2018 2.0 e-torque battery issue -30F

[slobster]

I am trying to ease my mind here.
So my wife and I went north for the weekend just south of the Canada border, far north MN. Well it hit -25 to -30ish over night Sunday night. I remote start the Jeep fine Monday morning and it warmed up. Loaded it up and headed out.

While driving , maybe 2 minutes in I get the aux buttons not available and then the battery light comes on. It did it for about 5 minutes the day before but stopped, figured it was just the cold and the battery needed to warm up, no big deal. This time the battery light stayed on and as we were driving systems were failing left and right. ABS error, 4wd error, finally head unit rebooted a few times, lost power steering and blower shut down, then wouldn’t drive over 30mph. Finally it completely died and we had to pull off. Jeep was stuck in run mode, would not shut off, lights super dim, door locks not working. Unfortunately for us it was -22 at the time and we were in the middle of nowhere.

Thank the lord an older couple stopped and gave us a ride to the nearest gas station, I eventually got a tow to the nearest auto repair. We had another vehicle with us so we left the jeep about 4 hours north of my current location. Talked to the repair shop and he is going to pull and charge the 12 volt battery. Is there anything else I should be looking at?

Searching led me to believe if the 48v battery dies the 12v will still charge. So wtf happened?
Btw the 12v battery is only a few months old. But maybe it took a crap? Not sure why it would run the Jeep fine but no charge. Jeep has 56k miles on it.

sorry this might be all over the place. My mind is running 90 miles an hour and I have a nasty pit in my stomach. First time a vehicle has ever broke down on me and I needed a tow.

Thanks for any help. This is a small town shop so his resources might be slim.

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[Windshieldfarmer]

Glad you are safe…that is truly an extremely dangerous situation.

I have an e torque 2.0 but have never had it in temps below zero. Just to venture a guess, the 48v battery was unable to accept a charge from the generator (no alternator) because of the cold…I know the 48v battery has a cooling system but not so sure about warming. I also believe it’s a lithium battery which can perform poorly in extreme cold. If the 48v battery becomes discharged or unchargable there is no way to retain a charge in the 12v battery…thus your issues. The 48v battery is covered by an 8 year warranty…that is where I would start.

I’ve been in South Dakota once in minus 22 conditions. Can be deadly…again you are fortunate to have found a warm ride to a service station..

 

[slobster]

Thanks for the reply. So it might be possible for the 48v battery to recover if we warm it up then? The repair shop doesn’t have my keys unfortunately, but I may mail them so he can test it for me. They are supposed to hit mid 30s starting next week up there.

I did call mopar and they told me the battery is only covered by the 3/36 warranty. The problem is I am far from a dealer and I don’t want to pay for a $1k tow if possible.

 

[JamesWyatt]

https://www.jlwranglerforums.com/forum/threads/signs-of-failing-auxillary-battery.77901/

 

[slobster]

https://www.jlwranglerforums.com/forum/threads/signs-of-failing-auxillary-battery.77901/

That’s the AUX battery, I don’t have the AUX. I have the BSG I believe everyone calls it.

 

[JamesWyatt]

That’s the AUX battery, I don’t have the AUX. I have the BSG I believe everyone calls it.

Just showing bad batteries can cause these symptoms.

https://www.jlwranglerforums.com/fo...-test-48v-etorque-battery.111007/post-2533015

 

[Windshieldfarmer]

Thanks for the reply. So it might be possible for the 48v battery to recover if we warm it up then? The repair shop doesn’t have my keys unfortunately, but I may mail them so he can test it for me. They are supposed to hit mid 30s starting next week up there.

I did call mopar and they told me the battery is only covered by the 3/36 warranty. The problem is I am far from a dealer and I don’t want to pay for a $1k tow if possible.

Yes….warming temps should help…a lot. Good luck getting this dealt with.

Yes the 12 volt battery is only 36 months. Regarding the 48v battery, you need to look at written warranty data; I am certain it’s eight years or 80,000 miles for the 48v battery and belt start generator and associated equipment. Just look it up online….

 

[REDCOMETJLUXR]

Had the same problem while on a trail almost a year ago with someone in our group, ended up just being a bad battery, one difference is the jeep in this link/vid is not an Etorque, but still same issue. Night recovery! JLUR has electrical breakdown on badge of honor trail and pulled to trailhead until 2am | Jeep Wrangler Forums (JL / JLU) -- Rubicon, 4xe, 392, Sahara, Sport - JLwranglerforums.com

 

[Windshieldfarmer]

Here you go.

 

[Bandit59]

I am trying to ease my mind here.
So my wife and I went north for the weekend just south of the Canada border, far north MN. Well it hit -25 to -30ish over night Sunday night. I remote start the Jeep fine Monday morning and it warmed up. Loaded it up and headed out.

While driving , maybe 2 minutes in I get the aux buttons not available and then the battery light comes on. It did it for about 5 minutes the day before but stopped, figured it was just the cold and the battery needed to warm up, no big deal. This time the battery light stayed on and as we were driving systems were failing left and right. ABS error, 4wd error, finally head unit rebooted a few times, lost power steering and blower shut down, then wouldn’t drive over 30mph. Finally it completely died and we had to pull off. Jeep was stuck in run mode, would not shut off, lights super dim, door locks not working. Unfortunately for us it was -22 at the time and we were in the middle of nowhere.

Thank the lord an older couple stopped and gave us a ride to the nearest gas station, I eventually got a tow to the nearest auto repair. We had another vehicle with us so we left the jeep about 4 hours north of my current location. Talked to the repair shop and he is going to pull and charge the 12 volt battery. Is there anything else I should be looking at?

Searching led me to believe if the 48v battery dies the 12v will still charge. So wtf happened?
Btw the 12v battery is only a few months old. But maybe it took a crap? Not sure why it would run the Jeep fine but no charge. Jeep has 56k miles on it.

sorry this might be all over the place. My mind is running 90 miles an hour and I have a nasty pit in my stomach. First time a vehicle has ever broke down on me and I needed a tow.

Thanks for any help. This is a small town shop so his resources might be slim.

If it has the factory battery that will probably be the issue

 

[Grooster]

Low voltage causes all sorts of communication issues for the Jeep. When my '19 Sahara (2.0, etorque) was 3 years old, the main battery began to fail. After replacement, the aux switches didn't show up until we drove a bit. My guess is the replacement battery, while charged, wasn't to full capacity yet. I opted for a larger capacity battery, avoiding the lower priced options.

 

[slobster]

Update on this. Picked up the jeep today and temps were -4f. Jeeps runs fines now. Had the shop charge my 12volt battery. Voltage on dash shows 14.6 when running. My guess it was too damn cold for the 48v to charge the 12v. Not sure how I would get around this issue. Still may bring it in to the dealer and have them load test the 48v but the jeep is doing the auto start/stop and all functions are working. I dunno, now I don’t trust taking it out of town.

 

[slobster]

I bet you have a used up 12v battery and the 48v one cannot charge it up enough.

I just got back from an 8 hour drive in the desert. My weak battery after startup I got the low battery warning, later during the day it crept down to 13.4v At startup I got the low battery warning and at the end of the day no warning for low battery.

What is going on is I see 14+ volts when the battery has less than ideal SOC and later in the day the SOC is high enough that the regulation power is then decreased to save fuel.

At the end of the day with multiple restarts the message does not show up indicating a battery with high state of charge.

My fix for the problem is to charge the jeep every night and when not needing to drive it and replace the battery with a more potent one ASAP.

This is a brand new 12 volt battery. The jeep is over 5 years old and with the winters here I always change my batteries at 5 years unless they fail earlier. Also the jeep started right up in that weather, just would not charge the 12 volt battery. With the remote start at 15 minutes and then driving 30 minutes I would say that 12volt lasted a good while before dying.

I wish I would have stopped and maybe restarted it, maybe it was in some funk.

 

[Windshieldfarmer]

This is a brand new 12 volt battery. The jeep is over 5 years old and with the winters here I always change my batteries at 5 years unless they fail earlier. Also the jeep started right up in that weather, just would not charge the 12 volt battery. With the remote start at 15 minutes and then driving 30 minutes I would say that 12volt lasted a good while before dying.

I wish I would have stopped and maybe restarted it, maybe it was in some funk.

I’m guessing minus 30 exceeded the engineering threshold for the 48v battery or the 48v battery, at five years old, has lost some of its capacity which only became evident in extreme cold. Assuming you’re still within the 80,000 mile warranty I would certainly have the dealer take a look. I’m glad you’re back in business. Minus 4 is not exactly balmy….

 

[slobster]

I’m guessing minus 30 exceeded the engineering threshold for the 48v battery or the 48v battery, at five years old, has lost some of its capacity which only became evident in extreme cold. Assuming you’re still within the 80,000 mile warranty I would certainly have the dealer take a look. I’m glad you’re back in business. Minus 4 is not exactly balmy….

I am going to check my manual and make sure the 8 year 80k warranty is listed in writing then I will take it in and have the dealer check it over. I hope the there is a CEL code in the history they can see.

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