How To See Battery Charge State On iPhone?

[FordAnglia]

Greetings,

Newbie B250e owner here, just took delivery of a 2017 B250e that came off lease.

While I digest reading the manual and other material from Mercedes-Benz, I'm puzzled by NOT finding answers to a simple question; "Can my iPhone show the state-of-charge for the (high voltage) battery?"

Comments Welcome and

Thanks In Advance,

Peter

 

[IKcedar]

I'm fairly new to the B Class Electric family. It seems like Mercedes offered this ability to check on the status of your charge for your vehicle but in May of this year they discontinued it with no advanced notice and nothing to replace it. I tried contacting Mercedes about it and they couldn't give me any reasons or answers on if they had any future plans to replace it. I hope you are enjoying your 2017 EV......Gary

 

[JeffRay]

Peter,

Welcome. Enjoy the ride.

Gary is correct, up until recently, MB provided an App that did this but stopped supporting that feature. It only unlocks the car, locates it, etc. No word on whether their new app for the EQC will be applicable to our Bs. Doubt it.

I am not aware of any aftermarket plug in that can do this either but then again, have not researched this. I for one, always top up mine at every opportunity as it is leased. If I owned, I would want to preserve battery life by charging when down to 25%.

The main thing I did use the app for when it worked was to monitor charging remotely. More than once, having been alerted that the car had stopped charging prematurely, I went back and restarted charging. Mostly due to human error at dealer, not a problem with commercial chargers.

 

[in2insight]

The charger we bought for the home, from JuiceNet, has a great app that not only shows the charge progress but also allows us to set when the charging starts.
Of course, this will only work at home.

Chargepoint app shows progress as well when charging on their network.

Welcome to the b250e family. Small but mighty!

 

[JeffRay]

in2insight,

You are correct sir. I use Chargepoint regularly as it is free at my local Whole Foods. It does indicate when charging and at what rate and alerts you when the B is no longer drawing power. I do have to do mental math to guesstimate how long to charge and how close to end. Do it enough and you can approximate.

 

[FordAnglia]

I'm fairly new to the B Class Electric family. It seems like Mercedes offered this ability to check on the status of your charge for your vehicle but in May of this year they discontinued it with no advanced notice and nothing to replace it. I tried contacting Mercedes about it and they couldn't give me any reasons or answers on if they had any future plans to replace it. I hope you are enjoying your 2017 EV......Gary

Gary,
Thanks for being first to confirm what I had discovered in my own research. I'm enjoying the B250e; coming up the learning/adjusting curve this week in daily commuting. The "Red Stickers" (California HOV lane access) have cut my commute in half!!

Peter

 

[FordAnglia]

Peter,

Welcome. Enjoy the ride.

I am not aware of any aftermarket plug in that can do this either but then again, have not researched this. I for one, always top up mine at every opportunity as it is leased. If I owned, I would want to preserve battery life by charging when down to 25%.

As my vehicle was just off lease I don't know if the prior owner/driver took a long term view of battery management. The vehicle logged about 10K miles in two years so it likely had an easy life. Going forwards I plan to charge at 20% and stop charging at 80%, let's see how my daily travel and access to charging works out over the coming months.

The main thing I did use the app for when it worked was to monitor charging remotely. More than once, having been alerted that the car had stopped charging prematurely, I went back and restarted charging. Mostly due to human error at dealer, not a problem with commercial chargers.

Indeed, that's what I had in mind. Thanks for the advice!

Peter

 

[FordAnglia]

The charger we bought for the home, from JuiceNet, has a great app that not only shows the charge progress but also allows us to set when the charging starts.
Of course, this will only work at home.

Good point, and as I'm not planning to install a home charger I was hoping for a smart phone "meter" that would help in sharing our chargers at work.
With the release of the Tesla Model 3 we have just about doubled our electric fleet in the past year. We share six L2 and two L2 higher power chargers.

Chargepoint app shows progress as well when charging on their network.

Welcome to the b250e family. Small but mighty!

Thanks for the welcome, I'm having fun with this bright red EV! I've used a couple of ChargePoint public chargers, and their smart phone app is great.
The chargers at work are Clipper Creek, and I'm not sure of the smart phone support (if any) Coworkers with Teslas have a lot of details about the vehicle and charging through the Tesla app.

 

[IKcedar]

As my vehicle was just off lease I don't know if the prior owner/driver took a long term view of battery management. The vehicle logged about 10K miles in two years so it likely had an easy life. Going forwards I plan to charge at 20% and stop charging at 80%, let's see how my daily travel and access to charging works out over the coming months.

From what I understand is you don't need to stop charging at 80% to preserve the battery because unless you are using the range extender button then the battery won't allow you to go past the 80% and you can just leave it charging until it says it reaches 100%. It's already built into the system to discourage you from charging the entire capacity of the battery pack. The actual battery is 36 kWh but only 28 kWh is usable unless you press the range extender button in the car before charging it up. Gary

 

[FordAnglia]

As my vehicle was just off lease I don't know if the prior owner/driver took a long term view of battery management. The vehicle logged about 10K miles in two years so it likely had an easy life. Going forwards I plan to charge at 20% and stop charging at 80%, let's see how my daily travel and access to charging works out over the coming months.

From what I understand is you don't need to stop charging at 80% to preserve the battery because unless you are using the range extender button then the battery won't allow you to go past the 80% and you can just leave it charging until it says it reaches 100%. It's already built into the system to discourage you from charging the entire capacity of the battery pack. The actual battery is 36 kWh but only 28 kWh is usable unless you press the range extender button in the car before charging it up. Gary

Learning something new each day...
I didn't really know what that button was for, visited the owner's manual and now know about it.

I charged at work this morning, was on the L2 charger for three hours before returning to the vehicle. The charging had finished, I was tied up in a meeting, and I don't have anyway of knowing when charging has actually completed.

When I did return the range display was "101 miles" but it quickly dropped to the expected 82 miles within one minute of driving. Odd. I wasn't expecting the range to go higher than the prior high value (88 miles in my case)

Is this normal behavior?

Peter

 

[barsaec]

Peter,

That is pretty standard behavior with the range estimate. I'm assuming you did not hit the extended range button before charging. When I rarely do that, we can get about 10% more range, but the range meter starts high and quickly tails off.

 

[JeffRay]

Peter,

A couple of tips:

1. After a while, you will be able to figure out how long you need to plug in to charge back to 100% (80% of capacity). For example on a typical L2 charger putting out 6kwH, since our battery is 28.8ksH, you can do the math to estimate time to full charge. I just use 1 hour per 20% for example. That way, you can unplug and free up charger for mates.

2. Range is a function of what setting you have, E, E+ or S. The car defaults to E on startup. You can toggle to see different ranges for each setting. All a guess of course. The main range factors are your driving habits, temperature, and the setting. If you have toggles, that is a factor too.

3. Range dropping fast maybe a result of your having to navigate a stop and go area before you get to cruise at highway or stable speeds?

4. If sharing becomes problematic at work, next step is to limit charging to 4 hours. Those Teslas could be hogging the chargers longer. Our B250e can juice up 80% in four hours. Four hours means two people can plug in each workday at each charger. Just a thought.

 

[FordAnglia]

Jeff et al.,

Thanks for the tips! I used a public charger on Saturday - my local favorite at Target. There's no fee for two hours of L2 charging. Seems like a good habit to bring up the range without a full charge and more time spend there.

Which brings a new question (or perhaps new topic) Target uses ChargePoint equipment. Two of the four chargers are No Op. I'm wondering who to call? ChargePoint or Target? Or, someone in the Target store, which seems like an uphill swim to me.

Peter

 

[rrattie]

I think usually letting ChargePoint know is a good idea. Because likely no one at the store can help you.

 

[JeffRay]

Peter,

ChargePoint works with commercial and property owners. Both have an incentive to keep the units operational. In the past, I have called Chargepoint to report an inoperable charger. However, I would go to customer service at Target or whereever and let them know. Chargepoint will respond to Target as they have a contract and fees are based on usage or time in use. Target are the ones paying for the electricity use for the convenience of their customers.

That being said, am running into more inoperable ChargePoint units so that may be a not so good sign.

 

[FordAnglia]

I've filed a service request with ChargePoint, although I think the local Target store holds all the cards. Not sure how to reach out to Target, I doubt their store employees know much about the EV chargers positioned at the end of their property.

BTW, the four ChargePoint stations share the corner of the car park with eleven Tesla Superchargers. These are always busy, and often the line up of Teslas waiting for charging service blocks access to the ChargePoint stations.

The few times I've used the ChargePoint stations there's a merry dance of Tesla vehicles, and Tesla occupants (plus kids in the back) each on their smartphones. Welcome to Silicon Valley, folks!

Peter

 

[JeffRay]

Peter,

Go into the Target, see Customer Service, ask to speak to the on duty Manager. Ask her/him. If it is on their property, they will know who and how to contact ChargePoint to keep their customers happy.

Very rude of the Tesla owners to block the mere mortals ChargePoint chargers. Hrumph.

 

[FordAnglia]

Go into the Target, see Customer Service, ask to speak to the on duty Manager. Ask her/him. If it is on their property, they will know who and how to contact ChargePoint to keep their customers happy.

Logical approach. As a former Target employee I have "insider knowledge" - The "Duty Manager" in Target-speak is the "GSTL" (Guest Services Team Leader) and she is busy herding all the front-end registers, dealing with guests, Cart Attendants, and LP (Loss Prevention) The store manager is unlikely to know about the EV chargers. I have little faith they even know there are EV chargers out front of the store ("What's an EV?")

I've emailed Target corporate public relations in the twin cities (1000 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55403) on the theory that you-know-what rolls down hill. Pointing out that EV owners are still Target customers, and No Op EV chargers are a public relations issue with the local community.

We may find that although Target is the largest stake holder in this shopping center, the property owner or management company deals with Tesla (Supercharger) and ChargePoint stations.

Let's see if I get a response to my email, or from Target store 2088 at the local level. I'll update everyone here.

Peter,

 

[JeffRay]

Peter,

Thanks for insider info. Good luck.

 

[FordAnglia]

Email from Target Sat, Aug 10, 11:30 AM, I was out of town this weekend, so catching up today.

Hello Peter,

Thank you for bringing this to our attention. While I wouldn't be able to provide you with any team members' direct contact info I can certainly let the store director know that you expressed your concerns about the state of disrepair for two of the four EV charging stations at that location. I will also share this with our operations partners.

Sincerely,

Joseph