Phantom / Vampire Drain Solution Works! Using 12v Battery Tender

[mudito]

Guys, I know its annoying and another hack, but can I just disconnect the 12V battery from its loads and the truck will go truly dormant? I sometimes don't use it for 3-6 or more weeks at a time, especially in winter. Of course, naturally, I understand that I won't have Bluetooth communications with the truck but that's OK. Will it just be be back to normal when I reconnect the 12V battery? James

I think you need to disconnect both the High Voltage and the 12V Batteries and that's basically a full shutdown. I don't know if you will have any Error Lights or messages once the truck is back as I never performed this myself. My guess is that it should be OK as it should be the same procedure as a 12V swap.

Having said that, you'll lose the thermal management features, so (in the winter case) the extreme cold might impact your battery health, so I would probably NOT recommend this procedure.

My recommendation would be to either do the battery tender 'hack' and/or enable shipping mode with Gear Guard and everything else disabled in your truck. That should reduce the battery consumption for sleeping/idle while still keeping the critical systems up and running

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[Nixapatfan]

Also if you miss an update cycle it probably won't be able to update until you place a service call to resend updates. Best to use a battery tender.

 

[James Worden]

Yeah, I wasn't thinking to get as extreme as disconnecting the HV battery pack, that seems like alot plus the issues you mentioned. I was just thinking if loads were disconnected from the 12V battery, it wouldn't drain it constantly. 0.7 - 1kW/day is wicked extreme for an idle loss. The tender idea keeps the loss fed which is good but I also don't want to throw away 25-30kWh every month with the truck siting around. I would just as easily plug the truck in once every month bring back to 50-60% SOC, the only difference is this goes throught the trucks HV to DCDC converter to keep the 12V battery charged.
- I really like the idea of reducing or eliminating the idle loads or losses as much as possible.
- This "shipping mode" is interesting, does that reduce standby loads and losses? How do I put it in "shipping mode"?

 

[mudito]

The tender idea keeps the loss fed which is good but I also don't want to throw away 25-30kWh every month with the truck siting around.
- I really like the idea of reducing or eliminating the idle loads or losses as much as possible.
- This "shipping mode" is interesting, does that reduce standby loads and losses? How do I put it in "shipping mode"?

So, when you're connected to a tender, it won't draw the same as if you don't. Since there will be no need to charge the 12V, the computers won't do a full 'wake' and hence that results on less power draw.

- This "shipping mode" is interesting, does that reduce standby loads and losses? How do I put it in "shipping mode"?

You go to the settings App/Service and there's a toggle in that menu that puts the truck in Shipping mode which is designed specifically to preserve battery while on transit (it turns off non-vital functions like telemetry, cloud communication, etc). This definitely helps with Vampire Drain, while not a full fix.

The best combination would be shipping mode + battery tender. Not sure how much draw you might get from the tender, but I'm sure it'll be MUCH LESS than the 25-30kWh you'd normally get as monthly loss.

 

[James Worden]

Mudito, Thanks. Makes good sense. I’ll try these things, starting with shipping mode, then maybe the tender as well.

 

[Dbl-J]

Why go through the trouble of getting a tender, if you just plug the vehicle in and put it in shipping mode?
I see your point about the benefit of shipping mode and using a tender. I’m just trying to understand the benefit if I’ve got the wall charger in my garage, instead of using the tender.
On that note, would it make sense to also use a tender and plug the car in if you’re going to store it?

 

[Nixapatfan]

Why go through the trouble of getting a tender, if you just plug the vehicle in and put it in shipping mode?
I see your point about the benefit of shipping mode and using a tender. I’m just trying to understand the benefit if I’ve got the wall charger in my garage, instead of using the tender.
On that note, would it make sense to also use a tender and plug the car in if you’re going to store it?

Plugging the vehicle keeps the HV topped up but doesn't directly charge the 12v so you'd still lose 1-2kw per night. The tender will only use a few watts per night so if the goal is to save energy then the tender is the way to go.

 

[James Worden]

In essence, the overall design architecture is poor and not thought out very well and I do hope there’s a software fix that Rivian engineering will come up to help reduce the automatic sleep mode as much as possible so anyone who cares about efficiency and wasted 1 kWh/day won’t have to do these couple of hacks to bandaid the issue. It’s a lot of energy. Very few people are going to go to this effort and trouble.
I’m am glad that smart folks like on this forum figured out a hack do at least nerdy or technical folks can do something about the issue.

 

[Dbl-J]

Plugging the vehicle keeps the HV topped up but doesn't directly charge the 12v so you'd still lose 1-2kw per night. The tender will only use a few watts per night so if the goal is to save energy then the tender is the way to go.

would it be possible to plug both in at once/ same time?

 

[Nixapatfan]

would it be possible to plug both in at once/ same time?

I personally haven't tried this but I see no reason why you couldn't. The HV charger doesn't have a direct connection to the 12v.

 

[James Worden]

I set the truck in shipping mode and locked it and I will report back what it uses per week at the same temp in this condition. I don't have a tender on yet. If I do the tender, I think I'll do a 40-50W solar module with 13.5V max output max power tracker that way its all in the truck. (obviously, not useful in a garage).

 

[mudito]

I set the truck in shipping mode and locked it and I will report back what it uses per week at the same temp in this condition. I don't have a tender on yet. If I do the tender, I think I'll do a 40-50W solar module with 13.5V max output max power tracker that way its all in the truck. (obviously, not useful in a garage).

Looking forward to this test!

 

[James Worden]

I’ll write back in a week and then 2 weeks with the shipping mode on and locked, all else should be off, like Gear Guard.

 

[MikeWilliams_R1T]

I can see this being pretty useful for extended trips where I’m parked at the airport… especially in the economy lot outside.

I have a 30w solar battery tender I use on my boat. Connecting that to the OBD2 adapter mentioned earlier in this thread, I could still keep gear guard on and maybe. not lose 2% a day while parked.

The tender has suction cups that I could connect to the windshield or just lay it on the dash. Best results, maybe suction cup it to the roof or hood outside and run the cable in through the door.

Even if it only cuts the VD in half by keeping the 12v a little better topped up, it makes it worth a shot.

 

[James Worden]

Good idea with the solar, I wish Rivian had just built a small solar module into the design, it could be embedded in the rear window, along the top of windshield or somewhere on the body. Wow 2% energy use per day for Gear Gaurd, that crazy, 1.4kWh/day. My Eufy cameras around the house run 180 days on an internal Li battery. I guess Rivian didn't take apart one of these to see how they motion sense and record 4K video with low energy!

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