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[Stefan1991]

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[GetOffYourGas]

I've had my Bolt since August and driven about 4000 miles with it. In all these months battery conditioning never used any electricity. When I go the energy screen it always stays at 0%.
I live in Tennessee and right now temperatures are dropping a lot during the night. Like this week I'm seeing temperatures in the upper 30's in the forecast. Also this morning (I think it was 39 degrees when I left to work), battery conditioning was at 0% and was still at 0 when I got to work.

Does anyone know what temperature range battery conditioning kicks in?

I don't know what temperatures it kicks in at, but I have never seen the car condition the battery when the temperature is above 25F. But that's OAT, and not the battery temperature. Chevy doesn't give us access to that information.

 

[cranial1963]

Check out this four page thread...from what I gather, your temps in the high 30's are not within the conditioning target range.

http://www.mychevybolt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=5907

 

[LeftieBiker]

I've driven my Leaf for 4 1/2 years, and the battery warmer has only come on about 7 times in that period. Some Winters it never came on at all. The Bolt's system should run more often, but since it also uses pack temp and not outside temp, it will take seriously cold weather, for more than a few hours, to trigger it.

 

[GetOffYourGas]

The Leaf's battery heater was only to prevent the electrolyte from freezing (catastrophic failure). The Bolt warms the battery for better performance (range, acceleration, regen). I can confirm that the Bolt's system does in fact run far more often than the Leaf's. But the battery has to cold soak in sub-freezing temperatures overnight for it to get cold enough to warm itself. It may be more willing to warm itself when plugged in, but I don't keep it plugged in over night.

 

[LeftieBiker]

The Leaf's battery heater was only to prevent the electrolyte from freezing (catastrophic failure). The Bolt warms the battery for better performance (range, acceleration, regen). I can confirm that the Bolt's system does in fact run far more often than the Leaf's. But the battery has to cold soak in sub-freezing temperatures overnight for it to get cold enough to warm itself. It may be more willing to warm itself when plugged in, but I don't keep it plugged in over night.

I understand that. My point was that the pack doesn't get as cold as ambient air most of the time - it takes many hours sitting in frigid temps to chill even the smaller Leaf pack.

 

[SeanNelson]

Does anyone know what temperature range battery conditioning kicks in?

I've seen a very small amount of battery conditioning (equivalent to about 0.4 kWh's worth) on my Bolt which was parked overnight in an unheated garage at outside air temperatures that were just a degree or two below freezing. The garage temperature was probably very slightly warmer than the outside air temperature.

 

[winterescape]

I too had never seen any battery conditioning... until this week . I was at a hotel and it dropped into the 20's overnight. The next morning I had "preconditioned" the car while plugged in and my energy usage initially showed 5% consumed for battery conditioning.

 

[SeanNelson]

I too had never seen any battery conditioning... until this week . I was at a hotel and it dropped into the 20's overnight. The next morning I had "preconditioned" the car while plugged in and my energy usage initially showed 5% consumed for battery conditioning.

So according to that screen at the time you snapped the photo you had used a total of 3.4 kWh, of which 5% was due to battery conditioning. 5% of 3.4 kWh is 0.17 kWh, or 170 Watt-hours - a pretty tiny amount. It's less than the energy consumed by leaving a 100W incandescent electric light bulb on for a couple of hours.

 

[rocstar]

Mine kicked in for the first time today, after having been parked outside all day in upper 20s/low 30s F temps - but just barely. It showed 0% when I started the car, but was showing 1% after a few miles.

 

[GetOffYourGas]

Mine kicked in for the first time today, after having been parked outside all day in upper 20s/low 30s F temps - but just barely. It showed 0% when I started the car, but was showing 1% after a few miles.

Sounds very much like my experience. At around freezing, I see 1-3% used for conditioning (depending on the total used since last charge). It will be interesting to see what happens if winter ever arrives this year. Will it hit double-digit percentages in sub-zero weather? Have any Canadians here seen double-digits?

 

[Pigwich]

Mine kicked in a few times this summer when the temperature was insanely hot, around 107F, so it cools as well.

As for the graph, do remember that the whole pie is the energy since last charge, so that 5% is out of the 3kWh and not the entire pack capacity. It only took a tiny sip.

Even on Spark EV with it's 19kWh pack, the mass was great enough that it really never turned on except for a few very unusual days, and power usage was barely enough to measure. Of course, there's nothing normal about Los Angeles weather either.

 

[naturoses]

I am in Boston, temps are currently 25F at the time writing (Dec 17, 2017, 12.15pm). The battery conditioning I see is as follows:
At Start = 2%
Put seat heater = 5%
Wheels just started to turn = 8%
At 1 -2 mile of travel = 10%
AT 6.5 - 9 miles of travel = ¬12%
The car is always charged each day at least 10 – 13 hours at Level 2. On the display, for the past 3 days, never charged more than 200 - 208 miles (at full charge). As a reference, in middle – late October the charge was at 248 -286 miles (full charge). The car was charged outside and never garaged.

 

[JeremyK]

Just saw 14% energy used for battery conditioning while doing a 30 mile RT here in MI last weekend. Single digit high temps here.

 

[SmokingRubber]

I live near the ocean, and I've never seen any usage on "battery conditioning". Coincidentally, my kwh stays between 2.8 and 3.0 so I WISH it would do some conditioning to maybe improve that number.