Winter and the ED

Tom Vaughn said:

Even when my ED is fully charged should I leave it plugged in during the winter? I am in Northern Indiana and it gets pretty. Right now it's 19 degrees F. Thanks.

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You don't have to leave it plugged in unless the temperature is falling to -20C/-4F.

You should also verify that you had the 2016 service campaign No. 2016060002 done on the car. This is a software update to the BMS. In this forum, we have had ED's that have had their 12V batteries go flat even though the car was plugged in.

An electric car is not like a cellphone. Once charging is completed, the car turns the charging station power off unless the HV battery SOC falls to 95 percent or so then it would turn charging back on. But if the 12V battery goes dead - and they have - this prevents the car from ever turning the charging station power on. It also for some unexplained reason, caused the HV battery to totally discharge - totalling the car if it is out of warranty. The software update might, or might not, change things so the car periodically charges of the 12V battery from the HV battery to prevent this.

Or more simply, plugging the ED in for charging does not guarantee that it stays charged! Yeah, I know, clear as mud.

MineCooky said:

Ahh, good to hear about that topic. Is there a thread?

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That was an odd paragraph I wrote...

There is no thread specifically about the service campaign - but it was mentioned in a number of the threads regarding EDs whose HV battery pack self-destructed when the ED was stored for a few months. The precipitating event seemed to be (but we aren't sure) the 12V battery going dead (or the battery being removed and taken indoors for winter storage of the car). In one case, the 12V battery and the HV battery went dead even though the ED was kept plugged into a level 2 charger during storage.

We have also been perplexed that the ED does not seem to have some kind of programmed routine to periodically turn on DC-DC converter to keep the 12V battery topped-off.

We think that the service campaign No. 2016060002 may have been a fix for one or both these problems, but have no way of finding out. MB is a totally opaque organization.

The (long) threads on this subject are here: