Barbagris
Well-known member
PV1 said:
Sure. Starting at four bars, if I remember correctly.
Battery Failure?
- Thread starter tonymil
- Start date
Help Support Mitsubishi i-MiEV Forum:
Sure. Starting at four bars, if I remember correctly.
nt2w
Well-known member
nt2w said:
Well, here's the update as of 9/30.
The dealer confirmed that the battery had indeed failed- no details given. On 9/23, they said they were awaiting approval from MMNA to order a new battery. When I followed up on 9/30, they said they had gotten a call from Japan to alert them a battery was on its way--- in fact they were expecting something this week.
That's much faster than tonymil's experience, but I'm not holding my breath- we'll see when the pack actually arrives.
The dealer arranged with my local Enterprise car rental to provide me a loaner for the duration, at their expense. That's nice, although the only vehicle that was available long term (I live in the hinterlands so not a lot of selection) was a Chevy Impala. I like the sunroof, but the 25 MPG is abysmal. I haven't had a vehicle that got such poor mileage since I sold my S-10 pickup truck ten years ago. Actually was going to arrange for a smaller car, but if it's only going to be another week, I'll live with the Impala- I've gotten used to it.
Hope to have my i-MiEV back soon...
Rich
Rich, thank you for the update. So far, so good. Do let us know when you get your iMiEV back - you'll appreciate it even more after your ICE rental. 
nt2w
Well-known member
Got the call from my dealer this morning. They have received the battery and are in the midst of the installation now- hoping to have it ready to pick up tomorrow. They'll call tonight to confirm.
That was fast!
I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow.
Interesting factoid- this time I'll be able to drive it home rather than flatbed due to the four (count 'em) ChargePoint stations that have been installed along the way. Although it's a haul between two of them--- about 58 miles, so I'll have to take it easy on that leg of the drive, and I'm a little nervous to have to depend on a brand new pack to make that mileage.
That was fast!
I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow.
Interesting factoid- this time I'll be able to drive it home rather than flatbed due to the four (count 'em) ChargePoint stations that have been installed along the way. Although it's a haul between two of them--- about 58 miles, so I'll have to take it easy on that leg of the drive, and I'm a little nervous to have to depend on a brand new pack to make that mileage.
nt2w
Well-known member
Well, I got the car back today
Late yesterday afternoon, another plot twist- the dealer decided after talking with MMNA to flatbed the car back so I didn't have to drive it 80 miles home, very nice.
After the dealer's testing, when it got to me it had 15 bars and 75 miles RR. I plan to run it down to 2 bars to make sure the RR meter is calibrated.
Felt good to be back in the car. Very happy with the experience, and relatively fast (3 weeks exactly) considering the battery came all the way from Japan!
Late yesterday afternoon, another plot twist- the dealer decided after talking with MMNA to flatbed the car back so I didn't have to drive it 80 miles home, very nice.
After the dealer's testing, when it got to me it had 15 bars and 75 miles RR. I plan to run it down to 2 bars to make sure the RR meter is calibrated.
Felt good to be back in the car. Very happy with the experience, and relatively fast (3 weeks exactly) considering the battery came all the way from Japan!
blownb310
Well-known member
Thanks for sharing your experiences with us. Glad to hear you're back on the road!
Mike
Mike
+1blownb310 said:
Nice to see Mitsubishi standing by their product, and it is a significant effort and expense for them to get the pack in from Japan. As far as I can tell, this was a rare event with no indication of what may have caused it in the first place.
tonymil
Well-known member
nt2w said:Well, I got the car back today
Late yesterday afternoon, another plot twist- the dealer decided after talking with MMNA to flatbed the car back so I didn't have to drive it 80 miles home, very nice.
After the dealer's testing, when it got to me it had 15 bars and 75 miles RR. I plan to run it down to 2 bars to make sure the RR meter is calibrated.
Felt good to be back in the car. Very happy with the experience, and relatively fast (3 weeks exactly) considering the battery came all the way from Japan!
That's great news! I'm glad they have their act together.
nt2w
Well-known member
And thanks, tonymil for your assistance on this- I think my sharing of your battery failure gave my dealer some guidance on how to go about this.
Epilogue- car is back to normal. I drove it down to 2 bars to make sure it got recalibrated, and had 82 miles RR yesterday morning.
Cheers-
Rich
Epilogue- car is back to normal. I drove it down to 2 bars to make sure it got recalibrated, and had 82 miles RR yesterday morning.
Cheers-
Rich
sandange
Well-known member
Glad to hear all is good again
Thanks for sharing
Thanks for sharing
martinwinlow
Well-known member
- Joined
- Sep 1, 2012
- Messages
- 112
Hi,
If I can add my 2p-worth to the question of whether the 'fuel' gauge being full of segments indicates 16kWh of energy aboard or just 'fully charged'...
For the BMMS (battery management AND monitoring system - some BMS' do only one or the other, not necessarily both) to decide when the battery is fully charged is easy enough without measuring kWh - just measure the collective pack voltage. Deciding when it is empty is another matter and this is down to the cell chemistry amongst other things but generally far more difficult to establish and is usually done either at a cell level or by kWh counting - in and out. Consequently, over time, the 'empty' point may become obscure to the BMMS, particularly so if the BMMS employs cell balancing. Therefore, by driving the car till the lowest cell voltage falls to a safe minimum you can 'reset' the real 'empty' point and charging, in terms of kWh, can recommence from there together with a recalibrated kWh meter, i.e. in the case of the i-Miev (IMO) the 'fuel' gauge.
In tonymil's case the reason his gauge wouldn't go to 16 bars was because the defective cell prevented a full 16kWh charge. If the gauge was volts based the termination voltage would still be much the same despite the defective cells and would, therefore, give 16 bars regardless.
There is one other reason I think this is how it works and why Mitsubishi may have done it this way. For the buyer of a used i-Miev to be able to tell how badly the pack is degraded would be very useful. If a full charge (after recalibration) only shows 15 or fewer bars, the prospective buyer is in a much more informed position as to the value of the car. This may, of course, just be wishful thinking! MW
If I can add my 2p-worth to the question of whether the 'fuel' gauge being full of segments indicates 16kWh of energy aboard or just 'fully charged'...
For the BMMS (battery management AND monitoring system - some BMS' do only one or the other, not necessarily both) to decide when the battery is fully charged is easy enough without measuring kWh - just measure the collective pack voltage. Deciding when it is empty is another matter and this is down to the cell chemistry amongst other things but generally far more difficult to establish and is usually done either at a cell level or by kWh counting - in and out. Consequently, over time, the 'empty' point may become obscure to the BMMS, particularly so if the BMMS employs cell balancing. Therefore, by driving the car till the lowest cell voltage falls to a safe minimum you can 'reset' the real 'empty' point and charging, in terms of kWh, can recommence from there together with a recalibrated kWh meter, i.e. in the case of the i-Miev (IMO) the 'fuel' gauge.
In tonymil's case the reason his gauge wouldn't go to 16 bars was because the defective cell prevented a full 16kWh charge. If the gauge was volts based the termination voltage would still be much the same despite the defective cells and would, therefore, give 16 bars regardless.
There is one other reason I think this is how it works and why Mitsubishi may have done it this way. For the buyer of a used i-Miev to be able to tell how badly the pack is degraded would be very useful. If a full charge (after recalibration) only shows 15 or fewer bars, the prospective buyer is in a much more informed position as to the value of the car. This may, of course, just be wishful thinking! MW
martinwinslow, thank you for your informed discussion, a supplement to your many contributions over on EVDL. Glad to see you've now got your i-MiEV, and I hope it serves you well.
Since tonymil's battery replacement has still been a zero-cost (to the owner) issue, it's somewhat misplaced in this thread and I've been tempted to move this entire battery discussion over to a separate thread under Batteries and Battery Management. Anyone care to comment on this? - PM is fine.
Edit: deleted comment about expensive repair issues.
Since tonymil's battery replacement has still been a zero-cost (to the owner) issue, it's somewhat misplaced in this thread and I've been tempted to move this entire battery discussion over to a separate thread under Batteries and Battery Management. Anyone care to comment on this? - PM is fine.
Edit: deleted comment about expensive repair issues.
Moved the entire discussion of tonymil's battery problem and solution into this thread and out of the "expensive repair" thread. Thank you those of you who PM'd me.
dniemeyer99
Well-known member
Not feeling to happy at the moment. I have been having a similiar problem with my iMeiv as described in these post. Failure to charge completely. I have sent the car into the dealer and all they have been able to say is yes it is not charging. This has been three weeks now. They say they have replaced the on-board charger to no success and now we are waiting on replacing the EV-ECU. My question and frustration is that I can not believe that the EV-ECU is the problem as this unit is not part of the charging current. It only communicates to the on-borad charger via the CAN-BUS. If the EV-ECU does control the on-board charger it would do so by only by commanding it to. If the EV-ECU does stop the charge it would be because of some sensor or imbalance in one of the cells. Which is either the cell or the sensor for the cell (BMS).
I have a feeling someone within Mitsubishi does not want to replace the battery until they absolute need to. Wasting my time and frustrating me as there is no fix or real plan of what is being done to fix the problem after 3 weeks at the dealer.
If this problem is due to a failed cell, this would be the third one listed on this forum.
I have a feeling someone within Mitsubishi does not want to replace the battery until they absolute need to. Wasting my time and frustrating me as there is no fix or real plan of what is being done to fix the problem after 3 weeks at the dealer.
If this problem is due to a failed cell, this would be the third one listed on this forum.
dniemeyer99, thank you for posting. Sad to see the dealer giving you the run-around and failing to accurately pinpoint the problem. Hopefully they've given you a loaner iMiEV while they mess with your car. Figure that Mitsu service techs across the country have virtually zero experience troubleshooting an i-MiEV, but I would have hoped they would have higher-level factory support for cases such as this.
A failed cell (or, as you pointed out, its sensor) should be easily detectable. Another good reason to get CaniOn - to know for ourselves before a dealer ever touches the car.
MartinWinlow - you have a Mitsu MUT-3: how does it display cell voltages and SoC? Perhaps you might post a screenshot?
dniemeyer99, whereabouts are you located? Please do keep us up to date on the gory details of your progress - and be sure to get the service people to tell you EXACTLY what they found wrong once they claim it's fixed.
A failed cell (or, as you pointed out, its sensor) should be easily detectable. Another good reason to get CaniOn - to know for ourselves before a dealer ever touches the car.
MartinWinlow - you have a Mitsu MUT-3: how does it display cell voltages and SoC? Perhaps you might post a screenshot?
dniemeyer99, whereabouts are you located? Please do keep us up to date on the gory details of your progress - and be sure to get the service people to tell you EXACTLY what they found wrong once they claim it's fixed.
dniemeyer99
Well-known member
Thanks for your input. If any one can comment on in what way the EV-ECU is used in the charging, it might help.
As for my location, I am in Sudbury, Ontario and the nearest iMeiv dealer (which does not have any in stock) is 300 km away. Giving me a loaner would therefore mean going to the gas station again. And as any electric car owner knows, it's not why we bought the car in the first place. In fact the last three weeks has shown me just how much I really do not like paying $1.40 for a litre of gas.
i.e. I miss my car.
As for my location, I am in Sudbury, Ontario and the nearest iMeiv dealer (which does not have any in stock) is 300 km away. Giving me a loaner would therefore mean going to the gas station again. And as any electric car owner knows, it's not why we bought the car in the first place. In fact the last three weeks has shown me just how much I really do not like paying $1.40 for a litre of gas.
i.e. I miss my car.
FiddlerJohn
Well-known member
My guess is the decisions ARE being make by, and paid for by, the factory and that's why the local shop explanations are not clear. The local mechanic is just following factory directives. In the past replacing the battery meant shipping a car from japan, swapping batteries and shipping back to Japan at the factory expense. Still true?JoeS said:
Yes dniemeyer99, I think you are exactly correct.dniemeyer99 said:
Unlike Nissan, Mitsubishi did the right thing and replaced those failed batteries. If we were to talk with the failed battery Nissan drivers and the failed battery Mitsubishi drivers, all parties would agree that Mitsubishi is doing a better job. Just be glad you don't have to sue in court.
dniemeyer99 is so right: After driving an EV, ICE seems wrong. Sometimes necessary but we now know we can do better. I feel your pain.
PV1
Well-known member
The EV-ECU is the brainbox of the car. It controls nearly everything in the car, including regulating charging. It listens to whichever EVSE you plug into via the J1772 connector, basically reading the pilot signal from the EVSE to determine maximum amperage allowed, but also using another pin to detect if the plug is in the car. It talks via CANbus to the charger, to read incoming voltage and to set the charging rate. The EV-ECU gathers battery data from the Battery Management System (BMS), which is located within the battery pack and is attached to every cell in the pack to read voltage, and each group of cells (not sure of the exact number) to gather temperature. If you have the quick charge port, it is in direct contact with the quick charger on a separate CANbus. For quick charging, the car tells the quick charger what amperage it wants, and performs numerous checks throughout the entire time the quick charger is plugged into the car.
The issue you are seeing, where the car will charge, but not completely, sounds like you have a bad cell or two in your battery pack. If the car does not charge at all, then I would look at the charger and the relays and fuses located under the hood and dashboard. If the EV-ECU is actually the problem, I would be surprised.
The issue you are seeing, where the car will charge, but not completely, sounds like you have a bad cell or two in your battery pack. If the car does not charge at all, then I would look at the charger and the relays and fuses located under the hood and dashboard. If the EV-ECU is actually the problem, I would be surprised.
DonDakin
Well-known member
Hello all,
I had a problem last summer with the charger in my car. In the end it had to be replaced.
It took a long while about a month to get the car back and I had a loaner ICE for 2 weeks of that which I had to fight to get.
It was not a pleasant experience to be without the car.
The symptom I had was the car would not charge at all period. The people at the dealership that fixed it were really inexperienced with this car and were very dependant on support from Japan via the head office to move things along. As you can imagine this just slowed things down. I got involved and called the dealer but it was frustrating to see the very slow progress and hearing that they were always waiting to hear from Mitsubishi support.
I'm sorry to hear that your car had a failure and I hope they fix it soon but I think quick servicing on major component failure is not really likely. It's also really unlikely that they will give you a loaner iMiev. So what's happening in your case seems to be "normal".
The upside of this is the car will be fixed and you already have a brand new charger and it sounds likely that you will get a new battery. That's pretty good. Also of course it will feel great when you get the car back.
dniemeyer99 if you don't mind can you discribe the events leading up to you bringing it in to be fixed ? Did it charge but not fully ? If so how much ?
It's still a great car it's just not great when it breaks.
Don.....
I had a problem last summer with the charger in my car. In the end it had to be replaced.
It took a long while about a month to get the car back and I had a loaner ICE for 2 weeks of that which I had to fight to get.
It was not a pleasant experience to be without the car.
The symptom I had was the car would not charge at all period. The people at the dealership that fixed it were really inexperienced with this car and were very dependant on support from Japan via the head office to move things along. As you can imagine this just slowed things down. I got involved and called the dealer but it was frustrating to see the very slow progress and hearing that they were always waiting to hear from Mitsubishi support.
I'm sorry to hear that your car had a failure and I hope they fix it soon but I think quick servicing on major component failure is not really likely. It's also really unlikely that they will give you a loaner iMiev. So what's happening in your case seems to be "normal".
The upside of this is the car will be fixed and you already have a brand new charger and it sounds likely that you will get a new battery. That's pretty good. Also of course it will feel great when you get the car back.
dniemeyer99 if you don't mind can you discribe the events leading up to you bringing it in to be fixed ? Did it charge but not fully ? If so how much ?
It's still a great car it's just not great when it breaks.
Don.....
dniemeyer99
Well-known member
Well, I am beginning to understand that the transition to EV's will not be as easy as people seem to feel. It is clear that there are a lot of mechanics that do not have the correct skill set. Meaning car companies will need to hire different people or pay a lot in training. And we know how much car companies like to spend money in support of their customer.
It seems that Mitsubishi technical support is stepping through a check list. If you have this problem, replace this part. The list would therefore be generic and the most expensive part will be the last part replaced. So how long will it take for my battery to get replaced ? At the speed that Mitsubishi is going, my money is on three months.
As for the symptoms of the problem I was having. The first day I only charged to 15 out of the 16 bars. The next charge, 11 out of 16. Third charge 9 out of 16. And the last charge before bring it to the dealer was 7 out of 16. This seems very similar to what I have read on this post.
I will update the group when needed.
Regards Dave
It seems that Mitsubishi technical support is stepping through a check list. If you have this problem, replace this part. The list would therefore be generic and the most expensive part will be the last part replaced. So how long will it take for my battery to get replaced ? At the speed that Mitsubishi is going, my money is on three months.
As for the symptoms of the problem I was having. The first day I only charged to 15 out of the 16 bars. The next charge, 11 out of 16. Third charge 9 out of 16. And the last charge before bring it to the dealer was 7 out of 16. This seems very similar to what I have read on this post.
I will update the group when needed.
Regards Dave
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