Multiple System Warnings

It has been a little over four months and 5k miles since the last occurrence. Haven't had any issues even during a 1500 Mile road trip to Colorado. The car has yet to be taken to the dealer for service and hope there won't be any more reoccurrences until it is time for it's service visit.

 

I feel like I'm late to the party, but decided to post anyway. Left on a long (4 week) trip and failed to ask anyone to start the car while we were gone. We thought since the car was plugged in and the electric battery charges the 12v we were OK. Not the case. Came back to a dead car. Got a jump and the car started right away, but with the initializing system message and multiple error messages. Drove the car for about 40 minutes on HV (fortunately could get there from EV) (so the tow guy said 20 minutes, but I'm paranoid). Initializing message gone, but error messages remained. Bought the car in July, 8K or so miles, hasn't been serviced. We'll see what happens when I take it to the airport to p/u my husband tonight. Btw, I live in Scottsdale. Way cold right now, at least for here.

 

Thanks for the info Angela. I'm surprised and disappointed the car went dead even plugged into AC.

 

I have the same experience as LL. I had the warnings about 3 or 4 times which went away and hasn't reappeared. I should be getting my first service soon so I don't have any software updates since getting the car.

 

Hi, Angela -

I am not exactly an expert on troubleshooting such matters, but I can give you some thoughts based on our own experiences with the Clarity PHEV gained in 6 months of ownership.

First, it isn't clear to me what the charge state of your main (big, traction) battery was when you parked the vehicle.

We recently (last month) went on a 3-week trip to Europe and left our car in regular airport parking for that time. Following recommendations from others on this forum, I made sure that the main (traction) battery had a charge level of about 50% or higher before I parked for a long interval, but then parked normally with no chargers in sight. Three weeks later, we arrived back at the departure airport -- no problems. In fact, we were even able to monitor the car and its battery charge state on the HondaLink app on our smartphone remotely from Europe, giving us some further assurance that all was well with the car.

Second, we did experience the multiple fault issue early in our ownership, but the s/w updates applied then by a dealer seems to have solved all of that. We haven't had a recurrence of that issue at all. But, frankly, given that your car's 12V battery had somehow been depleted, it is not much of a surprise that you got multiple error messages anyway. I would have been more alarmed to get no messages at all under those circumstances.

Finally, it might be worth checking to see whether the 110V charger was plugged into a live outlet during the whole time of your absence. I am not sure, but if you had some localized power outage or maybe a GFCI circuit breaker trip for some reason, the power to the car could have been interrupted and thus the charge. In that case, monitoring the charging state via the HondaLink app might have remote alerted you to that issue. That said, the car's manual (p 458) says that after a power interruption "...the vehicle will resume charging once power is restored" unless the traction battery has fallen to -22F or below -- not likely in Scottsdale, even in a big cold snap. Still, if a GFCI or other breaker had somehow tripped, the power to the charger would not have been restored until someone manually reset it.

Or, something else weird happened that a dealer may be able to figure out for you and solve. An update on this forum from you after you have figured it all out would be welcome information for many of the rest of us.

 

I believe the 12-volt battery is charged by the DC-to-DC converter only when the Clarity is "On." One poster who used his Clarity's 12-volt battery to provide emergency power after a hurricane found this out.

 

Hmm, I wonder if triggering a remote pre-conditioning would be enough to "start" the car for purposes of getting the 12 volt some juice then. Like if you have to be gone for a month, pre-condition it through the app once a week.

Of course if you're in a temperate environment, that's not probably going to work.

 

My guess would be "no" but I'm trying to figure out if there is a way to test this. Methinks that somewhere in all the complex electric system there's a simple relay that engages when in "On" that enables the DC-to-DC converter, and I doubt that this would be activated by pre-conditioning.

 

"That said, the car's manual (p 458) says that after a power interruption "...the vehicle will resume charging once power is restored" unless the traction battery has fallen to -22F or below. . . "

I can confirm that if the electricity to the outlet is temporarily interrupted (with the car plugged in and not charging before the interruption) the charging will start once the electricity comes back on. I really wish it wasn't that way because if you are away from home and car for a couple of months and want to keep the car plugged in while you are gone (so you can charge the car remotely as needed), and you lose power for a few seconds you will come home to find your car's SOC at 100% for the weeks that you were gone. You don't want to keep your SOC at 100% for weeks at a time.

Sent from my Chromebook 15 (CB515 - 1HT / 1H) using Inside EVs mobile app

 

You could get one of those IFTTT outlets to power your Level 1 charger and control that outlet with your phone+smart hub. I'm not sure how those outlets behave after a power failure, however. To get even more complicated, your IFTTT outlet could be plugged into a UPS to protect it from sensing a power failure.

 

I did consider using one of my Meros smart outlets but wasn't comfortable putting 12 amps through it. Hopefully my HL will continue (knock on wood has always worked) to send notifications to me to tell me when charging starts after a possible interruption in power. Thanks for the thoughts :>) In the absence of that working I can get my neighbor to turn the car on with the cabin heat and heated seats on full blast for awhile to get the SOC back down to 70%.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Inside EVs mobile app

 

Upon further review... Well, my car has only 2,700 miles, fwiw. After driving my car on HV (which I guess wasn't really the thing to do if the 12v charges from the electric battery), I plugged it in. I thought I'd delayed charging the electric battery since it wasn't really low and prime electric rates were in effect, but it charged the electric battery anyway. When I went to drive it to the airport that night (one hour drive each way), I only got one error message the first time I started it, which quickly went away. I started driving on HV (under the mistaken assumption that that would charge the electric battery like on a Prius), everything was working fine (cruise control,etc.). At some point it switched itself over to EV, so I guess if you're driving and the 12v needs charging, it will switch to the electric battery to charge it. Reset the timer for charging and that's been fine since. Anyway, all's good now, except I lost my auto seat setting, but all things considered, that's not bad.

PS - I don't think there was a power interruption while we were gone. We left the car in the garage since we were gone for 4 weeks and got a ride to the airport. I had it set to automatically charge at night, so it would have been 100% that night, and, iirc, it was 100% when I got the car jump started.

 

The charge is maintained in the 12-volt battery by a DC-to-DC converter connected to the main battery. It recharges the 12-volt battery as needed whenever the Clarity PHEV is "On."

If you want to increase the charge in the main battery while driving, you can press the HV button for a few seconds to activate HV CHARGE Mode. However, because that's the least efficient way to drive the Clarity, most recommend using that mode only to get a decent charge before tackling a significant grade.

When you're driving in HV Mode (not HV CHARGE Mode), the Clarity's brain selects the most efficient mode from one of three possible propulsion modes: EV Drive (battery-power only), Hybrid Drive (battery- and gas-power), and Engine Drive (battery- and gas-power with the engine connected by a clutch to the gears that drive the wheels, but only at speeds around 45 mph and higher).

 

Wow this is a long thread. I'm sad to say, this thread lives on. I had leased my Clarity less than 2 months ago and I'm receiving a ton of warnings and errors (TPMS warning, Break System Problem, Electric Parking Break Problem, RDM Problem, VSA Problem, etc.) along with my gauges lighting up like a Christmas tree. Weather in Southern California has been nice (high 60s to low 70s) so I don't think weather plays a factor to me. I initially thought it was a power surge from the 240v public charger that I was using when I got the error codes (after disconnecting the 240v public charger and starting up my car). I did back up abruptly after I started up the car, so I'm not sure if that plays a factor in this. I made an appointment with the dealer to get this checked.

For those that went to the dealer, did they charge you a fee? I hope not! Should be covered under warranty. Also, for those that have the HondaLink app, did this clear your notifications?

 

I had two very similar incidents way last summer, which at the time, were cleared by a hard reset by removing the negative cable from the vehicles 12V (NOT the high voltage) battery. But, in the meantime Honda has since issued several service bulletins for software updates to solve these and other issues. It would be very unsatisfactory if the leasing dealer you dealt with just a couple of months ago did not apply those s/w updates before pushing you out the door, but I can see where it could happen.

Take your car to a dealership to see what updates have already been applied. All of this should be free of charge and covered by warranty. I don't remember offhand the service bulletin numbers, but these can be readily found on this forum in several spots. If you still have issues finding them, PM me and I will dig them out for you.

 

It is interesting that these events happened for it seems the vast majority of owners early in ownership (first month or so) then pretty much went away even without any patches being installed. I still have had none of the SBs applied, including the HV range patch. Will probably get the oil changed next week, so I bet the dealership will apply patches. I am still tempted to tell them to leave the car alone other than changing the oil and rotating the tires, but I think I am leaning towards letting them do whatever maintenance is recommended and just hope they don't mess anything up...

 

Actually, I only had the SB's applied that related directly to the multiple system warning issue that I actually experienced. I let all the others "ride" until my first oil change & tire rotation and had the same thoughts as you -- leave well-enough alone (which is also a Rule for PC's). However, I let the dealer apply all the other outstanding SB's too (yes, I ignored the Rule), but I in the three weeks since the service was applied I have noticed no changes in the car's condition or behavior. Conclusion: it's safe to apply them. Alternate Conclusion: the dealer service department didn't actually apply them, but claimed the warranty reimbursement from Honda anyway. Either way, I'm happy enough.

 

That is true that after the second time with the warning lights that issue went away. I'm sure we all received the large packet of updates to be installed with maintenance, which I just had done. So far, so good......

 

When I took my car in for servicing (oil change), I asked the dealer what to do to keep the 12volt from dying when we were gone for 6 weeks. The answer was to disconnect it. We left the car plugged in, so we'll see in about 5 weeks.

 

There are also a large variety of auto battery "kill" switches on the market that disconnect the 12V battery without messing with cables. See, for example, https://www.amazon.com/s?k=auto+battery+kill+switch&crid=38GAPRCTX2YKR&sprefix=auto+battery+kill%2Caps%2C146&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_17