PHEV... Hybrid drivetrain has stopped (working)

[Roger_N]

12 minutes ago, philip42h said:

No, no, no ... the car remains in Ready mode all the time it is running - the engine won't run (and indeed you can't get out of Park) unless the car is in Ready mode. So, the car goes into Ready mode when the key is present, the driver has foot on the brake pedal and presses the Start/Stop button. The car remains in Ready mode until the driver presses the Start/Stop button again (or something really untoward happens!).

OK when you said while it is being charged, I had not picked up on the fact you were talking about the PHEV, my bad, as I now see you were talking about plugged in charging.

[ernieb]

With the PHEV in Ready Mode  it will charge the 12v Battery and in the winter, or if your not going to use the car for my length of time, it’s worth letting the car sit for 20 mins in Ready Mode just to top up the 12v Battery. 

[Nick72]

So as I've barely used the car in a few weeks (all in EV mode too, engine hasn't started for probably a month) I decided to check the 12V Battery with the multimeter. It's perfect fine. Well over 12V.

Took the car on a run this AM. Long run, engine on and seperately in EV mode to see if I could trigger this nonsense again. All working completely fine. No time for the next couple of weeks to investigate with the dealer due to work commitments and don't need the car for anything more than a few miles. No long trips planned for a good few weeks.

 

A mystery.

[TonyHSD]

14 minutes ago, Nick72 said:

So as I've barely used the car in a few weeks (all in EV mode too, engine hasn't started for probably a month) I decided to check the 12V battery with the multimeter. It's perfect fine. Well over 12V.

Took the car on a run this AM. Long run, engine on and seperately in EV mode to see if I could trigger this nonsense again. All working completely fine. No time for the next couple of weeks to investigate with the dealer due to work commitments and don't need the car for anything more than a few miles. No long trips planned for a good few weeks.

 

A mystery.

Thanks for the update. 
I had once hybrid system malfunction fault while under hard acceleration and that left me off the road for no apparent reason. I deleted the error and the problem never happen again so far over 6 months. Mystery to me too but if ain’t broken I am not touching it. I called a software glitch or system has protected itself from destruction while was heavily loaded. If it’s a real problem will occur again, if not perhaps was one of those just luck events. 👍

[srt]

I know there were problems reported with early Yaris and the fix was to make sure the car was in "Ready" mode for at least an hour a week - to charge the ancilliary 12V Battery - using the DC-DC inverter from the traction Battery. Could be the same with the Rav4 PHEV

[ColinB]

8 hours ago, srt said:

I know there were problems reported with early Yaris and the fix was to make sure the car was in "Ready" mode for at least an hour a week - to charge the ancilliary 12V battery - using the DC-DC inverter from the traction battery. Could be the same with the Rav4 PHEV

I had this problem during lockdown when I wasn't using my C-HR enough. First time it happened the car was on the drive, tried to start it and the error message came up. AA turned up, clipped a power supply somewhere in the fuse box and it started immediately, he suggested taking it for a 30 minute drive which I did. I bought myself a Battery pack, which came in useful next time it happened. The official Toyota line is to sit in the car with it in ready mode for something like 30+ minutes every week or two to keep the Battery topped up.

[Nick72]

15 hours ago, ColinB said:

I had this problem during lockdown when I wasn't using my C-HR enough. First time it happened the car was on the drive, tried to start it and the error message came up. AA turned up, clipped a power supply somewhere in the fuse box and it started immediately, he suggested taking it for a 30 minute drive which I did. I bought myself a battery pack, which came in useful next time it happened. The official Toyota line is to sit in the car with it in ready mode for something like 30+ minutes every week or two to keep the battery topped up.

Oh I just can't be ubikd to do that. Not sitting in the car for 30 minutes once a week. I just don't have the time. I may need to let the wife use it instead and accept the risks.

[IanML]

If you park outside, you could buy a Halfords Solar Panel and plug it into the OBD2 connector, which will keep the 12V Battery charged up when the car is unattended and switched off.  The obd2 connector is always connected to the Battery, so the car does not have to be in ready mode.

I park my Rav4 in the road and use it infrequently, and since I started doing that, I have not had to use a Battery charger or booster.

[Nick72]

10 hours ago, IanML said:

If you park outside, you could buy a Halfords Solar Panel and plug it into the OBD2 connector, which will keep the 12V battery charged up when the car is unattended and switched off.  The obd2 connector is always connected to the battery, so the car does not have to be in ready mode.

I park my Rav4 in the road and use it infrequently, and since I started doing that, I have not had to use a battery charger or booster.

That's a great idea.

[philip42h]

On 6/24/2022 at 5:13 PM, Nick72 said:

Driven probably only a 30 mile run 2 weeks ago followed by about 9 off 1.5 mile runs.

A 30 mile run - say 45 minutes - plus 9x 1.5 mile runs - say 5 minutes each - makes around 90 minutes in Ready mode over the past two weeks. That's way more than enough to keep the 12v auxiliary Battery topped-up. While the issue could arise from a problem on the 12v side of the system, it isn't going to be due to lack of charge time ... 😉 

[Nick72]

1 hour ago, philip42h said:

A 30 mile run - say 45 minutes - plus 9x 1.5 mile runs - say 5 minutes each - makes around 90 minutes in Ready mode over the past two weeks. That's way more than enough to keep the 12v auxiliary battery topped-up. While the issue could arise from a problem on the 12v side of the system, it isn't going to be due to lack of charge time ... 😉 

True

[Mikw]

3 hours ago, philip42h said:

A 30 mile run - say 45 minutes - plus 9x 1.5 mile runs - say 5 minutes each - makes around 90 minutes in Ready mode over the past two weeks. That's way more than enough to keep the 12v auxiliary battery topped-up. While the issue could arise from a problem on the 12v side of the system, it isn't going to be due to lack of charge time ... 😉 

Doesn't that depend on how much it charges during all those 5 minute journeys? It might be discharging during those as initial start up procedure takes a lot out of the Battery

[philip42h]

9 hours ago, Mikw said:

Doesn't that depend on how much it charges during all those 5 minute journeys? It might be discharging during those as initial start up procedure takes a lot out of the battery

That would be true if it were a traditional ICE, but it's a Toyota hybrid. All the power to start the engine comes from Nick's massive traction Battery - assuming the engine actually starts and he doesn't stay in EV mode throughout the journey. All the auxiliary Battery is required to do is to get the car into Ready mode - once in Ready mode the auxiliary Battery is recharged from the traction battery. And Nick reported that the car had already be made Ready and then 'stalled' ...

The 'weakness', such as it is, with the auxiliary battery is a long lay-up maintaining the car's electronic systems when it isn't going anywhere. Such as folk found during lock-down. This is resolved by accumulated time in Ready mode (or a spot of trickle charging). And that's just not the case in Nick's example.

[IanML]

That assumes that the auxiliary Battery is always trickle-charged when in Ready Mode.  I know of some EVs where this is not the case, and there is an unstated period after entering Ready before the charging commences.  Someone needs to do some trials with an ammeter to see whether that is the case with this model.

[roadster-rav]

41 minutes ago, IanML said:

That assumes that the auxiliary battery is always trickle-charged when in Ready Mode.  I know of some EVs where this is not the case, and there is an unstated period after entering Ready before the charging commences.  Someone needs to do some trials with an ammeter to see whether that is the case with this model.

I can confirm that  the Rav4 Battery charging starts immediately when ready mode is switched on according to my voltmeter. It may be that charge rate diminishes once the Battery reaches full charge. I doubt that the charge rate ever goes above 10 amps so one hour in Ready mode, whether in motion or not, will not fully charge a flat Battery. 

[ernieb]

13 hours ago, Mikw said:

Doesn't that depend on how much it charges during all those 5 minute journeys? It might be discharging during those as initial start up procedure takes a lot out of the battery

Nick, has a PHEV and even if the traction Battery is considered empty at 30% SOC it starts the charge as soon as the car is in the READY mode.

[Mikw]

On 6/27/2022 at 10:56 PM, Mikw said:

A 30 mile run - say 45 minutes - plus 9x 1.5 mile runs - say 5 minutes each - makes around 90 minutes in Ready mode over the past two weeks. That's way more than enough to keep the 12v auxiliary battery topped-up. While the issue could arise from a problem on the 12v side of the system, it isn't going to be due to lack of charge time ... 😉 

I was responding to this. The 12v Battery charges of the traction Battery. We know from users that short journies deplete the 12v Battery due to lot of draw on initial start up.

I'm not massivel familiar with the way the Phev works, but if the 12 v is charged up from the traction battery then i think those 9 5 minute runs would more than undue 45 minutes of ready mode.

On the Yaris forum a user managed to deplete her battery doing 10 minute daily runs for example

[ernieb]

With the PHEV the 12v Battery continuously runs the alarm system 24/7 which is the big drain but the moment it’s in READY mode that 375v traction Battery to 12v inverter is running. My understanding is that even in winter conditions a 20/30 mins period in READY mode should keep the 12v Battery topped up.

[roadster-rav]

1 hour ago, ernieb said:

With the PHEV the 12v battery continuously runs the alarm system 24/7 which is the big drain but the moment it’s in READY mode that 375v traction battery to 12v inverter is running. My understanding is that even in winter conditions a 20/30 mins period in READY mode should keep the 12v battery topped up.

Topped up possibly but charged fully from nearly flat is not possible. Say the charge rate is 10 amps at 14 volts a nominal 140 X 0.5 watt.hours of energy can be transferred to the Battery in 30 minutes. For a 12 volt 45 AH Battery that is very approximately 10% of the battery's capacity. In practice the rate of charge will vary and Toyota are very good at managing Battery condition and life but can't work miracles. Essentially if you try to fully charge a flat 45AH battery in less than 5 hours it would be at the expense of its life span and I don't think that would be acceptable to Toyota's engineers.

[nlee]

For those interested in knowing what is going on with the 12V Battery, I saw someone using this £20 device somewhere else on the web.

Battery Monitor BM2 device for Cars & Campervans 12V Battery/leisure Battery tester Compatible with Android iOS and Ipad with bluetooth 4.0 and above. https://amzn.eu/d/6s3gCkc

It links to an app via bluetooth and seems to have some decent functionality including logging what's going on with battery charging and drain continuosly. It also alerts low battery statuses when in range. (Note, I suppose if there is already too much drain on the battery, this will also cause some additional drain!)

Contrary to what some off us believe on here, the person using it on a RAV4 Prime suggests he's tested it and that the 12v battery does charge when the vehicle is plugged in but only when it is actively charging, i.e once the traction battery is full charged, it also stops the 12v battery charging. Maybe an advantage for those charging over a longer period on a granny charger, rather than 2 hours on a 6.6kw charge? Not much help to the HEV, I appreciate.

I haven't got one, haven't tested it so can't confirm and only relaying what I've read.

 

[ernieb]

Nigel, interesting comments, it would be good if it does charge the 12v Battery.

[nlee]

1 minute ago, ernieb said:

Nigel, interesting comments, it would be good if it does charge the 12v battery.

Ernie, I also just read something else that says, it does charge the 12v Battery, but only when actively charging the traction Battery and the Battery heater is on (not sure if they meant switched to on, or actually running - if it's the latter, it might not be much benefit in summer!). Who knows???

[ernieb]

6 minutes ago, nlee said:

Ernie, I also just read something else that says, it does charge the 12v battery, but only when actively charging the traction battery and the battery heater is on (not sure if they meant switched to on, or actually running - if it's the latter, it might not be much benefit in summer!). Who knows???

Interesting, I always have the Battery heater/cooling active on mine to maximise and create the best conditions for the traction Battery.

[Nick72]

I thought I had read on the US forum that the 12V Battery does charge if the car is charging from a wall box. Trying to find the posts on this but struggling. 

I mean, that would make a huge amount of sense. And, if the preconditioning is on then this is power drawn off the 12V Battery right? So it would make sense not to flatten the Battery and instead supply top up power via the inverter from the traction battery as it charges?

[ernieb]

8 hours ago, Nick72 said:

I thought I had read on the US forum that the 12V battery does charge if the car is charging from a wall box. Trying to find the posts on this but struggling. 

I mean, that would make a huge amount of sense. And, if the preconditioning is on then this is power drawn off the 12V battery right? So it would make sense not to flatten the battery and instead supply top up power via the inverter from the traction battery as it charges?

and I’m struggling to find where I ‘thought’ I’d read that the 12v Battery did not charge when the traction Battery is charging. Maybe it’s the potential confusion about having the traction Battery heating/cooling on?