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Coolant pump ran all night, still running

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Is it normal for the coolant pump to be running continuously for over 12 hours? The battery temp was 34C when it started as it was pretty hot outside.
Thanks.

Yes, that's normal when it begins to get hot outside during the day. Its trying to evenly distribute the heat and if it doesn't it will form hot pockets. Without the Roadster plugged into a live source such as 240v there's no way for it to chill down the pack temps unless its above 40C, and even if its above 40C it's not going to work on the temps all that long off of the ESS charging juice.

I don't let my pack sit in a hot bath whenever I get a chance, especially above 30C. Anything above 26C I initiate a cooldown.
 
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To give you an idea of how much heat the battery retains, got to work (35 mile commute), ESS temp was at 27C. I park in an underground garage where its cool and away from the sun. Didn't read the temp when I got to the Roadster, but when I got home today on my 35 mile trek my ESS was @ 36C and I wasn't pushing the motor but being rather casual. Took 3 cool downs over an hour's period in Range Mode to drop the pack down to 26C. After the 26C cooldown my circulating cooling pump doesn't run after it sleeps. I also pop the rear trunk on the day's where ESS temps have risen above 32C to help the trapped heat from the ESS & PEM to be flushed out. Otherwise its an insulated heat trap under the CF skin.

I do firmly believe that heat kills CAC. My CAC was climbing in the mild 80F weather we'd be having but as soon as it jumped 90F and above my CAC stopped climbing and actually dropped.

I picked up a another metro-board electric skateboard (I also have a longboard) to throw in the back of the Roadster. That way I can drive my Roadster to a charging station when I get to work and ride my electric skateboard back while its cooling down. And skate back to get the Roadster once its dropped and added some charge. I haven't done it yet but now the hot weather is kicking in I want to care and preserve the ESS as much as I possibly can. Any heat wave I forsee I'll throw the board in the back of the Roadster. If I take a simple lunch break / commute with the Roadster from work the ESS rises even more and I bite down on my teeth just feeling the cells of the ESS are feeling like a hot lobster dinner.

 
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To give you an idea of how much heat the battery retains, got to work (35 mile commute), ESS temp was at 27C. I park in an underground garage where its cool and away from the sun. Didn't read the temp when I got to the Roadster, but when I got home today on my 35 mile trek my ESS was @ 36C and I wasn't pushing the motor but being rather casual. Took 3 cool downs over an hour's period in Range Mode to drop the pack down to 26C. After the 26C cooldown my circulating cooling pump doesn't run after it sleeps. I also pop the rear trunk on the day's where ESS temps have risen above 32C to help the trapped heat from the ESS & PEM to be flushed out. Otherwise its an insulated heat trap under the CF skin.

I do firmly believe that heat kills CAC. My CAC was climbing in the mild 80F weather we'd be having but as soon as it jumped 90F and above my CAC stopped climbing and actually dropped.

I picked up a another metro-board electric skateboard (I also have a longboard) to throw in the back of the Roadster. That way I can drive my Roadster to a charging station when I get to work and ride my electric skateboard back while its cooling down. And skate back to get the Roadster once its dropped and added some charge. I haven't done it yet but now the hot weather is kicking in I want to care and preserve the ESS as much as I possibly can. Any heat wave I forsee I'll throw the board in the back of the Roadster. If I take a simple lunch break / commute with the Roadster from work the ESS rises even more and I bite down on my teeth just feeling the cells of the ESS are feeling like a hot lobster dinner.


I did a test today and each OVMS cool down cycle seems to drop temps by 3C. My pack started at 34C and after the first cool down it dropped to 31, then 28 after the second and 25 after the third.

My CAC has dropped from 154.5 to 153.3 after a few hot weather drives.
 
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I did a test today and each OVMS cool down cycle seems to drop temps by 3C. My pack started at 34C and after the first cool down it dropped to 31, then 28 after the second and 25 after the third.

My CAC has dropped from 154.5 to 153.3 after a few hot weather drives.

Did you cool down using Range mode? Also did you lower your charging amps down to 16? There's no need to take a charge unless you want some but I'm usually around 60-65 SOC when I come home and begin the cool down. Range mode is more aggressive of a cool down which drop the temps faster.

Since we've been getting more mild weather now, 80-85 F down from 90-97F during the day, my CAC started creeping back up. I think the pack's sweet spot for ambient temps is 77-86F. That's the temps I've always seen my CAC climb.
 
When you say OVMS cool down I assume you mean you charged in range no? Or is there a new setting I'm missing?

Yes, Range Mode. I've been doing it manually until I can find a provider who won't rip me off for a dataplan. Att wanted $15+ / mo. and no longer would sell just data for the go plan. The OVMS has a cooldown function in the SMS feature, that puts it into range mode and does I believe 3 initiations or so until it reaches the target temp you requested. I don't think its in the UI for the user app yet.
 
Yes, Range Mode. I've been doing it manually until I can find a provider who won't rip me off for a dataplan. Att wanted $15+ / mo. and no longer would sell just data for the go plan. The OVMS has a cooldown function in the SMS feature, that puts it into range mode and does I believe 3 initiations or so until it reaches the target temp you requested. I don't think its in the UI for the user app yet.

Awesome. I think I totally missed that. Do you know the SMS text off the top of you head. I don't remember seeing it in the user manual.
 
Att wanted $15+ / mo. and no longer would sell just data for the go plan.

While AT&T won't sell just data on a Go plan, the data for the app is very cheap (or you can do everything through SMS).

Get the $0.10/min voice plan. Since you won't be making any voice calls, that part is free.
Add the $4.99/month Messaging plan, which gives you 200 SMS/month.
Prepay for several months (I think $100 is the maximum(and your prepay expires in 12 months)).

I find that, even with heavy use of the app, my $100 is lasting 10 months.
 
You will want to be at OVMS firmware v. 2.6.5 or later for these features to work reliably. Once you have that, here are the steps:

1. Set a charging location. While parked where you want to charge, send
ACC HERE

2. Enable Advanced Charging Controls at this location
ACC ENABLE

3. If you're using time-based commands (CHARGEAT, CHARGEBY), then set your Time offset from GMT. This is Parameter #23 in the app. Mine is "-4:00". for EDT.

4. If you set the time offset, verify it by sending a STAT? message. You'll see what the OVMS thinks is the current local time in the first line of the response.

5. For COOLDOWN, you might want to set the values in Parameter #15. The variables are Desired Temperature in degrees C, and maximum cool down time in minutes (separated by a colon). The default is "31:60".

6. Now, set all of your ACC Parameters. Some (like CHARGEAT and CHARGEBY) require others to be set as well. As an example, my current setting message looks like this:
ACC PARAMS COOLDOWN CHARGEBY 08:00 MODE STA LIMIT 40

7. Finally, check that your ACC PARAMS are set correctly by sending
ACC PARAMS?

Hope this helps you get going!
 
Yes, Range Mode. I've been doing it manually until I can find a provider who won't rip me off for a dataplan. Att wanted $15+ / mo. and no longer would sell just data for the go plan. ...

I don't think that's correct. I just got a SIM from AT&T that won't cost more than $100/yr including 200 SMS per month and all the data I'll need and then some. The $4.99 plan now only includes 200 SMS and no data, but you can add a data plan based on use just like the .10/min voice. The data is so cheap that you'll never use up your $100/yr minimum so it works out to $8.50/mo.
 
I don't think that's correct. I just got a SIM from AT&T that won't cost more than $100/yr including 200 SMS per month and all the data I'll need and then some. The $4.99 plan now only includes 200 SMS and no data, but you can add a data plan based on use just like the .10/min voice. The data is so cheap that you'll never use up your $100/yr minimum so it works out to $8.50/mo.

Honestly, they wouldn't sell me a plan. I told them that I had others who have the plan you mentioned above and they said it isn't available anymore. That was over a year ago. Was that recently Henry? I was looking for under $10 / mo and still want my data plan since I like the front end UI.
 
Honestly, they wouldn't sell me a plan. I told them that I had others who have the plan you mentioned above and they said it isn't available anymore. That was over a year ago. Was that recently Henry? I was looking for under $10 / mo and still want my data plan since I like the front end UI.

I got my plan back in 9/2013. The AT&T sales staff didn't even know about it, but I showed them the page on my iPhone. I said I needed the SIM for a data logger and tried to explain the situation. I put a $100 on it and haven't had to refill it yet. I think my balance is hovering around $25 or so. I'll refill it when necessary. I think I have this one and I bought a 200 text package for $4.99/month or something.

10¢ Per Minute Plan cell phone plans from AT&T

- - - Updated - - -

This might be a more OVMS-specific question, but here we go. I don't give the Roadster much yet (that's changing one the lease on our LEAF ends in a month - quite the change in cars, huh? - but I digress) so it's mostly in storage mode. It's getting very hot this time of year in the Phoenix desert. Highs have been in the 100's all weekend with overnight lows in the 70's. So the Roadster battery does get quite hot. It's about 11pm right now in Phoenix and the battery is at 96 F. The car is plugged in at my house to a Roadster/Clipper Creek EVSE (Is it a CS-70 or 90? I can't remember).

With ACC enabled via OVMS, my settings are:

Cooldown enabled
Charge at plugin
Mode: storage (30A).

I've been sending the "Cooldown" command for the past few hours. I get a "Cooldown requested" message, but a cool down is not happening. SOC is at 64%.

I've been fiddling with this all weekend. Sometimes the Cooldown command starts a cool down, but it doesn't seem to be consistent.

What am I doing wrong?

Any general suggestions on how to protect the battery in this heat? 110 F degree highs are probably coming in July. We might get a few highs of 90's before the steady 100's settle in by June. I won't start driving the car regularly for another month and then my commute is only 7-8 miles round trip. Should I drive the car a bit and get the charge down to 20-30% or so and then leave it in storage mode for the next month? When I start driving regularly - with my short commute - should I standard charge to 50% or so every night for my daily commute to keep that SOC low?

Any thoughts would be appreciated.
 
For US folks, the UK-based GlobalSimCard is the way to go.

Costs £14.99, but includes a £10 credit.

In 20 months of heavy OVMS usage (practically daily), I've used £75 worth of data and SMS, which works out to $6.33/month including setting up a couple of boxes, and extra SMSs dealing with a bad antenna at one point.
 
I'm using the ATT GoPhone plan with the same parameters as hcsharp. I put about $25 in every 3 months. I use the app all the time. It is costing me less than $9/month.

On the topic: I looked at this thread because my roadster has been awake for 3 days, which by itself heats the battery. It's only gotten to about 75 degrees F in my garage but it shows the battery and PEM at 89!
How do you make the car Sleep? Theoretically it would cool down to ambient 75 degrees F.
michael
 
On the topic: I looked at this thread because my roadster has been awake for 3 days, which by itself heats the battery. It's only gotten to about 75 degrees F in my garage but it shows the battery and PEM at 89!
How do you make the car Sleep? Theoretically it would cool down to ambient 75 degrees F.
michael
That's strange; my Roadster was awake this whole weekend, too. It finally went to sleep yesterday.