acceleration lag + atypical Battery Cooling Fan

Today after sitting for 75 minutes in 70F weather, when I powered on the car the Drive Battery Cooling Fan turned on. It only does that right after I've driven it hard on the freeway, not after sitting (before sitting it had dome ten minutes of only moderate freeway driving).

Then merging onto the freeway nearly floored, acceleration 'surged', by which I mean that instead of a smooth acceleration I got lags and kept to 60 mph. These lags only lasted about five minutes.

On the way home I started the car again (no fan this time), freeway-merged and accelerated hard (as much as 0 to 70) some more times, but no more lag. At this point I wouldn't have been surprised if the Drive Battery Cooling Fan turned on again, and it did...but not until after about ten minutes of driving slow on city streets.

I'm nervous this might be the first sign of drive battery issues. The Green Bars still go to the top.

Fortunately I wasn't planning to drive it again until it's appointment in a week for 100K service at Art's here in Berkeley, California.

 

Thanks very much for your reply, bisco! (I always forget about codes; I gotta get me one of those code reading thingies.)

The fan being clogged is a nice thought, I'm gonna let that relax me until it's sorted!

 

Aaaah, I see. No trouble lights.

 

Art's thinks it is the first sign of drive battery death.

I was about to sell it when the pandemic started, and don't drive enough to merit a hybrid...but given the car shortage and the shape it's in (I had them do an inspection), when it does die I'm gonna drop the $2.6K on having them replace the battery.

We didn't bother to clean the battery fan. The timing of the anomalous fan activity doesn't really suggest it, and I never had a pet in the car or drove an inch in dusty conditions when the windows weren't closed.

If it weren't for my carpal tunnel, I'd probably clean the fan anyway just for fun.