Battery died

[2021Expy]

Good afternoon,
Thank you for letting me join. I have a 21 Expedition limited max. Brought her in the garage yesterday. Went to open the doors and nothing. Put my meter on the battery and reading 5.68v. Yes I know it's dead and needs to be 12.6 or close to it. The battery is 10/22. Really unsure why it would have drained it overnight. Thanks for the read.

 

[GlennSullivan]

I had a similar situation happen last summer with my 2017. The battery had been replaced less than 2 years prior, I left the truck in the garage with the radar detector on for a week and the battery discharged enough to trigger the battery management system. The remote and in-vehicle start would not work. Charged it for several hours, battery would not take a charge. Took the battery to the Ford dealer I bought it from 20 months prior and they did not believe me, performed their own charge and test routine and then handed me a new battery.

Bottom line, as a number of people on here will attest to (multiple several threads regarding same) it appears that with current batteries, if they are discharged, many times they are DONE and cannot be recharged / brought back.

2017 - No Key Detected After Dead Battery

have not driven the 2017 truck in a few weeks and inadvertently left the radar detector on. FOB battery is good, put Jump pack on truck, lights on, hatch opens and closes, but getting NO Key detected. What is the problem and how do I get around it? TIA.

www.expeditionforum.com

 

[2021Expy]

I kinda figured. Just don't understand what caused to just drain like that. Just trying to avoid spending money if this is going to be a reoccurring problem.

 

[GlennSullivan]

Did you have anything plugged into any of the vehicle ports, even if the device was not turned on?

 

[JasonH]

You can place a Bluetooth battery monitor on the replacement and it will allow you to monitor the voltage over time. My vehicle sits for long periods, so I can see the voltage dropping over the course of the week. If it drops substantially, something may be draining the battery. The new telematics systems in modern vehicles are frequently a culprit. They're known to have software issues that keep them in the wake state frequently, until the battery is toast. Usually there will be a software update. I would start there: check for a TSB for your vehicle VIN.

 

[MTB2022]

My 2022 flaked out on a trip up north in december. Drive mode and 4 wheel drive unavailable . Multiple times totally random. The little wrench appeared went away and came back. A couple of weird display issues also on 12 inch radio screen. Finally got it for service and they ended up replacing the battery. 9Kmiles when it all went down.

 

[2021Expy]

The only thing I plugged in was a baby monitor camera to the 12v up front. It has an on off switch. Not sure if it pulled enough juice while off but still plugged in.

 

[2020-MAX-Limited]

I kinda figured. Just don't understand what caused to just drain like that. Just trying to avoid spending money if this is going to be a reoccurring problem.

I turned off all wifi access and automatic update functions so the car would not be constantly connecting to wifi and ford's cloud when it was sitting in the garage. It was always going into power save mode anyway.

Alternately, you could leave the 12V battery on a trickle charger while sitting. For me, it took several trickle charge cycles to restore the battery to a good charge and now it doesn't go into power save mode unless I let it sit for almost two weeks between drives. I took it off the charger when we went away on vacation, and after 10 days, the Fordpass app finally said the car went into battery save mode.

 

[GlennSullivan]

I've mentioned before in other threads on this subject that I now have battery tenders for every vehicle we own with quick connect cables installed on the vehicle. If I'm not going to use the vehicle for a week or more, it goes on the tender.

It is not like the old days, when you left your interior lights on, the battery went dead, you jumped it or put it on the charger and all was well, like it never happened. If you discharge a battery today, no matter how new, chances are it is done. Happened to me 2x in recent years and after battery replacement there was no indication of any other issues, such as a drain or charging system problem.

 

[2021Expy]

Changed the battery in the bus amazing how things work with juice lol.