macarose said:
Hi there. Hope all is well.
How do you get the Chevy Spark EV in neutral if the big battery is dead?
Do you need to add jumper cables to the 12 Volt battery?
Any help would be a great help. Thanks so much!
Hi macarose, is there any update on your situation?
Yes, the 12V battery absolutely needs to be charged or running off a power supply and provide enough power to start up the low-voltage systems. If the battery voltage is not high enough, you'll just get caught in a drain trap where the car keeps trying to start and sources 20-50 amps, but the instrument cluster stays dim and nothing happens, eventually killing you battery. It happened to me and I had to disconnect the negative terminal, which was scalding hot. But it recovered after being stuck like this for 20-30 minutes and the 300V was able to engage and charge the 12V.
The user manual should mention the procedure to shift out of park and the things that will keep the shift lock engaged and hampering you. Check out 9-18 Driving and Operating.
To make it easy for you (but please still check):
-Have the battery at a healthy charge or on a charger or strong power supply (12.6V - 14.8V), jumper cables are fine as well
-Don't have anything plugged into the J1772 charge port
-Have the key fob with a healthy coincell battery in the "ignition" dock or inside
If all those things are taken care of, sit down, foot on the brake, and hit ON/RUN and you should succeed in shifting to N.
