Honda Link App Smart Charge Update

2681 Views 5 Replies 4 Participants Last post by 2002, Jan 17, 2022

JimWoo

Discussion Starter · Dec 27, 2021

Honda just pushed an option to update to my Honda Link app which allowed me to access their new Smart Charge feature. After previewing it a little I went ahead and installed the update and went through the steps to convert my previous charging schedule to the new Smart Charge method. At the very end of the steps the Smart Charge process gives the Clarity owner the option to dictate the percentage of charge at which the battery is to be topped off before ending the charge cycle. The default is apparently 100%, and after scratching my head a little and wondering whether I should accept the default or change it to a lesser percentage, I left it at 100% for now.

Here's my dilemma and question...I've read a lot discussions on this site that seem to suggest many Clarity owners are of the opinion the Honda engineers who built the Clarity and created the programming for this vehicle did so with a lot of failsafes in mind. One of those failsafes suggested was to not allow the battery to inadvertently be overcharged and damaged by the owner. The theories put forth in defense of this argument, as I recall, seem to suggest the Clarity's charging system was programmed to automatically shutoff somewhere around the 80% or so charge level.

I guess I could pick up the phone (groan) and attempt to call Honda with my question and my dilemma, but when it comes to the Clarity, and questions of this type, I've learned from past such experiences the people I get on the phone at Honda support tend to know less than nothing about technical matters at these levels.

So, any ideas out there sports fans? Do you think it is safe to accept the 100% charging default on this new Honda Link Smart Charge app, or should one, in the absence of further information, play it safe and pick the tried and true and safe 80% number instead?

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2002

· #2 · Dec 27, 2021

I suppose their slogan is:

"SmartCharge, from the people who brought you HondaLink".

I think I will hold off for now until it has been out for a while, but I will certainly be interested in hearing your experiences with it.

JimWoo said:
I guess I could pick up the phone (groan) and attempt to call Honda with my question and my dilemma

I can only guess that Honda will point you to the Owners Manual which states:

"To help extend the lifespan of the battery, it is recommended that you fully charge the battery each time prior to driving."

Since Honda is on the hook for ten years of warranty for the battery for most owners, it seems unlikely that they would recommend doing something that would kill the battery. We know that the entire battery is not used because people who track their charging report that it only takes about 14.5 kWh to charge the 17 kWh Clarity battery. So clearly 100% is not actually full

A separate question is whether there is any benefit to charging at say 80% vs. 100%. Based on general knowledge about lithium batteries there is an argument to be made that there might be some benefit, but how much benefit there would be specifically for the Clarity is pretty much unknowable. Some people say there would be little to no benefit, and it's hard to argue against that in the absence of actual data. However Honda sure has gone the other direction with their claim that charging to full will actually extend battery life. It sure would be nice if they would explain how and why that is.

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ClarityDave

· #3 · Dec 28, 2021

JimWoo said:
Honda just pushed an option to update to my Honda Link app which allowed me to access their new Smart Charge feature. After previewing it a little I went ahead and installed the update and went through the steps to convert my previous charging schedule to the new Smart Charge method. At the very end of the steps the Smart Charge process gives the Clarity owner the option to dictate the percentage of charge at which the battery is to be topped off before ending the charge cycle. The default is apparently 100%, and after scratching my head a little and wondering whether I should accept the default or change it to a lesser percentage, I left it at 100% for now.

Here's my dilemma and question...I've read a lot discussions on this site that seem to suggest many Clarity owners are of the opinion the Honda engineers who built the Clarity and created the programming for this vehicle did so with a lot of failsafes in mind. One of those failsafes suggested was to not allow the battery to inadvertently be overcharged and damaged by the owner. The theories put forth in defense of this argument, as I recall, seem to suggest the Clarity's charging system was programmed to automatically shutoff somewhere around the 80% or so charge level.

I guess I could pick up the phone (groan) and attempt to call Honda with my question and my dilemma, but when it comes to the Clarity, and questions of this type, I've learned from past such experiences the people I get on the phone at Honda support tend to know less than nothing about technical matters at these levels.

So, any ideas out there sports fans? Do you think it is safe to accept the 100% charging default on this new Honda Link Smart Charge app, or should one, in the absence of further information, play it safe and pick the tried and true and safe 80% number instead?

My guess is that the “100%” is not really 100% of the battery capacity and is probably closer to 80%. But the option of only charging the battery to 90-95% (of 80%) may eliminate some of the weak regenerative braking or inability to use the paddle at the full 4 chevrons if you have that problem immediately after charging to 100%.

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Htg_Clarity

· #4 · Jan 17, 2022

2002 said:
I suppose their slogan is:

"SmartCharge, from the people who brought you HondaLink". lol !

...

"To help extend the lifespan of the battery, it is recommended that you fully charge the battery each time prior to driving."

Since Honda is on the hook for ten years of warranty for the battery for most owners, it seems unlikely that they would recommend doing something that would kill the battery. ... Honda sure has gone the other direction with their claim that charging to full will actually extend battery life. ...

Agreed. Of course, the meaning of that quoted Owner's Manual sentence, especially the "each time prior" phrase, does leave some room for interpretation.

Given the current understanding of how to extend battery life, the phrase might be interred as meaning "each time immediately prior", or perhaps "preferentially only just prior". I certainly don't expect Honda to comment either way, but if push came to shove, they could arguably claim - that's what they meant! Or not! :-(

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Htg_Clarity

· #5 · Jan 17, 2022

Htg_Clarity said:
Agreed. Of course, the meaning of that quoted Owner's Manual sentence, especially the "each time prior" phrase, does leave some room for interpretation.

Given the current understanding of how to extend battery life, the phrase might be inferred as meaning "each time immediately prior", or perhaps "preferentially only just prior". I certainly don't expect Honda to comment either way, but if push came to shove, they could arguably claim - that's what they meant! Or not! :-(

fixed typo - interred to inferred.

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2002

· #6 · Jan 17, 2022

Htg_Clarity said:
Agreed. Of course, the meaning of that quoted Owner's Manual sentence, especially the "each time prior" phrase, does leave some room for interpretation.

Given the current understanding of how to extend battery life, the phrase might be interred as meaning "each time immediately prior", or perhaps "preferentially only just prior". I certainly don't expect Honda to comment either way, but if push came to shove, they could arguably claim - that's what they meant! Or not! :-(

I assume that you are referring to the strategy that when charging to full, you should try and reach full charge shortly before departure, to avoid the battery sitting at full charge* for several hours.

*Standard Disclaimer: In this context full charge means 100% SOC, which is not the actual full capacity of the battery. The system prevents charging to actual full capacity to prevent damage to the battery.

The Prius Prime actually accommodates this strategy in their timer charging, you set a start time and departure time, it then tries to reach full charge as close to departure as possible. Although the only thing else that the manual says about this topic is that you should avoid leaving the car fully charged for long periods of time in hot weather. Or maybe they said direct sunlight in hot weather. Something like that, I'm going from memory from back when I was looking at getting a Prius Prime. But the Honda Clarity is not the Prius Prime so there is only so much that we can infer from what Toyota recommends about the Prime.

I tend to doubt though that this is what Honda meant, as otherwise I think the wording would have been more like, "To help extend the lifespan of the battery, each time that you fully charge the battery it is recommended that charging should be completed immediately prior to driving". And then to make this possible they would have needed to have included Departure Time in the timer scheduling like Toyota does, otherwise it's very difficult to do.

My current theory on their statement is that possibly cell balancing only occurs when charging to full. Now cell balancing may not be needed all the time, maybe say once every month or two, or many even just every few months, who knows. But whatever it is, that would be too complicated to explain and so it's easier to just tell everyone to charge to full every time.

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