A DIY Solution for R1S Keep Mode

Vincent · 2025-01-10T19:33:15+00:00

A friend needed to support his son who would be running a 'very cold' marathon on Sunday while rucking a 30 pound pack. The outside temps will be around 15F-20F the whole time. The location of the race is nowhere close to any L2 chargers, but he's not worried about driving distance to or from the race - it is 50 miles away from his house. He says he will be sitting in his ruck with his laptop and watching his live track+Garmin inReach data for the duration of the race (about 4 hours). He thought about taking his Honda EB2800i gasoline powered generator, if he can use the level 1 EVSE attached to the generator and keep the truck running with full heat + power - without really consuming much of the truck's main battery? He feels it's super dorky to have a gas generator running while attached to a Rivian in the woods, just so he can stay warm, but don't know if it would work ok this way and 'preserve' the main battery so he doesn't need to worry about driving range when we wants to head home. He talked to me about it and I told him the simple answer is NO. I tested this theory the other night when I was plugged into a 5.9kW charger. To maintain the interior amenities (interior and exterior lights, radio, heater, seat heaters), it took almost all of the charge. I charged for 15 minutes, it delivered 1.6kW, and the truck consumed 1.4kW, delivering only 0.2kW to the truck battery. Told him he would be using a laptop at another 200ish watts. The little trickle charger charges at 1.4kW on a good day, 1.2kW is normal for me. You can slow the bleed, but you cant stop it. My advise to him was for him to charge it up to 100% at home, and roll the dice is what I would do.

Rivian Blue

Member

Dec 27, 2024

I love my R1S, but losing Keep Mode after moving from Tesla has been a real bummer. So I decided to solve it myself. And it's been working out great.

This is a simple shortcut to turn on climate, but it will only run if my phone is not on certain WiFi networks. This allows me to define where to NOT automatically turn on climate (home, work, friends house, wherever you want). I pair this with an automation that automatically runs the shortcut whenever my phone disconnects from the bluetooth in the truck.

It works really well. I jump out of the truck to run an errand, and my climate stays on, and my truck is still nice and toasty when I get back ten minutes later.For those that are concerned about waste, I'm reminded that climate is on due to Rivian's aggressive Live Activity on iOS. The automation can be turned off at any time, and for in town errands, is worth it's weight in kWH to have this absolute crucial feature back.

Bonus: It's almost better than Tesla's too since I don't even have to think about it. I always wished Tesla's keep mode would just always work for 10 minutes or so every time you left the vehicle, vs having to tap the button every time.

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