24 Outlander PHEV in areas without Cell coverage

[Alphahelix]

Hi, I’m just trying to help my ma with her new outlander phev. She lives rurally and there is no cell coverage, but the car is connected to her phone via Bluetooth and it is connected to her WiFi network. She needs to be able to monitor/schedule the charge with Mitsubishi connect and lives in a cold weather area so preconditioning/heating would be beneficial.

It does not seem like it’s possible to pair up with Mitsubishi connect unless both the car and her phone have cellular coverage. There are areas around here with spotty cell service but it is not enough for data to connect, just voice calling works.

So I have 2 questions; 1 being do I have to drive in to the city to pair this up, and 2 and much more importantly being… Is any of this stuff going to work after its paired? When it is plugged in in the driveway connected via Bluetooth and wifi but no cell … will ANY of the features work? If not this seems like a horrible design choice/oversight by Mitsubishi.

Does anyone else live rurally? Can anyone offer any insight?

Thanks

 

[mellobob]

Yes, awful way to run a railroad. I live in a similar area and have the same problems with my '23.

First off, set up your app the first time where you have both cell data and wifi. Did the dealer not do this? He should!

Once the app and car are connected you should be good to go. I can run the awful, crappy, dumb app from my house. I _think_ the car is connecting to my home wifi. But, we have a very small amount of cell coverage ... but not enough to even send a text reliably so I doubt that it's getting any info that way.

 

[Grandad]

I had issues with my '23 and the app (less than 25% success rate) so I called Mitsu Customer "Service". They ran a check on my vehicle and I was told it was the fault of "the poor cell service in [my] location,"(1-2 bars LTE) and there was nothing they could do for me. The remote app also regularly mis-reported the vehicle's status,.

Since you mention cold weather pre-conditioning, in case you're not aware:
• the remote app "climate control" does not start the ICE - it relies on a heat exchanger only, not heat from combustion
• below ~ -15C (~5F) the heat exchanger does not produce heat and in order to warm the vehicle it needs to be started manually to engage the ICE to produce heat

There is of course the whole issue of the vehicle locking out at cold temperatures "to protect the battery" resulting in an absolute failure to start. The issue is dealt with in the Owner's Manual (not available until after purchase) by stating that under these conditions the operator should plug in the vehicle and "wait for the air temperature to warm..."(really - check your Mom's manual) In my case that was about the same as saying "park your expensive PHEV and come back in the spring." This is the subject of pending class actions in the US and Canada. For more details search "Mitsubishi Battery class action"

Long and short, you are correct - the vehicle was very poorly engineered.

IMO (and that of many others) the vehicle as sold was unfit for purpose and deliberately misrepresented to buyers.

 

[drwho]

Hmmm ... we've been looking at some rural properties lately. I'll discuss this with my wife.
Thanks for the heads-up.

 

[Rudtoine]

I've heard that some car manufacturers offer a dedicated Wi-Fi connection for their vehicles, even in areas with no cell service. Have you checked to see if that's an option for your Outlander?