Remote Electric Heating Question

[maby]

It really isn't going to be making a decision to draw x KW from one source and y KW from another - the electronics to do that would simply be too complex and expensive to build. As I said above, I'm sure that it draws the power for the heater from the battery which is effectively on float charge. If the battery is initially fully charged, most of the current will come from it - and the voltage of the battery will begin to decline. It's that reduced battery voltage that triggers more current to be drawn from the charger and, hence, from the mains.

When you charge a battery pack, the current drawn is inversely proportional to the percentage charged. Assuming that you started with a fully charged battery, you will be sitting at the point in the charging curve where the current sourced from the charger is low and the time to get back to 100% is high.

 

[PHEVclub]

To be honest I am still none the wiser on this one.

I have a 30 Amp charger fitted so if I start the heater via the APP what we are saying is that the heater draws power from the battery which then in turn charges from the wall charge point? However the heater draws power faster than the wall charger can charge the batteries and so a 10 minute heat cycle would incur a 30 minute charge cycle?

However I ran 2 x heat cycles this morning, one after the other, one minute apart. The APP immediately showed the charger charging but did not indicate at all any degradation in battery state, ie. it was still at 100% even after the two heat cycles. If the above is the case then surely the battery level would have dropped?

I think the predicted range drops because you have been deemed to have used the heater and the calculations then assume that once started the heater will remain on, which in my case it doesn't, hence the pre-heat. Like I said after completing exactly the same journey as I do everyday when I got back home this morning the range left was the same as I have seen everyday however when I started the car the range was significantly lower than normal due to the 2 x pre-heat cycles.

I think it would be far better to have both pre-heat and cool to have settable temps on both that could be set from the phone rather than 100% heat or cold. This morning we found that 2 x pre heat cycles was a bit too warm, yesterday 1 x pre heat cycle was not enough. Software App upgrade possibly?

 

[jaapv]

Exactly what I have been saying all the time. Don't use the range indication as a measure of battery level.

 

[maby]

To be honest I am still none the wiser on this one.

I have a 30 Amp charger fitted so if I start the heater via the APP what we are saying is that the heater draws power from the battery which then in turn charges from the wall charge point? However the heater draws power faster than the wall charger can charge the batteries and so a 10 minute heat cycle would incur a 30 minute charge cycle?

...?

You may have a 30 amp charge socket fitted but, unless you have modified the car, you only have a 16 amp charger.

That 16 amps should be enough to run the heater, so the drain on the battery should be minimal. If you were using the 10 amp charge cable that comes with the car, it would certainly have to draw some current from the battery - there seems to be a question mark whether or not running the heater under these circumstances will trigger the charger to back in if it had previously switched off having fully charged the battery.

 

[jaapv]

I think it is clear it really needs a 16A charge point and cable to run the heating off the mains, using the 10A charger (really a misnomer, it is a current limiter and relay box) will result in running the heating off the battery and charging it again, as demonstarted in this thread.
A regular 30A charge point will not result in the car charging at more than 16A.

The car can be charged @ 32A but you need a fast-charging unit which will set you back 10.000 Euro at least.
It does not do the battery much good either if done frequently.

 

[user 258]

Hi,
I plugged my car in to charge with a half empty battery. Once it started charging I turned on the preheat, which started to work. The car was still drawing the usual 2.75KW it usually does to charge while the preheat was on. How is this different to having a fully charged battery discharging at 4KW for the preheat while being topped up at 2.75KW from the mains?
Can anyone that uses a 16A charging point catagorically state that when preheat is turned on with a fully charged battery that the 16A charger immediately starts in order to power the heater rather than the power coming from the battery? If so, how do you know? Does the charging point give an instantaneus power output reading?
Kind regards,
Mark
(Still miffed if the preheat while plugged into mains depletes the battery rather than using the mains)

 

[ufo]

If you want to have full Ev range and also want to preheat, you have to keep it plugged in approximately 30 mins after heating stops. ICE (petrol engine) never kicks in.

I had been wondering about this myself, so thanks UFO for answering my question before I'd actually asked! Seems a bit self defeating sadly but at least we could use this information to estimate the power drawn by the heating (someone cleverer than me needed here though!)

Something else I was unclear about is how sophisticated is the control system? ie. does it sense cabin / ambient temperature and not preheat if it's not needed / switch off when up to a set point? And if so what set point does it use - is it a fixed temperature or does it use the setting of the A/C system? The latter seems obvious but would mean that you'd need to remember to set it appropriately the night before. Or is this all assuming too high a level of sophistication?

Also, I know that it switches off when a door is opened (why?) but what about the boot?

Mine worked for the first time this morning but I can't say it was especially toasty, but now I know it only runs for 10 mins I'll adjust my start time.

Preheating/cooling indeed uses settings of the A/C system, tested that one too. When it is preheating/cooling it functions just like any climate control A/C, meaning brings the temperatue inside of PHEV to set value and maintains it there (To obtain most effective preheating set your A/C mode to bottom and dash board outlets, tested that one too). Remember even in conventional vehicles with climate controlled A/C, heating/cooling constantly runs to maintain set temperature it does not stop when set temperature is reached.

 

[jdsx]

Hi,
I plugged my car in to charge with a half empty battery. Once it started charging I turned on the preheat, which started to work. The car was still drawing the usual 2.75KW it usually does to charge while the preheat was on. How is this different to having a fully charged battery discharging at 4KW for the preheat while being topped up at 2.75KW from the mains?
Can anyone that uses a 16A charging point catagorically state that when preheat is turned on with a fully charged battery that the 16A charger immediately starts in order to power the heater rather than the power coming from the battery? If so, how do you know? Does the charging point give an instantaneus power output reading?
Kind regards,
Mark
(Still miffed if the preheat while plugged into mains depletes the battery rather than using the mains)

I can't say anything about this definitively because we seem to be having an Indian summer in Glasgow :lol: However, I do know that as the battery approaches full charge, the charging rate slows down considerably. When I plug the charger in (assuming a reasonably empty battery) I usually get something around 4KW, but over about 80% this slows down progressively. I usually try to unplug once the charge goes down to around 1.5KW to leave a little empty battery to benefit from regen on my way out in the morning. I would estimate therefore that the time taken to get from 99% to 100% is considerable - it will be at nothing like 4KW, probably less than 1KW, so if you (we) are expecting the pre-heat to take 4KW from the mains, I think we are probably mistaken... it will take it from the battery, and then it will try to re-top-up the battery but at a very slow rate Happy to try an experiment once it gets colder - I'm too mean to pre-heat the car when it's still warm :lol:

 

[user 258]

If you want to have full Ev range and also want to preheat, you have to keep it plugged in approximately 30 mins after heating stops. ICE (petrol engine) never kicks in.

I had been wondering about this myself, so thanks UFO for answering my question before I'd actually asked! Seems a bit self defeating sadly but at least we could use this information to estimate the power drawn by the heating (someone cleverer than me needed here though!)

Something else I was unclear about is how sophisticated is the control system? ie. does it sense cabin / ambient temperature and not preheat if it's not needed / switch off when up to a set point? And if so what set point does it use - is it a fixed temperature or does it use the setting of the A/C system? The latter seems obvious but would mean that you'd need to remember to set it appropriately the night before. Or is this all assuming too high a level of sophistication?

Also, I know that it switches off when a door is opened (why?) but what about the boot?

Mine worked for the first time this morning but I can't say it was especially toasty, but now I know it only runs for 10 mins I'll adjust my start time.

Preheating/cooling indeed uses settings of the A/C system, tested that one too. When it is preheating/cooling it functions just like any climate control A/C, meaning brings the temperatue inside of PHEV to set value and maintains it there (To obtain most effective preheating set your A/C mode to bottom and dash board outlets, tested that one too). Remember even in conventional vehicles with climate controlled A/C, heating/cooling constantly runs to maintain set temperature it does not stop when set temperature is reached.

Hi,
I'm pretty sure I remember reading that the preset heat/cool disregards the climate settings. My climate is usually off anyway. How would happen if you set the climate to max heat before turning off and then set it to precool?
How did you test?
Kind regards,
Mark

 

[pupenhausen]

I've got a 16 amp charger, and a smart meter for my electricity. If the car is fully charged but still plugged in with just the fridge running in the house, consumption is 2p £/hr If I start cooling from the app this goes up to 50p £/hr about 30 seconds after I've sent the instruction. If I stop the cooling 1 minute after, the 50p per kWh consumption continues for about 10 minutes. So yes, the battery is being depleted quite considerably considering the small gains you get. I'm not giving my cans of de-icer to the neighbours just yet!

 

[user 258]

Hi,
Out of the 4-5 tests I done I can say the using the pre-heat when connected by the standard 10A charging cable ONLY uses the battery for the heater. It does NOT use the mains and at least in my tests did not start recharging the battery once the pre-heat had stopped.
The result of this yesterday was that the EV distance I covered was 23 miles with A/C off and 1 mile EV range showing. This is compared to the usual 28 ish actual range so a drop of about 3-4 miles EV range for a 10 minute pre-heat.
Doing the maths, 10 mins at 4KW is 0.67KWh, which is 8.3% of the normally usable 8KWh of the battery. Reducing my 28 mile range by 8.3% shows I should lose about 2.3 miles. This is rreasonably close to what I experienced on a one off test.
Has anyone with a 16A charger been able to clearly show that activating pre-heat with an already fully charged battery takes the power from the mains not battery?
Kind regards,
Mark

 

[maddogsetc]

I'm pretty sure I remember reading that the preset heat/cool disregards the climate settings. My climate is usually off anyway. How would happen if you set the climate to max heat before turning off and then set it to precool?

Seems logical to me, however - I remembered last night to turn up the AC set temperature and set the mode to feet/demist. This morning when I got to the car it was clear that the demist function had been running as there was a clear 'tidemark' in the condensation on the windscreen. That tidemark hasn't been there on other days when I've left it with my usual daytime settings - 19°C and face only. TBH the cabin has never felt noticeably 'warm' when I first open the door so until now I've not been sure whether the preheat has actually been running or just simply already cooled back down.

The result of this yesterday was that the EV distance I covered was 23 miles with A/C off and 1 mile EV range showing. This is compared to the usual 28 ish actual range so a drop of about 3-4 miles EV range for a 10 minute pre-heat.

That reflects almost exactly my experience ('almost' in that I'm talking about indicated range rather than actual) and that's with a Podpoint 16A charger.

 

[user 258]

I'm pretty sure I remember reading that the preset heat/cool disregards the climate settings. My climate is usually off anyway. How would happen if you set the climate to max heat before turning off and then set it to precool?

Seems logical to me, however - I remembered last night to turn up the AC set temperature and set the mode to feet/demist. This morning when I got to the car it was clear that the demist function had been running as there was a clear 'tidemark' in the condensation on the windscreen. That tidemark hasn't been there on other days when I've left it with my usual daytime settings - 19°C and face only. TBH the cabin has never felt noticeably 'warm' when I first open the door so until now I've not been sure whether the preheat has actually been running or just simply already cooled back down.

Well, as mentioned, I leave my climate control turned off but it still managed to pre-heat.

The result of this yesterday was that the EV distance I covered was 23 miles with A/C off and 1 mile EV range showing. This is compared to the usual 28 ish actual range so a drop of about 3-4 miles EV range for a 10 minute pre-heat.

That reflects almost exactly my experience ('almost' in that I'm talking about indicated range rather than actual) and that's with a Podpoint 16A charger.

So it sounds likely that pre-heat uses the battery not mains even when available. Any one else tried this out yet?
Kind regards,
Mark

 

[jdsx]

Hi,
Out of the 4-5 tests I done I can say the using the pre-heat when connected by the standard 10A charging cable ONLY uses the battery for the heater. It does NOT use the mains and at least in my tests did not start recharging the battery once the pre-heat had stopped.
The result of this yesterday was that the EV distance I covered was 23 miles with A/C off and 1 mile EV range showing. This is compared to the usual 28 ish actual range so a drop of about 3-4 miles EV range for a 10 minute pre-heat.
Doing the maths, 10 mins at 4KW is 0.67KWh, which is 8.3% of the normally usable 8KWh of the battery. Reducing my 28 mile range by 8.3% shows I should lose about 2.3 miles. This is rreasonably close to what I experienced on a one off test.
Has anyone with a 16A charger been able to clearly show that activating pre-heat with an already fully charged battery takes the power from the mains not battery?
Kind regards,
Mark

That's very interesting. Given that the battery indicator has 16 bars, presumably we should lose one bar for every 6.25% of charge...therefore if the pre-heat is taking 8.3% of the battery.....shouldn't one of the bars disappear?

 

[user 258]

Hi,
Out of the 4-5 tests I done I can say the using the pre-heat when connected by the standard 10A charging cable ONLY uses the battery for the heater. It does NOT use the mains and at least in my tests did not start recharging the battery once the pre-heat had stopped.
The result of this yesterday was that the EV distance I covered was 23 miles with A/C off and 1 mile EV range showing. This is compared to the usual 28 ish actual range so a drop of about 3-4 miles EV range for a 10 minute pre-heat.
Doing the maths, 10 mins at 4KW is 0.67KWh, which is 8.3% of the normally usable 8KWh of the battery. Reducing my 28 mile range by 8.3% shows I should lose about 2.3 miles. This is rreasonably close to what I experienced on a one off test.
Has anyone with a 16A charger been able to clearly show that activating pre-heat with an already fully charged battery takes the power from the mains not battery?
Kind regards,
Mark

That's very interesting. Given that the battery indicator has 16 bars, presumably we should lose one bar for every 6.25% of charge...therefore if the pre-heat is taking 8.3% of the battery.....shouldn't one of the bars disappear?

Good point. I didn't know the battery indicator had 16 bars. I'll have a look next time. In any event, I would treat losing a bar as supporting our hypothesis while not losing a bar proves nothing thanks to Mitsubishi not being *precise* with these types of things. I'd really love to be able to read the battery state of charge with my OBD device but can't find out how.
In any event, according to maddogsetc the estimated EV range drops by roughly the expected amount and my actual range also dropped by roughly the expected amount.
Kind regards,
Mark

 

[user 422]

I usually charge from a 16Amp point at home and the charge is always complete in 3 hrs or so - using the pre-heat triggers the charge indication ( on the remote App ) within a few minutes of the pre-heat turning off the charge indication also turns off... leaving the battery fully charged.

 

[user 258]

Hi,
Out of the 4-5 tests I done I can say the using the pre-heat when connected by the standard 10A charging cable ONLY uses the battery for the heater. It does NOT use the mains and at least in my tests did not start recharging the battery once the pre-heat had stopped.
The result of this yesterday was that the EV distance I covered was 23 miles with A/C off and 1 mile EV range showing. This is compared to the usual 28 ish actual range so a drop of about 3-4 miles EV range for a 10 minute pre-heat.
Doing the maths, 10 mins at 4KW is 0.67KWh, which is 8.3% of the normally usable 8KWh of the battery. Reducing my 28 mile range by 8.3% shows I should lose about 2.3 miles. This is rreasonably close to what I experienced on a one off test.
Has anyone with a 16A charger been able to clearly show that activating pre-heat with an already fully charged battery takes the power from the mains not battery?
Kind regards,
Mark

That's very interesting. Given that the battery indicator has 16 bars, presumably we should lose one bar for every 6.25% of charge...therefore if the pre-heat is taking 8.3% of the battery.....shouldn't one of the bars disappear?

Hi,
OK, after using the preheat the battery level didn't drop, but the estimated EV range dropped from 30 to 28 miles. However, I remembered that even with a (normally) flat battery a single battery bar remains so that's 15 bars for the usable range so 6.6% per bar. However, within 0.4 miles of setting off (slow driving) the top bar did disappear. So that supports that roughly 7-8% usable battery is used with preheat, by my car, on a 10A charger.
Still disappointed with this.
Kind regards,
Mark

 

[user 258]

I'm pretty sure I remember reading that the preset heat/cool disregards the climate settings. My climate is usually off anyway. How would happen if you set the climate to max heat before turning off and then set it to precool?

Seems logical to me, however - I remembered last night to turn up the AC set temperature and set the mode to feet/demist. This morning when I got to the car it was clear that the demist function had been running as there was a clear 'tidemark' in the condensation on the windscreen. That tidemark hasn't been there on other days when I've left it with my usual daytime settings - 19°C and face only. TBH the cabin has never felt noticeably 'warm' when I first open the door so until now I've not been sure whether the preheat has actually been running or just simply already cooled back down.

Hi,
I locked myself in the car with phone in hand to test this. I set climate to 20C, outside ambient temperature was 16C, and I then turned off the climate control before locking the car.
Using preheat sends hot air to both screen and feet with a little coming from the face vents.
Using predefrost sends hot air just to the screen vents.
Using precool sends cold air just to the face vents.
I am therefore confident that my recollection of Mitsubishi saying the timed heat/cool ignored the settings of the climate control are correct.
The only thing I wonder is if the predefrost also activated the A/C as well as the heater in order to demist as well as defrost. If so, that is likely a 6KW drain on the battery. Might have to give that a try
Kind regards,
Mark

 

[jaapv]

I usually charge from a 16Amp point at home and the charge is always complete in 3 hrs or so - using the pre-heat triggers the charge indication ( on the remote App ) within a few minutes of the pre-heat turning off the charge indication also turns off... leaving the battery fully charged.

Exactly, but on the 10 A charger it is different, as that cannot supply sufficient power

 

[Johlin]

Hi. I can not get my temperature up in my phev. Ive set the time to heat the car 15 min before i drive off in the mornings after reading that the heater only heats for 10 min and then turns off..
Problem is that ony half of my windscreen (middle) is clear and my car does not feel very varm (steering weel is cold for example)
Im I the only one with this problem? Im I doing anything wrong?
(outside temperature is usually around 1-5 Celcius)
All the best from Sweden.