New owner with fob question and others....

[AgingHippie]

Just got my 2014 RAV4 EV Saturday, wanted one for years. 51K miles. I've figured out how to clear its consumption history, and some of how to work the radio (at least got the satellite activated), and how to pair it to the phone.

Charged it up on the 110 cord it came with (took forever), not using extended charging, the GOM says 91. Is that good?

Got my Juicebox Pro 40 on order, expecting it by Friday. Fortunately work has Chargepoints, but they're limited to 3 hours.

The car came with only one fob. I insisted that the dealer would supply 2, and I would not pay extra for the second one. He agreed but said he had to order it, and I had to bring the car back (30 miles away) for them to "program" it. Question: do they really need the vehicle, or should they be able to program it using the VIN and ship it to me?

Any other advice or pointers?

Thanks.

 

[miimura]

They need to plug the service laptop into the car to tell the car to accept the new fob. How would you feel if anyone that worked at a dealership could make a fob that would work on any car out there? That would be scary. They really do need the car in order to pair the fob to the car. They also need to cut the mechanical key to match your existing locks. However, that can be done from the key code without the car present.

 

[AgingHippie]

They need to plug the service laptop into the car to tell the car to accept the new fob. How would you feel if anyone that worked at a dealership could make a fob that would work on any car out there? That would be scary. They really do need the car in order to pair the fob to the car. They also need to cut the mechanical key to match your existing locks. However, that can be done from the key code without the car present.

Thanks for info. So it's like a bluetooth kind of pairing operation, but some proprietary protocol rather than bluetooth? Hope it's not just bluetooth, that's way too easy to hack.

 

[Allen]

One issue I was discussing with miimura a few weeks ago... Related to keyfobs but not your spare key.

I've had my car broken into twice. Both times I'm sure it was locked. It's always broken into in front of my house where I am sleeping.

I now (when I remember to) put my keys in a stainless steel cocktail shaker which I use as a cheap faraday cage. I'm fairly sure it works as I can put my key in the shaker and try to unlock my car and it's not recognized.
Information on why can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AHSDy6AiV0

Of course if I am truly stopping them from easily gaining access to my car then that might invite more damaging methods of entry. I'm hoping that the added trouble will make it not worth their effort though.

This is not a knock against Rav4 EVs but keyfobs in general. You can set your car to ignore the proximity commands from the fob and rely only on the direct signal buttons but this makes locking your key in the car more likely and I park with a valet in the city all the time so probably not an option for me. Of course they can steal the unlock code as well but it requires them to be there when you use the fob.

 

[AgingHippie]

One issue I was discussing with miimura a few weeks ago... Related to keyfobs but not your spare key.

I've had my car broken into twice. Both times I'm sure it was locked. It's always broken into in front of my house where I am sleeping.

OK that's scary. How far away does the fob need to be to be out of contact? Would 20' do it?

I've had trouble unlocking the car using the door buttons - I wonder if my car is configured to unlock only using the button on the fob? Is that possible?

 

[davewill]

The technology used is RFID. There is an antenna inside each of the doors that supports the fob and in the cabin. The system can tell where you are, so that having the fob by the driver door doesn't allow someone to unlock the passenger door with a touch. One feature of using RFID is that it doesn't absolutely need battery power to work. That way the fob can be used even if the battery is dead, by using the physical key to unlock and holding the fob against the start button when you start the car.

 

[Incredulocious]

OK that's scary. How far away does the fob need to be to be out of contact? Would 20' do it?

I've had trouble unlocking the car using the door buttons - I wonder if my car is configured to unlock only using the button on the fob? Is that possible?

To be clear, the issue demonstrated in the video is that a repeater can be used to relay the signal from the fob to the car if the repeater can be brought close enough to the fob. So, normally, just being a few feet away will prevent the fob from operating on the car. They don’t talk about how close the repeater has to be to the fob but they show it working in the cafe about 10 feet away.

I love how keyless fobs work though and it’s one of my favorite features: being able to just walk up, step in and drive off without ever having to touch the fob in my pocket. Seriously annoying when using another vehicle that doesn’t do this. Hopefully this tech can improve to make it harder to steal the signal but it’s not something I’m going to worry about.

Tesla is doing something different with the Model 3 versus the older S and X: there’s a card (also RFID or something else?) rather than a fob as a backup mechanism but the primary method will be via some sort of presumably secure Bluetooth mechanism on your smartphone that won’t require pulling out the phone and launching an app. Don’t know how the security of this will compare to modern RFID fobs but it’s different.

 

[Incredulocious]

Charged it up on the 110 cord it came with (took forever), not using extended charging, the GOM says 91. Is that good?

As you’ll learn from the extensive thread on the subject of the displayed range estimate (or as many like to say “GOM” or “guess-o-meter”), you can’t draw any conclusions from the displayed estimate. You might see something in the 70’s up through the 100’s: the number is based on the vehicle’s recent driving history and that’s affected by everything from how heavy-footed you’ve been to the air temperature, driving speed, elevation gains/descents, etc. So, don’t draw any conclusions from that number.

You can temporarily reset the calculation to its default factor if you’re really curious by following the “Tony reset” (essentially disconnecting the battery for a while). Details in that thread also.

And here’s that thread:
http://www.myrav4ev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=825

 

[AgingHippie]

I noticed today that driving 33.8 miles knocked 30 miles off the GOM. This is kind of like having a gasoline car with a fuel gauge that doesn't work properly. Can I make it up to (distant place with no chargers) and back? Maybe. Is this a thing with all electrics, or is the software in the RAV really bad?

 

[jgblair]

Actually, the RAV4-EV has two gauges. The first is a fuel gauge that corresponds to an ICE's gas gauge except that the RAV's is more precise. It is broken into 20 increments (with the top 4 hidden and used only for an extended charge). The gas gauges I've seen only show about 8 increments. The second gauge is the GOM, which estimates how far you can drive on your remaining fuel. Most ICEs lack that. The RAV's is not very accurate, especially at the higher ends. For me, it becomes progressively more accurate the lower it gets. How you drive makes all the difference. The GOM can't tell if you are driving into a headwind or uphill or have the heater-A/C on.

As far as far you can go, you know the typical range of your RAV is about 105/125 miles (regular charge/extended) at 65 mph on a calm day on the flat at maybe 70º F. I usually figure on 100 miles between charges on extended. I have the JdeMO so I look up the CHAdeMO (high speed) charging locations along the route I plan on going. I program their locations into the NAV (using lower case with the city name first so they standout when I am looking for one). If I am going on a long trip (like I am on a 1200 mile round trip at the moment), I make up a binder with the route shown (map quest) and print out a page for each charge location (plugshare). I keep that in the car. Since I have done this trip four times, there is not much to do except to do a quick check for any new chargers before I leave. I would do the same before I had the JdeMO, but understand that the charging time is longer. It works as long as I am at the location long enough. Every place I have ever gone has electricity (I know some people go to places that don't), so that means charging is possible. I have charged on 120 volts at a motel that was not within walking distance of a charger. I got about 30 miles overnight, which was enough to make it to a charger. Another time I drove to a location that had no CHAdeMO's within 60 miles. I was able to find a 14-50 outlet (240 volts/50 amps) on plugshare.com before I left and charged for a few hours while I was there. That enabled me to reach a CHAdeMO on my way home. After a few trips you get a feel for this. If you are driving and you know you will need more range, slowing down is a simple way to do it. I have a plan of how fast to go, but have to be prepared to slow down because of altitude gain or weather (wind or temperature) detours etc. That's why I like to have a 20 mile cushion on new routes and 10 miles on familiar routes.

 

[AgingHippie]

Solid advice, thanks.

It seems to me like, since the display on the right knows that you're running the A/C and has a second GOM, or maybe a NGOM (nagging guess-o-meter) that sort of tells you "if you'd turn off that A/C then your miles remaining would be this", that would mean the car does know it's running. Or am I reading the display wrong?

I got my JB40, which greatly reduces my range anxiety. I'm not planning any long trips in the RAV, but it sounds like if I do then I need this JdeMO thing, guess I will have to look that up, find out if it's just an adapter or some kind of modification to the car. Got a link?

 

[miimura]

http://shop.quickchargepower.com/JdeMO-for-2012-2014-Toyota-RAV4-EV-JdeMORav4.htm

There are some people that have it on their car but have decided to return their leased car. So, they will remove and sell the JdeMO, presumably at a discount to the new price. You would still have to pay for installation.

 

[AgingHippie]

One issue I was discussing with miimura a few weeks ago... Related to keyfobs but not your spare key.

I've had my car broken into twice. Both times I'm sure it was locked. It's always broken into in front of my house where I am sleeping.

Just noticed in this video, you've got an EV with a sunroof? Did you add that?

 

[Allen]

The videos are not of my car but of other instances people have caught on camera. BTW, a Hong Kong group recently took it a step further by digitizing the signal so they could send it much further distances and did it with about $15 devices on both ends.

One solution is to turn off proximity control. Then you have to press the fob to the door or start button and use the RFID.