Intelligent Battery Heating

[Plodalong]

I haven’t found much about battery heating from the manual. It seems it’s a good idea to start heating 30 minutes before fast charging to improve the charge speed. And I sometimes get an alert to advise battery heating as the ambient temperature is low. But considering the high load imposed by heating, are the efficiency benefits worth it? Any info gratefully received from a newbie.

 

[jpk]

As someone who'll be commuting circa 90 miles a day I'd be really interested to see if anyone has done any real world studies and narrowed down the kinda mileage you need to travel for the benefit to outweigh the initial battery loss through heating.

 

[Rolfe]

Another newbie here. Yesterday morning I took my car to the public charging point at the end of my road and left it there on the CCS charger for 52 minutes during which it moved from 45% charged to 92% charged. I then drove it back home and parked it in the drive. THEN the car popped up a message saying it was a bit cold out and did I want to turn on battery heating?

What's the point of that? I've seen that message before, but I have no idea how to turn on battery heating at a time of my choosing rather than when the car suggests it. The car doesn't know I'm thinking about charging it in half an hour or so, and yesterday the message came up after I'd finished charging it.

 

[jpk]

As a man who's love a bit of factual date to pour over it would be great if mg could produce a multi axis chart that shows energy expenditure on one axis from differing ambient temperatures to the desired battery pack temp with ascending mileage on the other axis to cross reference the break even point even incorporating the differences of predetermined average miles perKwh

 

[siteguru]

I'm not sure how "intelligent" the battery heating can be. Maybe in the Trophy, IF it links setting a rapid charger as a destination in the satnav, it could preheat the battery before arriving at the charger so that best charge efficiency can be achieved.

I recall reading (here, somewhere) that it may be worthwhile for longer journeys (50+ miles in a single stint?) in cold weather, but any journey length shorter than that then you're going to use more capacity heating the battery than you'd gain in efficiency from having a warm battery.

 

[JuziWomble]

Another newbie here. Yesterday morning I took my car to the public charging point at the end of my road and left it there on the CCS charger for 52 minutes during which it moved from 45% charged to 92% charged. I then drove it back home and parked it in the drive. THEN the car popped up a message saying it was a bit cold out and did I want to turn on battery heating?

What's the point of that? I've seen that message before, but I have no idea how to turn on battery heating at a time of my choosing rather than when the car suggests it. The care doesn't know I'm thinking about charging it in half an hour or so, and yesterday the message came up after I'd finished charging it.

On the Battery Main window - It has three tabs - Select the third (on the Right for Me) - Where you can see the graph - Under that is a Battery Heat tab option - ENSURE IF you tap it on that you remember and tap it off ...

 

[Rolfe]

On the Battery Main window - It has three tabs - Select the third (on the Right for Me) - Where you can see the graph - Under that is a Battery Heat tab option - ENSURE IF you tap it on that you remember and tap it off ...

Thanks, I'll try to remember that.

I'm not sure how "intelligent" the battery heating can be. Maybe in the Trophy, IF it links setting a rapid charger as a destination in the satnav, it could preheat the battery before arriving at the charger so that best charge efficiency can be achieved.

I recall reading (here, somewhere) that it may be worthwhile for longer journeys (50+ miles in a single stint?) in cold weather, but any journey length shorter than that then you're going to use more capacity heating the battery than you'd gain in efficiency from having a warm battery.

I thought the point of it was to speed up charging, so that if you wanted the car to gobble the maximum charge possible at the next charger then that would be the thing to do. How is that affected by the length of your journey? Or do you mean the length of the journey you plan to do following the charge?

Sorry, I'm very ignorant. I'm here to learn.

 

[JuziWomble]

I thought the point of it was to speed up charging, so that if you wanted the car to gobble the maximum charge possible at the next charger then that would be the thing to do. How is that affected by the length of your journey? Or do you mean the length of the journey you plan to do following the charge?

Sorry, I'm very ignorant. I'm here to learn.

re Length of journey = The Battery will generate its own heat as in its being used - In a Leaf for instance it would suffer from Rapidgate as the car had no thermal management functionality on multiple charges on a lengthy journey - Our Mg's dont suffer here as it has thermal management functionality - Hence we can heat or cool the battery depending on needs

 

[Rolfe]

So what should govern whether we decide to turn on the heating or not? Explain it to me like I'm an idiot (because I almost certainly am).

 

[Ian Key]

Use battery heating...
...if you need to rapid charge due to time constraints and the ambient temperature is low or...
...it's below freeing and you are connected to you home charger or...
...it's below freezing and you are going to do a journey over 37ish miles.

 

[tsedge]

Use battery heating...
...if you need to rapid charge due to time constraints and the ambient temperature is low or...
...it's below freeing and you are connected to you home charger or...
...it's below freezing and you are going to do a journey over 37ish miles.

This is great advice

 

[Rolfe]

Use battery heating...
...if you need to rapid charge due to time constraints and the ambient temperature is low or...
...it's below freeing and you are connected to you home charger or...
...it's below freezing and you are going to do a journey over 37ish miles.

Thank you so much for that! By the way, for point 1, how low is low?

I take it that if you don't use battery heating in cold weather for whatever reason, it won't actually damage the battery? Just charge more slowly?

 

[OriginalBigAl]

As a man who's love a bit of factual date to pour over it would be great if mg could produce a multi axis chart that shows energy expenditure on one axis from differing ambient temperatures to the desired battery pack temp with ascending mileage on the other axis to cross reference the break even point even incorporating the differences of predetermined average miles perKwh

Intelligent battery heating data, I would have to go back to school or make friends with Prof Brian Cox to understand that.

 

[MoDolph]

I take it that if you don't use battery heating in cold weather for whatever reason, it won't actually damage the battery? Just charge more slowly?

The problem is that the exact battery chemistry and physical makeup is a trade secret of CATL so we don't know.

However, almost every paper I have read regarding NMC batteries show that degradation increases both above and below ~25C. Charging and discharging the battery below 10C was particularly bad. Whether it is worth taking the usage hit is, unfortunately, unknown.

 

[Rolfe]

Thanks for that. Er, mine's a SR though, so not NMC.

 

[MoDolph]

Thanks for that. Er, mine's a SR though, so not NMC.

Ah, my bad, I forgot.

 

[Rolfe]

Ah, my bad, I forgot.

Do you have any equivalent advice for the SR?

 

[MoDolph]

Do you have any equivalent advice for the SR?

I only like to comment when I'm absolutely sure and I was only concentrating on NMC at the time as that's what I have.

I think it was not as big as issue for LFP but I would have to check when I get back to work next week.

 

[Rolfe]

Thanks. Some of this is a bit of a closed book to me.

 

[Barbette]

Does anyone else have a problem with Intelligent Battery Heating resetting to “On”? I was only getting 2 miles per kWh for about the first 10 miles when the ambient temperature was between 0 and 10 degrees. I turned IBH off (in the battery charging tab, as described above) and got much improved range ( >3.5). On every subsequent journey, when I restart the car IBH is set to on again once and needs to be turned off before I start. Is there a way to make the car remember? Or do I have a bug?