R4P... Seriously let me down

[Nick72]

7 hours ago, NASY said:

Tried your 1 to 5 Nick. Car started just fine, so seems like an anomaly when you had the fail to start, not very reassuring really.

Thank you. For some bizarre reason the 12V Battery must have been low or there's an intermittent fault, potentially a short or other drain somewhere. Worst kind of problem.

[Nick72]

If they'd just charge the 12V when the car is plugged into the wall box that would probably solve the problem.

[ernieb]

1 hour ago, Nick72 said:

If they'd just charge the 12V when the car is plugged into the wall box that would probably solve the problem.

Absolutely, I just can not see why this should not be the case. Even if it gets some charge now it’s just not enough to keep the 12v Battery in prime condition.

[philip42h]

3 hours ago, Nick72 said:

If they'd just charge the 12V when the car is plugged into the wall box that would probably solve the problem.

1 hour ago, ernieb said:

Absolutely, I just can not see why this should not be the case. Even if it gets some charge now it’s just not enough to keep the 12v battery in prime condition.

While I'm inclined to agree, it shouldn't be necessary - the HEV manages perfectly well without the auxiliary Battery being recharged from the mains ...

... but, of course, the HEV doesn't have a heat pump or the ability to precondition the cabin.

[nlee]

So another observation related to above. 

I decided to give the Battery a full charge last Wednesday. When I started at 09:00 the Battery showed 11.9v after being stood overnight. I used the bike setting (as advised on here) on the Ctek charger, with no AGM. The Battery monitor said not charging but it did very gradually rise to about 12.75 at 16:30. Out of curiosity, I then put the charger in car mode and it instantly jumped up to 13.6v for about 40 mins then dropped to a steady 13.1v. I turned the charger off at 19:00, the charger suggested the battery was fully charged and was in float mode. When I removed the charger, the voltage settled to 12.5v (not what the charts say is 100% charged). Immediately before I used the car at 07:45 the following morning, approx 13 hours later, with no traction battery charge that night, the battery voltage was 12.2v.

What I notice though, was prior to charging the battery, and mentioned earlier in the conversation) was the voltage was jumping to 14.35v when I first started the car but was quickly dropping to 12.6v after 5 or 10 mins of driving, making me assume the battery was full. Since charging, the entirety of every journey (including a 2 hour journey on Saturday was at 14.35v) - this journey took the voltage from 12.0v before starting, to 12.6v at the end.

It has me wondering if when the battery is at the lower end, the inverter is being tricked that the battery is full and switching to maintenance voltage before it should, so the lower the battery to start with, the less it gets charged!

I'll keep monitoring.

[Nick72]

57 minutes ago, nlee said:

So another observation related to above. 

I decided to give the battery a full charge last Wednesday. When I started at 09:00 the battery showed 11.9v after being stood overnight. I used the bike setting (as advised on here) on the Ctek charger, with no AGM. The battery monitor said not charging but it did very gradually rise to about 12.75 at 16:30. Out of curiosity, I then put the charger in car mode and it instantly jumped up to 13.6v for about 40 mins then dropped to a steady 13.1v. I turned the charger off at 19:00, the charger suggested the battery was fully charged and was in float mode. When I removed the charger, the voltage settled to 12.5v (not what the charts say is 100% charged). Immediately before I used the car at 07:45 the following morning, approx 13 hours later, with no traction battery charge that night, the battery voltage was 12.2v.

What I notice though, was prior to charging the battery, and mentioned earlier in the conversation) was the voltage was jumping to 14.35v when I first started the car but was quickly dropping to 12.6v after 5 or 10 mins of driving, making me assume the battery was full. Since charging, the entirety of every journey (including a 2 hour journey on Saturday was at 14.35v) - this journey took the voltage from 12.0v before starting, to 12.6v at the end.

It has me wondering if when the battery is at the lower end, the inverter is being tricked that the battery is full and switching to maintenance voltage before it should, so the lower the battery to start with, the less it gets charged!

I'll keep monitoring.

That's an interesting observation and you could be right.

[Corollanutter]

I keep saying that there is something not quite right with the 12V charging regime on these Hybrids. The Battery seems to be at a low state of charge almost all the time - which is not good for the Battery condition or life. Toyota (and we) "get away" with it as the 12V Battery has very few demands put upon it compared to a pure ICE vehicle (i.e. cold starting).

[philip42h]

1 hour ago, nlee said:

So another observation related to above. 

I decided to give the battery a full charge last Wednesday. When I started at 09:00 the battery showed 11.9v after being stood overnight. I used the bike setting (as advised on here) on the Ctek charger, with no AGM. The battery monitor said not charging but it did very gradually rise to about 12.75 at 16:30. Out of curiosity, I then put the charger in car mode and it instantly jumped up to 13.6v for about 40 mins then dropped to a steady 13.1v. I turned the charger off at 19:00, the charger suggested the battery was fully charged and was in float mode. When I removed the charger, the voltage settled to 12.5v (not what the charts say is 100% charged). Immediately before I used the car at 07:45 the following morning, approx 13 hours later, with no traction battery charge that night, the battery voltage was 12.2v.

What I notice though, was prior to charging the battery, and mentioned earlier in the conversation) was the voltage was jumping to 14.35v when I first started the car but was quickly dropping to 12.6v after 5 or 10 mins of driving, making me assume the battery was full. Since charging, the entirety of every journey (including a 2 hour journey on Saturday was at 14.35v) - this journey took the voltage from 12.0v before starting, to 12.6v at the end.

It has me wondering if when the battery is at the lower end, the inverter is being tricked that the battery is full and switching to maintenance voltage before it should, so the lower the battery to start with, the less it gets charged!

I'll keep monitoring.

This is all nonsense ... 🙂 ... OK, maybe not complete nonsense but there are other points of view ... 😉

I have a smart charger. It doesn't have a 'bike mode' - it's a smart charger so I don't have to tell it that it is charging a ridiculously puny Battery (it can work that out for itself). All 'bike mode' does is reduce the charge rate so that it takes proportionally longer to fully charge the Battery ...

The 'chart' shows nominal voltages for lead/acid starter batteries when not connected to the vehicle at various states of charge. Since a lead/acid Battery consists of 6 cells at nominally 2.1v each it should show 12.6v when fully charged and under no load. As soon as we apply any load the battery will cease to be 100% charged - maybe 99.9% but less that 100%. Coupled with inevitable inaccuracies of measurement, 12.5v is a reasonable indication of a 'fully charged' auxiliary battery ...

Next, we shouldn't confuse the inverter with a smart charger, and we don't know the charging strategy employed by the inverter, but we shouldn't assume that it has a "maintenance mode" - it probably doesn't. We know from observations to date that it certainly has a "charging mode" under which it aims to charge the auxiliary battery at around 14.4 volts - i.e. the nominal charging voltage for a lead/acid battery. I surmised, initially, that the inverter could fully charge the auxiliary battery and then switch off - leaving the auxiliary battery to supply the necessary 12v supply - but this risks leaving the auxiliary battery at a depleted state of charge at journey's end (which might have explained some of the problems?) Instead, I suspect that the inverter first fully charges the auxiliary battery and then switches to 12v supply mode in order to provide the 12v supply that the car needs without much reliance on the auxiliary battery. But I really don't know how this bit is supposed to work ...

[nlee]

6 hours ago, philip42h said:

I have a smart charger. It doesn't have a 'bike mode' - it's a smart charger so I don't have to tell it that it is charging a ridiculously puny battery (it can work that out for itself). All 'bike mode' does is reduce the charge rate so that it takes proportionally longer to fully charge the battery ...

I also have a "smart" charger, a Ctek MXS 5.0, it does have a bike mode and another contributor suggested there may be some benefit to using it for this Battery, hence trying it. However, I have since read in the manual that is is designed for batteries between 1.2 and 14Ah (14.4v @0.8a) and the car mode is for 14 to 160Ah batteries (14.4v @5a), so agree it should be fine to use the car mode and let the charger work it out.

7 hours ago, philip42h said:

I suspect that the inverter first fully charges the auxiliary battery and then switches to 12v supply mode in order to provide the 12v supply that the car needs without much reliance on the auxiliary battery. But I really don't know how this bit is supposed to work ...

I agree this is most likely. This is about the voltage seen when the traction Battery is charging via 240v but the aux Battery is charged a little by this. For example, the traction battery only took a quick top up last night for 45 mins. When the charger kicked in, it immediately when to 14.4v then dropped within a minute to 12.7v. Before it started the voltage was 12.2v. immediately after it finished, it was 12.45v. Leaving it to settle for 1 hour, it was 12.3v. I know this isn't much in the scheme of things, but it seems every little matters for this set up.

However, it does appear that the inverter may sometimes be dropping to 12v supply before the battery is charged, and this appeared to be happening with an already low battery.

[Derek.w]

In car mode using a CTEK MSX so charging at 3.8 amps

Battery Type calcium EFB 4.3 Ah

My best results are in bike mode in car mode it was holding less charge so recharging more often

Yes bike mode takes longer to charge the Battery.

No harm in trying both modes and let us all know what works best for you.

[Derek.w]

My Battery replacment info is Yuasa HSB202 and Halfords quote a bench charge at 2 Amps

Note this Battery wont sute early Yaris hybrids as poles are opposite polarity.

[Roger_N]

It would be interesting to know if the Battery is left connected when they cars are shipped, I would suspect they are and if so they would almost certainly be run flat during the journey from Japan.

That leads to the question of are theses batteries just recharged or do they just use a booster pack to get them off the ship? I doubt they would recharge on board the ship due to the potential fire hazard. So the Battery might not be in prime condition (run completely flat) when you collect the car

[Nick72]

2 hours ago, Roger_N said:

It would be interesting to know if the battery is left connected when they cars are shipped, I would suspect they are and if so they would almost certainly be run flat during the journey from Japan.

That leads to the question of are theses batteries just recharged or do they just use a booster pack to get them off the ship? I doubt they would recharge on board the ship due to the potential fire hazard. So the battery might not be in prime condition (run completely flat) when you collect the car

I fixed this when I got the car in so much as it went on an 8 hour drive business round trip. Probably gets on average about 24 hours of driving a month about two thirds of which are long business drives. This is what I don't understand. 

Sure there have been periods of say 6 or more weeks where the car was sitting there on the drive apart from a few very short trips out a week. And bizarrely no problems starting whatsoever. Including being overseas for several weeks.

And yet I had been using the car a lot prior to it dying on me. Including a couple of long trips just days before.

Not had an issue since I boosted it to get things going again. But I still haven't got around to repeating exactly what I did when it went flat. Others have kindly tried it out and report no issues. So I'm still stumped. 

[philip42h]

3 hours ago, Roger_N said:

It would be interesting to know if the battery is left connected when they cars are shipped, I would suspect they are and if so they would almost certainly be run flat during the journey from Japan.

That leads to the question of are theses batteries just recharged or do they just use a booster pack to get them off the ship? I doubt they would recharge on board the ship due to the potential fire hazard. So the battery might not be in prime condition (run completely flat) when you collect the car

Guessing wildly - and I really mean guessing - I would expect Toyota to have thought of that. These cars expend energy while idle at a rather 'silly' rate because of things like the security systems and the eCall system - the energy consumed by an electronic system on standby doing absolutely nothing is really very small. If I were Toyota, I would have implemented a 'transit mode' such that when the cars left the factory they were in such a mode and ran only the absolutely necessary minimum of systems - no interior lights, no security, no eCall etc. And then, when I'd got my product to Burnaston, I'd recharge the auxiliary Battery (which shouldn't be too depleted at all) and enable 'customer mode'. But I'm not Toyota and I'm only guessing ... 😉

[philip42h]

On 10/28/2022 at 7:56 PM, Nick72 said:

Pressed the air con button on the fob. Nothing happens.

Gets in the car a few minutes later. Won't start.

So, back to the original problem - if you are not totally bored with it by now ... 😉

Was the car actually 'on charge' when you "pressed the air con button on the fob"?

And you say "nothing happens" - what did you expect to happen? What should have happened?

"Gets in the car a few minutes later" implies that at that point the car still had enough 12v power to unlock the door, but not sufficient to prime the braking system so it won't go into Ready mode ("Won't start").

Tests so far conducted by forum members suggest that you should have been able to do what you attempted to do and that works for them. So the question may be, "what didn't work quite as it should"?

I am imagining here, something that put a drain on the 12v system that should have been covered by power from the traction Battery via the DC-DC converter but wasn't ... ???

[Roger_N]

2 hours ago, Nick72 said:

I fixed this when I got the car in so much as it went on an 8 hour drive business round trip. Probably gets on average about 24 hours of driving a month about two thirds of which are long business drives. This is what I don't understand. 

Sure there have been periods of say 6 or more weeks where the car was sitting there on the drive apart from a few very short trips out a week. And bizarrely no problems starting whatsoever. Including being overseas for several weeks.

And yet I had been using the car a lot prior to it dying on me. Including a couple of long trips just days before.

Not had an issue since I boosted it to get things going again. But I still haven't got around to repeating exactly what I did when it went flat. Others have kindly tried it out and report no issues. So I'm still stumped. 

Nick

The point I was making was that 12v car batteries don't like being allowed to completely discharge and that this could have happen before you even got the car, possibly reducing the life of the Battery.

[Nick72]

1 hour ago, philip42h said:

So, back to the original problem - if you are not totally bored with it by now ... 😉

Was the car actually 'on charge' when you "pressed the air con button on the fob"?

And you say "nothing happens" - what did you expect to happen? What should have happened?

"Gets in the car a few minutes later" implies that at that point the car still had enough 12v power to unlock the door, but not sufficient to prime the braking system so it won't go into Ready mode ("Won't start").

Tests so far conducted by forum members suggest that you should have been able to do what you attempted to do and that works for them. So the question may be, "what didn't work quite as it should"?

I am imagining here, something that put a drain on the 12v system that should have been covered by power from the traction battery via the DC-DC converter but wasn't ... ???

Wasn't on charge.

Expected air con to switch on when I pressed the fob but also realised that I had switched it off in the car on my last run out (no point running air con if I don't really need it). However, I would have thought it might have still overidden the previous setting of off given user now demands it to be on via the fob.

Enough power to open the driver's door. Enough power to show me the list of unhelpful messages it showed me. But would not start for a variety of different randomly changing reasons issued on the MID. No mention of low 12V. Then eventually no messages but the buzzer was going off saying the car wasn't in park, even though it was. Not enough power at this point to open the boot. Then figured 12V and resorted to booster.

So I think you're right. Something must have been draining the 12V and I suspect it was the act of attempting the remote air con from the fob against an already weak 12V Battery (though it shouldn't have been unless there's a drain somewhere else albeit I haven't had the starting issue since so...).

Something is sounding rough under the bonnet though. I'll be seeing if I can flush this out over the weekend as a long trip up the north Lake District is planned.

BTW I've used the fob air con button without the car plugged in many times last winter with no problems.

This might all cone down to a dodgy 12V Battery. Booking it in for December to get checked out and do the things the dealer should have done the last time it was in for a service (update the traction control as part of the recall, open and close all windows with long press on the fob). So they may as well check out the Battery.

[philip42h]

2 hours ago, Nick72 said:

Expected air con to switch on when I pressed the fob but also realised that I had switched it off in the car on my last run out (no point running air con if I don't really need it). However, I would have thought it might have still overidden the previous setting of off given user now demands it to be on via the fob.

As I understand, switching on remotely merely reinstates the previous setting established by the driver. If the A/C is set to Off (i.e. the Auto Off button) then 'clearly (if anything is clear) the climate control compressor / heat pump won't run - but the fan will. So, if you've had the A/C off but the fan running - as one might for a little bit of air - the fan should run drawing power from the 12v supply. While, hopefully, this would be underwritten by supply from the traction Battery via the DC/DC converter, if it wasn't for some reason it might explain why the auxiliary Battery ran down ...

[nlee]

6 hours ago, Nick72 said:

And yet I had been using the car a lot prior to it dying on me. Including a couple of long trips just days before.

So this could be the issue that isn't working as we'd expect.

I've just got back from a near 4 hour journey (circled red in the chart below). I charged the car at my hotel yesterday evening. This morning the voltage was 12.3v. I drove to my meeting and the car was parked up through the day. Before leaving around 4pm the voltage was 12.15v. For around 95% of my journey home, the voltage was only 12.55v. So you'd think fully charged. After about 30 mins stood after the long journey, the voltage is 12.25v. So it's lost 0.15v through the day (despite a shortish journey this morning, but only gained 0.1v over a 4 hour drive.

 

[nlee]

I have also noted on several occasions now, when the car has been running at 12.55v, at the very moment I arrive home and reverse onto the drive, it goes to 14.6v. But obviously, that is of little use because I'm turning off within 30 secs. It's happened too many times to be a coincidence.

[Nick72]

49 minutes ago, nlee said:

So this could be the issue that isn't working as we'd expect.

I've just got back from a near 4 hour journey (circled red in the chart below). I charged the car at my hotel yesterday evening. This morning the voltage was 12.3v. I drove to my meeting and the car was parked up through the day. Before leaving around 4pm the voltage was 12.15v. For around 95% of my journey home, the voltage was only 12.55v. So you'd think fully charged. After about 30 mins stood after the long journey, the voltage is 12.25v. So it's lost 0.15v through the day (despite a shortish journey this morning, but only gained 0.1v over a 4 hour drive.

 

Bizarre 

[ernieb]

It's like there is a wide hysteresis curve between on and off charge state. I think all this seems to be pointing to taking precautions, where possible, if the car is going to be left for any length of time.

[philip42h]

12 hours ago, nlee said:

So this could be the issue that isn't working as we'd expect.

I've just got back from a near 4 hour journey (circled red in the chart below). I charged the car at my hotel yesterday evening. This morning the voltage was 12.3v. I drove to my meeting and the car was parked up through the day. Before leaving around 4pm the voltage was 12.15v. For around 95% of my journey home, the voltage was only 12.55v. So you'd think fully charged. After about 30 mins stood after the long journey, the voltage is 12.25v. So it's lost 0.15v through the day (despite a shortish journey this morning, but only gained 0.1v over a 4 hour drive.

 

So, what happen at around 11:20? Did you go and fetch something from the car?

As for the rest, assuming that this day illustrates normal system behaviour, it seems evident that by default the DC/DC converter supplies 12.6v while in Ready mode. I suspect that the converter and Battery work in tandem and, periodically, particularly on start-up, the converter provides 14.5 volts to top-up the Battery. But the target voltage for the Battery is 12.3 / 12.4 volts rather than the full 12.6. The auxiliary battery may well approach 12.6v if you were to leave it in Ready mode for 48 hrs - but that's pretty unlikely to happen.

[philip42h]

12 hours ago, nlee said:

I have also noted on several occasions now, when the car has been running at 12.55v, at the very moment I arrive home and reverse onto the drive, it goes to 14.6v. But obviously, that is of little use because I'm turning off within 30 secs. It's happened too many times to be a coincidence.

It is interesting, but irrelevant, to note that reverse is always a pure EV operation - there is no way that the ICE can physically drive the car backwards. It may not be so noticeable on a PHEV because of it's bigger traction Battery, but typically the ICE in my HEV fires up as I am reversing out of the garage - MG2 & MG3 are driving the car backwards while the ICE is spinning MG1 to generate the electricity to allow that to happen. Amusing, but wholly OT. 🙂

When we put the car into reverse we immediately add to the demand on the 12v system by switching on the rear view camera and rear parking sensors. This seems at least a plausible explanation of Nigel's observation that the converter responds by increasing the rate of charge to the auxiliary Battery ... ?

[philip42h]

16 hours ago, Nick72 said:

Something is sounding rough under the bonnet though.

Chattering relay perhaps ... ? Just trying to think of something that might also impact the 12v system.