Pre-conditioning Question ?

[lightboxcar]

We have the My-T app scheduled to charge the BZ4X only in the middle of the night due to better tarrif.

So the charger cable is sometimes still attached in the morning when we remotely switch on the heating and defrost function.

Noticed RAV4 PHEV members saying pre-conditioning did not use any Battery power when the car was plugged into charger.

Does that hold true for the BZ4X, i.e. pre-conditioning won't use Battery power when the charger cable is plugged in, even if charging is scheduled on the happen ONLY duringthe night ?

Thanks

 

[Tom_Dww]

I have used pre-conditioning with the car plugged in and the range did not decrease. Pre-conditioning from my experience helps to give better consumption figures. 

[bZ4X]

2 hours ago, lightboxcar said:

We have the My-T app scheduled to charge the BZ4X only in the middle of the night due to better tarrif.

So the charger cable is sometimes still attached in the morning when we remotely switch on the heating and defrost function.

Noticed RAV4 PHEV members saying pre-conditioning did not use any battery power when the car was plugged into charger.

Does that hold true for the BZ4X, i.e. pre-conditioning won't use battery power when the charger cable is plugged in, even if charging is scheduled on the happen ONLY duringthe night ?

Thanks

 

Unfortunately, it usses cars Battery currently. 

[Rajavina]

11 hours ago, lightboxcar said:

We have the My-T app scheduled to charge the BZ4X only in the middle of the night due to better tarrif.

So the charger cable is sometimes still attached in the morning when we remotely switch on the heating and defrost function.

Noticed RAV4 PHEV members saying pre-conditioning did not use any battery power when the car was plugged into charger.

Does that hold true for the BZ4X, i.e. pre-conditioning won't use battery power when the charger cable is plugged in, even if charging is scheduled on the happen ONLY duringthe night ?

Thanks

 

When the charging cable is plugged to the car and if your charging point is ready pre heating will consume electricity from the grid and not from the traction Battery. If you have a smart meter at home you can see the electricity being drawn from the grid.

[philip42h]

11 hours ago, lightboxcar said:

Noticed RAV4 PHEV members saying pre-conditioning did not use any battery power when the car was plugged into charger

There may be some 'crossed wires' here ... the RAV4 has two batteries - the traction Battery and a 12v auxiliary Battery. The 12v auxiliary Battery is recharged from the traction battery via a DC/DC converter when the car is in Ready mode. I'm pretty certain that the bZ4X will be the same.

The PHEV does NOT recharge the 12v auxiliary battery while the traction battery is being recharged from the mains, UNLESS preconditioning is active at the same time. Preconditioning draws power from both the traction battery (the heat pump) and the 12v auxiliary battery (everything else required by preconditioning) and sensibly maintains the charge in the 12v auxiliary battery while this is going on. Provided that the traction battery is connected to the mains the traction battery will be topped up too.

I would suspect that the bZ4X behaves in he same way. Either way, the required power is drawn from the corresponding battery. And the traction battery will be topped up provided that it is actively connected for charging. I'd be very surprised if the bZ4X 'magically' drew power from the mains when the charger is scheduled to be Off.

[ernieb]

It might depend on the charging box? I have a PHEV and just use a simple granny cable, 240V and the pre conditioning does use the house power. I wonder if you are using a wall charging if the schedule may preclude the use of power outside the scheduled times?

[philip42h]

20 minutes ago, Rajavina said:

When the charging cable is plugged to the car and if your charging point is ready pre heating will consume electricity from the grid and not from the traction battery.

Being pedantic, sorry, this is not strictly true - pre heating will always consume electricity from the  the traction battery; if the traction Battery is simultaneously connected to a charger, the traction Battery will be topped-up from the grid ...

[bZ4X]

1 hour ago, Rajavina said:

When the charging cable is plugged to the car and if your charging point is ready pre heating will consume electricity from the grid and not from the traction battery. If you have a smart meter at home you can see the electricity being drawn from the grid.

No @Rajavina, I tested it.

 

It doesn't make sense but bZ4X uses energy from the traction Battery. 

 

1) My car was plugged in

2) just after charging reached %100

3) I remotely turned on the a/c heating with full power for 20 mins

4) Eventually Battery dropped to %99 while the car was plugged into the grid. Thus, it uses  traction Battery

If room mode is activated, then the car may be running the air conditioner from the mains.

[lightboxcar]

5 hours ago, Rajavina said:

If you have a smart meter at home

We do have a smart meter, but not usung anything to see what power is being used.  Need to find out how to do that, thanks

[lightboxcar]

5 hours ago, philip42h said:

I'd be very surprised if the bZ4X 'magically' drew power from the mains when the charger is scheduled to be Off.

Yes, thanks, that sounds right.

We will try and confirm when we find out how to monitor the smart meter.

Tomorrow they are also supposed to be fixing the wall charger connection, right now it doesn't work, so we have no way to monitor that either.  At least it does charge the car

[lightboxcar]

5 hours ago, ernieb said:

I wonder if you are using a wall charging if the schedule may preclude the use of power outside the scheduled times?

Yes , we have a wall charger.  The My-T is scheuled to only charge between 00.30hrs and 06.30hrs.  so maybe you are correct

[lightboxcar]

4 hours ago, bZ4X said:

If room mode is activated

Thanks fior the useful info.

What is 'room mode' and how is it activated ?   Our My-T app only shows 'Heating and Defrost'

[bZ4X]

1 hour ago, lightboxcar said:

Thanks fior the useful info.

What is 'room mode' and how is it activated ?   Our My-T app only shows 'Heating and Defrost'

It is designed for long distance journuies actually. 

 

Owners Manuel page 145:

When the charging cable is 
connected to the vehicle, elec-
trical components such as the 
air conditioning system and 
audio system can be used by 
the power supply from an 
external power source.

Starting My Room Mode

1 Connect the charge cable to the

vehicle to start charging.

AC Charging: P.121

DC Charging: P.129

2 Turn the power switch to ON

while charging.

My Room Mode settings is automati-

cally displayed on the multi-information

display.

3 Operate the meter control

switches to select “Yes”, and

then press “OK”.

My Room Mode is started and it is pos-

sible to use the air conditioning system,

audio system, etc.

Select “No” and press “OK” when My

Room Mode is not being used.

To disable My Room Mode, turn the

power switch off.

My Room Mode will automatically be off

when DC charging is completed.

 

[ernieb]

Rechecked today on my PHEV, connected via my granny cable, app showed 50.7 miles with A/C heating on. Set cabin conditioning to 21oC, front and rear window defrost. After 20 mins the car showed 50 miles range (it does not show decimal points and never round up or down) so power for the heating etc. taken or topped up from the mains supply. 
it might be worth testing the b4ZX using an always on charging supply?

[Rajavina]

10 hours ago, philip42h said:

Being pedantic, sorry, this is not strictly true - pre heating will always consume electricity from the  the traction battery; if the traction battery is simultaneously connected to a charger, the traction battery will be topped-up from the grid ...

I agree. When I preheat for 15mins I have not seen any drop in SOC of traction Battery. As you said batteries are topped up simultaneously. 

[Bagel09]

I just purchased a FWD version and I'm noticing when I go warm up my vehicle it will drop SOC well still being plugged in on a level 2 mobile charger. I remote started the vehicle via app and let it run for the full 20 minutes with the heat/heated steering/heated seats on and it dropped 2% by the time the 20 minutes was over - it was still plugged in to my home charger. ( I charge my vehicle to 80%)

[philip42h]

1 hour ago, Bagel09 said:

I just purchased a FWD version and I'm noticing when I go warm up my vehicle it will drop SOC well still being plugged in on a level 2 mobile charger. I remote started the vehicle via app and let it run for the full 20 minutes with the heat/heated steering/heated seats on and it dropped 2% by the time the 20 minutes was over - it was still plugged in to my home charger. ( I charge my vehicle to 80%)

I don't pick-up my bZ4X until next week but that seems perfectly reasonable to me:

• You've plugged in the car and set it to charge to 80%
• It has completed as requested and finished the charging session (even though you haven't yet removed the plug).
• You've asked the car to precondition which it does using charge from the traction Battery ...

I don't believe that being plugged-in is synonymous with "charging".

[adidev]

As the cold days are coming, I started observing the pre-conditioning in my car - I charge to 90% overnight (just to enjoy regen breaking and a bit conscious about battery). Start pre-con in the morning, 20 min before the trip, still plugged in. When I get into the car, the SoC is 88~89%! It does look like (as stated by some here) the pre-con uses traction Battery, not the mains!!! Why!!!

And I was only wondering before whether the traction Battery is pre-heated as well when I start pre-con.

This needs to be fixed.

[philip42h]

7 minutes ago, adidev said:

It does look like (as stated by some here) the pre-con uses traction battery, not the mains!!! Why!!!

Preconditioning always uses power from the traction Battery. If the car is plugged-in and actively charging at the time, the traction Battery will be topped-up to compensate for any draw via preconditioning. If the car is still plugged-in but charging has already finished - in your case having reached 90% - or otherwise not charging, it will not start a new charging session. 

[adidev]

1 minute ago, philip42h said:

Preconditioning always uses power from the traction battery. If the car is plugged-in and actively charging at the time, the traction battery will be topped-up to compensate for any draw via preconditioning. If the car is still plugged-in but charging has already finished - in your case having reached 90% - or otherwise not charging, it will not start a new charging session. 

Thanks @philip42h I just found a page in the OM, only related to the remote A/C start with the key, but I guess, it's the same with an app - it uses only traction Battery. In my opinion, it's wrong. The whole idea of having the car plugged (in my case I only need once in a few days) was to have a nice and cosy car in the cold mornings, preferably with the Battery ready to drive. All from the mains, not the traction Battery. Sometimes I travel far and every little % counts.

[philip42h]

9 minutes ago, adidev said:

every little % counts

It is, how it is. I doubt folk would be happy if preconditioning only worked when plugged into the mains?

But is every little percentage counts you could consider charging to 100% or perhaps specify and charging stop time (rather than a start time) so that charging is still ongoing when you initiate preconditioning?

[adidev]

17 minutes ago, philip42h said:

perhaps specify and charging stop time (rather than a start time) so that charging is still ongoing when you initiate preconditioning

This is not a bad idea, only my charging finishes when the cheap tariff and it's usually one hour before leaving.

Quote

It is, how it is. I doubt folk would be happy if preconditioning only worked when plugged into the mains?

I didn't mean that - I'm sure with today's technology, the car could decide whether to use the traction Battery or the mains if available.