My vehicle was at 9913 miles this am when the SOC started to climb to new heights about 3/4 mile from work. After 8+ hours of sitting in the parking lot, the vehicle continued to maintain values in the 70% range for about 1/3-1/2 mile before returning to normal SOC values. Other posters have reported on this feature that we believe Ford has programed into the vehicle. I'm not sure if this is every 10,000 miles or not.

I got some photos of this value in my cell phone I will share when I am allowed to upload them from the cell phone to the cell phone's website.

 

With most cell phones ( all 3 that I have owned ) you can email a photo to any email address. It does not have to be the phone company.

I can understand that SOC happening once in a while for calibration reasons. If it happens daily or weekly, something is probaby wrong.

In the few weeks I've had mine, I've only seen 31% to 56%.

 

I've had this happen twice in the last 1,000 miles. I've had the SOC xgauge since mid August and this hapened in mid October and again last week in Mid December. First time the battery flags indicated an SOC recal, but the last time no battery flags were set and the delta module voltage was still .05, so I don't know why the second occurence happened so soon again.

 

I'm having trouble uploading photos from the cell phone camera to it's website. I posted a request for help at the cell phone's website and will have to wait. I normally do not take photos with the cell phone but that was all I had on me when the hybrid battery was undergoing re-calibration.

This is the first time I had a SOC greater than the very low 60s. I could only barely exceed 60% SOC with a long downhill and with pumping of the brakes. I don't expect this to happen again until I reach nearly 20,000 miles.

 

Hey Bill... don't sweat it!
Your word is just as good as a photo!
-John

 

OK. I won't. DesertDogs photo will work just as fine and leads to this question--even if it is a bit off topic:

http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/f...lstandards.jpg

-It appears the proposed CARF Legislation on new fuel economy standards will become a reality. Could Hybrid auto-manufactures quickly and easily improve on current fuel averages by "tweaking" the SOC limiting software? Ford limits their current hybrid battery SOC between 40-60%. This is only a 20% range and what would happen if this range is increased to 30% (SOC between 35-65%)? If this occurs, what is the chance that it can be retroactive?

I'm curious on what the newest plug-in hybrid battery technology will allow for SOC? An increased SOC range and/or more power per battery unit? Then again, the newest battery technolgy does away with the heating and cooling hardware and thus allowing 6 times the number of battery cells in the hybrid compartment.

 

You would have and 08 FEH/MMH/MTH my testing indicates that is one of the things they did to the 08s. And no way they would make this retroactive.

 

Thanks for the update. Within the past three months there was a thread on 2nd generation Sanyo hybrid battery for the 2008 model year. Gpsman1 (John) questioned this labeling as there was no apparent changes with battery chemistry. Your post would confirm that the newest batteries have a more generious SOC range that allows a slight improvement in fuel efficiency.

 

But will they last as long???
No way to tell now. We'll know in 8 to 10 years!

 

Going down a long mountain grade, my SOC hit 67.9%.

It may have gone higher, but I reached the bottom of the slope at 67.9%.
It did take a charge slower, but was still allowing something like 22 amps, about half of normal regen to enter the battery.

After the downhill, I needed to accelerate up the next hill, and the battery used up that power quickly, to return to 53.0%.

I was getting about 60 MPG going uphill for 1 mile at 60 MPH!
-John