I did some searching and did not find what I wanted. If this is a repeat, please forgive me.

I am curious abot IMA. Does the motor supply the same amount of power no matter what the charge on the batteries is? Does it supply more power on a nearly full charge than it does on a lower charge?

If the charge is low on the batteries, does the motor kick in later or stop earlier?

Also, what is the average charge on the battery system. Mine usually stays around the middle of the scale. It tends to climb to about 3/4 if I drive more that 30 minutes. It also seems that when I get back in the car after 8 hours or so, the battrey level has dropped. I have not studied this veyr hard yet, just a perception.

I hope I amde my questions clear. Any help is appreciated very much.

Clay

 

The one thing that I have seen is as follows:

As the reserve battery for the IMA gets depleted (at about 25 percent capacity), the assist will reduce accordingly. I see it in three stages, the assist will reduce from 100 percent to 66 percent, to 33 percent, to zero as the reserve goes from to 25 to 12.5 to 0. (Observations are approximate, your actual experience may vary.)

I don't see this as a problem, just a normal progression.

I have not observed that my battery has less of a charge after an overnight "rest" or other extended period of non-use. In fact, I remember being away for a long weekend and firing up the car on a Tuesday and having the battery at full (can't remember if I left it that way).

Does that help?

 

Yes it does. Thanks. I assume when you talk about 100%, 66%, etc, you are saying that the motor reduces in power applied to the ICE.


Clay

 

Yes, the blue "assist" bar to the right of the green "charge" bar will decline, no matter how hard you press on the accelerator pedal.

 

I believe the battery does drain over time. I have found that I can come out and find my battery low after parking it with a decent charge.

I am under the suspision that the car will use the IMA battery to keep the regular battery fully charged. I have an aftermarket voltage gauge in my car and notice when I'm autostoped if my voltage drops below 11.9V the volage will all of a sudden jump to 13.5 or so volts.

It could be a .1V drop in my wire from the battery so honda may do some charging of the battery from the IMA at 12V. If you have extra electronics (you replaced the radio or added some addition accessories, added an alarm) you might be experiencing what I am.

I have never seen any of this documented but it seems to be consistant with my experiences.

Anyone else notice this?

 

Does the IMA battery to run the fan that runs when you turn the car off?Clay

 

The IMA battery does keep the regular battery charged with a DC to DC converter.

Here is your docs: http://www.insightcentral.net/encycl...converter.html

Beware a dead 12V battery will kill the IMA pack as well.

 

???

 

Thats a good question. I don't know. I would only guess it doesn't. As far as the fan is concerned I would bet that honda didn't realy touch how it works from a regular civic.

 

I would almost guarantee that the cooling fan runs off 12 volt battery. You just dont want 144 volts running all over the car as that can KILL you. You could look at the fan and it will probably say 12 volts operating voltage on it somewhere.
Notice the orange cable under the hood for the 144 volt cable run. If they used that high voltage elsewhere it would have similar colors and I dont see that.