Was ICE cold weather start formula reprogrammed?

[craze1234]

I apologize for bringing this topic up again. I have tried searching the previous threads for an exact answer to some of my questions but can't seem to quite get them.

Here is my situation:

2018 model purchased and driven in upstate NY. Basically, one of the big reasons I purchased the Outlander was the EV button. I knew that PHEVs love to turn on the ice in cold weather. From reading the EV button description, it seemed logical that if I did not use cabin heat and did not mash the accelerator, I could drive the Outlander in my weather without the ICE.

It seemed as though this was true when I first got it. If I preheated the car and held down EV and put it in ECO and didn't use the cabin heater, I could go without ICE even in freezing temperatures. Then something changed. Now, if it is anywhere near 40 degrees F, the ICE can not wait to fire up. If I preheat the car for 20 minutes, I can get it to not start the ICE at start up or when I back out of the driveway. However, as soon as I get up to about 10 mph, ICE kicks on. I am as gentle as is humanly possible with the gas pedal.

What changed? Was something reprogrammed or does some switch start to wear and make it more likely to switch on the ICE?

I can see no sense in starting the ICE when I am driving at 30 mph and it is clearly not doing it to heat the car (if it did that, it would just start immediately and, again, I'm not trying to heat the car). At 30 mph, I would not want the ICE to help with acceleration anyway to avoid an accident so I wouldn't be asking for it to fire up without warming up. If Mitsu is trying to save the ICE, what would do more damage? 100 unneeded startups during the winter or one highly unlikely demand of the ICE to accelerate quickly?

I see there is a highly technical and invasive fix being worked on in another thread. I don't want to get into something like that that will void my warranty. However, if Mitsu could reprogram my car or replace a bad part so that I can reasonably drive this thing in EV in cold weather, that would be great.

Right now, on most of my trips, I drive for two miles with the ICE running the whole time doing absolutely nothing of benefit, park, return to a cold ICE which starts up again for the two mile return trip serving no purpose. I now basically has a gas car for four months a year!

 

[greendwarf]

Given the litigious nature of the US, Mitsu have to design for a worse case scenario (as Nissan found out to their cost), so they have to take into account the weather extremes of the north American market and wide differences in customer usage - including people who might damage the car by being stupid. After all you have warnings on takeaway coffee!

If you are doing so many short trips then perhaps you should have bought a BEV? Oh, and yes there does seem to be evidence that Mitsu tweaked the software to increase the incidence of ICE start-ups - probably upgraded when serviced. .

 

[user 3575]

We have the UK 2020 model, over the last few days overnight we have experienced -1 c, if I leave the heater in the on position set at 22 c the ICE unit has started to fire up first thing in the morning, however if I leave the heater set at 18 c it has not fire up the ICE unit yet.

In the winter I normally leave the heater in the off position but set at 18 c, when I start the car I press the EV mode, press ECO then switch the heater on, however as far as I can remember when we are down to -4c the ICE will fire up.

40 Fahrenheit is approximately 4.44 Celsius, definitely a different program.

 

[kpetrov]

A lot of folks have a suspicion that the car was reprogrammed, but it is not clear or proven.
I myself bought the vehicle (used) last summer and when the cold weather came 5deg Celsius was the critical point for me. On every short trip the ICE was coming on after a minute of driving only to be shut down by parking the vehicle without even fully warmed up.
So i had to do the invasive fix you talk about.
Some owners were pissed of and complaining a lot to their dealerships so the head office suggested battery service to be performed an... miracle, their engines went back to be quite again. I did it as well. BMU double reset followed by DBCAM procedure fixed the issue. Now in cold weather the ICE is coming to live only when my state of charge is under thirty-ish percent. The really cold weather didn't start yet but sure the procedure works and the culprit is the BMU.

 

[mellobob]

So, you (well, some of you) are buying a $50K (Canadian) car and driving around in the cold with heavy boots, pants and coats on? Reminds me of my first car, a '59 VW with no heat. Used to have a scraper in one hand to keep a little patch of the windshield cleared off. An electric bike would be cheaper for you ... and have the bonus of not having a windshield to scrape.

Sorry ... but this thread just keeps coming around time and time again and I just don't get it.

 

[greendwarf]

This does seem to be a particular problem in North America only.

 

[jaapv]

The temperature is down to zero here, and I found that activating both the EV and ECO buttons will kill the ICE instantly.

 

[kpetrov]

So, you (well, some of you) are buying a $50K (Canadian) car and driving around in the cold with heavy boots, pants and coats on? Reminds me of my first car, a '59 VW with no heat. Used to have a scraper in one hand to keep a little patch of the windshield cleared off. An electric bike would be cheaper for you ... and have the bonus of not having a windshield to scrape.

Sorry ... but this thread just keeps coming around time and time again and I just don't get it.

Well smarty some of us have built a perfect daily commute. 3 km. from home to wife's work and another 3km. to my work.
The vehicle is perfectly fine and cozy when preheated. Windshield perfectly clear without any scraping. We have an electric heater you know.

Opposite to your suggestion we should be wearing heavy boots and coats if I count on ICE to warm up the vehicle in that distance.

Update for the interested party... Last winter ICE kicking in constantly under 5deg Celsius. After an DBCAM procedure this winter -5deg Celsius and no ICE coming to life without a reason.

 

[Trex]

After an DBCAM procedure this winter -5deg Celsius and no ICE coming to life without a reason.

I talked about this some years ago. There are quite a few "registers" (or storage spots) from memory for DBCAM data. Those "registers" are sitting there waiting to be used on all our PHEVS. I think Mitsubishi (at least the engineering department I think) was expecting us PHEV owners to get our BMU calibrated more often than probably most of us do. :? Also maybe something gets lost in the translation from Mitsubishi to our countries dealers and importers in letting us know this? :?

Remember that without a DBCAM procedure (emptying the drive battery then measuring the amount of charge taken to refill it) our BMU is just "guessing" our drive battery capacity from all the research I have done and the BMU can effect things negatively like our EV range (among other thing it seems) unless calibrated every now and again and yes I have experience of that negativity.

Anyway that's my 2 bobs worth on this subject.

Regards Trex.

 

[littlescrote]

It sounds reasonably likely that there is a trigger based on cell voltage and the cold weather lowers this as well as a smoothing procedure or reset of some kind potentially bringing it back above the threshold,

 

[IslandLife]

Same happening to me. Think it's a battery protection measure... seems the battery needs to reach a certain temp before it'll kick the engine off. Preheating while charging doesn't seem to affect this as much as it used to.

My only thought is that Mitsubishi wouldn't charge this if they didn't need to. So, I'll just appreciate the battery protection and count the days until there is a BEV with 600kms of winter range, large enough and with enough storage for a family of 4 & dog that ski's, mountain bikes and camps that is relatively affordable (Mitsu PHEV price range).

 

[AndyInOz]

Same happening to me. Think it's a battery protection measure... seems the battery needs to reach a certain temp before it'll kick the engine off. Preheating while charging doesn't seem to affect this as much as it used to.

My only thought is that Mitsubishi wouldn't charge this if they didn't need to. So, I'll just appreciate the battery protection and count the days until there is a BEV with 600kms of winter range, large enough and with enough storage for a family of 4 & dog that ski's, mountain bikes and camps that is relatively affordable (Mitsu PHEV price range).

A dog that ski's, mountain bikes and camps?

I thought my little guy was clever because hide rides around on the kayak with me!

 

[craze1234]

Thank you for some constructive responses. I never saw that a bmu reprogram might help.

I know the Syracuse NY dealership has sold very few phevs. They will say "What?" when I start taking bmu. What would be the best approach or wording to use to get them to do what is needed (since I barely understand it myself). Thank you in advance.

Side note: I knew when I posted I'd get the why didn't you just buy a pure ev response. yes I drive mostly short trips but 10-15 times a year, we take trips that require more distance than evs available in our price range in 2018 that offer the size of the outlander with four wheel drive. Please don't be the why didn't you buy something else guy or gal on this forum. I put a lot of thought and money into this car. If I can solve this one problem, I would love it. For now, in the winter it frustrates me greatly.

 

[user 3575]

We have the UK 2020 model, over the last few days overnight we have experienced -1 c, if I leave the heater in the on position set at 22 c the ICE unit has started to fire up first thing in the morning, however if I leave the heater set at 18 c it has not fire up the ICE unit yet.

In the winter I normally leave the heater in the off position but set at 18 c, when I start the car I press the EV mode, press ECO then switch the heater on, however as far as I can remember when we are down to -4c the ICE will fire up.

40 Fahrenheit is approximately 4.44 Celsius, definitely a different program.

Now the temperature is dropping the ICE unit is firing up at 4 degrees on start up

 

[craze1234]

Well I was 47 degrees F today but the ice still fired up.

I have found that if I force the engine to start while parked, it will idle for exactly 5 minutes then shut off. I can then drive in EV. This results in a better mpg for any trip over 1 mile. This is probably because the engine is at low rpm while idling vs when it is moving the vehicle.

It is frustrating but a definite improvement over before. At least the car gets nice and warm.

As an example, I drove 5 miles from a cold start and got 70 mpg. With the pre start method, I got 105 mpg (I'm pretty sure the gas used idling gets factored in because when I first pull out, the mpg is very low- around 1 mpg)

On a 1 mile trip, we averaged 25 mpg from cold start and 37 mpg after warming.

 

[PHEV07]

So, you (well, some of you) are buying a $50K (Canadian) car and driving around in the cold with heavy boots, pants and coats on? Reminds me of my first car, a '59 VW with no heat. Used to have a scraper in one hand to keep a little patch of the windshield cleared off. An electric bike would be cheaper for you ... and have the bonus of not having a windshield to scrape.

Sorry ... but this thread just keeps coming around time and time again and I just don't get it.

It keeps being brought up because no one else outside North America is bringing this up.

On my previous 2018 Oulander PHEV, I merely held down the EV button, brake pedal and start button and the ICE did not turn on until I either set the heater to above 22'C of or I press heavily on gas pedal or had a drained battery.

From what I have been reading, that is no longer the case because there may have been a software update uploaded.

I cannot test this myself because I traded the 2018 for a 2022 Outlander PHEV 13.8KWH on September of 2021.

I can no longer override the time the ICE kicks in and I am no longer pleased with what Mitsubishi as done, because now the ICE wants to kick in at a mere 2'C.

I have to ease off on the pedal so as to keep the power needle before the point that the need hits the Engine run mode to prevent the ICE from starting (traffic permitting)

I bought this PHEV to allow me to maximize my EV Driving, but now Mitsubishi Motors has take that option away from us, so yes, we're are very pissed off and we WILL keep posting about this.

 

[nrayanov]

My procedure to ensure the engine will not turn on is the following:
1. Activate EV mode.
2. Activate ECO mode.
3. Use B0 for driving.

The engine will come on only if the battery is very low or the AC is set to 24 C or more.

 

[kpetrov]

My procedure to ensure the engine will not turn on is the following:
1. Activate EV mode.
2. Activate ECO mode.
3. Use B0 for driving.

The engine will come on only if the battery is very low or the AC is set to 24 C or more.

Yea but what are the temperatures in your area right now? ;-)

 

[PHEV07]

My procedure to ensure the engine will not turn on is the following:
1. Activate EV mode.
2. Activate ECO mode.
3. Use B0 for driving.

The engine will come on only if the battery is very low or the AC is set to 24 C or more.

On my 2018 North American model, this process worked get at Temps above -10'C.

1) Hold EV Button down, foot on Break and start Car.

But on my 2022 PHEV this procedure only works with Temps above 5'C.

I need to ease up on the gas pedal, keep power needle in Battery range, Heater set to 20'C or less on fan speed 2, if I go above that, the ICE starts.

At Temps below 0'C the ICE starts no matter what I try.

There needs to be an update to allow us to force EV Mode to at least Temps as low as -10'C otherwise, I need to find another Manufacturer.

I go thru Gasoline needlessly as the ICE engages far too often with a fully charged battery

 

[nrayanov]

Yea but what are the temperatures in your area right now? ;-)

That works down to -10 C. I haven't had the chance to try anything colder.