How long does the screen stay on ?

Maybe it's just because I've been driving home in the dark, but I've noticed that my center console touchscreen (MyFordTouch, right ?) stays on for some time after I shut the car off. I've walked away and come back 5-10 minutes later and seen it still on, but never overnight. I haven't checked other time spans.

How long is it supposed to stay on ?

I'm shutting off the car, turning off the audio system, getting out and locking it. I can't think of any other way I am supposed to "turn the car off".

I've had two incidents now where I shut off the car and locked the doors, and came back 20 or 30 minutes later to find the radio on at high volume. In each case I'd been using my phone to stream audio via Bluetooth right before I parked, so I think that might have something to do with it.

I'm concerned about running down the 12V battery, and also about attracting unwelcome attention to my car at night, or having it stay drivable even after I've shut it down and locked it. After all, if it will turn on and play the radio by itself, what else might it do ?

The center display screen turns off for me after I turn the car off while in park and then open the car door to get out, close the door and then lock the doors.
The speedometer displays go off soon after within a minute.

Kakkerlak said:

Maybe it's just because I've been driving home in the dark, but I've noticed that my center console touchscreen (MyFordTouch, right ?) stays on for some time after I shut the car off.

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Sorry to ask a silly question, but are you sure you're turning the car off? The behavior you are describing sounds like what happens when you park and get out but haven't actually turned the car off. (I know because I've done this. )

Like NightHawk describes, I can also confirm that, when I turn the car off and open the door, the center screen MFT goes off fairly quickly. (And stays off... I've never come back to the car, after it was turned off, and found the MFT back on, and certainly never found the audio playing.)

Question: When this happens to you, do the dash displays and speedometer also stay on? Or, it is just the center MFT display?

Kakkerlak said:

I've had two incidents now where I shut off the car and locked the doors, and came back 20 or 30 minutes later to find the radio on at high volume. In each case I'd been using my phone to stream audio via Bluetooth right before I parked, so I think that might have something to do with it.

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What version is your MFT software at? I'm asking because this sounds suspiciously like a long standing MFT bug where it refuses to "go to sleep". On our other cars with much earlier versions (like 3.1) we would have this occur: Get in the car to come home and find the radio still playing from the morning!

When this happens to you, do the dash displays and speedometer also stay on? Or, it is just the center MFT display?

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Thanks for the sincere replies; I was concerned that I had somehow not mastered technology like "turn on and off".

The dash displays and speedometer turn off the way I expect them to; first the L/R screens go dark, then the speedometer needle and dial a few seconds later.

But the main MFT screen stays on for at least 20 minutes.

This is playing with my head because I am *almost* sure that it did not do this previously.

EDIT:

The System Information display says CCPU S/W Version 4.32.14073_PRODUCT. I don't know what software that's referring to.

Ford Support (support.ford.com) Sync History shows version Gen2-3.7.11, installed July 9, 2014. I took deliver on August 31, 2014 so it hasn't been a field update.

Kakkerlak said:

Ford Support (support.ford.com) Sync History shows version Gen2-3.7.11, installed July 9, 2014.

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Hmmm.... sounds like there an even more updated version than MFT 3.6 (which I thought was the latest version for FFE).

Has anyone heard of this 3.7 version before?

Then again, if this newer version potentially has bugs like leaving the MFT screen on... maybe I don't want to update.

Version 3.7 only contains language updates no functionality updates.

3.7 is only available for the 2014+ Fusion. Fusion Forum members with 2014 cars have been able to install it, new 2015 Fusions come from the factory with 3.7. 2013 Fusion owners cannot view/install 3.7 from Ford's website.

The biggest improvements in 3.7 that I know of are:

• Display shows estimated arrival time instead of minutes until arrival
  Guidance mute button is now available on the main screen instead of having to go into a menu for it

hybridbear said:

3.7 is only available for the 2014+ Fusion.

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Then how is that Kakkerlak's FFE is showing that 3.7 has been installed?

WattsUp said:

hybridbear said:

3.7 is only available for the 2014+ Fusion.

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Then how is that Kakkerlak's FFE is showing that 3.7 has been installed?

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Perhaps it came with it from the factory. Ford was still producing 2014 Focuses (Focii) when they released 3.7 and started building 2015 Fusions. Perhaps they started installing 3.7 from the factory around that point.

Kakkerlak - what's your build date?

FordETIS shows my build date as "09.07.2014", which I think must be Date/Month/Year format because the door sticker says "07/14".

I have three MyFord Touch related symptoms going on:

1. Twice, the car has been found to be playing the FM radio at high volume after having been shut off and locked for an hour or more. This occurred once the day I bought it, and again last week. In both cases the car had been playing Bluetooth audio prior to being shut off.

2. During driving in morning and evening twilight hours, the MFT screen backlight occasionally flickers to a dim backlight, then back to normal backlight. This might be related to the Auto-Dim feature. This behavior has been noticed within the past month but may have been always present. It does not appear to occur during full sunlight or full dark hours.

3. The MFT screen remains turned on for 20+ minutes after the car has been turned off and locked. This behavior developed within the last two weeks.

I don't mean to turn this into a community troubleshooting exercise. Ford Support, via an online chat, encouraged me to take the car to my local dealer to have the firmware "re flashed" on MyFord Touch.

I work with embedded industrial computer equipment for a living and understand that "re-flashing" a device clears out accumulated history or adaptive data rather than actually improving the reliability of the flash memory image.

Kakkerlak said:

FordETIS shows my build date as "09.07.2014", which I think must be Date/Month/Year format because the door sticker says "07/14".

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Correct, ETIS shows European dates. That means July 7th, 2014.

Kakkerlak said:

2. During driving in morning and evening twilight hours, the MFT screen backlight occasionally flickers to a dim backlight, then back to normal backlight. This might be related to the Auto-Dim feature. This behavior has been noticed within the past month but may have been always present. It does not appear to occur during full sunlight or full dark hours.

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The Focus, C-Max and possibly Escape do this. The Fusion does not. It's just different programming relating to the backlight design of the dash & MFT screen. The Fusion is either in day mode or night mode, there's no gradual dimming. The Focus gradually dims from day mode to night mode.

Try after turning the car off, lower the driver side window, then open the driver side door, get out, close the driver side door and then reach inside thru the open window and press the button that locks the doors. Make sure you don't leave any of the electronic keys inside the car (I keep it in my pocket).
On my FFE the main center display turns off right away when I do that and then the speedometer displays turn off within a minute after that.

The Escape's MFT module comes from a different vendor and as such may not exhibit the same behavior.

Kakkerlak said:

2. During driving in morning and evening twilight hours, the MFT screen backlight occasionally flickers to a dim backlight, then back to normal backlight. This might be related to the Auto-Dim feature. This behavior has been noticed within the past month but may have been always present. It does not appear to occur during full sunlight or full dark hours.

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Yeah, mine's done this through all the MFT versions I've had. The auto-dim feature is a little sensitive around dusk (or early morning as well, I would suppose) (or driving under trees) and can't decide what it wants to do.

Thanks for the method suggestion, NightHawk. I followed exactly that procedure but the display stayed on.

During my tests I even saw the "MyFord Mobile is active... to provide GPS navigation" message box show up, even after the car had been turned off and locked.

I just did a Master Reset.

The system rebooted, erased all my stored data (phone association, waypoints, etc) but it still doesn't shut off the MyFord Touch main screen when I park and lock the car.

Maybe a visit to the dealership really is in order.

Today I went through the process of re-registering the FFE with MyFordMobile, since the Master Reset evidently cancels the registration of the car with MyFordMobile.

And tonight when I got home.... the screen turned off right away, just like it used to. The one drive I performed this afternoon (which is when I went out and confirmed the MFM registration on the touchscreen) I didn't look closely to see if the screen stayed on.

I'm suspicious, therefore, that the "don't sleep" behavior was tied to MyFordMobile in some way.

I even noted that once after the car had been turned off but the screen was still active, that the "MyFordMobile is active and provides GPS location services...." pop-up appeared. That message usually appears only when you're first starting out on a trip.

I'll check it again in the morning.

Kakkerlak said:

I even noted that once after the car had been turned off but the screen was still active, that the "MyFordMobile is active and provides GPS location services...." pop-up appeared.

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You mentioned this before... but what is it? I've never seen such a pop-up. Maybe it's a MFT 3.7 thing?

Can you post a picture of it?

I see it about every 3 or 4 days just after I start the car (thus it isn't a 3.7 thing). Its a small confirmation dialog that pops up informing you that MFM is active.

A different, but related question about MFT -- Is it normal for the screen to illuminate all white when getting into the car (before you push the start button)? I keep expecting a Ford logo or something to pop up, but it's just a blank white screen until I start up the car, at which point MFT boots up.

My guess is that this is normal behavior and the screen is just acting as another "light" to illuminate the car (similar to the dome light) but wanted to confirm.