Wireless charger issues

[dont slow down]

I'm pretty disappointed with the wireless charger in our 22 limited. It doesn't seem to charge very well and my phone gets really hot. I have a Samsung s21 phone.

I just performed a test to get some numbers.

Put my phone on the wireless charger at 1:30, it was at 10%. At 2:00 I checked it, it was 23%. At 2:45 it was at 33%. The first check makes sense. At 30 minutes it got 13%, but the second check it only got 10% more over 45 minutes.

My phone was also very hot. I think the phone stops accepting the charge when it gets too hot, which to me makes sense as for the slow down in charge rate.

The phone does not get hot with any of my 3 other wireless chargers that I regularly use. Why does this one get so hot? For a $500 option this charger works pretty poorly. Anyone else have issues?

 

[Rick]

Our phones are too big to even use the wireless charger unless they are out of their cases.

 

[dont slow down]

Another hour and 20 minutes on the wireless charger yielded another 10% increase. So a total of a 3.5 hour drive charged my phone 33%. Pretty sad.

 

[J_C]

Is it in a case? Is it positioned well? Do you have something running in the background that is using compute resources, getting your phone very hot, AND using power, to account for this? I mean that if the charging was poor/slow, that should heat up your phone that much less. The faster the charge rate, the more heat it generates.

I don't know what you are using your phone for while driving. Maybe I am barking up the wrong tree, but I know that one thing I leave off when not driving is bluetooth, and the screen is off, not typically running nav apps if I know where I'm going, not streaming music or anything.

Maybe the wireless charger is bad. Just throwing things out there to think about, and it doesn't make sense to me to simultaneously have slow charging AND hot phone and trying to blame the charging... unless your charger has a defect and has a short in the EM coils to cause the heat.

The efficiency of this (any) EM charging is fairly low, but you could research that efficiency and measure what the charging circuit is drawing to see if there's excessive loss. Just spitballing, I can't imagine that the design inherently overheats phones.

 

[Brockdog12]

There are complaints about this with other Ford models including the Bronco. My Bronco did not have one, but my Explorer does, haven't tried it yet though.

 

[dont slow down]

Is it in a case? Is it positioned well? Do you have something running in the background that is using compute resources, getting your phone very hot, AND using power, to account for this? I mean that if the charging was poor/slow, that should heat up your phone that much less. The faster the charge rate, the more heat it generates.

I don't know what you are using your phone for while driving. Maybe I am barking up the wrong tree, but I know that one thing I leave off when not driving is bluetooth, and the screen is off, not typically running nav apps if I know where I'm going, not streaming music or anything.

Maybe the wireless charger is bad. Just throwing things out there to think about, and it doesn't make sense to me to simultaneously have slow charging AND hot phone and trying to blame the charging... unless your charger has a defect and has a short in the EM coils to cause the heat.

The efficiency of this (any) EM charging is fairly low, but you could research that efficiency and measure what the charging circuit is drawing to see if there's excessive loss. Just spitballing, I can't imagine that the design inherently overheats phones.

Thanks for the suggestions. It is in a case, a very thin case, which has never interfered with my nightstand wireless charger, my truck wireless charger, or my desk wireless charger. All different brand chargers, 2 of them are lower quality chargers, all charge fine.

During this drive my phone was not used for anything, no navigation, no music, just in standby. I keep all my background permissions and notifications very minimal, only about 5 apps have those permissions. Bluetooth and wifi are always on and never been an issue.

A quick google search said that the most common cause of heat during wireless charging is misalignment of the coils between the phone and charger. My phone fits just about perfectly in the space without much room to adjust. I did try flipping it during my test, one hour with the top of the phone towards the driver side and another hour with the top toward the passenger side. Still yielded poor charging and a hot phone.

I'm just wondering if this is something I should bring up with the dealer at our next appointment or if this was a really widespread problem with no real fix and it just being one of those Ford "the way it is" problems.

 

[themishmosh]

I feel like the wireless charging pad is a feature that's not really a feature. It doesn't accomodate today's larger phones. It charges fairly slowly, even with a good alignment. I think you are better off with a car mount/charger or just plug the phone into the USB to charge it quickly. It should be noted that Androids have the potential to charge faster wirelessly. Apple limits fast charger to their wireless charging pads... aftermarket charging pads are limited to 7.5W no matter what the charging pad says.

 

[melsbw69]

Is it in a case? Is it positioned well? Do you have something running in the background that is using compute resources, getting your phone very hot, AND using power, to account for this? I mean that if the charging was poor/slow, that should heat up your phone that much less. The faster the charge rate, the more heat it generates.

I don't know what you are using your phone for while driving. Maybe I am barking up the wrong tree, but I know that one thing I leave off when not driving is bluetooth, and the screen is off, not typically running nav apps if I know where I'm going, not streaming music or anything.

Maybe the wireless charger is bad. Just throwing things out there to think about, and it doesn't make sense to me to simultaneously have slow charging AND hot phone and trying to blame the charging... unless your charger has a defect and has a short in the EM coils to cause the heat.

The efficiency of this (any) EM charging is fairly low, but you could research that efficiency and measure what the charging circuit is drawing to see if there's excessive loss. Just spitballing, I can't imagine that the design inherently overheats phones.

The wireless charging feature sucks! I have a 2022 platinum explorer, and for what I paid EVERYTHING should work well. I hate when people assume we do not know how to use our vehicle. Even worse when they get on their morale high ground! If you cannot be helpful……keep it to yourself!

 

[melsbw69]

The wireless charging feature sucks! I have a 2022 platinum explorer, and for what I paid EVERYTHING should work well. I hate when people assume we do not know how to use our vehicle. Even worse when they get on their morale high ground! If you cannot be helpful……keep it to yourself!

Actually, it doesn’t charge correctly due to the camera lens sticking out too far on the phone. At least for iPhones.

 

[CCPhill]

I'm pretty disappointed with the wireless charger in our 22 limited. It doesn't seem to charge very well and my phone gets really hot. I have a Samsung s21 phone.

I just performed a test to get some numbers.

Put my phone on the wireless charger at 1:30, it was at 10%. At 2:00 I checked it, it was 23%. At 2:45 it was at 33%. The first check makes sense. At 30 minutes it got 13%, but the second check it only got 10% more over 45 minutes.

My phone was also very hot. I think the phone stops accepting the charge when it gets too hot, which to me makes sense as for the slow down in charge rate.

The phone does not get hot with any of my 3 other wireless chargers that I regularly use. Why does this one get so hot? For a $500 option this charger works pretty poorly. Anyone else have issues?

I have a Samsung S22 Ultra and it is too big to fit in the charger, but my wife has the standard 22 and that fit's but has on one occasion overheated. However, as I need to have my phone connected for Android Auto it is not a problem for me, what was a bigger problem is the little slot they have in front of the cup holders where I can connect a cable but I need 2 hands to do it . so found an accessory on Etsy that should be a standard offering on the Explorer. It basically is a tight fitting block that then allows me to just push my phone on as I get in the car and just pick it up as I get out, no more fumbling with wires, looks clean and automatically connects to the screen as soon as I put it in the slot

 

[Rick]

I have a Samsung S22 Ultra and it is too big to fit in the charger, but my wife has the standard 22 and that fit's but has on one occasion overheated. However, as I need to have my phone connected for Android Auto it is not a problem for me, what was a bigger problem is the little slot they have in front of the cup holders where I can connect a cable but I need 2 hands to do it . so found an accessory on Etsy that should be a standard offering on the Explorer. It basically is a tight fitting block that then allows me to just push my phone on as I get in the car and just pick it up as I get out, no more fumbling with wires, looks clean and automatically connects to the screen as soon as I put it in the slotView attachment 442081

Can you post a link to the product on Etsy?

 

[peterk9]

The wireless charging feature sucks! I have a 2022 platinum explorer, and for what I paid EVERYTHING should work well. I hate when people assume we do not know how to use our vehicle. Even worse when they get on their morale high ground! If you cannot be helpful……keep it to yourself!

The cost of a vehicle has nothing to do with things working properly or not. Having been a member here for more than 10 years, I have seen many instances where members have posted questions about their vehicles that are covered in the manual. It's impossible to know a poster's familiarity with their vehicle, so when another member replies in an attempt to help, they usually try to cover all items that may have a relationship to the problem. The member you replied to has been very helpful to the general membership and I see no reason whatsoever for your apparent disdain for him for attempting to help you.

Peter

 

[J_C]

... found an accessory on Etsy that should be a standard offering on the Explorer. It basically is a tight fitting block that then allows me to just push my phone on as I get in the car and just pick it up as I get out, no more fumbling with wires, looks clean and automatically connects to the screen as soon as I put it in the slot

Looks nice, but will that require a near-perfectly sized phone for it? Otherwise it seems like the vibration of the vehicle is going to eventually rip the USB port off the phone PCB if it has some play due to the phone not fitting tight enough.

 

[dont slow down]

I have a Samsung S22 Ultra and it is too big to fit in the charger, but my wife has the standard 22 and that fit's but has on one occasion overheated. However, as I need to have my phone connected for Android Auto it is not a problem for me, what was a bigger problem is the little slot they have in front of the cup holders where I can connect a cable but I need 2 hands to do it . so found an accessory on Etsy that should be a standard offering on the Explorer. It basically is a tight fitting block that then allows me to just push my phone on as I get in the car and just pick it up as I get out, no more fumbling with wires, looks clean and automatically connects to the screen as soon as I put it in the slotView attachment 442081

I purchased one of those for my wife and it works really well. A well designed product. Won't work with my Samsung unfortunately but I'm not the primary driver of the vehicle so that's OK. I have since changed phones to the s23+ and with my case it does fit. It still charges slow but doesn't get hot anymore. So I guess I'm good for now.

 

[CCPhill]

Can you post a link to the product on Etsy?

Ford Explorer 2020 Charger and Holder Compatiable With Android and iPhone 15, 15 Plus, 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max - Etsy

This Car Accessories item by 3Dtmacdotcom has 223 favorites from Etsy shoppers. Ships from Pinckney, MI. Listed on Mar 23, 2024

www.etsy.com

 

[CCPhill]

Looks nice, but will that require a near-perfectly sized phone for it? Otherwise it seems like the vibration of the vehicle is going to eventually rip the USB port off the phone PCB if it has some play due to the phone not fitting tight enough.

I have not had any issues. It seems to be a very stable holder. I have even hit bumps without losing the connection

 

[Rick]

Ford Explorer 2020 Charger and Holder Compatiable With Android and iPhone 15, 15 Plus, 15 Pro, 15 Pro Max - Etsy

This Car Accessories item by 3Dtmacdotcom has 223 favorites from Etsy shoppers. Ships from Pinckney, MI. Listed on Mar 23, 2024

www.etsy.com

Thanks!

It will work with both my wife's Samsung and my Pixel phone.

 

[CCPhill]

Thanks!

It will work with both my wife's Samsung and my Pixel phone.

If you get one let me know what you think. I really like mine