HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

Both batteries are dead in my Escape HEV 2008 »because +2 months of no use!«
I've replaced the 12V battery and after that, I've tried to restore the HV battery pack charge by means of the special jump start procedure -with the magic bottom an the end of the instrument panel. The manual says I can do that twice before discharge the 12V battery...as I did not get the result...I tried one more time (and discharged the 12V battery...at the end, this is not a problem) but I could not get the ICE running...:angry:
any body knows how to recharge the HV battery pack faster?

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

I think you are simply going to have to recharge that 12v enough times that the traction battery picks up enough charge to start the engine.

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

update: I've isntalled a brand new 12V battery and tried 3 times again -it did not die, but still can't run the ICE.
Scangauge showed "SOC = 0.0%" and "Traction Battery V = 84 volts". Tomorrow I will try with other car in front of my Escape and jump start both batteries....or both methods at same time.

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

The jump start button does not actually "charge" the HV battery. It powers the HV battery heater circuit to warm the HV Battery. The rationale is that as a battery is warmed it gains capacity and could possibly thus gain enough to start the ICE.

It sounds to me like your HV battery just doesn't have enough left for this to work.

My take is that you need a HV jump to get the ICE going (don't ask me how to do this). Then recharge the HV Battery by keeping it running a good long time to ensure a full charge.

During the summer of 06 we left ours stand for the summer but had a friend come over several times and run it for 15-30 minutes. Had no problem.

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

I remember seeing a proceedure for this, can't really remember or if it was for dealers.
Funny I thought the magic button was to charge the 12V battery to pull in the HV contacts,
The fact that you only have 80volts out of 350 means you ain"t going nowhere.
Like Bill said the dc/dc convertor is only to steo down the hv to 12v. I can't imagine
what you would use to charge that monster, except that enginer kit!

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

The FEH can be jump-started with jumper cables just like a conventional vehicle. The procedure is in the owner's manual. Once jump-started, the vehicle needs to be run until the HV battery is charged.
Using the HV battery starter button deeply discharges the 12V battery and can kill it since lead-acid batteries aren't meant for deep discharge. I think this is what the OP is experiencing.

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

It is my understanding that the HV battery can be recharged, minimally recharged, using a fully charged 12 volt battery as a charging source. My understanding is that there is a DC-DC voltage up-converter (inverter) for doing this. Might take ~24 hours to restore a ~full charge so it would probably be a requirement to have a charger on the 12 volt battery during that entire period.

Obviously there is a possibility that your Dc-DC upconverter has failed.

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

You know Bill, I've seen this comment before. It is odd that the owners manual implies that it actually charges:

"If the jump start button is pressed, but the indicator on the button
flashes slowly, the low voltage (underhood) battery may not have enough
energy to charge the high voltage battery. "

Maybe they just didn't want to provide the details, or do the systems differ between the years (this is from the 2008 FEH manual)?

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

That procedure charges the 12v battery only. Since the car does not have a conventional starter (the HV battery turns the engine to start it), if the HV battery does not have enough charge, then there is no way to start the engine.

Re: HV battery pack and 12V battery discharged...how to re-charge it faster?
 

The high voltage scangauge reading for my 08 was 84 when everything was fine and the folks at linear logic told me to use a different code and then it started reading in the 300's. I think maybe your contactors are not working or you have a popped fuse somewhere. Seems like if SOC is reading 0.0% then you would have lights in the dash telling you something is wrong like stop safely now.