I have finally discovered through experience some negative characteristics of the ima battery. I live in Pa and many times I take a trip to Berlin Md, near Assateague island. My elevation where i live is 1010 feet above sea level Berlin md is basically sea level . On the trip down I get great mileagefor 176 mile around 54 mpg/ . when I return though the mileage drops to 52 , that accounts for the elevation difference. The phenomenon is that the last 60 miles are constant up and down in Pa hills( our mountains) The battery must be heating up on the charge end and heating up on the discharge end, as I noticed I dont get the full degree of assist in theses condtions . Bare in mind that it is the summer and the hills I have described our constant. Ac is used on return trip but not the morning leaving the homestead tips That is my explanation , that the software is sensing high battery temp and limiting degree of charge and discharge of the ima comments ?

 

funny you should post this. i was just wondering the same type of thing about my battery today. it's been very hot, and my usual drive is a lot of rolling hills, with a couple of nice long downhills. my battery has been very hard to get fully charged, i had to coast down the long hills with the clutch engaged to fully charge it. then it seemed to drop to about 3/4 and that was as high as it would stay. under pressure, it dropped quite low and then came back up when i decelerated.

i can usually drive along at about 50MPH and have a 3 bar charge showing, and for the past two days, it didn't work.......

i am hoping it's just the heat and not a battery failure.

 

Add me to that, too. I've found mileage dropped to upper 30's...very hard to get into the 40's. Here are some observations.
1) New Tires - Didn't get LRR, but mileage isn't much different than the worn OEM.
2) Hot Weather - Noticing the same thing. Very hard to get to full charge. There were a few times that it suddenly dropped from four bars to one bar with A/C on.
3) Hard to get assist on startup.
4) Sometimes on braking, it'll get good charge, then suddenly reduced charge while still applying greater brake pressure.

So, I figured it was the heat as well. One thing I haven't checked is to make sure the battery fan is working. I'll try to check that this weekend.

I should add that last summer it was just as hot, but we were still getting mid 40s, so we're down about 15%.

 

I'm wondering if honda when they did their update are trying to proect MT versions of the civic so they don't suffer the battery failures of the insight.

 

That is my hypothesesto extend battery life despite this though the car perfomed well and the milage from this trip still eneded up at 53mpg at a total of 450 miles. I

 

I brought this issue up a while ago with little response. At least I'm not alone. Since I've been commuting with my wife (which means the AC has to be on at all times) and the temps are high (90+ w/ 100% humidity) the IMA does not assist at times and the forced regen kicks in often. My 60+ mpg tanks are just hitting over 50mpg. Some trips, though, I'm lucky to hit 50.

Jess

 

Yesterday during my commute home the ambient temp was 105 here in Albuquerque New Mexico. That is unusually hot for this locale, and the highest operating air temp that my HCH II has seen. I got stuck in a traffic jam, which is also rare for this city. Any how, my battery meter plumeted to just 1 bar. For the very first time I witnessed the car performing forced regeneration while at a standstill! Frankly I thought it could only regen while in motion. It was a bizare experience seeing the tach rev up above idle speed and several green bars on the regen meter while I was at a standstill in the traffic jam. The forced regen at standstill was not entirely smooth either. It was an altogether weird experience. I assume this was normal operation for the HCH II under the severe circumstances.

 

Yes, I consider it normal. It's happened to me a few times.
The first time it happens to you - it seems like a paranormal experience. A car possessed on charging up the battery