Replacement battery to solve deep sleep problem?

[Potatomafia]

I've only had 3 dead battery events but probably a dozen deep sleep events since I picked up my hybrid in April 2023.

The first dead battery event happend about 6 months into ownership. I drove 40 miles home on the freeway after work, just like every weekday. The truck was completely dead the next morning. It was completely random; I did nothing differently than previous days or weeks. Luckily, I had a compact lithium jump pack to get the truck going again. I immediately turned off all of the telematics and removed the Ford Pass app from my phone. Then I performed the BMS reset procedure.

The next dead battery event happend about 4 months later when I caught COVID and didn't drive for about a week. I jumped it again and did the BMS reset.

The third time happened yesterday. I drove the truck Wednesday and it was fine. Yesterday morning it was completely dead, measuring only 3.8v across the positive and negative terminals. This time, I had no jump pack and the girlfriend was at work so I had no other vehicle to jump it from. Luckily, there is an Advance Auto about 3 blocks from my house. I ordered a Diehard Gold T4 battery and walked to pick it up.

It's so random. The truck can sit at the airport for 10 days and be completely fine but it goes dead randomly overnight? I do need to change the SoC setting in ForScan. If the new battery and changing the SoC setting doesn't fix the issue, then I'll resort to taking it to my local Ford dealer. I don't have time to play stupid dealer games. If they can't figure it out, then I'll think about getting rid of my Maverick. It sucks but I can't live with a new vehicle that I can't trust.

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[CurtisB]

I'll try to be brief. Please note, that each time I did this, I did do the battery reset and let the truck sit overnight:

Within 2 months of ownership, came out in the morning to a completely dead truck. No power. Nothing. After reading about the fixes at that time, no one had mentioned getting an AGM battery. I bought a Diehard T4 470 CCA 585CA battery. Lasted 4 months with no sleep issues, then died.

On 05-11-2024 I installed a Duralast Platinum H5-AGM 680 CCA size 47 battery. A month later I got a deep sleep message, but since then, I have been able to start up the truck. One sleep message I got was the morning after driving 3 hours at 70mph!!

One final thing I need to do is get the dreaded Forski#, I mean Forscan thingee, and set the charge level to 95% and also, pull Fuse 11 from the fuse box therefore eliminating HAL 9000's control over my life.

I do feel more confident with having the AGM battery. The battery seems to recover fast because charges back up just by me driving. It definitely doesn't need to have a trickle charge like the other ones.

 

[Tom 71 Maverick 24]

Regarding the battery issues - the common theme I'm seeing is that Ford has decided that 80% capacity is acceptable. I disagree - for a battery that may be called on at any time to start the vehicle's engine, It needs to be fully charged. 12.7 volts +/-.

The reason I say that - one of the jobs I've had in the electric power industry included maintaining substation batteries. Now, you may wonder why an electric substation has batteries - well, it has circuit breakers, controlling circuits, plenty of things that have to operate even when the substation is dead. You still need to be able to trip breakers and close breakers and maintain communications with the power system control center.

Anyway, as a rule, we always maintained the batteries at full charge, in fact they were kept at a charge level of approximately 2.24 volts per cell, which would add up to around 13.4 volts for a 12 volt battery. Granted, these station batteries had many individual cells (usually 60) rather than 6 in a single case.

Point is, they are maintained always at a state of full charge. In fact, in the days prior to testing them, we would usually top them off with distilled water if needed, and place them on a "24 hour overcharge" whereby they are charged at a higher rate (higher voltage) which would push some sort of chemical reaction within the cells. It would also circulate the water/acid mixture to ensure that it was equalized throughout the cell.

Anyway, to test, we took each individual cell, with the charger OFF, and measured voltage and specific gravity to ensure that they were still within spec.

Those batteries typically would last many years. Standard old-school lead acid batteries.

 

[Packer Bill]

Regarding the battery issues - the common theme I'm seeing is that Ford has decided that 80% capacity is acceptable.

From what I read, Ford did this to save gas (the alternator in the EB works less, saves gas). I changed the charge level from 80% to 95% a few months ago (and installed an AGM battery) and I have been a happy driver.

 

[Tom 71 Maverick 24]

Just to add - the company that made the station batteries, Exide, always recommended maintaining a "float" voltage of about 2.22 to 2.25 volts per cell as long as the charger was working. And, my auto mechanics class instructor (granted, a gazillion years ago) pushed that regular car batteries needed to be kept fully charged for longevity. I know it's different for lithium batteries, but I've always maintained that you keep these regular car batteries topped off.

 

[CurtisB]

Regarding the battery issues - the common theme I'm seeing is that Ford has decided that 80% capacity is acceptable. I disagree - for a battery that may be called on at any time to start the vehicle's engine, It needs to be fully charged. 12.7 volts +/-.

The reason I say that - one of the jobs I've had in the electric power industry included maintaining substation batteries. Now, you may wonder why an electric substation has batteries - well, it has circuit breakers, controlling circuits, plenty of things that have to operate even when the substation is dead. You still need to be able to trip breakers and close breakers and maintain communications with the power system control center.

Anyway, as a rule, we always maintained the batteries at full charge, in fact they were kept at a charge level of approximately 2.24 volts per cell, which would add up to around 13.4 volts for a 12 volt battery. Granted, these station batteries had many individual cells (usually 60) rather than 6 in a single case.

Point is, they are maintained always at a state of full charge. In fact, in the days prior to testing them, we would usually top them off with distilled water if needed, and place them on a "24 hour overcharge" whereby they are charged at a higher rate (higher voltage) which would push some sort of chemical reaction within the cells. It would also circulate the water/acid mixture to ensure that it was equalized throughout the cell.

Anyway, to test, we took each individual cell, with the charger OFF, and measured voltage and specific gravity to ensure that they were still within spec.

Those batteries typically would last many years. Standard old-school lead acid batteries.

This type of knowledge is why I am a member of MaverickTruckClub. All this makes total sense, and really answers the questions regarding the "sleep" issues we have all been having.

The Maverick was built with the hopes of meeting a nitch market. The "nitch" market turned out to be much larger than anticipated.

Add to that trying to build these trucks a year after covid with parts and manufacturing already behind the needs of the automotive world. The inventory of AGM batteries ended fairly soon during 2021-22 production and were replaces with regular flooded batteries. This was not a good setup for the consumer, but demand was and is still high.

Thanks to so many in here, we, on are own, were able to figure out a solution. Yes, it costs us our own money in a new truck, but most of us didn't want to be stranded.

 

[Tom 71 Maverick 24]

My 2017 F-150's battery lasted 6 + years and still started the truck. It was marginal in terms of cold cranking amps, and was on its way out, but it never let me down. I have a feeling that it was charged pretty much the old fashioned way.

 

[zacatac]

I replaced my battery with the AC Delco AGM just today to hopefully resolve the issue with my interior lights not working probably 50% of the time when the truck sits overnight. It's closer to 100% not working when it's cold.

I already had my truck in the dealership 3 times for this issue. The first time they did a BMS update and reset, the second time they replaced the battery with a higher CCA version, however it was still lead acid. The last time they replaced the BCM, the negative cable which has the battery monitoring circuit in it, updated the BMS again and then did a reset I believe.

After all that, the lights didn't come on the very next morning.

I'm really hoping that changing the battery and updating the BMS settings solves this issue.

One thing I did find interesting is that the BMS was already programmed for an AGM battery. From what everyone is saying the AGM charging profile is different than the lead acid, so I wonder if that was degrading the lead acid battery??

 

[Packer Bill]

One thing I did find interesting is that the BMS was already programmed for an AGM battery. From what everyone is saying the AGM charging profile is different than the lead acid, so I wonder if that was degrading the lead acid battery??

I noticed this too. I know the 80% charge level as degrading my battery too quickly...perhaps the incorrect profile contributed to the degradation of the original battery... .

 

[CurtisB]

I replaced my battery with the AC Delco AGM just today to hopefully resolve the issue with my interior lights not working probably 50% of the time when the truck sits overnight. It's closer to 100% not working when it's cold.

I already had my truck in the dealership 3 times for this issue. The first time they did a BMS update and reset, the second time they replaced the battery with a higher CCA version, however it was still lead acid. The last time they replaced the BCM, the negative cable which has the battery monitoring circuit in it, updated the BMS again and then did a reset I believe.

After all that, the lights didn't come on the very next morning.

I'm really hoping that changing the battery and updating the BMS settings solves this issue.

One thing I did find interesting is that the BMS was already programmed for an AGM battery. From what everyone is saying the AGM charging profile is different than the lead acid, so I wonder if that was degrading the lead acid battery??

To answer your question, yes, from what I read in here from knowledgeable electricians and battery enthusiast, AGM batteries recover quicker and hold a charge longer, thus being able to sustain the 2 hour after the truck shuts down drain cycle. This issue is more prominent in the Maverick Hybrid. Hybrid's don't have alternators, they have a computer system that monitors the charge cycle.

 

[Glen Baker LLC]

I replaced my battery with the AC Delco AGM just today to hopefully resolve the issue with my interior lights not working probably 50% of the time when the truck sits overnight. It's closer to 100% not working when it's cold.

I already had my truck in the dealership 3 times for this issue. The first time they did a BMS update and reset, the second time they replaced the battery with a higher CCA version, however it was still lead acid. The last time they replaced the BCM, the negative cable which has the battery monitoring circuit in it, updated the BMS again and then did a reset I believe.

After all that, the lights didn't come on the very next morning.

I'm really hoping that changing the battery and updating the BMS settings solves this issue.

One thing I did find interesting is that the BMS was already programmed for an AGM battery. From what everyone is saying the AGM charging profile is different than the lead acid, so I wonder if that was degrading the lead acid battery??

I was wondering
What group size or part number was the new AC DELCO AGM battery ?
Thank you
GB

 

[Darnon]

My 2017 F-150's battery lasted 6 + years and still started the truck. It was marginal in terms of cold cranking amps, and was on its way out, but it never let me down. I have a feeling that it was charged pretty much the old fashioned way.

I can guarantee that a 2017 F-150 had a current monitoring system for adaptive charging.

 

[uga]

I was wondering
What group size or part number was the new AC DELCO AGM battery ?
Thank you
GB

https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo.php?pk=8878472&cc=0&pt=2476&jsn=4

This is the best price I have seen anywhere..................................

 

[Glen Baker LLC]

https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo.php?pk=8878472&cc=0&pt=2476&jsn=4

This is the best price I have seen anywhere..................................

Thank you.
I just hope it isn't blasphemous using an AC DELCO battery in a FORD.

GB

 

[sockeye]

I think you're supposed to have your fingers crossed while you're doing the reset.
What group size did you get in your DieHard?
Thank you.

It was a diiehard gold T4. 470 CCA

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