SPL Tech

I dont believe that article for a second. Less than 0.5% of the vehicles on the road do not use gasoline or diesel right now. The technology for electric is not sufficient yet. People need to be able to drive cross country, and electric vehicles do not allow that. There is CNG, LPG and biodiesel, but again same problem as electric, it's hard to drive cross country. I suspect in 2017 still less than 3% of the vehicles out there will not use gasoline or diesel. Gas is going to be around for a very long time as it is the ONLY energy source out there right now that provides sufficient HP, reasonable cost, and allows you to drive anywhere anytime without hunting around for some type of special fuel.

Hua, I always figured a 36kw motor would be pretty huge. I mean your alternator in your car can only produce about 1500W, and so I figure a 36kW motor would easily be 10x the size of an alternator. Any photos of the MG1 and MG2? How does MG1 charge the 12v? I though MG1 goes through the inverter to get stepped down from 600V to 300V, or whatever the HVB battery voltage is (300V ish), and the 2000W 300V to 12V inverter provides 100% of the power to the 12v system? What voltage does MG1 and MG2 run at? I know in the Prius the voltage is almost doubled from the HVB to the motor through the inverter. So when they say MG2 is 36kW, is that 36kW draw or 36kW output?

I think it is a bit silly that you consider 57 MPG on a car rated for 42 as "not that great." Also, comparing data from a single trip is meaningless. Have her drive as she does for a month and then compare that data.

It is an appliance and has a shelf life. The official rated lifespan as per Ford of the CMAX is 15 years.

I disagree that the shutters open when the CMAX is stopped all the time. I would not consider that a fact. Five times I have stopped my CMAX, gotten out, and looked upfront and the shutters were closed. This was when it was 80 degrees out too. That said, I have never checked when the engine was at full operating temp, just within the first mile or so of driving.

hey, if you are not using E10 then you are cheating. I say your world record is DQed. 99% of drivers do not have access to E0. Try some E10 and then report back on your FE.

hmm, does seem kind of pointless. So how much does this boost the city and highway MPG then?

I dont understand why there is any need to install covers. The CMAX already has shutters which I assume stay closed until the engine reaches operating temp, no? I dont know why they would be open if the engine is not at operating temp.

There is plenty of real proof out there. Only a million vehicles on YouTube showing dyno comparisons. Synthetic blend is only 30% synthetic oil, so a more appropriate name would be conventional oil blend.

So it's not just a start/stop feature, the vehicle is a full-on hybrid then? If it has an electric motor HVB and regenerative braking, I would call that a standard hybrid.

Nice, so instead of using your starter maybe 3,000 over the course of your vehicle's life, you now use it 50,000 times. I wonder how long until those starters start dropping like flies.

hmmm interesting that the transmission is considered hybrid and therefore covered to 8/100k. Also interesting that the MG1 and MG2, however, are not covered since they are clearly specific only to the hybrid system.

True that cars get 0 MPG while idling. But most newer 4-cyl cars are very efficient at idle fuel consumption. For example, my Jetta TDI only uses about 0.1 - 0.2 gal per hour at idle. The same engine uses about 1.5 gal per hour at 70 MPH. As far as auto-off goes, I am not sure what you are talking about. I am not aware of a single non-hybrid vehicle that auto shuts off at stop lights. Most modern vehicles turn off the fuel injectors while cruising at speed (e.g. downhill on the highway) and so you dont use any fuel, but the vehicle needs to be moving at speed for that feature to engage, and the engine will still continue to spin as the tranny does not disengage, only it's spinning by way of momentum from the driveaxle, not by burning fuel. There is also a negative effect by turning off the injectors, and that is the engine creates drag, essentially creating artificial engine braking. So in other words, if you shift into N, the car will go faster downhill, but then the engine will have to burn fuel to keep the engine at idle. So it's a trade off.

Does the hybrid system include all electronic components including the electric motors? I was always under the understanding that warranty only covered the battery. Everything else is covered under bumper to bumper or powertrain.

Also, I dont recommend a 10k rotation either. My VW called for 10k, and I could never get the rated lifespan of the tires, not even by running them until the belt was showing.

Next time tell them you rotate every 2000 miles and they wont use that as an excuse. Something does sound off. It's not hard to align a vehicle. With modern alignment machines, it's completely common to determine the exact alignment, toe and camber of your axles. No guessing "it looks straight" either it is or it is not, the machine will say either way. Not sure why they are having so much trouble. Maybe the toe, camber or alignment is changing over time. That is, they set it right, and then something happens and it's misaligned later.

Anyone know which ESP I would have to go with to cover all the most expensive portions of the vehicle like the hybrid system, tranny, engine, DC/DC converter, ect? Ford's website does not say which plans cover hybrid systems and which do not. I was originally going to just go with the basic care plan.

I will add in a solar panel, but the solar itself is not sufficient to charge the battery, I have to use the vehicle. The solar will only reduce the amount of time it takes to deplete the battery. The other concern is if I use a battery regulator, if my fridge battery is dead and I start the vehicle, the DC/DC converter is probably going to pour 100+A into the battery to charge it just like would happen with an alternator. I am not sure how the DC/DC converter is going to like that. It might be better to use some form of current limiting device to limit the charge current to 35A or so.

I often live out of my Cmax for extended periods, and I would like to buy a 12v fridge/ freezer. It draws about 30w and runs about 50% duty cycle during peak summer months. Anyway, I am thinking of getting a second 12v battery and a 30w solar panel. Any ideas how to charge the battery from the vehicle? I dont want to get a battery isolator because those have 0.9v drops across them, and the 12v system sounds like it's already weak in the Cmax. I cannot just wire the second battery in parallel either as I dont want to kill the main battery as my freezer will be plugged in 24/7.

hmm, I dont have that gauge. My energy use gauge is fixed with the climate control use gauge, and it looks different. Did you buy your C-Max outside of the USA?

How about with Ford ESP, can you do your own maintenance and still preserve your ESP? I know some aftermarket ESPs require all dealer maintenance, otherwise they wont cover a repair.

So then it is measuring current consumption and not output then. That implies that the gauge may be of limited accuracy as I assume the gauge assumes the power consumption of the motor is linear, or at least logarithmic, with the load. But in reality, that is never true. For example, as electric motors get hot, their power consumption changes relative to when they are cold. A motor might need 7kW to produce 5hp when hot and maybe 6.2kW when cold (rough example). I suspect the gauge does not account for things like this.

Since we are talking about arbitrary BS trips and bogus trip lengths, I'll throw some in there too. I got 999.9 MPG on my last trip of 4.2 miles. The ICE dident come on one. I think that makes me the world record holder. I'll by myself some champagne.

So theoretically the blue EV meter on the Engage would show the output power of the electric motor. But at times I have noticed that the EV meter will climb 1 - 5 bars (so about 1 - 3% max output) without the vehicle moving and without my foot on the gas peddle. Sometimes it happens when I turn the AC at first. Other times it happens randomly. This leads me to believe that the EV gauge is not actually displaying the output of MG1, but rather the current draw on the HV battery which the gauge just extrapolates to output power on the display. Any ideas?

Damn, that is bad. 27 at and average of about 85 MPH? I think I was getting about 40 MPG in my Jetta TDI diesel at 70 MPH. That said, 85 is really fast. You probably need about 40% of the capacity of the engine to hold that speed. What is typical for say 60, 70 and 80 MPH? What are others getting for those speeds?