After the PCM software update/recalibration - observations by Hybridbear

[acdii]

I do really good "going" to a customer site, but for some reason I also do crappy coming back. 50's there, 45 back. Must be the car saying, i dont want to go back to work!

[B25Nut]

 

I do really good "going" to a customer site, but for some reason I also do crappy coming back. 50's there, 45 back. Must be the car saying, i dont want to go back to work!

Acdii, you have a very different definition of "crappy" than the majority of us. Of course, you were probably being sarcastic...

[Eddie Sessum]

I just started to think about this, maybe ford locked ev at 62mph to try to force us at that speed to get close to that 47mpg.. Maybe eh?

[KingJL]

I'm glad I'm not the only one experiencing this. Even after the PCM update, I still do best on the highway when I keep the ACC on 62mph.

DUH! You will always do better at '62' than you will above that... Physics anyone!

[GrySql]

DUH! You will always do better at '62' than you will above that... Physics anyone!

Of course, that may well be true but we were discussing getting very low mpg's at 50-55mph and when we accelerated to 62mph the car got better mpg's.

 

Again today my car struggled to get 20mpg's at 50-55mph with a 2/3 SOC, I was very concerned as I watched the car struggle, so I increased the speed to 65mph (HVB still charging) and the mpg's finally rose to the 30mpg's after the HVB topped off at a full SOC.

The activity on my display is completely different now, I have no idea what is going on anymore, I used to be able to easily manipulate the EV and ICE, not so now.

At first I thought I liked how the update worked, the car felt more responsive but I had not checked my mpg's yet.

Since the PCM update the FFH has not exceeded 34mpg's, on any outing.

 

A couple days ago I reset the Overall MPG's (with the Empower screen) and filled the tank, effectively starting my Overall Mileage at zero.

Today's trip was 18 miles one way, some highway/city mixed, at no more than 69 mph (briefly), AC on and I got 32mpg's each way, worse than ever before.

This tankful (since zeroing out the Overall Mileage) has gone 47 miles so far, with my Overall Mileage at 28mpg.

I'll have more data after a complete tank.

 

I wish my car was doing what B25Nut's car did after the PCM update, my FFH seems to be going backwards (mpg's) with every software change.

Edited August 22, 2013 by GrySql

[no1fordman]

@no1fordman

After getting the famous calibration and driving on the highway to work as I always do I seen no change. I went back and talked to the service manager and he contacted a tech in Detroit who then came back with the reply after I explained the issue of not going over 62mph with out it going to gas. He said that this quoted speed from 62 to 85 mph is when you are driving at a speed above 62 and you slow down, it will go into hybrid. they said this didn't happen before the calibration. I told them I could do 65mph before and take the cruise off and it would go to hybrid before this update. plus you have to have the air off to get that bigger mph. I don't see this helped and so far from what I'm seeing from others, they aren't happy either. I also saw where C-Max owners would get a one time compensation of 350.00 and leases would get 325.00 because of this. both vehicles have the same motor and stated 47/47 so why aren't the Fusion owners offered the same.

[B25Nut]

 

@no1fordman

After getting the famous calibration and driving on the highway to work as I always do I seen no change. I went back and talked to the service manager and he contacted a tech in Detroit who then came back with the reply after I explained the issue of not going over 62mph with out it going to gas. He said that this quoted speed from 62 to 85 mph is when you are driving at a speed above 62 and you slow down, it will go into hybrid. they said this didn't happen before the calibration. I told them I could do 65mph before and take the cruise off and it would go to hybrid before this update. plus you have to have the air off to get that bigger mph. I don't see this helped and so far from what I'm seeing from others, they aren't happy either. I also saw where C-Max owners would get a one time compensation of 350.00 and leases would get 325.00 because of this. both vehicles have the same motor and stated 47/47 so why aren't the Fusion owners offered the same.

If your HVB has a 2/3+ charge and you're doing 68 mph on a stretch of highway that is just slightly downhill and it doesn't switch to all blue EV mode by itself (without letting off the gas), then your update was not done correctly. Have your dealer do it over again.

[acdii]

Well the update has worked in mine. My last fill is up by at least 2 MPG.

[djminfll]

I also saw where C-Max owners would get a one time compensation of 350.00 and leases would get 325.00 because of this. both vehicles have the same motor and stated 47/47 so why aren't the Fusion owners offered the same.

C-max owners are being compensated for $550, not $350. And the reason why they are getting this and FFH owners are not is because the EPA testing done on the FFH was accurate. Ford achieved the 47mpg as claimed, although it may not always be easy for owners to duplicate, except under ideal situations. However, Ford never actually tested the C-Max, they used the same info from the Fusion and applied it to the C-Max. Therefore, FFH owners are not eligible for any compensation.

Also, the Fusion has consistently been getting better FE than the C-Max, despite the Fusion being a larger vehicle.

[dalesky]

3.03?

 

Good God. I looked on gasbuddy.com and the lowest I saw was in the $3.10 range in South Carolina. Either way, that hurts.

 

Must be nice to fill your tank for $30 instead of $40!

Yep, here in South Cackalacky the gas is generally the lowest in the nation. Right next door, in N. Caroline, quite a bit higher.

[Twinkle]

Today I was able to get 43.5 MPG round trip to and from work. Totally trip distance of 39.6 miles. On the way to work I go driving 70-80 mph. On the way home not so fast. Also on the way home I hit traffic and then was in EV alot. But happy with the results. I have not done the upgrade calibration yet. Heck my car has only 1440 miles on it so far. I can't see how others are getting up in the 50's MPG?

[LASooner]

I just got my update done on Thurs, but since I'm off work until the 2nd week of September, I won't be able to see the benefits until then.

 

One thing to remember, part of the update was more aggressive use of the active grill shutters, so your aerodynamics are going to change based on the needs of the car, this may account for inconsistencies from trip to trip.

[djminfll]

I just got my update done on Thurs, but since I'm off work until the 2nd week of September, I won't be able to see the benefits until then.

 

One thing to remember, part of the update was more aggressive use of the active grill shutters, so your aerodynamics are going to change based on the needs of the car, this may account for inconsistencies from trip to trip.

Is there a way to tell that the grille shutters are working?

[Jackie Hogue]

We just had the calibration done and are seeing less mpg in short around town trips. It seems the engine runs more and the battery always seems low. any suggestions?

[GrayStrider]

First tank post update, and we saw a lower than normal tank MPG; however, it's been hotter and our driving pattern changed a bit from over the summer as we teacher types are back in the classroom, so I'll wait to see what the more long term change is, if any. I drive hybrid better than my DH, and he did the majority of the driving on the first post update tank, so between the hotter temps, going back to the commute, and him driving the majority of the miles on that tank, I figured it'd be lower. Did notice a slight change in the backup camera display - we backed the car into the driveway after getting groceries and instead of just seeing the green/yellow/red bars like usual, as we got closer to the garage door, green boxes filled in between the green bars. Always fun to see what's new after an update.

 

On a happy note, on our short summer road trip in late July into early August, before the update, we had a tank at 48.8 MPG, and another at 46.1 MPG. Only one tank was below our average MPG, and it was due to the climb we had from Tempe into Flagstaff. I love our car - so stylish for a family sedan, so comfortable to drive/ride in. We had enough room for the four of us (two teenagers plus my DH and I), with a little trunk room left over after adding four small suitcases.

[corncobs]

It would really cool if someone could confirm that the PCM adjust to driving patterns and styles ( city vs. highway ) but after this last road trip I'm almost 100 % certain that it does.

 

The behavior of the car going into EV at higher speeds 65 - 72 MPH is still not clear to me. Sometimes it switches to EV @ 72 MPH on a half SOC on let's say a 1% downslope but it doesn't on a 3% slope with 3/4 SOC.

 

Today I tried to make sense of the behavior again but it only made sense sometimes and 5 min later it does something completely different. I guess the software knows what to do best even if it doesn't makes sense for an automation engineer like me.

[MaineFusion]

3.03?

 

Good God. I looked on gasbuddy.com and the lowest I saw was in the $3.10 range in South Carolina. Either way, that hurts.

 

Must be nice to fill your tank for $30 instead of $40!

 

I've been averaging $3.62/gal according to Fuelly. Since I figure I'll be driving about 20,000 miles a year, every bit of extra MPG I can get will add up.

 

Great show. With all the NSA stuff in the news lately the Person of Interest theme becomes more real.

 

I was thinking more along the lines of Fahrenheit 451. Seriously, though, I think it is time to start electing people who will take work to reign in these types of erosion of civil liberties.

 

Don't worry about keeping it below 62 mph. It's not advantageous to use EV at highway speeds.

 

I strongly disagree with this. My daily commute is 97mi round trip, and most of it is at highway speeds. For my last tank of gas I averaged 53mpg, which is around 2mpg better than what I was getting just prior to the PCM update. Also on my last tank of gas I was in EV mode almost 50% of the time. Here are my last set of numbers, which are on Fuelly:

 

Date Miles Gal. MPG Price City % Notes

8/22/13 579.9 10.95 53.0 3.649 15% 288.4mi EV

Edited August 25, 2013 by MaineFusion

[Eddie Sessum]

I'd have to agree 2-3mpg hwy gain tops. City I seem to be getting decently more. I also suspect during fall and spring we will do better with the lowered warmup points.

[MaineFusion]

I agree that spring and fall is when we'll see the biggest advantage to this new update.

[hybridbear]

Finally took a highway trip yesterday. Going south to Faribault we were driving into 20 MPH winds out of the SSE which hurt gas mileage but wasn't unexpected. The majority of the trip was cruise control at 65 MPH.

 

 

The trip home with the wind behind us was significantly better. On the return trip with the wind behind us the car was in EV mode on most flat sections and all downhill sections. The ICE would only come on for uphill runs or when the SOC got too low. The HVB spent most of the return trip at a low state of charge because the car spent so much time in EV mode. Both trips were with the AC set at 73 and outside temps of about 90 degrees with high humidity. Today it's supposed to be 99 degrees here with a heat index of 110!! :fan:

 

In city driving I still see 0% improvement. The pics below are a trip where I always get 60+ and have averaged about 63 MPG the entire summer tracking these trips. There is no difference post-update.

 

 

 

I reset our Lifetime Stats when the update was done and after the first couple hundred miles the new Lifetime Average showed over 58 MPG. Then my wife drove all week and got only 39 MPG lowering our tank average from 56 down to 51 and dropping the Lifetime from 58+ down to 52. Then I drove Friday around the city and brought it back up to 53+ but the highway trip yesterday lowered it to 52.5 MPG only in the 600+ miles since the update was done. The MPGs have definitely gotten worse when my wife drives and are no better when I drive.

 

I have noticed a difference in the coaching bars. The Cruise Coach was much lower after I drove at 65 MPH yesterday compared to pre-update trips on cruise at 65 MPH. The acceleration bar is also lower now than it used to be. I used to always be at 100 or very close and now I find more often that the acceleration bar is giving me a slightly lower score where I can see the gap between the bar and 100. My wife used to get around an 85 or so on the acceleration bar and now when I look after she drives it's often down near 75 only.

 

I don't think that the MPGs from yesterdays highway trip are any better than they would have been pre-update. My wife gets much worse gas mileage now than before. And they took away the coolant symbol changing from blue to white based on the warm-up stage which really irritates me. I wish I hadn't gotten the update.

[MaineFusion]

Hybridbear,

 

I'd agree that there isn't much in the way of change for "city" driving, but I don't think that is what this PCM update targeted. The improvements seemed most targeted towards highway speeds. It was good to see how the wind speeds affected your MPG and it is inline with what I would have expected. Aerodynamic drag can have a huge impact on how much energy is required to move forward -- just ask any bicycle racer.

 

I'd love to have a pitot tube to measure air speed vs ground speed to help figure out exactly how much winds affect fuel economy. Heck, we should just turn our cars into moving laboratories that record every data point possible. We could then rent supercomputer time to process all the data to figure out the absolute perfect driving technique to get the absolute best MPG possible to save the most money on gas. :drool:

 

Oh wait...

 

All the money we'd spend creating our rolling laboratories and processing the data would wipe out any savings from figuring out the absolute perfect driving technique by a factor of like 10,000 to 1. Scratch that idea.

[corncobs]

I also think that the improvements were more targeted towards highway mileage but the car struggles to get good MPG if its not driven often at constant highway speeds 65+ MPH.

 

After getting 41 MPG on our return trip after driving 1000 miles on the way out and only getting 39 MPG my car has learned what it should do for highway driving.

 

@ HB I'm not quite sure where you wanna see more city improvement? You are already beating EPA by ~15 MPG consistently.

[Eddie Sessum]

Found that hills seem to be better managed by the update. Going up it gives elec assist at 70mph to help keep milage up than going downhill on the other side it it coasts with the ICE off and charging.

[GrySql]

I'd love to have a pitot tube

I think I found my mpg problem... ;)

 

At my age I've gotta find a 'pilot relief tube', all these potty stops are killing my mpg's!

Obviously this PCM update didn't include an algorithm for us 'over the hill' types.

Edited August 25, 2013 by GrySql

[rvlasek]

It would really cool if someone could confirm that the PCM adjust to driving patterns and styles ( city vs. highway ) but after this last road trip I'm almost 100 % certain that it does.

The behavior of the car going into EV at higher speeds 65 - 72 MPH is still not clear to me. Sometimes it switches to EV @ 72 MPH on a half SOC on let's say a 1% downslope but it doesn't on a 3% slope with 3/4 SOC.

Today I tried to make sense of the behavior again but it only made sense sometimes and 5 min later it does something completely different. I guess the software knows what to do best even if it doesn't makes sense for an automation engineer like me.

I agree,when I first got PCM update, mileage worst, now after 10 days of mostly city driving,getting better,now 45.2 lifetime mpg...very pleased now