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it seems to charge even when just driving.
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I had quite a time related to this with my dealer when my HCH was new.
IMA uses what some calls "hidden charging" or "trickle charging" while you drive.
There are no green charge bars visible, but you can see the bars on the battery state of charge rise one by one every couple of miles or so.
No regen or coasting charging required.
A month after I bought my car the IMA would allow the battery to drain way down to 1/4 charge before the green charge bars would appear.
Sometimes I'd drive all the way into work.... that's about an hours drive and 45 miles with a 3/4 discharged IMA battery.
Regen and foot-off-the accelerator was the only charge possible.
The catch was, it only happened on my afternoon drive, never at night.
What I mean is:
I start off with a 90% battery charge.
A few hills to pull and it drops a couple of bars.
I drive for 5 miles but no hidden charge.
A couple of more hills, a couple of bars drop off.
Miles pass and sitll no hidden charge.
Couple more hills and now I'm down below half charge.
Now I enter the freeway after 25 miles and the charge drops to about 1/3.
I begin to pull a freeway hill which drops it down to 1/4 and now green bars light and I'm charging hard.
At night I always get hidden charging when needed without fail.
I had the car in the dealer 6 (yes 6 times) and they told me it is supposed to work like that. But also they denied the existance of hidden charging so I'm not sure about their diagnosis.
They even consulted their support in California.
The last time my car was in for that they reset the computers (Fuse reseat) and that fixed it......until recently.
Lately it has been happening again now with the colder weather.
I'm not sure if it really is a problem because it doesn't seem to affect my overall MPG.
I've decided not to worry about it but will mention it in my next service schedule.