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Random Carplay failure - how to fix

1.8K views 16 replies 10 participants last post by  waterndirt  
#1 · (Edited)
Carplay will work for me continuously for days and then suddenly stop working. After several sessions of this, I am starting to suspect the problem may be the handshake between the phone and the car (our Cayenne's wireless BT based carplay is four years old, slow as a dog to start, but once it connects on the same phones it never fails).

Anyhow - here's what I have found works to restart CarPlay. You want to do this stopped somewhere safe, not while driving.

1) Go to the RR's connected devices settings, and delete your iphone from the list of approved devices.
2) Go to your phone, and select 'Forget this device' for the BT connection to your RR.
3) Search for the car's bluetooth on the phone and select Pair. A pairing request will pop up on both the phone and the RR. Accept both. It doesn't seem to matter which order is used (car first or phone first)
4) Approve all the requests that come up on the phone regarding address book etc.
5) After all this rigmarole - the phone will ask 'enable carplay' - select yes. If this does not happen, go back to step 1.
6) Once you select 'enable carplay' things will work fine for TBD days and fail again. Repeat this sequence again. I have had to go through this process 4 or five times in the last 5 months.
7) Stopping/restarting the car, shutting down and rebooting the phone do not have any effect on success or failure of step 5.
8) If you are the primary user of the car and you have multiple devices paired - one of the other devices will become the primary device once you do this. You can go into the connected devices setting and select your phone to be the primary device.

Also note - I do not connect my phone to the wifi hotspot of the car. In fact, I've not even provided the SSID and password of the car wifi hotspot to my phone. Carplay initiates over bluetooth and then switches to the wifi radio in the phone to talk to the wifi connection of the car (this is just using higher bandwidth wifi for the phone and car to transmit data back and forth, nothing more).

I've also experimented with wired USB carplay. Once the carplay connection fails - it will not come up on wired USB either.

I hope this sequence is of help to folks who are periodically experiencing this. This SHOULD NOT happen. I suspect it's a bug somewhere in LR's software stack, not Apple.
 
#3 ·
Carplay actually works by using the phone BT to communicate with the car, initiate an ad-hoc wifi hotspot using the in-vehicle hardware and then connect to this hidden wifi network (transmitted along with the regular wifi network of the car's hotspot) to transmit HDMI video over wifi to the central screen.
Carplay will not initiate if your phone is connected to another Carplay receiver (obviously).
Carplay will delay connection to the screen when the iPhone is connected to a wifi network. A very common reason for frustration for all garage owners who have wifi access points in their garages. You need to get out of the range of the "regular" wifi for the iPhone to connect. Disabling wifi in iPhone settings will not help, disconnecting from the network may help but not always, as BT and wifi then race to connect and fire up the Carplay host (BT) and to connect to the known wifi network (wifi). Usually wifi wins.
 
#6 ·
A frustrating issue I had with CarPlay, that made me not use it, is that I use WiFi calling on my phone because my house doesn’t have strong cell signal.
The issue is, when I try to use CarPlay in the car, because it’s connecting via WiFi to the car, the phone goes to WiFi calling while driving. The problem is that my car often connects to the Tmobile network (rarely the att), and the Tmobile is not good where I live, whereas the Verizon network is much better and what my phone has. So when you’re driving, instead of using the Verizon network, you’re stuck using the WiFi calling on a poor connection Tmobile network just because the WiFi signal is strong in the car even tho the cell signal behind it is weak.
 
#8 ·
You can turn off WiFi calling on your iPhone, then your voice calls would be entirely on the Verizon network. Do you have it turned on for use inside your house? If so you can get a cellular hotspot inside your house that rides off your home internet. When I was on AT&T I used to have one of these because our house is like a faraday cage.
 
#11 ·
I totally agree on many of the points here. Carplay will work for a good stretch and then **** the bed. I have found that while in park, rebooting PIVI by holding the radio power button 10-15 seconds) (MY23), usually gets in back. Totally agree it seems like a handoff issue.

I would add to Step 5

5) After all this rigmarole - the phone MAY ask 'enable carplay' - select yes. If this does not happen, go back to step 1. Cause sometimes it doesn't.

At one point I did have to redo the LR WIFI because my phones wouldn't connect to Carplay no matter how many times I tried the above steps. Deleted it on phone, and it was actually turned off on the car somehow.

It is super frustrating, usually I can get it to work but it is my wife's car and she hates that it just doesn't work. Only positive thing I can say, my daughters Honda Accord also has issues with Carplay so it is not isolated to LR. Lastly, wireless works better than wired so I tell my wife to not connect her phone to the USB until it syncs up, cause when it drops wired, it is a park and reboot.
 
#14 ·
Reboot PIVI by pressing and holding the “call accept” button in the steering wheel until the infotainment screen restarts.
I’d take it to the dealer, take a video if you can of it happening. They may try to rat out and quote that Technical Bulletin about “spotty reception” for CarPlay. (Something about phone changing cell towers while driving in city-scapes causing CarPlay failure… b.s. IMO)
My experience is TA will likely authorize a replacement FICM if the software is up to date on the handheld and PIVI.
 
#15 ·
Hey everyone. I just started having this issue today. My USB port (in the center console) will not connect or charge or relay Apple CarPlay to my screen on my 2018 Range Rover sport. I have tried my kids phones, my wife's phone and I have tried different charging cables and none of them will charge or connect. However when I plug in my portable charger for my iPhone it charges the portable charger so there's nothing wrong with a USB port. This just started today. And I believe it started right after I renewed my subscription to the Range Rover app. Could this be coincidence?

Blues traveler I tried your steps… Thanks for that… However when I get to "5) After all this rigmarole - the phone will ask 'enable carplay' - select yes. If this does not happen, go back to step 1." It doesn't ask me to enable CarPlay. I've tried four times. And I am still left in the dark. Unfortunately after about an hours worth of online research I can't find a solution to this problem. Any ideas?
 
#17 ·
For those having issues, connect to the cars Wi_Fi, Navigate to Settings on your phone, tap Wi-Fi and then tap on the round info button next to the cars Wi-Fi SSID. Disable both Private Wi-Fi address and Limit IP Address Tracking. These do not apply in this setting and cause confusion in my opinion. Make sure phone is up to date.

Also, let's clear this up. Wi-Fi is not internet. Wi-Fi is a set of protocols that connect devices to a network wirelessly. Hotspot in this instance is the internet data / cell service that is fed into the cars network for use for other devices, ie iPad, computer, etc. The Hotspot is not necessary for CarPlay to work. I don't even subscribe to the LR Hotspot service any longer.

CarPlay needs the cars Wi-Fi and bluetooth in order for it to work while using the internet / data from your phone's cell service.

I have zero problems with CarPlay.