Re: my Miev will not charge

Hi DonD

Kind of caught between a rock and a hard place...
If I had the knowledge and expertise to decipher this warranty book & regulations

http://s211.photobucket.com/user/Sandange/slideshow/miev/Miev Warranty

If I had the time to confront and debate the warranty - so far it will have cost me 4 weeks by the time I get my car back - at almost $ 100 a week in gas for the mileage we do.
This totals close to $ 400 this month not to mention the wear and tear on my gas car.

If it takes 4 more weeks to "Maybe" win my point it will have cost me another $ 400 in gas money

All this besides my monthly car payment

Hey sandy,

I hear you. And the warranty for the drivetrain does not cover the AC which like Robert says is disappointing.

In one sense I guess mitsubishi did go above and beyond on the compressor but to tell the truth if they programmed the computer to not run the car or charge it without the AC compressor working then I think they are making the AC a part of the drivetrain and should include it in the drivetrain warranty. Maybe your car AC failing woke them up to that. It certainly woke me up to it.

In any case your right about being in a difficult situation.

I guess that $400 for a new compressor and new charger is good. I would not have been able to do any better that's for sure.

And posting this and letting everyone know Your situation is very worthwhile and appreciated.

Don.....

Thanks for your encouragement.

Maybe we should address a situation like this that is unique to EV drivers and facing unexpected repairs & delays for repairs.


This could apply to any new EV early adapter

As a purchaser of a new Ev
I evaluated my purchase price with the following line of thought

1) Yes I was paying more than an equivalent ICE vehicle.

2) Based on the difference of the 2 , (on a monthly payment (5 year)) The saving of the gas costs, compared to electricity and maintenance....
applied to the monthly payment of the EV.
(costs would break even or better if gas prices continue to rise.)

3) The drive train and battery warrantee would have me covered at least as long as the payments would go on.

What happens when Murphy's Law kicks in
An unexpected component failure that renders the EV unusable.

As an early EV adapter, Availability & costs of Original manufacturers parts are at a premium.

Costs depending on the monthly mileage and length of delay..
Any long delays for repairs have a significant financial impact
Especially if an ICE vehicle is to be substituted, as a loaner
.
What was budgeted as Gas & Maintenance allowance is now added on top of your monthly EV payment.

Optimum situation would be if an equivalent EV substitute is available.

Anyone else here experienced a similar situation.

Last fall, when I had my battery replaced under warranty, my dealer provided me with a loaner car while my i-MiEV was in the shop. However, the loaner was a Chevy Impala, hardly an economy car!

While I enjoyed playing with the sunroof on the Impala, filling the tank was unpleasant. I think I was getting 24mpg at the best.

Cheers-
Rich

I'm a happy camper now that Blackie is finally back in the stable.

It took a month but the people at Mitsubishi stepped up and made things good again, even though I was just over the warranted mileage.

Almost forgot how much I enjoyed driving it.

That is great to hear....

It's true that a month away from the imiev is toooooo long.


Glad to hear it's back.


Don....

sandange said:

I'm a happy camper now that Blackie is finally back in the stable. It took a month but the people at Mitsubishi stepped up and made things good again, even though I was just over the warranted mileage. Almost forgot how much I enjoyed driving it.

Click to expand...

Sandy, delighted you have your car back and that Mitsubishi did well by you. I don't suppose they shared with you what they suspect had really happened to cause those two disparate failures?

The service manager explained the had to be in close communication with Mitsu Canada and they in turn with Mitsu Japan to diagnose the situation and order the tests they wanted to run.
Just checked out the invoice and they don't detail what they did with the charger , only the list of tests they ran ,( pla44.pla45, pla46,) and that they replaced & charged the Ac compressor

Well I've had another set back this week.

Charged the car last Saturday night to find that Sunday morning it was missing 1 bar from full. I figured I didn't allow enough time for full charge
Drove it down to 1 bar over half Sunday and set delay charging so it should be full Monday morning.

Monday morning car did not charge - not even 1 bar.
I had enough to drive my wife to the train and back home & was left with 3 bars

Plugged it in, fan kicks in, the red plug emblem lights up, and with in 15 seconds the car icon with the yellow exclamation mark comes on.

I tried several times to recharge (always level 2) with the same results.

Roadside assistance towed it to the dealer Monday.
Friday today & they were still running test & waiting for results.
Not a happy camper
I was hoping it was something minor and quick to remedy.

sandange said:

Just checked out the invoice and they don't detail what they did with the charger , only the list of tests they ran . . . .

Click to expand...

Mystery solved! - It appears they did nothing to the charger . . . . and replacing the A/C system (if they actually even did that) obviously didn't solve your charging issue

I'm guessing you're too far away to take it to a different dealer which actually knows what they're doing?

Don

sandange said:

Well I've had another set back this week. ...Roadside assistance towed it to the dealer Monday. Friday today & they were still running test & waiting for results. Not a happy camper. I was hoping it was something minor and quick to remedy.

Click to expand...

Sandy, I am so dismayed by the recurrence of you original problem - tells me their original diagnosis and part replacement were questionable and/or that there is still an unfound root cause of this problem in your car. This truly needs some expert help to uncover.

Do keep meticulous notes on everything that has been done and is going on - it may be a good idea to escalate this issue to Canada Mitsubishi corporate. You have already broken ground by having the most difficult-to-solve problem anyone on this forum has faced with the i-MiEV! :shock:

Hi Don - just re read the invoice and - it reads like a short story - My French reading skills are some what challenged.
It does say they replaced the OBC & the AC unit.

This dealer is the largest for sales for the Miev in Quebec and has the equipment to handle the servicing. I don't think there is anyone close by better qualified.

Joe - Yes I will keep as many details as possible and share them as it all develops.

As you have both said - No matter how you shake it, I still have a charging problem.

Your problem seems to be similar to the one I had earlier this year. My car also would not charge. My guess is that Mitsubishi will try to replace the charger. And when that does not work (assuming it is not the problem), you will get a new battery pack. The question is not if they will fix it but how long it will take. It seems that replacing the pack has a few more bureaucratic paperwork to complete within Mitsubishi. I assume this is because of the cost as well as collecting data of pack failure.

What I do not understand is in their trouble shooting, the ECU should be telling the technician an error code or the reason why the charging has failed. You are seeing the yellow exclamation mark and therefore the ECU has seen an error somewhere. A well made controls software should indicate an error code.


Dave

I wouldn't think this problem is related to the battery. As we've seen on other cars, a failure of a battery cell or two is shown in the charge gauge by it not going to 16 bars. This isn't to say that there couldn't be a problem inside the pack, but it doesn't sound like a failed cell, but rather a communications issue or hardware failure of a cell or part of the CANbus, such as a bad temperature sensor.

As for speculating as to the charging issue and assuming there is not a internal charger problem which is always a possibility, I can see that the following would stop the charging process.

1) CANbus, this communication is done throughout the components within the car. There should be safety protocols within this communication that would shutdown the car to even be able drive the car if there were to many errors in the communication messages. Failed messages can be seen by the ECU and therefore indicate an error code. There could be a failed connection to the charger, but again an error code should be flagged.

2) Failed BMS sensor. My understanding, these sensors are on the BMS circuit board located on each of the battery cells. The board will measure the voltage and temperature on each cell and communicate to the ECU via CANbus as to the status. Clearly if the voltage on any cell is outside well define limits, charging needs to stop as there is a fire risk within the cell. Overcharging (and I mean greatly overcharging) is very bad for the cell and could short it out. Remember the Toshiba laptop fires.

3) I could also see the temperature sensor triggering the stop charging condition. We all know that high temperatures damage the cell, and if we have a failed sensor and therefore indicating a high temperature on the BMS circuit, I could see the ECU turning off the charging sequence to try to protect the battery.

4) As I said in point 2, The BMS board measure the battery voltage and tries to balance all the cells. A failing cells will have a harder time in keeping the cell balance with the rest of the pack. Which could be the reason why we do not get all 16 bars. But there will be a point at which if one cell is a 3.4 volts and all the rest are at 4.1 volts, the ECU will have to stop charging.

However, as I said before these are all guesses. What I do not understand is that there should be an error code that the technician should be able to access to indicate why the charging stopped. The previous post had indicated an A/C issue which is temperature related. So maybe there is a bad BMS board within the pack and not a bad cell.

Dave

Any overcharge of a lithium battery is bad. Sadly, laptops still fry their batteries, even after the recalls. I have my laptop dialed back to 60% since it spends most of its time plugged in. At 80%, cell voltage is near 4.2 volts on the laptop.

The i-MiEV shows severe misbalance or cell failure by not going to 16 bars. We haven't seen them throw error codes on a failing battery. I would say there is a bad connection, a bad temp sensor, or another bad charger, though having 2 bad chargers in a row is unlikely.

Sandange, do you have Canion, or access to your car?

No I don't have Canion or access to the car .

What's really disappointing is that they don't give you a free loaner car, nor do they seem to be in any big hurry to fix your car. I think it's safe to say that if they were footing the bill for a $50 per day rental, they would be working lots harder to get your car back to you lots sooner . . . .

Don

I had the same thought Don
They did offer me a rental that they would subsidize up to $20/day I would have to only pay $5 a day, plus of course the gas that can easily be $ 75 a week depending on what car I can get.

Heaven help me if I bring it back with a scratch.

Ok and I can't forget I still have to pay my car payment.

I think my wife and I will just share our ICE vehicle until it's sorted out.


We were so spoiled with the Miev as we would just hop in and drive it anywhere - always with some charging stops planned in.

Now with the ICE it's different planning but just as stressful when if you consider if you forget something or run out of time and the stores close.
Making an extra trip here & there it costs another $10 here and another $ 20 there for gas -
it quickly adds up.

So for now we often cancel extra trips. This can give me a cabin fever feeling.

Of course we can always throw more money into the tank.

Little update

I recently visited the dealership service department and they were very apologetic.
To Make a long story short....
They are stumped.
Japan has told them what tests to run and they all show no problems.
All the battery cells test fine .
The new charger they installed tests fine.
But the same problem persists

1 1/2 month's with out our Mieve to date

I might venture a suggestion to Mitsubishi - that a mobile techie swat team be put together and sent out to do 2 things

Tackle abnormal complicated situation as this and
Give some advanced training to the dealers Miev service technicians.