OutraGeo

Hi Bill. Yep - I understood the electronics and technology, and thanks for the analogy! That bucket thing was cute. Anyway - if the 12v battery DID need charging then it needed only a microsecond and practically charged up to full power from the arc as my negative clamped neared a piece of bare metal. Not sure how much actual 'charging' could have taken place in such a short time, but it was less time than flipping a switch. Yep - I know about the Energi forum - been there. Weak. There just aren't enough C-Max Energi drivers out there yet and the threads are bare-bones with little participation. This C-max Hybrid forum has way more participants and interesting material, and my car, even though it is an Energi as opposed to an SE/SEL model, still qualifies as a Hybrid C-Max. I know, cuz my car thanks me for driving one every time I power down! Thanks, tho - maybe once more Energi folks sign on I'll mosey back over there for a look-see. In the meantime - YOU guys (and gals) are where the action is and you're talking about a problem I'm having as we speak - so I'll pull up a chair, if that's ok, and stay around here a little longer spell... p.s. Since I've re"conditioned" (charged) my battery, nothing has gone amiss, though I'm hardly convinced the charging had anything to do with it. My windows mysteriously returned to normal operation all on their own, and the blue ring glowing past it's time-out hasn't re-occurred either. truth is, I'm still sneaking down to the garage in the middle of the night expecting to hear the car burp or wink a turn signal at me or something. I also downloaded and installed the smartphone monitoring app to check battery status on stuff remotely. That's very cool - but doesn't the system need to have SOME juice to be able to telemeter that status stuff to my smartphone app? Hmm... gotta look into that one...

Thanks, guys - at least misery breeds good company, as they say - so something good is coming out of this... Bill - yeah, the "instant charge" thing is a bit weird, that threshold between dead or alive must be a fine line indeed. Although - when I discovered my car dead - I mean "dead-dead" - there was not a single electrical component that would light up. In the garage, with all the lights off and completely dark, I notices when I put my eyeball right up to the turning signal or tail-lights that I could detect an extremely fain flickering - but no dome lights or dashboard power at all. When I pulled the charger out to re-charge the battery, I connected the positive after taking off the little red cap under the hood, but I didn't see the negative post right away, so I was hunting for some bare metal to clip it to and when I tapped a corner bolt and got a little spark I clamped on and everything came back to full power in a split second. Didn't really need recharging at all - but I left the charger hooked up anyway to get some readings hopefully 're-condition' the 12v system (wishful-thinking, I suppose). PJ - I have a decent charger already, with automatic settings and shut-off, switchable 2amp-10amp, trickle charge, etc. -so it's not as fancy as the one DrDiesle has been hawking - but it'll do for now. I'll probably spring the ~$60 or so and get one of those anyway if the problem persists, but I'm kinda hoping I won't need to. I already had one of the car starting bricks that now goes with me everywhere. It's older, but holds a charge, and hopefully will light things up enough to get me on my way if I need it. If not - its' back to the auto parts store (or eBay or Amazon, whatever) to pick one up. Salman - points well taken. As others mentioned, we appreciate your advocacy here - just be careful you don't step on folks toes. I value your commentary though - so keep 'em coming... If push comes to shove with Ford, you're the type I want out in front anyway! As for your #6 question, I don't know if the dealer was charging or jumping the vehicle when I went to pick it up. In hindsight and after reading through this depressing thread, however, it just struck me as odd that they would have to jump (or charge) a brand new car coming off the lot (that has also been on a few recent test-drives, mine included a total of 65 miles at the time of transfer). New info: Found another electro-gremlin: my blue ring around the charging port has, twice in the last 48 hours, NOT shut off after the car is fully charged and no power to the charging cable. My charger is on a timer so that I can take advantage of lower electric rates between midnight and 5am. I plug the charger in whenever I pull into the garage and it automatically starts charging at midnight. You know how the blue charger ring glows in quarter-ring segments as it is charging? And as soon as it is fully charged (a few hours typically depending on how much juice it needed), the blue ring shows a complete circle with no segments pulsing? Then the ring turns off. Well, my ring wouldn't turn off. On 'settings' on the dash and in the manual it explains how you can adjust when and how the blue ring lights up. I just left mine at the default setting. If you plug in a charger that has no juice, the blue ring glows for a bit, then goes dark. Or, if the car is fully charged, it stops glowing and goes dark. Clearly, look windows rolling down themselves, dome lights glowing long after people have left the vehicle, and my own headlights that would not shut themselves off with the 'auto' setting, this new 'blue-ring' issue could be a problem: what if I don't drive the car for a whole week - with no juice to the charging cable - the blue ring glowing anyway for days on end would, I presume, slowly drain the battery as well. The whole thing makes me think that there are several components that stay on or could drain the battery, that they happen intermittently, and unpredictably, and that it really has little to do with the 12v battery itself as much as some harness or connection or firmware glitch. I mean, throughout this thread users have been quoting TSBs and other internal Ford communications that addressed to problem (in spite of the fact that they often deny such problems are prevalent). I would have to assume that later adopters/purchasers like myself (car is barely one month mine) would ALREADY HAVE HAD THESE TSB issues applied to their newer vehicles. Really - Ford can't be that naive or irresponsible as to ignore ongoing problems with cars that are still on the lot and haven't been delivered to customers yet - or can they? If a TSB goes out that is universal to all C-Max cars, the smart thing to do would be to cycle your inventory through the shop and swap the connector or whatever do-hickey so that new purchasers don;t have problems as soon as they drive off the lot. The fact that problems are STILL cropping up with new purchasers like me tells me there are only two possibilities: 1. They are ignoring the problem on undelivered vehicles, or 2. They still don't know what the problem is. The TSBs I've looked over in these past pages (thanks for that by the way - it's great ammo when going to the dealer or Ford Cust Svc.), all stipulate: "for vehicles manufactured BEFORE such and such build date." Well - the presumption implies that AFTER that build date the problem was addressed at the factory. So if my C-Max was manufactured in Sept'13, and STILL having problems, then either the former TSB does not apply, OR the problem is STILL not being addressed adequately. Enough for now - have had no problems (other than the blue ring glow and the drivers window "one-touch up" not working) in the last day or two - but I'm going to the dealer tomorrow anyway to give them an earful and let them scope the car. It's time to join the paper trail - WooHoo! p.s. I still love the dang car, though! Rides smooth and quiet, great gas mileage, lots of bells and whistles (that maybe the problem, eh?), HOV stickers for solo carpooling. Not much of chick-magnet, but I plan to remedy that with some, ahem, modifications - if and when this other bugaboo 12v issue gets resolved. Carry ON!

Ok, well - it took me several hours to read through 52 pages - but I wanted to be as informed as possible before chiming in: Add me to the "Dead 12v-in-a-C-Max Society". Car is a 9/13-build Energi 302A with 3,400 miles. Had a bit of a different lead-in to my DOA in-garage this morning; as follows: 2 nights ago, my auto-headlight function would not turn off the headlights after parking the car in the garage. Normal routine for me has been to exit the vehicle, plug in my charger (hooked to a timer to start charging at midnight @lower rates), give the car a quick look-over and then head into the house. Well, I saw that the headlights did not turn off (they usually turn off within seconds of powering down), even after I left the vehicle. So I sat back inside, powered up, turned the headlight control knob to manual off, which killed the headlights, turned the know back to auto, which turned them on again, powered off and opened the door and the headlights turned off as before. Yesterday was cold and rainy weekend out running errands - first time driving in those conditions. Used extra climate, seat heaters, etc., lots of short trips., though not sure that has anything to do with it - some on the forum here seem to think so. Today, went to pull the car out to do some shopping - and... dead as can be - everything blacked out. The weird thing is, I hooked up a charger under the hood at the posts, and the car IMMEDIATELY came to full life - all power and accessories full on. I climbed in to check everything and at first noticed only the orange wrench icon on the left display and an error message to ("Check User Manual"). Lots of good that does - what are we supposed to do, look through hundreds of pages and just GUESS what the error is referring to? Anyway - I did just that and after several maintenance and troubleshooting passages and reading, found nothing that was explaining or offering any way to remedy the situation. The only other strange symptom I'm getting is now the driver's window only is automatically reversing when it reaches the top, fully-closed position and lowers again to about the half-way point. Went through the whole bounce-back reset procedure (pg 97) several times, but I can;t seem to make this go away. the wind is also no longer closing (raising) on "one-touch". It opens (lowers) on one-touch, and all the other three windows are operating normally. No clock problems, no accessory issues, and really little evidence of what caused the problem in the first place. I fully charged the car, blue ring is normal, and the orange wrench and warning message went away, but the main display gave me a "scheduled maintenance" message when I powered up the first time. In any case, I have to agree with the previous poster that it is NOT a problem exclusive or nearly so to the SE/SEL, it's just that there are fewer Energi units out there (and subsequently fewer chiming in to forums like this). I believe the 12v battery problem is endemic to the C-Max line across the board and likely beyond to other models as well but perhaps to a lesser degree. My intent is to take the car in to the dealer (Rancho Santa Margarita) and log the incident and have them check it out, etc. From what I'm gathering here it may be a high load-short trip problem, inferior 12v battery problem, rain/water intrusion issue, DC/DC conversion malfunction, software/firmware update dilemma, rear liftgate wire-chafing matter, or any number of possible other things - none of which appear to be the definitive all-inclusive diagnosis. Curiously, the day I went to pick the car up, I was asked to wait as the car needed to be "charged up". Coincidence? Yes, Ford needs to step up and admit there is a problem. Clearly, over 1,000 posts in a single forum regarding this singular problem can only mean there is something larger at work here than "user-error". The days of pointing fingers back at the customer are over. We're not idiots. Most of us bought (or leased) these vehicles only after substantial research and forethought. And these C-Max vehicles are NOT cheap. After spending this kind of money we shouldn't have to feel like we're rolling the dice and worry our loved ones may be stranded every time they pull out of the driveway. I've still got two older cars out front, not worth more than $500 together, that never once gave me this kind of anxiety -and still wouldn't! Something's wrong if I feel more comfortable going about my business in one of those beasts than in my slick new C-Max. In any case - thanks for filling us all in with your stories. I've lurked around here for a while, but I registered today (well, yesterday), in the hopes of bonding and hopefully contributing something to the discussion. p.s. A word to Ford (cuz I know you're reading this): I've been a Ford man all my life - as was my dad. This is my fifth - and last - if you guys don't come clean on this issue. You'll never wee me in a Toyota - but I do have other choices... How many life-long customers are you willing to risk by being evasive, clandestine, disingenuous. You've got a problem. Fix it.