BigJim Posted December 10, 2012 Report Share Posted December 10, 2012 My wife and I purchased a new 2013 C-Max SE this past Friday. We drove it Friday (it was awesome), Saturday (awesome), then on Sunday I wanted to show my wife the air intakes behind the rear passenger seats so she would know to not put anything over them since that is where the air intake to cool the High Voltage Battery is located. I reached down and pulled the switch to open the hatchback and nothing happened. I thought, that's odd, but passed it off as it being an electric lock and the key needing to be in the ignition, not remembering that the key has a button to open the hatch and the car was unlocked. Later we got in the car to go out, my wife put the key in the ignition, turned it to start and nothing. Then I noticed that nothing electrical was happening anywhere in the vehicle. I dug out the manual, wondering if the crash fuel shut off switch had malfunctioned or as I read later, the High Voltage crash shut off switch. I didn't immediately find what I was looking for in the manual. So, I called Ford Roadside Assistance. They were polite and offered to send a tow-truck but had no information to diagnose what was wrong. I grabbed my portable jump start unit, attached it to the + terminal on the 12VDC and grounded it away from the battery. As soon as I turned the switch on the jump start unit to on all the power on our C-Max came on, the head lights, the radio, the dome lights, the instrument panel, everything. I immediately turned the jump start unit off and disconnected it from the car. I looked at the HV battery gauge and it showed 2/3 full. No other indications were given before or after this problem. It seemed to me as if the jump start unit caused a reset of whatever system feature that had disabled all electric power in the vehicle.I put the jump start unit in the storage area, just in case, and we drove it without further incident. Today I took it into the dealer and it is there with a laptop connected to it for diagnostics. I found this website/forum and found a post that was almost identical to mine where both the 12VDC battery and the instrument panel were replaced, which apparently solved the problem. More to follow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedLdr1 Posted December 10, 2012 Report Share Posted December 10, 2012 BigJim, I had the bad IP... The symptoms were similar to yours, nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, worked until it was jumped off then everything looked normal... That is a problem in its self as a car that requires jump starting should at least have a Low Battery warning... And the bad IP did not "throw" any codes for the tech's diagnostic system to display. The good news is I have not had a single issue, of any type, since the IP was replaced...:D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigJim Posted December 10, 2012 Author Report Share Posted December 10, 2012 Dealer called. They have found nothing in diagnostics (no surprise based on what I've read in other posts) but will charge the battery and we can have the car back. We'll see what happens... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darrelld Posted December 10, 2012 Report Share Posted December 10, 2012 Dealer called. They have found nothing in diagnostics (no surprise based on what I've read in other posts) but will charge the battery and we can have the car back. We'll see what happens... I would ask the dealer if they load tested the battery? If it happens again they can't blame it on a bad battery the second trip. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigJim Posted December 11, 2012 Author Report Share Posted December 11, 2012 Thanks, and they did load test the battery. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oxnard Posted February 23, 2013 Report Share Posted February 23, 2013 Exactly same thing happened to me yesterday afternoon. Ford Roadside Service (AAA) touched the jumper cables to battery connections and everything came on. Kinda' pissed as the car only has 1650mi on it. (Infant failure I guess) They towed it to dealer. Waiting to hear from them. Oh, the car was face in in the garage and with no power we couldn't put it in neutral to load on the flat-bed. Good thing the jumper worked. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oxnard Posted February 23, 2013 Report Share Posted February 23, 2013 Update:Service Mgr. says that he has another C-Max in the shop with same problem. Claims Ford engineers to send software update to fix problem. Not holding my breath. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
salman Posted February 24, 2013 Report Share Posted February 24, 2013 Oxnard In the "Dead Battery" thread look up the posting by Andrewxx. He probably is the owner of the other car your dealer is trying to fix. Andrewxx reported the promise of a software fix a few days ago. Other owners in other parts of the country are not yet hearing about a software fix, but about electronic control modules and possible wiring problems. Time will tell if any of these produce results. Your case is the first time we on this board have heard about a dealer getting more than one dead 12 volt case. Sadly it probably will not be the last time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
andrewwx Posted February 24, 2013 Report Share Posted February 24, 2013 Hi Oxnard: Did you take your car to Vista Ford? If so is Peter your service tech? The dead battery thread contains the most info on this problem. There is a poll on page 17 of that thread please fill that out. The good news for you is that Ford is now aware that there is a problem. And while I am sorry that you are having problems I am sort of glad that there are two cases now at the dealer so it does not look like I am the odd duck. Cheers Andrew Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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