Cold weather battery tips

I'm looking forward to "seizing the day" on one of this week's frigid ones to see how it does....I'll start topping off the charge when I wake up and head out a couple hours later, with a warmed battery.

The day will dawn at around 2F (warmer in the garage), and top out at maybe 18F with a stiff wind--though I doubt the wind chill gets down into the guts of the car, it'll keep me inside it!
No need to wait a couple of hours Jedwin, the pics tell the story. Note how the battery warming warms the cabin
1 20 temp.webp1 20 wake.webp1 20 warmed.webp1 20 warming.webp1 20 warmed.webp1 20 warmed.webp
 
@jedwin another chilly morning and the AGT shook it off like a champion, the pre-con started 6:16 am and when I left at 6:45 am there was still some blue on the charging screen but that had zero affect on the drivability of the car.
616.webp1 20 cold.webp
 
Tomorrow's my frigid test drive; I'll watch the cabin temps as I add charge (and warm) the battery prior to leaving. (can't quite tell from your screenshots how much cabin-warming happened, as only two show cabin temps; the others have "climate on" with target temp shown)

Glad you're enjoying the car in the cold!
 
Tomorrow's my frigid test drive; I'll watch the cabin temps as I add charge (and warm) the battery prior to leaving. (can't quite tell from your screenshots how much cabin-warming happened, as only two show cabin temps; the others have "climate on" with target temp shown)

Glad you're enjoying the car in the cold!
The screenshots got loaded out of sequence, but if you look at the one that was 5:10 AM 4F and the one where it was 5:46 AM 10F the cabin temp rise was 6 degrees just from the battery preconditioning, and by 5:57 AM the preconditioning had stopped and the blue was gone from the charging screen.

I am enjoying the car in the cold, and my hope is that my posts will prove to people that the Lucid is an all weather vehicle and not some delicate object that belongs in a glass case being preserved so the grandkids can flog the car to death someday.
 
I’ve been doing some experimenting on how to keep the battery warm while plugged into my L2 charger at home. With this latest cold weather snap, my unheated garage gets to the mid 30’s F by morning. The car usually shows the “Power limited due to cold battery” message when this happens, which to me indicates no maintenance or warming is happening even though its is plugged in. I always thought that is why they recommended keeping it plugged in. Lucid has confirmed to me that the car does not do ant maintenance or temp control while plugged in, only recharges to the set limit. My curiosity led me to see what happens in different scenarios. Here is what my amateurish testing has turned up:

  • The Preconditioning option shows while unplugged. It goes away when plugged in.
  • Even though the panel indicates you can charge while preconditioning, if I plug in after selecting preconditioning, all activity stops as soon as the charge limit is hit.
  • If I select preconditioning while leaving it unplugged, it will only run until the car shuts off or the car is fully charged, whichever happens last.
Interesting though, if I leave a door ajar, effectively forcing the car to stay on, things change a bit:

  • If I select preconditioning while leaving it unplugged, it will run until the battery is warmed and the Preconditioning option goes off. It does consume 10 to 15 percent of the SOC to do this however.
  • If I awaken the car while plugged in, it will charge and warm the battery (or at least the cold battery warning eventually goes off).
The later two scenarios are what I hoped would happen without my intervention or forcing the car to stay on. I only speculate that keeping the battery in its optimum temperature range, even when not in use, would be the best course of action but I don’t have any facts to know if any of this is better or worse for long term battery life.



Pete
So, where did you land on this? I did some testing today, too. Here's what I found:

With the car outside but plugged into the 50 amp circuit via the mobile charger, the car had charged to 80% last night as planned. This morning, the car was still at 80% but I had the blue bar. So, I ran the defrost for 45 minutes. The cabin heated up great and it charged several times to get back to 80% as the battery drained to heat the cabin. But, the blue bar remained.

Then, I went out to unplug the car. I ran the preconditioning which is not available when plugged in with the mobile charging cable. After 45 minutes, the SOC was 71% and the blue bar was gone.

So, how can you heat/precondition the battery before leaving the house without losing battery power??? Why can't we precondition when it's plugged in? Does the remote climate do anything that the defrost doesn't do in terms of heating up the battery?
 
So, how can you heat/precondition the battery before leaving the house without losing battery power???
You can't really at the moment. This has been requested.
Does the remote climate do anything that the defrost doesn't do in terms of heating up the battery?
Nope, aside from maybe just being a bit more power hungry and forcing more charging.

I think the best thing you can do right now, if it works for your schedule, is schedule your overnight charging so that it usually finishes shortly before you leave.
 
You can't really at the moment. This has been requested.

Nope, aside from maybe just being a bit more power hungry and forcing more charging.

I think the best thing you can do right now, if it works for your schedule, is schedule your overnight charging so that it usually finishes shortly before you leave.
But, it charges intermittently when I run the defrost and that still didn't heat the battery enough to remove the blue bar of icicles 🥶
 
But, it charges intermittently when I run the defrost and that still didn't heat the battery enough to remove the blue bar of icicles 🥶
Yeah, but charging your daily 60-80% or whatever continuously probably will, or at least closer to it.
 
Yes, in cold weather, when you charge when plugged in, the car does some degree of warming the battery in order to be most comfortable taking even the L2 current. When it’s around 30°, it seems like it takes an hour or so for my car to have the little notice that they are moderating the charging current while the battery warms to disappear— though the amount of moderation happening is quite small; it doesn’t seem to greatly increase the charging time. (I’ve been assuming, without being sure, that heading out with at least a slightly warmer battery is going to result in a bit better efficiency as well)

It also appears that while we’re driving, even in the very cold, the batteries retain enough warmth just from being used to stay within that broad comfort zone for L2 charging— when I got home yesterday after several hours of driving in temperatures in the teens, when I plugged in at home after the trip (50A circuit), there was no message about a reduced flow due to cold battery. I’ve also never heard any kind of proactive battery warming system come on in my garage this winter, except during charging— though the storage temperature has never dropped below the low end threshold mentioned in the manual, which is I think 14°F…. Maybe if it got colder than that, the proactive conditioning would come on, at least as long as I’m plugged in.

BUT/AND….. all that appears to be separate from the “preconditioning“ protocol that is suggested before doing DCFC charging out in the wild. My presumption is that this hones the battery temp into a narrower range within which it’s comfortable taking higher current charges without tempering them for battery health reasons.

(if the gentle “battery conditioning“ that happens when charging at home, or the battery warming/cooling that happens while driving, was enough for DCFC, then I wouldn’t expect them to be recommending we do the preconditioning routine while en route to DCFCs on long trips….)

It sure would be nice if Lucid would share some of the temperature thresholds, and engineering tolerances, that are being maintained by these different systems. They must know that we are all geeky enough to be very interested!
 
Why can't we precondition when it's plugged in? Does the remote climate do anything that the defrost doesn't do in terms of heating up the battery?
You/we can, on the charging screen in the car schedule a time for the car to charge, if the battery is cold at that scheduled time the car will precondition the the battery before charging and during charging.
See the screenshot below from my phone.
 

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So, where did you land on this? I did some testing today, too. Here's what I found:

With the car outside but plugged into the 50 amp circuit via the mobile charger, the car had charged to 80% last night as planned. This morning, the car was still at 80% but I had the blue bar. So, I ran the defrost for 45 minutes. The cabin heated up great and it charged several times to get back to 80% as the battery drained to heat the cabin. But, the blue bar remained.

Then, I went out to unplug the car. I ran the preconditioning which is not available when plugged in with the mobile charging cable. After 45 minutes, the SOC was 71% and the blue bar was gone.

So, how can you heat/precondition the battery before leaving the house without losing battery power??? Why can't we precondition when it's plugged in? Does the remote climate do anything that the defrost doesn't do in terms of heating up the battery?
I just accepted that what I found is how the car behaves and there doesn't seem to be a way around it. Sometimes I'll wake the car in the morning and let it start the topping off charging. Then I'll remotely set the interior climate control to on. I assume the two simultaneous actions will warm the battery a bit as well as make it comfortable to depart.

Pete
 
I just accepted that what I found is how the car behaves and there doesn't seem to be a way around it. Sometimes I'll wake the car in the morning and let it start the topping off charging. Then I'll remotely set the interior climate control to on. I assume the two simultaneous actions will warm the battery a bit as well as make it comfortable to depart.

Pete
In cold weather when the car has a cold battery it preconditions the battery before and during the charging process.
 
You/we can, on the charging screen in the car schedule a time for the car to charge, if the battery is cold at that scheduled time the car will precondition the the battery before charging and during charging.
See the screenshot below from my phone.
The problem is that I don't have a consistent schedule when I drive. I can't set it to stop charging at a specific time on a regular basis. I have an irregular work schedule and I drive a lot. Aside from that, I have my charging schedule set for the overnight hours to save on the electricity charges.

But your point is well taken. I might actually save $ and increase my range by either scheduling my charge differently or by manually charging before I need to drive long distances.
 
The problem is that I don't have a consistent schedule when I drive. I can't set it to stop charging at a specific time on a regular basis. I have an irregular work schedule and I drive a lot. Aside from that, I have my charging schedule set for the overnight hours to save on the electricity charges.

But your point is well taken. I might actually save $ and increase my range by either scheduling my charge differently or by manually charging before I need to drive long distances.
You can always set the scheduled charge times hours after what time you think you may leave, then all you have to do 30-60 minutes before you actually leave is open the app and wake the car up, when you wake the car up it will start the preconditioning/charge cycle, yes it's not perfect but it works.
 
Yeah I had literally just landed on a similar option. I lowered my charge limit for the scheduled overnight charging and will hopefully remember to change it to the desired limit and charge an hour before I need to leave
 
As mentioned above, the L2 preconditioning and even running the defrost are not enough to get rid of the blue bar. The car reconditioned for 10 minutes and then started charging. But it had been charging for close to an hour when I took this picture
 

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As mentioned above, the L2 preconditioning and even running the defrost are not enough to get rid of the blue bar. The car reconditioned for 10 minutes and then started charging. But it had been charging for close to an hour when I took this picture
That's the old app screen, ask Lucid why your screen hasn't updated yet. Take a look at one of my screenshots and that's how the new charging screen looks.

What was the temperature when you started charging?
 
That's the old app screen, ask Lucid why your screen hasn't updated yet. Take a look at one of my screenshots and that's how the new charging screen looks.

What was the temperature when you started charging?
It's not the old app screen for android. It's the most current one. I just checked again Thursday. The temp was Probably high teens °F
 
To follow up on the discussion above regarding heating the battery while charging using L2 charging, I just noticed something weird. I'm out of town for work and plugged into a Tesla Destination Charger with an adapter at my hotel last night. It provides 15 kW which charges quite a bit faster than my 9 kW at home (mobile charger). This morning, it is 41 degrees out. And although the car finished charging late yesterday evening (hadn't been charging the car for over 8 hours when I looked this morning) I do NOT have a blue bar or cold battery warning this morning. Could the power delivered by the destination charger be sufficient to keep the battery warm but the mobile charger's power is insufficient to do that?
 
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