PHEV not starting sometimes

[jlo]

Hi. I bought an Outlander PHEV in late 2014. I am very happy with the car. It is mainly used for around town driving but has the flexibility to go up to Sydney or down the coast (I live in Canberra Australia).

Unfortunately there is a problem with my PHEV. Earlier this year when I drove the car down the coast (2.5 hour drive), a few days later while driving down the coast, I parked the car. When I tried to lock the car there was no response. I thought I had left a door open but when I opened the driver door, the dashboard was blank. The car would not start and locking or unlocking the car had no response. I called roadside assistance who were in the area and arrived 20 minutes later. I explained the problem and opened the door and the dashboard lights were working. The trip distance measure (trip A and B) had reset to 0. The car worked fine until a few days later driving back from the coast when the same thing happened. The roadside assistance measured the auxiliary battery which was fine (12+V) and then while opening doors etc, the dashboard lights again started working. This time there was an alarm about the electrical system needing a service. We had the car serviced a few days later but the Mitsubishi people could not recreate the problem.

The car then worked fine for 2 months, including trips to Sydney (3 hours each way).

However, the same behaviour happened when I went down the coast again. The car would not start (no dashboard lights) in the morning, but was fine later in the day. At home the problem occurred once more, again working again a few hours later. My wife took the car to Mitsubishi who can find no problem. The problem has happened once since on a short trip to work. The roadside assistance guy measured auxiliary battery which again was fine. He suggested a problem with a solder joint expanding when hot and breaking the circuit which is consistent with trips to coast but not the most recent occurrence after driving to work and the car parked in a cool parking area.

The car is booked in for a more detailed service next week but I was wondering if anyone has experienced a similar problem? It is obviously frustrating. It is also unsettling as the immediate reaction when you press the start button and nothing happens, is what am I doing wrong?

Any suggestions or advice appreciated!

Thanks

 

[greendwarf]

Didn't we have a post from someone in Brazil having problems because of the heat - there are warnings in the manual about it being unreliable when over 45c. The isolated failure in the cool may just be the normal glitch we all get when messing up the starting sequence.

 

[jaapv]

I had a similar problem on a Volvo 245 Turbo many years ago. It would burn out the electronics from time to time. It turned out after many visits to the Bosch service center that one mass contact had not been cleaned of paint sufficiently on assembly, causing peak currents that would damaged the electronics
Modern electronics will be better protected, so maybe this is some safety cut-out operating.

When I had a weird problem with the FCM system, the dealer could not find the cause, so they hooked up the car to the factory in Japan through the Internet, who found and repaired a corrupted piece of software.

 

[tjb]

ev system fault appeared.

The car was towed to the dealers and a full diagnostic check was done........the response was that the auxiliary battery needed a charge as it was flat. I was accused by the dealer that I must have shortcutted a fast charger. However the full print offs did confirm that the car had never had a fastcharge at anytime.

Visited the dealers the following morning assured everything was fine and good to go as they had jump charged the battery. Collected the keys ,entered the car to find that the EV fault system appeared ?????? Dealers red faced , mechanics scratching their heads ?????

To cut a long story oblong..........I was without the car for 2 weeks , full print offs were sent to Mitsi UK who could not find the solution. The print offs were then sent to Mitsi Japan headquarters for analysis.
The final outcome was that the auxiliary battery was deemed to be faulty and replaced with a new battery.

The car for the past 9 months has been faultless..........but my confidence in the vehicle had been shaken by that dreaded EV fault light.

 

[maby]

... and if they had started by taking the low voltage battery out and putting it on a diagnostic battery charger costing less than £50 from Halfords, they would have worked it out in less than 24 hours!

 

[greendwarf]

Err - we seem to have gone off topic guys. The OP was referring to an intermittent fault. :?