Honda Service Express Bulletins for 2018 Clarity PHEV

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Viking79 said:
It doesn't make sense for PHEVs to use heat pumps as it is cheaper to share coolant loop with ICE (as all heat pumps also need a resistance heater for low temperatures).
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So a resistance heater heats up the coolant that then heats up the cabin? So basically if I pre-condition the car to heat up in the Winter, does the engine run or just the coolant is being heated and circulating it? If the latter, that would seem to have some benefit to the engine in cold weather since it would be warmed up a bit before possibly starting.

(I just got my Clarity last week so have no experience with it in the Winter)
 
That battery service bulletin is infuriating, because a lot of dealers aren't doing that maintenance. I've been watching the inventory of local dealers for months and these cars are not selling on the east coast. Some of them have been around for several months, just sitting on the lot.

I finally found a car 200 miles and two states away that was *only* sitting for about six weeks and even that had a discharged 12 volt battery that they had to jump. But at least it was in the showroom the entire time so the chances of the batteries (both 12 volt and main one) being near dead and above 80 are reduced at least.

The car I test drove (not mine) was on the lot and even that car only had six miles on it, even though it was a demo. So doesn't appear that people are really test driving them either. Anecdotal I know, but still discouraging.
 
Emanuel Green said:
Now if only there were an easy way to turn off the A/C but leave the fan on... It's kind of a ridiculous number of steps to get fresh outside air without running the climate controls :-/
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Yeah, my vote would be to eliminate one of the two buttons for recirc on/off and add a dedicated button for A/C on/off.
 
weave said:
So a resistance heater heats up the coolant that then heats up the cabin? So basically if I pre-condition the car to heat up in the Winter, does the engine run or just the coolant is being heated and circulating it? If the latter, that would seem to have some benefit to the engine in cold weather since it would be warmed up a bit before possibly starting.

(I just got my Clarity last week so have no experience with it in the Winter)
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The engine doesn't run if climate conditioning, but I generally didn't use that feature.

Resistance heaters come in a variety of forms. The one in the Clarity PHEV heats coolant (very rapidly I might add) and runs it through the heat exchanger in the interior. This is the same heat exchanger the engine uses, but I believe there is a valve to isolate the resistance heater from the engine if you aren't using the engine, but I am not positive on this. I think this because when it is very cold and you have been using electric heater the temperature drops for a bit when the engine starts, and I imagine it is from the additional coolant from the engine mixing in. The engine should warm slightly quicker when started as it will get the warmer coolant from the heating loop, but I don't know timing on this (again, I think there is a valve isolating this so you don't heat more coolant than you need to with the electric heater).

So engine won't start in cold weather unless it gets very cold. Typically I didn't see any engine running unless the temp was below 0 or 5 F (it isn't based on ambient temperature like Volt was). It seems to run more if the car is cold soaked and climate heating demands are high. I didn't notice any heating performance or engine starting issues down to -20 F or so (didn't go colder than that). In those temperatures the car will run in hybrid mode most of the time and charging might be limited to around 4 kW. We had a couple weeks after buying the Clarity where high temps were 0 to 10F or less, and the car ran the engine most of the time on those days (if it had been charged recently and battery was warmer it wouldn't run engine until being out for a while). Like it might not start the engine on way to work from attached garage, but would on the way home when temps had dropped and car cold soaked.

I also don't know if climate preconditioning would reduce engine running, and it very well might as it might help warm the battery some and reduce climate needs.
 
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weave said:
That battery service bulletin is infuriating, because a lot of dealers aren't doing that maintenance. I've been watching the inventory of local dealers for months and these cars are not selling on the east coast. Some of them have been around for several months, just sitting on the lot.

I finally found a car 200 miles and two states away that was *only* sitting for about six weeks and even that had a discharged 12 volt battery that they had to jump. But at least it was in the showroom the entire time so the chances of the batteries (both 12 volt and main one) being near dead and above 80 are reduced at least.

The car I test drove (not mine) was on the lot and even that car only had six miles on it, even though it was a demo. So doesn't appear that people are really test driving them either. Anecdotal I know, but still discouraging.
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I'm picking mine Friday. But the three white base models on the dealer have about 35-45 miles. The newest one (highest stock number) was a Feb. production date and Car Gurus shows it's been there for 74 days. Out of the 12 they have, only one has the higher MSRP, which means they're old.
 
To add to my post earlier, looking at the diagram AnthonyW posted on page 2 of this thread, yes, the car isolates the electric heater from the engine using a water valve as I was speculating. It could use this to heat the engine coolant, but gas engines are better heat generators.
 
Audio System Description
 

Attachments

Nice. I was hoping to find some reference to what kind of cellular radio is in the car that is used by Hondalink (3G, 4G, LTE) but didn't find anything.
 
AnthonyW said:
Adaptive Cruise Control
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weave said:
Nice. I was hoping to find some reference to what kind of cellular radio is in the car that is used by Hondalink (3G, 4G, LTE) but didn't find anything.
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Thanks for sharing from your paid forays into Honda Tech. Shoot me your email address and I’ll send you some PayPal $.
Next time you're on Honda Tech try searching for TCU or Telematics Control Unit. That’s where I think the 3G/4G/LTE info will be.
 
Wayne Wilson said:
The audio system description describes an ANC function. First time I have heard that the Clarity has one. Thanks for this info. (ANC == Active Noise Cancellation)
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Yeah. Good to know that Clarity has ANC too. Accord has it. It was (almost) a deal-breaker for me.
 
Wayne Wilson said:
The audio system description describes an ANC function. First time I have heard that the Clarity has one. Thanks for this info. (ANC == Active Noise Cancellation)
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If you look on the rear of the headliner, just above the rear seat back and slightly off center to the driver’s side, you will see a rear microphone (for the ANC?). I think the front microphone is the perforated area across the ceiling console between the Home Link buttons and sun glasses compartment.
I can’t find any documentation on the ANC except in the manual under voice recognition, where it says the front microphone removes noise from the passenger side and so voice recognition can only be used from the driver’s seat.
So here’s my question...
Do we have ANC just for the voice recognition, or for cabin noise from outside, or both??
Here’s some more pertinent facts, some have had a feedback problem when installing sub woofers And I have noticed that I still get the irritating thumps when a car pulls close and has his giant sub woofer maxed out.
So what’s the story?
 
ANC is probably tuned to canceling road noise which is outside of the bass range... So it won't do much to those annoying sub woofer
 
KentuckyKen said:
If you look on the rear of the headliner, just above the rear seat back and slightly off center to the driver’s side, you will see a rear microphone (for the ANC?). I think the front microphone is the perforated area across the ceiling console between the Home Link buttons and sun glasses compartment.
I can’t find any documentation on the ANC except in the manual under voice recognition, where it says the front microphone removes noise from the passenger side and so voice recognition can only be used from the driver’s seat.
So here’s my question...
Do we have ANC just for the voice recognition, or for cabin noise from outside, or both??
Here’s some more pertinent facts, some have had a feedback problem when installing sub woofers And I have noticed that I still get the irritating thumps when a car pulls close and has his giant sub woofer maxed out.
So what’s the story?
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I googled Honda Active noise cancellation a while back and some Honda Sales Training info and a review for the 2018 2018 Honda Accord that’s says it’s for both.


Sent from my iPhone using Inside EVs
 
JimW said:
Thanks for posting these. I'm encouraged that it is so simple to remove and replace the center display. It would be great it they offered us an upgraded center display with faster performance and a volume control. Even better if they made it a free customer-satisfaction upgrade. This is honestly my only every-day complaint about this car. Is anyone at Honda listening here?
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Ditto Jim's post about an upgraded center display, but maybe for a different reason. For example, my 2016 Accord also has the Honda camera on the right hand mirror which activates either manually or automatically when changing lanes or making a turn to the right. Although the Accord display is smaller than the Clarity display, the view resolution from the camera is generally very good. However, in the Clarity it is apparent they used the same resolution camera but the (larger screen) center display (at least on my Clarity) can only show a very grainy image from that camera (and also the rear back-up camera). So, my vote for a center display upgrade is to allow for a better resolution of the images for BOTH the side camera and the back-up camera to be available to the Clarity driver.
 
insightman said:
Honda designed the Clarity PHEV to provide the most efficient plug-in hybrid possible. If Honda's engineers believed an explicit EV Mode would achieve that goal, that mode would be available. It would certainly be a simple matter to include an EV Mode button, but those engineers found it is more efficient to use EV Drive mode in combination with HV Drive mode and Engine Drive mode.

The computer algorithms that combine these modes frustrate some owners who purchased this plug-in hybrid with the expectation that they could choose to drive exclusively in EV Drive mode. I was one of these frustrated owners before I read how the Clarity PHEV was designed to maximize efficiency, not EV travel. I'm glad the Clarity recognizes EV Drive mode as the most efficient way to accomplish most of my driving.

The 2019 Insight is a brilliant 55-mpg hybrid that, like the Clarity PHEV, starts in EV Drive mode if there's sufficient charge in its battery, but not for very far or at significant speeds.
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Sorry to beat a dead horse but I've gotten amazing HV mileage and EV range consistently over the time of ownership (since Dec 2017), far exceeding my expectations. It was nice that my experience was confirmed by professionals who applied consistent methods and instruments to test the Clarity (See Car and Driver full review: https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2018-honda-clarity-plug-in-hybrid-test-review ). There, in real world tests, the Clarity beat the Volt in EV range (41 vs 37 miles going 75 mph) and HV mileage (46 mpg vs 39 mpg at 75 mph; Prius Prime got 47 mpg in Advanced and Plus trims). That the larger and 500 lbs heavier Clarity is able to beat Volt by a large margin on both measures, shows remarkable efficiency. Even with that incredible efficiency, the Clarity goes 0 - 60 mph in 7.7 seconds (Volt is a bit faster at 7.5 sec). More impressive is the rolling start 5 - 60 mph at 7.6 seconds. For ICE cars, this number is generally about a second slower than the 0 - 60 time.
 
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PHEV Newbie said:
Sorry to beat a dead horse but I've gotten amazing HV mileage and EV range consistently over the time of ownership (since Dec 2017), far exceeding my expectations. It was nice that my experience was confirmed by professionals who applied consistent methods and instruments to test the Clarity (See Car and Driver full review: https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/2018-honda-clarity-plug-in-hybrid-test-review ). There, in real world tests, the Clarity beat the Volt in EV range (41 vs 37 miles going 75 mph) and HV mileage (46 mpg vs 39 mpg at 75 mph; Prius Prime got 47 mpg in Advanced and Plus trims). That the larger and 500 lbs heavier Clarity is able to beat Volt by a large margin on both measures, shows remarkable efficiency. Even with that incredible efficiency, the Clarity goes 0 - 60 mph in 7.7 seconds (Volt is a bit faster at 7.5 sec). More impressive is the rolling start 5 - 60 mph at 7.6 seconds. For ICE cars, this number is generally about a second slower than the 0 - 60 time.
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A lot of people mention the the Insight makes more sense than the Clarity (less expensive, better looks). I haven’t seen the insight so I don’t have an opinion on that subject. I do know that with my clarity I don’t have to spend on gas for the most part whereas I would need to with the insight even at 55mpg.
 
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