2014-2017 C-Max Energi 3G to 4G modem update

[eostrike]

Update - 

 

On Saturday after getting the 4G upgrade completed I spent more than 3 hours with Ford support trying to get it work work on the Ford pass app. Then today Monday morning I spent 2 hours once again with support and still no go. I was told to take the car back to the dealer. So this morning my car was dropped off at the dealer and a loaner car was given to me.

 

Most of the people over the phone at Ford support had no clue about this recall and were not trained how to troubleshoot it. The service department also said they do not know what it going on but will try and reprogram the unit tomorrow when the mechanic that installed it is working. They said if the reprogramming does not work then they will need to engage their Ford support to see why this is failing to be noticed in the Ford pass app.

 

What I told them is that I believe the issue is that the Ford pass system did not synchronize properly as Ford pass still shows my modem as a 3G but in the My Ford Mobile app it say this has been upgraded to 4G and to use Ford pass. Something is not off here.

 

Hopefully I will get an answer sometime tomorrow.

 

The dealer I went to said I was the second person that had this update at their dealer and it was also a CMAX. They claim that owner had no issues.

 

Maybe the issue is that I am on an Android phone and possibly the other person was on an iPhone. Not sure yet.

 

 

@oldbeyondmeasure was it your CMAX that got the upgrade already?

[Nervous but Excited]

Thanks @cr08 and @eostrike

My undersanding is that I should budget at most another $500 for this, and that there are no repercussions beyond that. Am I underestimating the problem here?

[eostrike]

On 12/20/2021 at 3:42 PM, Nervous but Excited said:

Thanks @cr08 and @eostrike

My undersanding is that I should budget at most another $500 for this, and that there are no repercussions beyond that. Am I underestimating the problem here?

The 4G modem upgrade cost me $350.00 for the kit including taxes. The labor was taken care of by the recall. 

 

If you are not planning on using any of the features that Ford pass has to offer then the upgrade would not be needed.

[Nervous but Excited]

Thanks @eostrike. Given that I don't currently have the car and don't really know what's included in the Ford Pass... It's kinda difficult to imagine whether I would or wouldn't miss the features, haha.
 

[eostrike]

On 12/20/2021 at 3:57 PM, Nervous but Excited said:

Thanks @eostrike. Given that I don't currently have the car and don't really know what's included in the Ford Pass... It's kinda difficult to imagine whether I would or wouldn't miss the features, haha.
 

Pretty much the app will allow you to lock/unlock and remote start your vehicle. For me I have never used these features. It should also show you your charge times and let you know when the charge is complete. These are features that I do use.

 

 

The 4G modem in current vehicles have Wi-Fi hotspot I believe and with a monthly cost. I would never pay for this feature when I can tether my phones to my tablets or laptop.  I can not comment if this 4G update will give this feature as an option or if it was left out.

 

There are other paid features I believe, none I can comment on and none that I personally would pay for as a monthly service.

 

 

[cr08]

The 4G modem provided with this recall is very likely not to have the Wifi hotspot functionality. There are two distinct modem types depending on the vehicle and build. One is just the baseline FordPass modem with no hotspot hardware included. The other is the FordPass modem with the Wifi hotspot hardware. It is highly unlikely they're going to provide the hotspot version as our vehicles were never provided that option to begin with. They're just going to maintain feature parity with what we've already had.

 

As far as subscription fees, basically all the functionality in FordPass for the remote access stuff has been made free for life by Ford. They're no longer charging for it (beyond the cost of this recall of course). The only subscription I'm aware of is the aforementioned Wifi hotspot service.

[oldbeyondmeasure]

I see my name listed above (@oldbeyondmeasure) with a question. I have not been upgraded yet; my installation is scheduled for next week.

[eostrike]

Last update pertaining to my 4G upgrade:

As mentioned on an earlier post I had dropped my car back at Ford yesterday morning. They were not going to be able to look into it till today, Tuesday.

This morning I opened up the Ford Pass app and it was still not working. At noon today I opened it again and it was not showing the Activate Vehicle button and the recall in the upper left corner of the app for the 3G to 4G was now gone, meaning the upgrade was complete. 

I then called the dealer to see if they were working on my car. The service advisor had advised me that the car was in the techs bay but he has not touched the car yet. He mentioned that they contacted their Ford support to see what can be done. 

While sitting at my house the service advisor went to my car and I performed the activate from home, he saw a confirmation prompt on my Navigation screen and accepted it. We then tried the remote features and they are now working.

So, either if really took from Saturday afternoon until Tuesday afternoon for the Ford system to realize my car was not on 3G anymore, or the email that the ford tech sent to their help desk maybe fixed it, or I had a ticket created with Ford support yesterday however they said it would take up to 5 days to hear back. Not really sure how it started but everything is functioning properly now three days later.

For me this upgrade did not go as planned but in the end I can call this complete. 

I have included a few new screen shots. 

I would highly suggest that anyone who upgrades to the 4G perform the Ford Pass activation before leaving the dealership.

Lastly, cr08 was correct and this 4G upgrade does not included any Wi-Fi Hotspot (not really necessary) nor any other paid services. 

[eostrike]

On 12/21/2021 at 12:16 PM, oldbeyondmeasure said:

I see my name listed above (@oldbeyondmeasure) with a question. I have not been upgraded yet; my installation is scheduled for next week.

I only asked above as the dealer told me that they had only one 4G upgrade a week before mine and it was also a CMAX. Thought it may have been you since you paid for your earlier than I did. Let us know how your upgrade turns out when you get some time after the install has completed.

[eostrike]

When I got home from the dealer yesterday and turned off my vehicle it said my next charge will be 20 miles. I was pleased with that as I have been averaging 12 to 14 miles on each charge for some time now as this vehicles charging system is adaptive and learns your driving habits and charges to a little over what it predicts you will be using on your next drive.  When I woke up this morning the vehicle did in fact charge to 20-mile range. I went to the market and back and it showed that my next charge will now be 18 miles which it was when completed.

 

I was hoping that they removed this adaptive learning because in the Ford Pass app you can tell it a percentage that you want to charge the vehicle from 50% to 100% in 5% increments. I do not think My Ford Mobile app had the ability to select a charge percentage. I will not know if this is the case or not until I have had a few more charges. I suspect that nothing has changed with the adaptive learning and that maybe mine charged to 20-mile range after they reprogrammed the cars computer when installing the new modem as my driving history may have been erased.

 

For me I am unable to set up any preferred charge times as it keeps erroring out. In the update bulletin it does state that for the Ford Focus Electric owners only this will not work until Summer 2022. Maybe this applies to CMAX as well.

 

Their GPS locator for when trying to set up my preferred charge times thinks I am parked at my neighbors house. Hopefully this gets resolved with the update for the preferred charge times in the next 6 months. My Ford Mobile app always showed me parked at the correct address.

 

The Ford Pass app seems to be more responsive and opens and refreshes much faster than it ever did with the My Ford Mobile app.

 

After all the hoopla I had been through with this upgrade I am pleased with the results so far. There are a few hiccups but with anything new this will get ironed out in due time.

 

I have included two pictures of the preferred charge times, one that shows it erroring out and the other showing that we can now select the charge percentage. I might be wrong, but I do not think that was an option with the previous app. I can no longer access that APP to verify.

Edited December 23, 2021 by eostrike

[cr08]

It'll be really cool if the max charge level option works with our vehicles. I'm not hopeful though given we've never had that option anywhere and would require some software in the vehicle beyond the TCU (specifically the BECM which handles battery charging) to have a function to inhibit charging past a certain level. But definitely keep us updated if it works!

 

I'm curious if some of the newer plug-in vehicles have this feature? Maybe @ptjones can chime in on is FEHP?

 

Also glad to hear about the responsiveness. How fast are the remote start/lock/unlock functions to respond? I imagine the old system was probably SMS based or otherwise used a simple query/response system causing the delays but probably to save battery use. So if you refreshed the app, Ford's servers then had to send a query out to the vehicle for updates. Then you'd wait for the TCU in the vehicle to wake up for its periodic 'do I have anything to do?' check, find that query and respond back. Curious what they're going with now. Maybe with everything going LTE only which is just a data system with no classic SMS or Voice only signaling, Ford was probably afforded the ability to go to a more realtime and constant data connection this time around.

[EddyBoston]

On 12/19/2021 at 1:12 PM, eostrike said:

So Ford's support are useless. I spent over 3 hours yesterday on the phone trying to get my new 4G card to be recognized by Ford pass. Calling the Ford pass support they found that in their system my vehicle is still showing that it has a 3G card. So they transfer me to the sync department. On two of my phone calls I was hung up on as they kept telling me I am using the wrong app and need to use "My Ford Mobile". When I told them they are wrong and read them the message from MFM and the instructions from Ford they dropped the call and I would need to start all over. Yesterday was very frustrating. 

 

Now Ford pass support says that the dealer installed it wrong and that I need to go back there. Not sure how the dealer installed it wrong when my car shows the new modem serial number, MFM app says I am on 4G and to use Ford pass where Ford pass still thinks I am on 3G, something is not synchronized. I kept trying to get them to work on getting my car to show up as 4G on Ford pass but no one seems to be trained in doing this. I was hoping we could verify the modem serial number (ESN) but they say they do not see that information. 

 

I have been instructed to go back to the dealer to get this resolved. The dealer stated that there is nothing that they need to do, they said it is pretty much plug and play. They will get back to me sometime Monday regarding this but first thing Monday morning I will be back on the phone trying to get this resolved. They are making this more difficult than I believe it should be. 

 

The people from Ford pass are nice to work with but not trained in this particular issue. The people from Ford sync are not good in my opinion as when they do not know how to resolve something they just disconnect the call. I also believe they are from a call center outside the United States. No accountability there!

 

If you run into a similar situation do not let them tell you that you need to be using MFM app as it is for 3G modems and not 4G modems. I attached a screenshot just incase you get some untrained person telling you that Ford pass is the incorrect app for your car after upgrading to 4G.

 

So far I am $350.00 out of pocket for something that does not work. I know it will get resolved but me spending 4 hours at the dealer getting it installed, then more than 3 hours calling over and over again to support and getting no where, the need to do this again on Monday and possible drive more than 20 miles back to the dealer to sit there for hours is all time wasted for something that should have worked right from the start. 

 

I hope everyone else's upgrades go smoother than mine but once I find out what the issue is/was I will update it here.

 

 

 

 

I have my car in today for the upgrade. I will definitely do my best to make sure Ford Pass works before I leave the service department.... thanks for the heads up!!!   

[kccode1]

Can anyone verify the part number that was installed.  I tried the one posted earlier on this thread but it is not recognized.    I will well everyone after using Ford Pass and Lincoln Way they are constantly updating it and functions come and go with that.  I even have it on an Iphone and an Android and at times it will work on one and not the other.   It is not a function of your modem or car it is the App.    

 

 

[eostrike]

With value charges erroring out it does in fact add them to the vehicle. It would not allow me to change them in the app if I wanted to make changes. I even tried to delete the value charge times from the app but it will not successfully delete them.

So I went to the vehicle to delete the value charge time which I set from the app and it does not let you delete from the vehicles screen. It tells you on the screen to use the My Ford Mobile app to manage profiles however you can no longer use this app once migrated to 4G. 

Ford will need to work out all these bugs for sure in future updates.

 

In my opinion they pushed this update before having it fully tested.

Edited December 24, 2021 by eostrike

[cr08]

The 'Use MyFord Mobile' text is going to just be a static message built into Sync and won't be modified by this TCU upgrade. You would continue to use the FordPass app regardless of this message.  I believe if you upgrade to Sync 3.4.x (Ford won't offer this themselves, need to use the Cyanlabs Syn3Updater tool) it now references FordPass in this spot. I'll have to check mine and confirm.

 

Looks like you're on a version around 3.0-3.3.x per the screenshot. I think we're getting to a point and this has been semi-confirmed by some in the Cyanlabs forum that Ford is getting to the point of not offering any further updates for these older Sync 3 versions and focusing on 3.4/4. Ford only officially offers 3.4 to 2019 or newer vehicles I believe but it can be applied unofficially to older 2016+ vehicles.

 

EDIT: confirmed. This is on Sync 3.4.21265. And mine is still on the 3G TCU paired to MyFord Mobile.

Edited December 24, 2021 by cr08

[eostrike]

On 12/24/2021 at 11:45 AM, cr08 said:

The 'Use MyFord Mobile' text is going to just be a static message built into Sync and won't be modified by this TCU upgrade. You would continue to use the FordPass app regardless of this message.  I believe if you upgrade to Sync 3.4.x (Ford won't offer this themselves, need to use the Cyanlabs Syn3Updater tool) it now references FordPass in this spot. I'll have to check mine and confirm.

 

Looks like you're on a version around 3.0-3.3.x per the screenshot. I think we're getting to a point and this has been semi-confirmed by some in the Cyanlabs forum that Ford is getting to the point of not offering any further updates for these older Sync 3 versions and focusing on 3.4/4. Ford only officially offers 3.4 to 2019 or newer vehicles I believe but it can be applied unofficially to older 2016+ vehicles.

The dealer did tell me that they had to program something in the vehicle to make the 4G work. If they are going to make an update they need to do it 100%. I am just listing out what I have noticed. 

 

Yes I am on version 3.0. I was going to update to the unofficial version 3.4 about a month ago, already have Cyanlabs built on my USB stick but did not want to do it before the 4G upgrade in the event something did not work. Now that I have the 4G update I will wait to hear from others if they had success updating to 3.4 after installing the 4G modem. 

Edited December 24, 2021 by eostrike

[eostrike]

On 12/24/2021 at 11:45 AM, cr08 said:

The 'Use MyFord Mobile' text is going to just be a static message built into Sync and won't be modified by this TCU upgrade. You would continue to use the FordPass app regardless of this message.  I believe if you upgrade to Sync 3.4.x (Ford won't offer this themselves, need to use the Cyanlabs Syn3Updater tool) it now references FordPass in this spot. I'll have to check mine and confirm.

 

Looks like you're on a version around 3.0-3.3.x per the screenshot. I think we're getting to a point and this has been semi-confirmed by some in the Cyanlabs forum that Ford is getting to the point of not offering any further updates for these older Sync 3 versions and focusing on 3.4/4. Ford only officially offers 3.4 to 2019 or newer vehicles I believe but it can be applied unofficially to older 2016+ vehicles.

 

EDIT: confirmed. This is on Sync 3.4.21265. And mine is still on the 3G TCU paired to MyFord Mobile.

 

Thanks for sharing your screen shot. Yours most likely shows to use Ford Pass as the 3.4 update is for 4G users even though you are still on 3G. My point was that they should have updated it in the vehicles software to reflect that Ford Pass should be used rather than MFM which no longer works with 4G. Not a big deal just should have corrected when doing what ever programing to the vehicle they may have done.

 

Change of topic - Does the climate setting work on your screen after you updated to the unofficial 3.4 version?

[cr08]

On 12/24/2021 at 3:17 PM, eostrike said:

 

Change of topic - Does the climate setting work on your screen after you updated to the unofficial 3.4 version?

 

Not by default, but it can be enabled and works 100%. Here's the TL;DR and requires an AsBuilt modification via ForScan (easy process): https://community.cyanlabs.net/t/re-enabling-climate-domain-repeater-options-after-3-4-update-parking-sensor-display/3096/15?u=vchat20

 

Keep in mind mine is a '13 Energi SEL with the Dual zone auto climate control. If yours has the dual zone auto climate control, the above settings should apply as well.

[eostrike]

On 12/24/2021 at 1:04 PM, cr08 said:

 

Not by default, but it can be enabled and works 100%. Here's the TL;DR and requires an AsBuilt modification via ForScan (easy process): https://community.cyanlabs.net/t/re-enabling-climate-domain-repeater-options-after-3-4-update-parking-sensor-display/3096/15?u=vchat20

 

Keep in mind mine is a '13 Energi SEL with the Dual zone auto climate control. If yours has the dual zone auto climate control, the above settings should apply as well.

Thanks for this info. Mine had every possible option for the 2017 Energi C-Max so if dual climate was an option I am sure I have it. Can't say I ever used it though as I generally drive alone :-).

[RobertT]

On 11/30/2021 at 12:58 PM, EddyBoston said:

I just setup an appointment for this program on my 2018 Fusion Energi. The parts cost I was given for the 4G modem upgrade was $427 (free labor). That is a lot higher than the $310 listed above. This is in Watertown MA. I am curious what others are being quoted?

$475 Canadian $ here on the West Coast of Canada

[eostrike]

The maximum charge level in Ford Pass unfortunately does not do anything with the CMAX. As cr08 mentioned it will probably not work. I have had my maximum charge level set at 100% and it started at 20 mile charge and after a few days of driving my vehicle I am back down to 14 miles per charge based on my driving habits. Maybe if you lower it from 100% it will charge less but keeping at 100% does not fully charge it as these cars are designed for adaptive charging. I am not sure why Ford would have a feature in the Ford Pass app that does not work with our cars. They should have the app set up where it knows each vehicles capabilities and only shows those options that are available. 

 

The Ford Pass app continues to work just fine with the exception of the value charge times. 

[eostrike]

On 12/26/2021 at 2:52 AM, RobertT said:

$475 Canadian $ here on the West Coast of Canada

From what RobertT was quoted in Canada that translates to $370.78 US Dollar. That is still pretty pricy if it does not include taxes. Mine out the door here in California was $350.00 taxes included.

[cr08]

On 12/26/2021 at 4:48 PM, eostrike said:

The maximum charge level in Ford Pass unfortunately does not do anything with the CMAX. As cr08 mentioned it will probably not work. I have had my maximum charge level set at 100% and it started at 20 mile charge and after a few days of driving my vehicle I am back down to 14 miles per charge based on my driving habits. Maybe if you lower it from 100% it will charge less but keeping at 100% does not fully charge it as these cars are designed for adaptive charging. I am not sure why Ford would have a feature in the Ford Pass app that does not work with our cars. They should have the app set up where it knows each vehicles capabilities and only shows those options that are available. 

 

The Ford Pass app continues to work just fine with the exception of the value charge times. 

Don't rely on the miles of range! The vehicle is simply guessing and you will get lower numbers in colder climates or if your driving previously was more 'intense'. Go by the actual SOC/% as listed under the Charge Settings screen. You can 'guess' yourself a little bit by the battery charge indicator in FordPass and how much it is filled in. More than likely it has charged to 100% each time, but you're focusing on the miles listed.

 

My curiosity is more if you set it at a lower percentage, ie: 50% to 80%, and if the C-Max will properly stop at those levels per the actual SOC %.

Edited December 26, 2021 by cr08

[dbakerhmb]

On 12/20/2021 at 3:03 PM, eostrike said:

Update - 

 

On Saturday after getting the 4G upgrade completed I spent more than 3 hours with Ford support trying to get it work work on the Ford pass app. Then today Monday morning I spent 2 hours once again with support and still no go. I was told to take the car back to the dealer. So this morning my car was dropped off at the dealer and a loaner car was given to me.

 

Most of the people over the phone at Ford support had no clue about this recall and were not trained how to troubleshoot it. The service department also said they do not know what it going on but will try and reprogram the unit tomorrow when the mechanic that installed it is working. They said if the reprogramming does not work then they will need to engage their Ford support to see why this is failing to be noticed in the Ford pass app.

 

What I told them is that I believe the issue is that the Ford pass system did not synchronize properly as Ford pass still shows my modem as a 3G but in the My Ford Mobile app it say this has been upgraded to 4G and to use Ford pass. Something is not off here.

 

Hopefully I will get an answer sometime tomorrow.

 

The dealer I went to said I was the second person that had this update at their dealer and it was also a CMAX. They claim that owner had no issues.

 

Maybe the issue is that I am on an Android phone and possibly the other person was on an iPhone. Not sure yet.

 

 

@oldbeyondmeasure was it your CMAX that got the upgrade already?

Any update as to whether your Ford service department was able to fix your FordPass communication issue?

 

I have a very similar problem since my 2017 CMAX Energi was upgraded to the 4G modem on December 23rd.

I was easily able to “activate” the new 4G modem using the FordPass app, but the app could not control ANYTHING and could not show ANY status updates such as location, fuel, or charge levels.

The FordPass app showed my 4G upgraded CMax as still needing to get the 4G upgrade.

 

I also tried using the MyFord Mobile app that used to work flawlessly, but my CMAX was no longer listed and the app would not allow me to re-enter the vehicle as it is now a 4G vehicle and must therefore use the FordPass app.

 

I decided to start over and removed my CMax from the FordPass app as well as from my online ford owner account.

I double-checked my modem ESN and was able to confirm that it was different than it was before the 4G upgrade.

i performed a master reset of the Sync system in my CMax as well as updated the Sync system software to the latest Sync version 3.0 build 20204.

I then re-added my CMax VIN into my online Ford owner account where I was able to see things like the service history.

I then re-entered the CMax VIN into the FordPass app and again was able to successfully “activate” the modem, but again with no functionality.

As before, the FordPass app cannot control ANYTHING and does not show ANY status updates such as location, fuel, or charge levels.

The FordPass app also still shows my 4G upgraded CMax as still needing to get the 4G upgrade.

What is also strange is now there is problems accessing my CMax service history on the Ford owner website… I can see the vehicle listed under “my account”, but see NO vehicle info at all if I click for details or click for the vehicle dashboard.

 

I strongly suspect that a step was missing in the installation of the 4G modem itself that it preventing the FordPass app from recognizing that it has been upgraded from the 3G modem (despite the MyFord Mobile app insisting that it IS a 4G modem); and that this is affecting BOTH the FordPass app and Ford owner website from functioning properly.

I plan to contact Ford Guide today for help, but am not very hopeful based on the experience of others.

Would  love to know if the dealer can help… I was the first install at my dealer!

 

[SayheyBj]

I made an appointment today to have the upgrade done. I was charged $350 + tax in Massachusetts for the parts. I was told that it would take 1 1/2 days to complete but that Ford would not cover a loaner car. I will definitely see if it is working before I leave the dealer. Does this sound like everyone's experience? Has anyone gotten a loaner while this has been done?