, is on the edge of not reaching it's charge goal.

My advise is to either raise the amperage the FCSP is delivering or to increase your window until the cycling stops. What I do when it happens is click Charge to 100% in the app, then stop charging. When my window opens up I click resume schedule.

This only happens to me when I return home at a lower percentage than normal.

I’ve tried extending the charge time window along with lower the desired SOC, and then I’ve tried removing the departure time as well and basically any scenario where the truck is not charged to the desired amount set, and a charge window is set for it to wait to charge, it just continues to cycle. If the truck doesn’t think it can reach the desired amount within the preferred charging window, then it will just start charging immediately even outside the window, and I’ve seen it charge for a while then shut off and resume this cycling, and I’ve also seen it just continuing to charge as though it’s going to reach 100% then shut off.

I appreciate everyone’s input and I will try the cycling of the breaker after unplugging for the morning, however I have been through the software about 25 different ways to test and see if there’s any certain setting that is causing the issue but I’ve not found a solution that causes the truck to just shut down and sleep as it does when my desired charge level is set low and the truck is free to charge to that level, and as soon as it gets there, everything just shuts down.

this really should be easy for FORD, I should just be able to tell the truck, I’m leaving at 5 AM, I want the truck warm, and I want it charged to 100%. And the truck should just begin charging when it needs to in order to meet those three settings.

I really like this truck and the charge station pro is awesome, but it is frustrating having to set 2 alarms just to make sure I’ve got 100% charge on days I have to have it, and not allowing my truck to sit at its highest state of charge for 8 hours when it doesn’t have to.

 

[Heliian]

Turn the breaker to the fcsp off for 5 minutes and then back on.

This clicking happens when there is a comm failure usually caused by a power outage or surge.

 

[Maquis]

Do you have an OBDII code reader? It would interesting if the truck was storing any related fault codes.

 

[RaptorEV]

I don't know man, seems like a huge hassle. Just charge it to 100% and be done with it. Life's too short to worry about little stuff.

 

[Zprime29]

One option might be to lower the rate so that it actually takes all night to charge instead of just an hour or two. For example, let's say you have your charge window set as 10pm to 6am (8 hours) and you typically need 50% SOC to hit full. Then set your rate to 131 * 0.5 / 8 = 8.2, thus I'd set my charge rate to be roughly 35 amps.

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