Car won't charge / Gateway ECU / Firmware Update

[starlight]

Looks like my charging issue has to do with the Gateway Computer- the service dept put one on order for me.

 

[Dsinned]

I'm going to take my car in to the dealer tomorrow for the latest update; presumably Gateway ECU firmware version 1.3.76. When I had the last update (1.3.62) several months ago, it did nothing to "fix" the problem. As far as I'm concerned, the most simplified definition of the problem is:

The RAV4 EV cannot be consistently, nor reliably scheduled to re-charge itself while plugged in to a fully operational Leviton Level 2 EVSE during off peak hours when electric utility rates are lowest, generally from midnight to 6am on weekdays.

RAVCHARGE does a good job of working around this problem, but you have to remember to set the center console scheduled "departure time" a few hours later than when you would actually want the car ready to go after charge completion, which is illogical at best. If you forget to do this, and you have fairly significantly depleted the battery since your last charge, there is a good chance the car will self-initiate charging well before midnight, thus completing the (bulk) charge much earlier than necessary, several hours prior to 6am.

 

[Blastphemy]

Our 2012 Rav4 EV was left undriven and unplugged at half-charge for 18 days (from December 19 - January 5) due to a family vacation. When we returned home, the Rav4 EV turned on with no problem, thank goodness. I turned off the car, set to "charge immediately," and plugged in. Charged fully with no problem. We took a 20-mile drive that night and plugged in when we returned home.

The car is programmed to charge overnight so that I can leave at 5:30 a.m. each morning, and we've never had a problem with this feature. However, the next morning, the car had not charged overnight. Luckily, we had enough charge to take some family to LAX and back (70 miles round trip). Upon returning home, we set to "charge immediately" and plugged in. The car charged completely with no problem.

We took a 30-mile drive later that day and plugged in when we returned home. Again, the next morning, the car hadn't charged and no e-mail was received that indicated a charge interruption or that scheduled charging had started/finished.

We still consistently receive e-mails for the "charge immediately" events, both start and completion of such, and one "charge interruption" e-mail when I unplugged the car before it had finished charging another time, so I know the e-mail notifications are working.

I'm wondering if the change to 2014 has messed up the schedule, somehow. Has anyone else been having new scheduled charging issued this year? A one-off miss once in a while doesn't bother me, but two days in a row consistent scheduled charge failures is an indication of a real problem, IMHO.

I'm taking in the Rav4 EV for service this afternoon. I'll have in-hand some recent Technical Service Bulletins (T-TT-0248-13, T-SB-0082-13 REV1, and T-TT-0268-13) and the latest known firmware update as reported by evbuddy earlier in this thread (1.3.76 from a November 21, 2013 TSB I couldn't find online).

I couldn't find any sticker under my hood indicating that any prior firmware revision had been applied, but I understand from reading this forum that dealerships are not consistently doing this even after applying an update.

 

[miimura]

When you turn off the car, does the NAV screen show the expected charge duration and start time on the left side and does the correct departure time display on the right side?

 

[Dsinned]

Miimura, yes, both those informational displays are correct in my RAV4 EV, as desired, but which do not correspond to the actual timed events. This is another irritating idiosyncrasy of this problem.

I'm picking up the car from my local dealer's service dep't in a few hours . . . This morning when I dropped off the car, I SPECIFICALLY REMINDED the Service Writer about the Gateway ECU Calibration ID sticker requirement. He acknowledged this requirement by the TSB procedure, but I'll bet you dollars to donuts there will be no sticker placed under the hood yet again! :roll:

 

[Blastphemy]

That's pretty funny, Dsinned, that we both brought our Rav4 EVs in for service on the same day!

My dealership attempted to apply the 1.3.79 firmware update, but told me the car wouldn't accept it. So they're keeping it overnight and will call Toyota Corporate in the morning to ask what to do.

If it's anything like how many personal computers are updated, I suspect the Service Dept will first have to apply prior updates before the current one will be accepted. (If this is the case, then my dealership hasn't applied previous firmware updates that I requested, and they'll hear a few choice words from me about that!)

To the dealership's credit, they gave us a Rav4 EV loaner in the meantime. (It came with a full extended charge. The person who took our information for the loaner told me it's always extended charged since most people who rent it or take as a loaner don't have a 240V charger and can't charge it. I'll be curious to see if the mileage on this 1.5-year-old Rav4 EV is less than ours, which we rarely extended charge.)

The dealership didn't find the reason why the car hadn't charged the past two nights. Part of it was them not understanding that we said the car never started charging; the technician thought we just weren't getting a full charge based on our departure time, so he messed with my charge schedule (which made no sense since the car would just start charging earlier based on any departure time and current battery status). Needless to say, that explanation did not impress me, and I was annoyed that I had to explain to them why the car didn't start charging 'til 2:00 a.m. most days (because our set departure time is 6:00 a.m., and we never fully deplete the battery, and so the car usually only takes 3-4 hours to charge).

 

[Dsinned]

We'll I must eat a little crow here as upon pickup, my car (for the first time) did, in fact, have a Calibration ID sticker applied under the hood!

As Blasphemy just mentioned, the update provided to my car yesterday turned out to be "1.3.79", so this must be the absolute latest version. I was expecting 1.3.76, which may have been issued ~2 months ago.

My completed service work order indicated I had TWO firmware updates, one for the Toyota NAV/Infotainment system (VSB-xxx150) per TSB, T-SB-0082-13, and another for the Tesla side of the car. The end user center console verifiable update should have been done on my last service visit to the same dealer, but apparently it was overlooked.

The other Tesla related update, as expected, was performed to the Gateway Logic Control module, per T-SB-0050-13. Presumably, this relates to Calibration ID 1.3.79 being applied. However, the work order also mentions that the "Power Management Control ECU" was reprogrammed as well. I am assuming the latter is to a different Tesla firmware controlled module, and was updated supplemental to T-SB-0050-13.

This is the first time a "Power Management Control ECU" firmware update has been mentioned in any related discussions on this forum. I have no idea what this particular update was meant to address. Nevertheless, it is quite possible that Calibration ID 1.3.79 is associated with a two part firmware update in two different RAV4 EV Tesla related modules.

On a somewhat pleasant note, if not a bit surprising, when I picked up my car, I found that my battery was "fully charged" while at the dealership. I drove it home with 127 miles indicated on the GoM! :mrgreen:

It remains to be seen if this firmware update resolves my scheduled charging issues, but I will let everyone know in about a week or so.

Stay tuned . . .

 

[Blastphemy]

Glad you got your car back, Dsinned. I, on the other hand, did not get my car back today. The dealership still couldn't get the firmware updates to take, and there were lots of e-mails back and forth with Toyota corporate.

Guess what they determined the problem to be? The USB port was bad. Can you believe it? So the dealership ordered a replacement part. Guess we'll see if that was really the problem once the new USB port is installed! Hope it doesn't take a month for a simple USB port...

Thanks for all the great information about VSB-xxx150, T-SB-0082-13 and T-SB-0050-13.

 

[miimura]

Glad you got your car back, Dsinned. I, on the other hand, did not get my car back today. The dealership still couldn't get the firmware updates to take, and there were lots of e-mails back and forth with Toyota corporate.

Guess what they determined the problem to be? The USB port was bad. Can you believe it? So the dealership ordered a replacement part. Guess we'll see if that was really the problem once the new USB port is installed! Hope it doesn't take a month for a simple USB port...

Thanks for all the great information about VSB-xxx150, T-SB-0082-13 and T-SB-0050-13.

Have you ever used the USB port for music playback? Anyway, I thought they couldn't get the Tesla update to take - that should be through the connector in the back, on the left side of the cargo area.

 

[Dsinned]

I believe Miimura is correct. I don't believe the USB port in the front of the car would be involved in doing a firmware update, provided you already have software version "VB503150" installed in the NAV/Infotainment center console. For Tesla updates, I think they have to use a Techstream communications link tool which plugs in directly to the Tesla Gateway Logic Controller module in the back of the car. What dealer are you using for your service visit? Sounds like they may be rather clueless. :roll:

 

[vips]

Dsinned - What dealer did you take your car for service? Any advice on the Service Advisor and technician to work with there?

 

[Dsinned]

Piercey Toyota in Milpitas (just off 880, between Great Mall Parkway and 237). Walter Yamamoto was my Service Advisor.

 

[Blastphemy]

Have you ever used the USB port for music playback? Anyway, I thought they couldn't get the Tesla update to take - that should be through the connector in the back, on the left side of the cargo area.

Yes, that USB port in the center console has always worked fine for us with our iPhones/iPod.

I think the dealership is referring to a different port somewhere else on the car, perhaps the one in the back. They could be referring to the Techstream port as a USB port for the sake of brevity. Regardless, whatever works to get the firmware updated and our Rav4 EV back in our garage is fine with me.

I haven't ever gotten the impression that the EV technicians at my dealership are "clueless," but then I don't know what goes on behind the scenes. They've been able to resolve every other Rav4 EV issue we've had in less than a day, and have been very gracious about it. I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt for now.

 

[Blastphemy]

Received a call from our dealership that the USB port had been replaced and the firmware update... still didn't take.

So now the technicians are at a complete loss and are in contact with senior engineers at Toyota/Tesla to figure out (1) why scheduled charging no longer works, and (2) why the car won't accept any firmware updates.

At least our loaner is a Rav4 EV, or my wife would be very unhappy! I'll keep y'all appraised of the situation as developments occur. Hopefully no one else is experiencing these problems...

 

[Blastphemy]

When the dealership called to give us an update today, we were told that the Service Dept. had ordered a "third USB memory stick" and hoped that it would resolve the problem. (This wasn't our regular adviser, so who knows if he communicated the information correctly).

It ought to be very interesting to see how the dealership resolves this inability to update the firmware. The best part of today's phone call was the service adviser offering to release the car back to us if whatever they do to the car on Thursday doesn't work. My wife tried very hard to be nice, and I think she succeeded, but her response was, basically, "are you really telling me that you want to return my broken car to me before you've fixed it?"

I may have to take a drive down to the dealership to get some answers in person, because this is getting to be silly. I need to speak with the head Rav4 EV technician directly, not any of the service advisers whose entire EV knowledge is probably the Prius Plug-In, if they even know anything about that car at all!

Anyone have the phone number for that Kevin gentleman at Toyota Corporate who acts as a liaison for technical problems like this?

 

[TonyWilliams]

Anyone have the phone number for that Kevin gentleman at Toyota Corporate who acts as a liaison for technical problems like this?

1-310-974-7545

 

[Blastphemy]

The dealership called and told me my Rav4 EV is ready and has been reflashed with the current firmware. Apparently, a Toyota field representative had to be called in to help deal with the problem.

Indeed, it appears that Toyota sends the software updates on a USB memory stick that is inserted in the USB port between the driver and the passenger. The first two memory sticks received by the dealership were not formatted properly, or were somehow corrupted. The third one worked, under the supervision of the field rep.

When I pick up the car, I'll check for the under-the-hood sticker and see if my paperwork states the firmware version #.

But as long as the car charges on its schedule and doesn't die while driving at 65 mph, I'll be happy. This car just needs to last until Tesla releases the Model X, after all...

 

[Blastphemy]

So far the car has been charging reliably overnight, so the firmware update must have fixed the problem. Unfortunately, the dealer notes did not indicate the firmware version, so I can't report that to the forum.

 

[Dsinned]

Blastphemy, did your "overnight" charge initiate way earlier than necessary in relation to your preset scheduled departure time.

As an aside, from what you've said, it sure sounds like your dealer only updated the NAV/Infotainment system firmware via that plugged in USB stick. To best of my knowledge, the Tesla Gateway ECU (in the back of the car) can only be updated with a Techstream "black box" plugged in to that specific module. I could be wrong, but that is my understanding. There is even a Toyota TSB that specifically details the Techstream procedure to be used on the RAV4 EV. The current revision available for the Tesla firmware update is 1.3.79. Before that, I think it was 1.3.76 and before that 1.3.62, and even before that it was 1.3.57.

Why so many revisions? ANd what issue(s) did each revision specifically "fix"? I dunno, but with this many revisions, assuming one for every sequential number from 1 to 79, the majority that never made it to the production car or already in the field), suggests 100% proper operation of the Tesla Gateway ECU seems to be a "moving target".

 

[Blastphemy]

Are you saying that the 1.3.79 firmware version refers to the Gateway ECU and not to the NAV/Infotainment system? If so, then I guess my 20,000-mile service will be another fun experience. (I'm not taking the car back any sooner unless there are problems.)

The most recent overnight charge actually ended 13 minutes after the departure time I'd specified. I'll monitor that to see if it continues to be an issue.