Battery drain while parked for vacation?

[user 527]

I'd imagine this has been discussed, but I couldn't find a thread if it has already. Anyway, I'm curious about the rate of drain on the batteries when left stationary. Let's say, hypothetically, that when you park your Spark EV at the airport for a trip of one month (I wish I could take a vacation that long, btw), and it reads 50 miles remaining, what might it read upon return a month later? For purposes of this query, let's say the range in temp was 50-75.

 

[TonyWilliams]

I'd imagine this has been discussed, but I couldn't find a thread if it has already. Anyway, I'm curious about the rate of drain on the batteries when left stationary. Let's say, hypothetically, that when you park your Spark EV at the airport for a trip of one month (I wish I could take a vacation that long, btw), and it reads 50 miles remaining, what might it read upon return a month later? For purposes of this query, let's say the range in temp was 50-75.

Almost any modern EV is fine for this. The various Tesla models need to be plugged in because their temperature management consumes power when parked.

The singular issue with modern EV's is that with all the telematics, it tends to drain the 12 volt battery. I leave my cars on a 12 volt battery tender / trickle chargers when gone for more than a week.

If parked at a lot without power, either use a solar powered trickle charger or just disconnect the 12 volt altogether.

 

[Nashco]

I believe you'll be fine for a month as long as it's not below freezing (which is when the car wants to be plugged in to take care of the high voltage battery). It would certainly help if you had a solar charger, but if you don't have one I wouldn't worry much about it for a month. Alternatively, you can easily unhook the 12V battery in a matter of seconds. All that is required is a 10mm wrench; pop the hood, disconnect the (easily accessed) negative cable from the 12V battery with a 10mm wrench...takes about 30 seconds from start to finish! You won't even lose any of your personalized information like radio settings, etc. when you do this with the Spark EV.

Worst case scenario, if you ever do have a dead 12V battery, you can hook up jumper cables to the 12V battery under the hood and then turn the car on and drive away just like any normal car.

There's a lot of discussion on this topic here:

http://mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3726&p=6665

This is what the owner's manual states:

Vehicle Storage

Up to Four Weeks

-Plug in the charge cord.

Four Weeks to 12 Months

-Discharge the high voltage battery until two or three bars remain on the battery range
indicator (Battery symbol) on the instrument cluster.

-Do not plug in the charge cord.

-Remove the black negative (−) cable from the 12-volt battery and attach a trickle charger to
the battery terminals or keep the 12-volt battery cables connected and trickle charge from the
underhood remote positive (+) and negative (−) terminals. See Jump Starting on page 10-57 for
the location of these terminals.

If you don't have your paper owner's manual handy, you can reference it online here as well:

2014 Spark EV Owner's Manual

2015 Spark EV Owner's Manual

Bryce

 

[user 527]

I believe you'll be fine for a month as long as it's not below freezing (which is when the car wants to be plugged in to take care of the high voltage battery). It would certainly help if you had a solar charger, but if you don't have one I wouldn't worry much about it for a month. Alternatively, you can easily unhook the 12V battery in a matter of seconds. All that is required is a 10mm wrench; pop the hood, disconnect the (easily accessed) negative cable from the 12V battery with a 10mm wrench...takes about 30 seconds from start to finish! You won't even lose any of your personalized information like radio settings, etc. when you do this with the Spark EV.

Worst case scenario, if you ever do have a dead 12V battery, you can hook up jumper cables to the 12V battery under the hood and then turn the car on and drive away just like any normal car.

There's a lot of discussion on this topic here:

http://mychevysparkev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3726&p=6665

This is what the owner's manual states:

Vehicle Storage

Up to Four Weeks

-Plug in the charge cord.

Four Weeks to 12 Months

-Discharge the high voltage battery until two or three bars remain on the battery range
indicator (Battery symbol) on the instrument cluster.

-Do not plug in the charge cord.

-Remove the black negative (−) cable from the 12-volt battery and attach a trickle charger to
the battery terminals or keep the 12-volt battery cables connected and trickle charge from the
underhood remote positive (+) and negative (−) terminals. See Jump Starting on page 10-57 for
the location of these terminals.

If you don't have your paper owner's manual handy, you can reference it online here as well:

2014 Spark EV Owner's Manual

2015 Spark EV Owner's Manual

Bryce

Thanks! I think I'm picking up my car tomorrow!!

 

[genosensor]

We left ours parked in a carport without any power at all for 5 wks while we were vacationing.
Just got in and drove home. In fact, the traction battery seemed not to have discharged at all.