Car Not Charging/OMB reader not connecting

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tonyfri

Member
Joined
Jan 25, 2023
Messages
9
Ni All,
Amazing site. I have read alot and felt comfortable enough to open the DC-DC inverter because of this thread. Thanks.
Unfortunately I did not see much wrong. Also when I plug in a OBD reader it turns on but says "Failure to connect to car". Is this a different issue or maybe a sympton of the same problem?

Background: In January 2019 (7 years old) the battery really started to lose range and was becoming a problem. We thought it might have something to do with our summers that are routinely over 100 degrees. Then when on the highway it got the "turtle" lights and I slowed down from 60MPH to about 5mph. Dealership took it for a month and then shipped it to California for 4 months. My wife wrote letters that didn't really have any effect until she copied the National Transportation Safety Board and said it was a "safety" issue dying on the highway. Amazingly we had the car with a new 330V battery within 2 weeks! No charge because of warranty.

So, a few years back the car wouldn't charge with the 240V charger. I never worried about it and have since only used the slow 110V (Level 1) wall charger. A couple months ago some nights we found it didn't charge but the next night it would be okay. 2 days ago it stopped charging altogether.

For some reason the OBD reader can't find the car data/codes. The reader says "Failure to connect to the car". I plan to look through all the threads to see if this is a symptom anyone else has experienced and if it could be related to the charging issue.

Today I opened the DC-DC inverter and looked at the capacitors and resistors and everything seemed good to me. All fuses were good. There was some dark marks on the cover that probably came from the wires from the transistor off-gassing from getting too hot but they still looked alright.

So does anyone know how to diagnose this without a code or anything looking obviously bad?
From other threads I plan to :
1)lube the gear selector cable going into the back left rear of the car,
2) put DeOxit on the connectors of the J1772, and
3) check and clean the connections to the OBC.
I will post pictures tomorrow if I'm still stumped. I still have some threads to go through. There's a lot here. Love it!
 
Hi there and welcome to the forum

A few basics to start with, if the car is not charging there is a good chance your 12V Aux battery is low, make sure you check it/charge it first. Did you try your dongle on a different car to verify it’s actually working?
Let us know what you find…
Mickey
 
tonyfri said:
What is a dongle? Are you talking about the charging plug thing? :shock:
tonyfri, I also welcome to the forum.

The i-MiEV OBDII port is incompatible with a lot of OBD2 readers - past history showed that some readers wreak havoc and can end up with some weird things displaying on our dashboard, with unknown consequences. Best to stick with proven i-MiEV-compatible hardware/software.

For myself, for reading codes, years ago I purchased a iCarSoft i909 which has programs specific to the i-MiEV. It resets codes as well as reading them.

If you're interested in apps which interrogate and display many of the EV-related parameters, you might go through this compilation:

https://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=43930#p43930

Some of those also read and erase DTCs and cost much less than the i909.
 
I did use my neighbor's dongle and it did the same thing.
The 12V battery is at 12.93V when off and 14.52 when in "ready". I don't think that is the problem.
Thanks, I will look into the I909.
Today I plan to check the connections on the On-Board Charger box.
 
Alright, well, I just put in a new 12V battery and it didn't fix the problem.
I checked the connections on the cable going into the OBC and they looked good.
How would I verify that it is the actual On Board Charger box?
 
tonyfri said:
Alright, well, I just put in a new 12V battery and it didn't fix the problem.
I checked the connections on the cable going into the OBC and they looked good.
How would I verify that it is the actual On Board Charger box?

The 14.52V measurement in ready means that the aux battery charging circuit of your OBC seems to be working. Check out below for further hints

https://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4079

What dongle are you using and what app is it connected to, do any lights come on when you plug it in?
 
When my car wouldn't charge it took me a while to realize that it wasn't in PARK because the gearshift lever was not putting the car into PARK even though the shift lever was in the Park position.

I noticed in your first post that you intended to "1)lube the gear selector cable going into the back left rear of the car,"

Have you confirmed from the dash indicators that your car is actually always going into PARK when the shift lever is in the PARK position?
 
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