My instructions on restoring the hybrid EV function on the Ford Fusion Hybrid approaching the 8/9+ years mark.

[allen84]

 

 

 

Here is the picture of the TSB, if anyone wants to see it instantly without downloading it. 

 

I wonder how they will perform the fix?   

 

How generous are they going to be with the fix? Where the problem could re-occur within a few years?   I'm thinking this time they programmed in a message to recommend a battery change warning on the dashboard.  Another genius way I'm sure to get some revenue for an HVB replacement from ageing, out of warranty vehicle.

 

Even though the HVB will probably still be OK, would they even perform a battery health check to let you know it needs replacing?   Let's also hope that the acceleration hesitation lag is taken into account with the fix also.  Depending on how conservative they are with this reprogramming and how they make the HVB behave, they will still make the system recognize it as a 10+ year old battery. 

 

 

How are you going to approach this?

 

—Stay with your self fix? 

 

—Set the battery back to the 10th year and go in and let Ford perform their own fix?

 

—Or go in as is, and hope that their reprogramming rewrites everything based on the 10 year battery life?

 

 

For me,  I'm just gonna leave it the way it is, and not let them touch it.... for now, until I read on here of other people's experience and document of how they decided to go with Ford's fix and how it behaves if it will be better or worse than the self fix.   I just hope when I do my oil change soon if they so happen to update it on their own, not to update it without my knowledge.

 

I'm currently happy with the self fix and it causes no issues for me so far and working great. But, I would love to see comparisons. 

 

 

Edited April 30, 2020 by allen84

[mirak]

If Ford offers to fix it for free, I’ll give that a shot and report back. Otherwise I’ll just use the fix here when my new OBDII arrives on Friday. 

[Spirit10]

I think I will leave well enough alone as the "zap" fix has been working great now for a few months for me.  The Ford fix is an unknown entity as to what it might do to the car in a couple of years... Lock it down completely, force a battery purchase, or some other side effect.  At least at this point, the car has worked great for 10 years and I have every reason to believe it would go another 10 years with the zap in place, or until the battery really does crap out and needs to be replaced.  Also, based on my past experiences, my local dealer(s) will probably want to keep the car for a week or two to put it in the queue for repair. Just my 2 cents worth.

[PaulGo]

I agree with you allen84.  Will Ford's fix be more effective than your fix?  I would like to know what specifically they did in their fix.  If it improves HV battery life while giving full hybrid functionality for the life of the car that would be great.   If it screws things up where it puts the car into a semi-hybrid mode as a one size fits all solution that would not be good.  If is a complete re-write then re-applying your fix may not be possible.   It could also be possible that all Ford did was set the HV age counter back as you did.  

Edited April 30, 2020 by PaulGo

[allen84]

8 hours ago, PaulGo said:

I agree with you allen84.  Will Ford's fix be more effective than your fix?  I would like to know what specifically they did in their fix.  If it improves HV battery life while giving full hybrid functionality for the life of the car that would be great.   If it screws thing ups where it puts the car into a semi-hybrid mode as a one size fits all solution that would not be good.  If is a complete re-write that re-applying your fix may not be possible.   It could also be possible that all Ford did was set the HV age counter back as you did.  

 

I agree with you as well, Paul & @Spirit10.  What I'm afraid of is Ford will make this tamper-proof and probably lockout for further editing from people and forcing a possible newly programmed message for an HVB replacement from you to continue to enjoy the EV mode again.  I wouldn't doubt for a second that Ford would pull something sleazy like this. It is fair to say that this is their product, I'm guessing they don't like it when people mess with their system to circumvent something as important as their hybrid component to modify the way it functions in which they intended to operate. 

 

It is probably best to get to the bottom of this.  If someone on this forum is extremely close with the head of the service dept. or a great friend of one,  would they possibly find out exactly how their reset procedure is outlined?   Is it an update of the firmware? or step by step changes to the settings similar to the self fix? That would be great to see what tech does verbatim.  

 

Another thing that is a high degree of possibility, if it were a firmware update, they will probably shrink the EV green area and make it half as effective, making your EV time 30-50% less (EV green box expands to 1 bar, rather than max 2 bars we get), so even though you get your EV, your ICE will get much more on time, since you can't get to stay on EV long enough on 1 bar.  This way, Ford will get a compromise of maintaining HVB life a little while longer. 

 

If it is an editing of the BECM settings, it could be possible that they use something similar to my fix and just reset it to 0 or 1 year to shut us up. But, knowing ford they will not give you the benefit of a brand new battery and set it to 5 years instead. It will go back to mostly gas engine in a few years likely once again, hoping you would move on to a new car by then.  (the only way to find out is to check through Forscan to see what change they actually made.)  Since the self fix procedure is not fully tested long term to see how much stress a 10 year old battery can take (they should ask Toyota what their battery statistics on how well their battery held up in their 1997 Prius line, which came out 23 years ago). This is likely done from possible liability.  It will certainly not be better than the self fix, tricking the battery as new.

 

Their owners manual did state "The high voltage battery system is designed to last the life of the vehicle and requires no maintenance."  I would like to know what their definition of life means to them? It looks like 10 years from the looks of it. 

 

In the legal justice system, committing a serious crime that gets you a life sentence is considered a minimum 25 years before you go up against the parole board for release.   

 

 

 

Here is a cut and paste of part of the article in Wikipedia on the Toyota Prius battery life study:

 

As the Prius reached ten years of being available in the US market, in February 2011 Consumer Reports examined the lifetime and replacement cost of the Prius battery. The magazine tested a 2002 Toyota Prius with over 200,000 miles on it and compared the results to the nearly identical 2001 Prius with 2,000 miles tested by Consumer Reports 10 years before. The comparison showed little difference in performance when tested for fuel economy and acceleration. Overall fuel economy of the 2001 model was 40.6 miles per US gallon (5.79 L/100 km; 48.8 mpg‑imp) while the 2002 Prius with high mileage delivered 40.4 miles per US gallon (5.82 L/100 km; 48.5 mpg‑imp). The magazine concluded that the effectiveness of the battery has not degraded over the long run. The cost of replacing the first generation battery varies between US$2,200 and US$2,600 from a Toyota dealer, but low-use units from salvage yards are available for around US$500. One study indicates it may be worthwhile to rebuild batteries using good blades from defective used batteries.

Edited April 30, 2020 by allen84

[Adee]

@allen84 - many thanks for sharing this procedure. It ran flawlessly on my 2010 FF. I don't think it's "back" to where it was yet (I've only driven it 2-3 miles) and I am wondering if it takes time for it to be fully restored. In any event, my email's adee.feinstein@gmail.com and I'd like to visit your PayPal tip jar, so shoot me a mail please.

[lolder]

I think allen84's fix will not harm the battery. The tests of the HVB show little capacity loss at 160k miles. The only loss would be if a cell shorts but there are 207 of them so the percentage loss would be small. The car quits if a cell opens but I have not heard of even one of these. I believe there was a comment somewhere from within Ford a while back that the management of these NiMH batteries was going to make them last almost indefinitely. The 2nd most important aspect of Allen's fix is that the HVB resumes periodic re-conditioning.

[Brucer]

re. allen84

 

I need someone in north Georgia to do this on my 2010 Milan (145k)

Canton, GA 

Bruce @  404 642-3206     Thanks

[allen84]

15 hours ago, Brucer said:

re. allen84

 

I need someone in north Georgia to do this on my 2010 Milan (145k)

Canton, GA 

Bruce @  404 642-3206     Thanks

 

Brucer, at this point, you might as well just go to the dealer and have them perform the fix.  Hopefully, Ford is not as aggressive with their re-programming of the HVB's age behaviour as I might be thinking.  We just have to trust their process and that they do right by their customers, that it will just work as it supposed to as you've once experienced in the first 8 years of the car's age.

 

It is up to you.  The procedure is relatively easy to do on your own. (Although some people do seem to have trouble getting the license for the software or having the ODB device detect the with the laptop)  I can probably help you by way of remote access.

Edited May 1, 2020 by allen84

[lolder]

On 4/18/2020 at 11:17 PM, allen84 said:

 

I don't think it is a progressive problem.  The fact that it misled me to believe it gradually went bad because I noticed it happening in the winter, and it was expected of me that it behaves like this in the cold until it became warmer outside again.  But I think it would be an instant change and more noticeable if it had happened to me in the summer, and I would've taken action and research much sooner.

And as for Ford, who really knows if the knew about this problem and it was an act of planned obsolescence, or they actually were in the dark like us.   But as a business, they will just deny it and/or give hope to the public that a fix is on the way or hopefully people give up on it and forget about it.  It's not worth it to them for the amount of them sold and it is a 10-year-old car.   I'd imagine most dealers will not be truthful and possibly play dumb, denying any problem with it, because, like any business, they need to make money and they will not hesitate to get business from you, even it means they can sell you something as expensive as a new battery, and not expect your average joe to know the fix.

I noticed 2 or 3 distinct reductions in the HVB power over the space of about a year after the 8 year warranty was up. In the morning, the HVB was very low. It was much lower than 50% and lower than it normally cycles. It started and charged to the normal 50% but max EV speed was reduced. This happened several times the same way. I thought I had gotten some shorted cells which would lower the HVB voltage and the top EV speed. Re-conditioning also ceased.  

[mirak]

Ford refused to fix it for free. The dealer (same one I bought the car from new 10 years ago) wanted $150. I bought a $20 adapter, followed the instructions, and five minutes later my car is driving like new. This is an insanely cool fix. 

 

It’s crazy that Ford deliberately and significantly throttled back the hybrid performance by design. Infuriating really. I’ve been driving around for over two years just thinking my hybrid tech was dead. 

Edited May 7, 2020 by mirak

[akirby]

12 hours ago, mirak said:

 

It’s crazy that Ford deliberately and significantly throttled back the hybrid performance by design. Infuriating really. I’ve been driving around for over two years just thinking my hybrid tech was dead. 

There is no way it was done on purpose.  If they did there would be warning messages and notes in the owners manual and TSBs saying to replace the battery.  Anyone who does software understands this was a mistake not caught in testing or something that was used for testing and they forgot to remove.   
 

And you beg Ford to release an official fix which they just did and now you’re bitching about it maybe not being permanent?

 

Some of you need to take off the tinfoil hats.

 

Do I think they should have extended the warranty to cover this?  Yes.  Is it the end of the world?  No.   30 minutes of labor should be no more than $75.  If the dealer wants more than that shop around or do it yourself.

[mirak]

Having gone back now and read all 12 pages of this thread, let me add a few observations....

 

1. I can confirm that upon applying the change, I heard a mechanical click from somewhere in the car. Others refer to it as a "clunk." It was pretty soft. It's just interesting that applying a software changed made some sort of physical noise.

 

2. This isn't a programming error. It's quite clearly by design. We know it is by design because Ford created an adjustable interface in the programming where you can change the "year" of the battery! And that changing that year changes the performance of the hybrid tech.

 

3. Now, it can be argued that Ford had a legitimate reason for doing this - that maybe they thought it was necessary to gradually throttle back performance to extend battery life. But there are two problems with this: First, Ford never disclosed this when I bought the car. That's a problem. All products wear down over time, but here Ford deliberately programmed the performance to diminish without telling the customer (or even the dealers, evidently). Second, Ford has evidently now decided that this issue can be safely changed because Ford has issued a TSB to the dealers with a "fix" (although we don't know if it matches the fix in this thread).

 

4. As a few other have noted, the mpgs aren’t the only thing that suffered with the diminished hybrid performance. Short term acceleration really suffered too. that’s because the car seems to be designed to rely upon the HVB for a power boost at the early stages of acceleration, and when the HVB isn’t present the car’s acceleration feels very unresponsive until the ICE really kicks it. This is a safety issue. There are times when you need a quick boost of speed, such as turning out from a neighborhood into faster traffic. Even putting pedal to the metal the car would seriously lag for 1-2 seconds. 

 

5. The yellow wrench at high speed issue posted a few pages back is not related to this. That is almost certainly a cooling issue. This happened to me once a couple of years ago. It was a blistering hot 90+ degree day and I was barreling down the highway at 80mph+ because I was late to a wedding (an OUTDOOR wedding). The big yellow wrench came on and I though "crap" (actually a few slightly different words). I slowed down, got to the wedding, and later that night when I left the wrench was gone. Last I've ever seen it. This also is not a throttle body issue. That also happened to me, and it causes the car to barely be able to accelerate at all. Trying to clean the throttle body is a waste of money. You can easily replace it yourself for less than $150. Dirty throttle body is a known issue with the Fusions.

 

6. akirby - I'm not sure what I said that you are in a twist about. I'm not so much angry at Ford for baking this into the car's design as I am that they now acknowledge the problem yet still expect their customers to pay for the fix. That's not an unreasonable thing to be upset about. As others have noted, this issue smacks of class action. It's like the recent Apple and VW class actions rolled into one. Like Apple, it appears Ford deliberately baked a diminishing functionality into its product ("programmed obsolescense"). Like VW, this diminished hybrid functionality results in lower gas mileage. This issue could affect over 100,000 vehicles considering that all first generation FFHs, Mercury Milan Hybrids, and Lincoln MKZ Hybrids are likely impacted. Ford ought to do right by its customers, explain the issue, and fix it for free. Not charge $100+ for 5 minutes of work. I say all this as a Ford stockholder, btw.

Edited May 7, 2020 by mirak

[Adee]

18 hours ago, mirak said:

Ford refused to fix it for free. The dealer (same one I bought the car from new 10 years ago) wanted $150. I bought a $20 adapter, followed the instructions, and five minutes later my car is driving like new. This is an insanely cool fix. 

 

It’s crazy that Ford deliberately and significantly throttled back the hybrid performance by design. Infuriating really. I’ve been driving around for over two years just thinking my hybrid tech was dead. 

I completely concur. Apple pulled a similar stunt a few years ago with the "dying" battery on the iPhone 6. And, for the record, the ad hominem attack ("now you're bitching...") is completely uncalled for and out of line. I reported it, but the "report" probably goes to the poster...

[akirby]

2 hours ago, mirak said:

Having gone back now and read all 12 pages of this thread, let me add a few observations....

 

1. I can confirm that upon applying the change, I heard a mechanical click from somewhere in the car. Others refer to it as a "clunk." It was pretty soft. It's just interesting that applying a software changed made some sort of physical noise.

 

2. This isn't a programming error. It's quite clearly by design. We know it is by design because Ford created an adjustable interface in the programming where you can change the "year" of the battery! And that changing that year changes the performance of the hybrid tech.

 

3. Now, it can be argued that Ford had a legitimate reason for doing this - that maybe they thought it was necessary to gradually throttle back performance to extend battery life. But there are two problems with this: First, Ford never disclosed this when I bought the car. That's a problem. All products wear down over time, but here Ford deliberately programmed the performance to diminish without telling the customer (or even the dealers, evidently). Second, Ford has evidently now decided that this issue can be safely changed because Ford has issued a TSB to the dealers with a "fix" (although we don't know if it matches the fix in this thread).

 

4. As a few other have noted, the mpgs aren’t the only thing that suffered with the diminished hybrid performance. Short term acceleration really suffered too. that’s because the car seems to be designed to rely upon the HVB for a power boost at the early stages of acceleration, and when the HVB isn’t present the car’s acceleration feels very unresponsive until the ICE really kicks it. This is a safety issue. There are times when you need a quick boost of speed, such as turning out from a neighborhood into faster traffic. Even putting pedal to the metal the car would seriously lag for 1-2 seconds. 

 

5. The yellow wrench at high speed issue posted a few pages back is not related to this. That is almost certainly a cooling issue. This happened to me once a couple of years ago. It was a blistering hot 90+ degree day and I was barreling down the highway at 80mph+ because I was late to a wedding (an OUTDOOR wedding). The big yellow wrench came on and I though "crap" (actually a few slightly different words). I slowed down, got to the wedding, and later that night when I left the wrench was gone. Last I've ever seen it. This also is not a throttle body issue. That also happened to me, and it causes the car to barely be able to accelerate at all. Trying to clean the throttle body is a waste of money. You can easily replace it yourself for less than $150. Dirty throttle body is a known issue with the Fusions.

 

6. akirby - I'm not sure what I said that you are in a twist about. I'm not so much angry at Ford for baking this into the car's design as I am that they now acknowledge the problem yet still expect their customers to pay for the fix. That's not an unreasonable thing to be upset about. As others have noted, this issue smacks of class action. It's like the recent Apple and VW class actions rolled into one. Like Apple, it appears Ford deliberately baked a diminishing functionality into its product ("programmed obsolescense"). Like VW, this diminished hybrid functionality results in lower gas mileage. This issue could affect over 100,000 vehicles considering that all first generation FFHs, Mercury Milan Hybrids, and Lincoln MKZ Hybrids are likely impacted. Ford ought to do right by its customers, explain the issue, and fix it for free. Not charge $100+ for 5 minutes of work. I say all this as a Ford stockholder, btw.

I’ve  been an IT professional for over 30 years including 12 years doing development, testing and production support,  I can think of a dozen ways for it to be done accidentally.  10 is 2 digits - maybe they only allocated one digit so it overflowed.  Maybe it was done for testing and never removed.  Maybe it was a fail safe that was supposed to be removed after they were able to do more long term testing but that never happened.  

 

But the biggest indicator is this - what did Ford gain from this?  If they wanted you to buy a new vehicle there would be warning messages.   Notes in the owners manual to look for those symptoms.  There would certainly be TSBs that said to replace the battery with those symptoms.  None of that exists.  It doesn’t make sense.  And when presented with the issue they could have recommended a new battery but instead provided new software.

 

And Ford doesn’t make much if anything by selling a new battery pack.  Most of that goes to the cell mfr and the dealer for labor.

 

I already said that I agree it should be covered at no extra charge.  But 30 minutes labor at a dealer certainly isn’t going to break the bank either.  
 

I think accusing Ford of bad intentions over a $100 fix that you can also do yourself for free is tinfoil hat conspiracy thinking and it doesn’t make sense.  

[akirby]

1 hour ago, Adee said:

I completely concur. Apple pulled a similar stunt a few years ago with the "dying" battery on the iPhone 6. And, for the record, the ad hominem attack ("now you're bitching...") is completely uncalled for and out of line. I reported it, but the "report" probably goes to the poster...

Your report was duly noted.  That’s not a personal attack.

[mirak]

akirby - I’m not inclined to conspiracy theories. I think that’s a pretty rude thing to say.

 

Your claim that this might be a programming bug  because maybe 10 overflowed is illogical. It ignores the fact that performance is evidently set to scale back with each successive year.

 

Excusing this as “testing they forgot to take out” likewise makes little sense - do you really think they were gonna test this out over a 10yr period before taking the car to market?

 

What did Ford have to gain? I should think that’s pretty obvious: (1) They were concerned that if they didn’t slowly throttle back battery utilization, they could be facing a high level of in-warranty failure, and (2) the throttling would encourage a higher level of out-of-warranty vehicle or battery replacement. Two birds with one stone. It is a classic case of planned obsolescence. There are MANY of examples of manufacturers doing this - google it. Why do you expect Ford to be any different?

 

Why wouldn’t Ford have revealed this planned obsolescence in the manual? That strikes me as a silly question. Why would they?! That defeats the purpose of planned obsolescence if you tell the customer up front what you’re doing.

 

And finally, even you acknowledge that Ford ought to fix this for free - you just don’t see the point in getting worked up over something that doesn’t cost much to fix or can be fixed at home pretty easily. To which I say, it’s the principle of the thing. I take a principled stance against being jerked around as a Ford customer and a Ford stockholder. This is not how companies should treat their customers, especially if you hope for any customer loyalty. Companies lament the lack of customer loyalty - well it’s a two-way street. 

Edited May 8, 2020 by mirak

[akirby]

Ford isn’t smart enough to do what you’re suggesting and even if they were somebody would have blown the whistle by now.

 

But please continue with the conspiracy theories if that makes you happy.

[lolder]

I was delighted with my 2010 for 8 years after I got it 7/2009. In 2017 (after the 8 year warranty ) the HVB power step downs began. There were 2 or 3 and they were abrupt/overnight. They were obviously programmed in, not a bug. Bugs don't behave that way. That it occurred after the hybrid warranty expiration and in discrete steps is the suspicious part. Ford is in such turmoil and disarray I'm actually surprised they have issued a TSB. Akirby you've been a moderator here a long time and this has been the best run forum i have ever participated in. Do you remember back around ~2010 there was a discussion the car's Achilles heel might be Ford's ability to service it. My son has fixed the car for my grandson so he has a hybrid now. Meanwhile I'm on an even wilder ride with my 20 month old Tesla Model 3. It's an A.I. robot that doubles as a car. I expect it to eventually have a personality. I hope it's friendly.

Edited May 8, 2020 by lolder

[PaulGo]

5 hours ago, akirby said:

I’ve  been an IT professional for over 30 years including 12 years doing development, testing and production support,  I can think of a dozen ways for it to be done accidentally.  10 is 2 digits - maybe they only allocated one digit so it overflowed.  Maybe it was done for testing and never removed.  Maybe it was a fail safe that was supposed to be removed after they were able to do more long term testing but that never happened.  

 

But the biggest indicator is this - what did Ford gain from this?  If they wanted you to buy a new vehicle there would be warning messages.   Notes in the owners manual to look for those symptoms.  There would certainly be TSBs that said to replace the battery with those symptoms.  None of that exists.  It doesn’t make sense.  And when presented with the issue they could have recommended a new battery but instead provided new software.

 

And Ford doesn’t make much if anything by selling a new battery pack.  Most of that goes to the cell mfr and the dealer for labor.

 

I already said that I agree it should be covered at no extra charge.  But 30 minutes labor at a dealer certainly isn’t going to break the bank either.  
 

I think accusing Ford of bad intentions over a $100 fix that you can also do yourself for free is tinfoil hat conspiracy thinking and it doesn’t make sense.  

I am also an IT professional for over 30 years.  Ford did not gain anything by doing this, but for many months Ford denied the problem and kept stating the cars were operating normally!   I escalated via my Congressman to Fords top management and was called by the Regional manager.   They still stated that my two cars were operating normally.  One car was in Ford service intermittently for over two weeks while they tried to fix the problem but again after everything they tried they could not recognize the problem.  My belief is Ford initially did not want to dedicate the resources to fix the problem on a ten year old vehicle.  I believe the problem was sloppy programming and testing of the program.  The factors that should have been considered is not only the age of the HV battery but the miles (or hours of use) and monitoring the condition of the battery.   Giving the owners the runaround which cost some owners a considerable amount of money is unforgivable! 

[mirak]

10 hours ago, akirby said:

Ford isn’t smart enough to do what you’re suggesting and even if they were somebody would have blown the whistle by now.

 

But please continue with the conspiracy theories if that makes you happy.

Statements like this are pretty silly in my opinion. So Ford is smart enough to design and produce a complex hybrid vehicle, but they’re not smart enough to add a few lines of code gradually throttling back performance that they think will (1) help avoid in-warranty HVB failure and (2) encourage out-of-warranty vehicle/battery replacement? What basis do you have to say this?

 

Granted, I am likewise speculating, but as I have explained above, my speculation (what you refer to as conspiracy theories) is premised both on what we can observe and rational motivation for Ford. All you have to offer are flippant responses and stuff like “programming error” and “testing” - neither of which make sense as explained above.

Edited May 8, 2020 by mirak

[dogo88]

Instead of conspiracy theory how about planned obsolesce? No car manufacturer designs a vehicle to last forever. I remember many years ago (many) that 100k was the designed goal for a car. Nowadays cars can easily double or triple that with judicious maintenance. So, what is the planned obsolesce timeframe for a hybrid, where the engine may only run half as much as a non-hybrid vehicle?

 

Just my thought.

Dan

[akirby]

12 hours ago, PaulGo said:

 My belief is Ford initially did not want to dedicate the resources to fix the problem on a ten year old vehicle.  I believe the problem was sloppy programming and testing of the program. 

 

This is exactly what I said initially.  Could have been test code that was never removed.  Could have been sabotage by a mad developer.   I'm sure most of the initial complaints to the dealer never got to Ford because it wasn't a warranty issue.  Dealers were saying it's working normally or just trying to sell the customer a new battery.   Once Ford was aware of the problem they issued a TSB describing it.  But getting resources to look at a problem on a 10 year old vehicle isn't easy when that platform has been out of production for over 7 years.    Once they found the problem they had to make sure that it was safe to change it - which is more difficult if you don't know why it was done in the first place.   I've had to debug code like that - it's not easy and not easy to test the fix.

 

If it was planned obsolescence then they would have had warning messages and TSBs saying to either replace the battery or buy a new vehicle.   And they certainly would not have come out with a software fix.

 

Just saying the simplest and easiest explanation is that it was an accident as opposed to anything done on purpose by the company as a whole.   That's just not good business.

 

And I still agree that Ford should cover this update at no charge.  

 

 

[akirby]

4 hours ago, dogo88 said:

Instead of conspiracy theory how about planned obsolesce? No car manufacturer designs a vehicle to last forever. I remember many years ago (many) that 100k was the designed goal for a car. Nowadays cars can easily double or triple that with judicious maintenance. So, what is the planned obsolesce timeframe for a hybrid, where the engine may only run half as much as a non-hybrid vehicle?

 

Just my thought.

Dan

 

Ford tests all their vehicles to at least 150K miles, some more.   But I doubt they simulate a vehicle being 10 years old because that's never been an issue in the past.

 

How long a hybrid battery would last in real world use has always been a mystery that wasn't easy to simulate in a lab.  I think most expected 6-8 years at most but I think most hybrid owners are seeing 10-12 years or longer on most hybrid models.

[akirby]

4 hours ago, mirak said:

Statements like this are pretty silly in my opinion. So Ford is smart enough to design and produce a complex hybrid vehicle, but they’re not smart enough to add a few lines of code gradually throttling back performance that they think will (1) help avoid in-warranty HVB failure and (2) encourage out-of-warranty vehicle/battery replacement? What basis do you have to say this?

 

Granted, I am likewise speculating, but as I have explained above, my speculation (what you refer to as conspiracy theories) is premised both on what we can observe and rational motivation for Ford. All you have to offer are flippant responses and stuff like “programming error” and “testing” - neither of which make sense as explained above.

 

It makes perfect sense to anyone who has done software development and/or worked in large corporations.   And planned obsolescence is a nice theory but doesn't hold water when you have other Ford vehicles going 200K-300K miles with no issues.