Ecotricity Charging Issue and Electronic Park Failure

[Maanki]

Just thought I'd share my Saturday evening experience. Travelling back from the Lake District we stopped at the Forton services on the M6. It was only a short stop but I thought I would top up with some electricity while I was there and went through the usual procedure. I only put 10 minutes charge in the vehicle and stopped the charging procedure by pressing all the correct buttons and using my Ecotricity card on the front of the machine which then told me that the charge was finished and it was safe to unplug the vehicle. Did so, however when I got back in the car I was presented with a dead vehicle and the information "EV system service required" on the dashboard. So I called a Mitsubishi and they advised me that the vehicle would have to be recovered; the first recovery vehicle was front lift only and was unsuitable however when the second recovery vehicle turned up it was not possible to move the vehicle onto the back of the flatbed tow truck because of the electronic parking brake was stuck on and no about twiddling with various knobs would make it release. We waited for technician to arrive he took about one minute to release it with the following procedure.

Hold the gear lever to the right, keep the hand brake and foot brake on and then press the start key.

He then said that he been out to quite a few of these and it was an issue with ecotricity chargers and that Mitsubishi are aware of this and a firmware update is required. On googling it it does seem to be an issue with only partially charging vehicle and so I thought others might be a bit cautious about partial charging and I thought the information about how to release the electronic parking would also be useful as I could not find any information on that anywhere. In fact when I rang Mitsubishi support and asked them how to do it they advise me that they were not a technical service and is it in the manual, which of course it is not!

 

[maby]

Interesting! Did that procedure actually make the car usable again, or simply unlock the transmission so that it could be loaded onto the truck?

 

[raymie]

Probably also worth noting what age and model of vehicle you have in case this is fixed on newer ones or may only affect newer ones?

 

[maby]

P.S. the method of unlocking the transmission brake described above definitely should go into the "Tips, Tricks and Modifications" thread - it could easily be the most important entry there for many of us!

 

[jaapv]

Indeed; done.

 

[Maanki]

Good point. No, the procedure didn't make the vehicle usable but it did at least make it moveable! The vehicle is a 2014 model GX4hs. Have to say the dealer turned it around very quickly (which means they are familiar with this issue maybe!)

 

[gwatpe]

I had the EV service required message stay on and my fix was to reset the check engine fault. If the fault is real, the message will soon come back.

 

[simonrh]

I got this error from a Type 2 pillar in Milton Keynes recently and my heart sank thinking i would have to get recovered. Fortunately it cleared itself.

 

[CODDY]

Just had that exact experience at Southwould services on the M6. 3 hour tow home ! if this is a software issue then Mitsubishi need to get this sorted.

Just thought I'd share my Saturday evening experience. Travelling back from the Lake District we stopped at the Forton services on the M6. It was only a short stop but I thought I would top up with some electricity while I was there and went through the usual procedure. I only put 10 minutes charge in the vehicle and stopped the charging procedure by pressing all the correct buttons and using my Ecotricity card on the front of the machine which then told me that the charge was finished and it was safe to unplug the vehicle. Did so, however when I got back in the car I was presented with a dead vehicle and the information "EV system service required" on the dashboard. So I called a Mitsubishi and they advised me that the vehicle would have to be recovered; the first recovery vehicle was front lift only and was unsuitable however when the second recovery vehicle turned up it was not possible to move the vehicle onto the back of the flatbed tow truck because of the electronic parking brake was stuck on and no about twiddling with various knobs would make it release. We waited for technician to arrive he took about one minute to release it with the following procedure.

Hold the gear lever to the right, keep the hand brake and foot brake on and then press the start key.

He then said that he been out to quite a few of these and it was an issue with ecotricity chargers and that Mitsubishi are aware of this and a firmware update is required. On googling it it does seem to be an issue with only partially charging vehicle and so I thought others might be a bit cautious about partial charging and I thought the information about how to release the electronic parking would also be useful as I could not find any information on that anywhere. In fact when I rang Mitsubishi support and asked them how to do it they advise me that they were not a technical service and is it in the manual, which of course it is not!

 

[Neverfuel]

Just had that exact experience at Southwould services on the M6. 3 hour tow home ! if this is a software issue then Mitsubishi need to get this sorted.

Did you let the charge complete its cycle or did you stop it part way through?

 

[user 816]

Just had that exact experience at Southwould services on the M6. 3 hour tow home ! if this is a software issue then Mitsubishi need to get this sorted.

Did you let the charge complete its cycle or did you stop it part way through?

This was going to be my question too.

Be interesting to know if anyone has had a charge to 100% in a car that was completely left alone until it says done and you can just unplug - go wrong and strand the car.

Or if anyone has finished charging but powered up the car with the plug still in for example or any other slight variations on the situation.

I always charge with aux power put on before plugging in until its finished and had no problems touch wood. I made the mistake of hitting the full power up just before a charge finished once and there was a number of alarming clunks and beeps so I though oh dear this is bad. But it was OK. Pretty sure more due to good luck than anything else.