It's cold outside message

"It's cold outside - plug in when not in use" message popped up today. It's the first time I've driven the car in below freezing temps. This is just the start of the cold season (Wisconsin). Am I going have to plug in all winter? I keep the car in an unheated garage, so it gets below freezing in there when the outside air is around zero.

I got the message today as well, but only after I had already driven to work:
http://jamiegeek.myevblog.com/2013/11/12/really-getting-cold-here-now/

You can safely leave it plugged in in your garage, it will heat itself to the proper temperature (and charge as well).

Mine is parked outside overnight (plugged in all the time)--its at work where I can't plug it in and it sits outside ;(

I do beieve there are two cold messages.
It's cold plug me in, and reduced performance messages.

I just ordered a giant Snuggy for my FFE. Has two holes for the front wheels.

Be sure and get one that is car wash safe.

jmueller065 said:

I got the message today as well, but only after I had already driven to work:
http://jamiegeek.myevblog.com/2013/11/12/really-getting-cold-here-now/

You can safely leave it plugged in in your garage, it will heat itself to the proper temperature (and charge as well).

Mine is parked outside overnight (plugged in all the time)--its at work where I can't plug it in and it sits outside ;(

Click to expand...

We had similar weather - it got down to the 20's last night (my car is in a detached garage). I used the go first time for my wife - she was super happy and warm this morning. Except she decided to run 20 miles of errands before going to work today. Range was down to about 40 miles left - just that tiny bit too close for round trip to work. During the summer, the 20 miles of errands wouldn't have been a problem. So she took the other car.

By the way, I tossed the car around on glare ice last night. It did fine. The tires have way better traction than I imagined. The ABS worked just great - all kinds of chatter on the ice. The traction control did exactly what it should, some fun growling from the front end as it started (I was really playing around hard with it and hitting the accelerator hard) and the little yellow swirly car light lit up on the dash. I'm sure I had one wheel on ice and the other on pavement - it didn't do anything crazy, it just started in a straight line. ABS and Traction Control worked exactly like I expected.

Honestly, it handled way better than the ICE focus. On glare ice, I was happy.

jmueller065 said:

I got the message today as well, but only after I had already driven to work:
http://jamiegeek.myevblog.com/2013/11/12/really-getting-cold-here-now/

You can safely leave it plugged in in your garage, it will heat itself to the proper temperature (and charge as well).

Mine is parked outside overnight (plugged in all the time)--its at work where I can't plug it in and it sits outside ;(

Click to expand...

Was reading your blog.... I have a 19 mile commute each way, no hills tho. I am seeing almost the exact same numbers, but without hills. ...so...not the same numbers I guess.

Anywho, was 32 degrees and sunny yesterday. Ran heater the entire way set to 76 degrees. Went to lunch and after work, dropped kids off a tutors about 5 miles away. Ended the day with 11 miles left. Closest to empty yet. Almost had to turn off the heater!

I've started seeing this message every day now that winter is here.. I am not able to plug in at work so the car just sits in the cold all day.. I have plenty on battery range on the GOM to run errands and make it home ( I work a few miles away from my home). In the summer I usually plug in to my level 2 charger about every third day , now I plug in every night to fully charge.

I rarely go farther than a 25 mile radius from my home, and I drive on the fast side, with climate set to comfortable in the Chicago area.

On a full charge in the summer I would get in the 90's on the GOM, this morning I awoke with a full charge on the GOM reading 43 miles..

I guess my question is this. Am I doing any damage with this routine? I could plug in at work via my level 1 charger, but it is a bit of an inconvenience I really don't want to deal with since I have plenty of juice.

Max said:

I guess my question is this. Am I doing any damage with this routine? I could plug in at work via my level 1 charger, but it is a bit of an inconvenience I really don't want to deal with since I have plenty of juice.

Click to expand...

I don't think so: Heat is far more damaging to the battery than cold.

So far: a year and a half and 17,000+ miles and my battery shows no mileage loss. I can't plugin at work so my car just sits and cold soaks all day (even last Jan/Feb with <0F temps). I do try to park it in an open area in the winter so it can get as much sun as possible but on those dreary overcast midwest days it gets really cold in there when I get in to go home. So far so good.

The "It's hot/cold outside" messages mean exactly that. They don't look at the battery temperature which is what actually matters. An OBD scanner is the only way I know to monitor actual battery temp.

During the summer I frequently got the warning message, but the battery is very well insulated and heated up very slowly. Unless it was plugged in and charging, it would essentially never exceed the 98 degree point at which the TMS would have cut in.

Without an OBD scanner, you are shooting in the dark. Your battery may be at a moderate temperature or it may be freezing, there's no way to know.

I have found that I get the message only when I am at home and not when I am at work. When I drive to work in the morning it has been about 20 degrees and no message. When I drive home at night it has been warmer ~30 degrees and I get the message. It that becasue I have never plugged in at work so it knows there are no plugs there?

I certainly hope those are centigrade temperatures, because I can't imaging encountering those in Fahrenheit.

I also live in a northern climate near Chicago and have a detached unheated garage. I'm considering building a dimple board and wood platform to park my car on overnight. To offer a thermal break from the cold coming through the concrete. Or am I just being crazy? I'm not sure if it would be worth the trouble. As the FFE battery is inside the car. As opposed to say a Tesla where the battery is underneath the car. Any thoughts?

The FFE has two batteries, one is located between the two rear wheels. The second is found under the car were the gas tank would of been installed. Flat battery backs have more suface area, so it will loose heat more quickly.
Tesla model S, Nissa Leaf

jeffand said:

The FFE has two batteries, one is located between the two rear wheels. The second is found under the car were the gas tank would of been installed. Flat battery backs have more suface area, so it will loose heat more quickly.
Tesla model S, Nissa Leaf

Click to expand...

The FFE battery is also surrounded by delicious warm cocoa. (Ok, just kidding.)

Max said:

I guess my question is this. Am I doing any damage with this routine? I could plug in at work via my level 1 charger, but it is a bit of an inconvenience I really don't want to deal with since I have plenty of juice.

Click to expand...

You are not doing any damage to the car/ to the battery.
Cold temperature doesn't affect the life of the battery like hot temperature does.
What cold can do is decrease your car's power and decrease your battery's available capacity. But these are instantaneous issues- warm up the battery and power and capacity return to normal. So driving without plugging in at work through a typical Chicago winter and getting that "it's cold outside" message every day won't make your battery's capacity any worse next summer than someone driving the same distance through a typical So Cal winter.
I guess it's worth noting that charging very cold batteries can cause permanent damage, but the FFE is designed to prevent this by heating the battery to a safe temp if necessary before charging starts. I believe this is also evident in regenerative braking: on several extremely cold days last winter when I left work (no plug in option there) it seemed that regenerative braking while coasting was either not happening or was extremely curtailed for the first few minutes of driving.