Nissan LEAF - General

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#2261638 20-Jun-2019 19:47

RUKI:

Linuxluver:.....

..... You can buy one for as little as $8,500 now... That's a very good deal ....

I would be very careful about having just price and the word "good deal" in one sentence without disclosure of significant details, i.e. what range and within what period battery performance (SOH, Delta V, others) is guaranteed for those money?

Hi Yury

The context was buy the old, cheap LEAF as a 'host' for the 'new' 38.5kWh battery from BlueCars.....You don't want to pay for more battery than the minimum because the original battery is being replaced. It would / could be a cheap way to get a longer range EV....and the LEAF is a very reliable vehicle in all wheels-rolling respects.

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#2261640 20-Jun-2019 19:57

A wee update on the @EVsEnhanced firmware upgrade to my 30kWh LEAF.

Last Saturday, I drove from Auckland to Opotiki. I took the most direct route and did the trip in well under 6 hours. This trip was only about 45 mins longer than driving an ICE.

The key thing here is I spent the day there (10am to 4pm) and started charging at 6.6kw at about 13:00, so I would be full about 4pm. I then drove back to Auckland, using all 50kw DC chargers on the most direct route. The battery got no hotter than 50.1C at any point. The last charge at Waihi did take 32 minutes instead of the usual 20-ish.....so the firmware change was clearly doing it's job and keeping the battery heat down.

My 30kWh LEAF can easily get from Greenlane in Auckland to Waihi as it's mostly downhill. Going the other way requires some care as you need about 2kWh extra to make the same trip uphill.......at a reduced speed. If I wanted to go faster, I would have gone via Matamata.....but that adds half an hour to the drive....so the overall trip time is about the same. The key here is that I didn't have to detour to Huntly Countdown for the slower charger.....and that saved me almost an hour. I got home in under 7 hours.....which is pretty good, energy-wise for my car on a windy, rainy night.

This firmware update is pretty good. The LEAF just can't get too hot.

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EVsEnhanced

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#2261837 21-Jun-2019 11:02

Thanks again for the great feedback @Linuxluver. We're glad to hear it.

Guilliman

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#2267697 1-Jul-2019 11:02

For me the interesting thing is that I've gone on generally longer road trips since I got my Leaf compared to the previous ICE cars I had. From Auckland eastern suburbs we've been to Coromandel a couple of times to visit Hot Water Beach, Rotorua and Kaitaia. The first Coromandel trip was a bit hairy initially because my first planned stop was a dairy at Waitakaruru. This stop turned out to be a slow charger tacked onto a Spark phone box and it wasn't working. So we ended up crawling to a cafe at Kopu to use their slow charger and had something to eat. From there is was up to Thames for the Chargenet station there and then back down and around to Tairua. From there straight to the beach [then realising we forgot a bloody shovel].

That was a learning experience and I've since got a bit better at using Plugshare. Rotorua was next and there was a stretch where I was nervously monitoring my estimated range but managed to scrape through. Second time to the Hot water beach was better planned [still the same basic route but added another fastcharge stop]. I believe the most recent trip to Kaitaia was easier and that was when I started to make full use of my carplay dongle and iPhone data. I found I could select the planned charge stations I had set in plugshare, push the address details to Apple Maps then get navigation guidance on the head unit display. I found it was a really good combination.

FYI, mine is a 2016 24kWh Leaf I picked up from GVI Penrose. It is a Japanese import but the guys there swapped in UK instrument cluster and stereo. Having the translated manual is awesome as well and the staff there are switched on. It's just now in the last week or so lost it's first bar. I don't recall off the top of my head what the kms were when I got it but they were reasonable from memory.

I do admire Teslas but for the immediate future they're outside my comfort zone price-wise. For my average weekly commute the Leaf is more than adequate and I'm glad I switched to an EV. Unfortunately I'll have to take it to the AA today because another driver swiped the left side so probably on a Swift in the meantime [for the second time, this swipe happened on the day I picked it up after a minor previous insurance repair!].

"Lose it. It means go crazy. Nuts. Insane. Bonzo. No longer in possession of one's faculties. Three fries short of a happy meal...WACKO!" - Col O,Neill

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#2267741 1-Jul-2019 12:53

Guilliman: It's just now in the last week or so lost it's first bar.

Funnily enough on my 2015 24kWh Leaf I haven't yet lost the first bar. I have added over 32,000 km to the odometer and I've worn out the front tyres, but I still have 12 bars.

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#2267750 1-Jul-2019 13:13

MarkH67:

Guilliman: It's just now in the last week or so lost it's first bar.

Funnily enough on my 2015 24kWh Leaf I haven't yet lost the first bar. I have added over 32,000 km to the odometer and I've worn out the front tyres, but I still have 12 bars.

We've got a 2014 24kWh. We've had it for 2 years. It was 94% SOH when we got it. Now it's 96%. By 2023 will it be back to 100% LOL.

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#2267784 1-Jul-2019 14:38

Nice, looks like those cars are being taken care of. As I understand it, using DC charging and/or high battery temps will impact the battery. I must refresh my memory on the SOH when I got it, I don't believe I have the requisite dongle installed for Leafspy so I don't know it's current state.

I mostly fast charge on long trips, otherwise it's an overnight top-up from the wall. My Mercury EV rate is still active for now.

"Lose it. It means go crazy. Nuts. Insane. Bonzo. No longer in possession of one's faculties. Three fries short of a happy meal...WACKO!" - Col O,Neill

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#2271272 7-Jul-2019 10:40

MarkH67:

Guilliman: It's just now in the last week or so lost it's first bar.

Funnily enough on my 2015 24kWh Leaf I haven't yet lost the first bar. I have added over 32,000 km to the odometer and I've worn out the front tyres, but I still have 12 bars.

SOH mostly declines with age rather than the Odometer, as numerous taxi studies have shown.

My 2016 (January build, so almost a 2015) has 89.5% SOH while cold which jumps to the low 90's when fast charged, so I don't think your car is unusual at all.

Linuxluver

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#2271564 8-Jul-2019 00:10

MarkH67:

Guilliman: It's just now in the last week or so lost it's first bar.

Funnily enough on my 2015 24kWh Leaf I haven't yet lost the first bar. I have added over 32,000 km to the odometer and I've worn out the front tyres, but I still have 12 bars.

In the last 4 days I've made two return trips Auckland to Opotiki in my 30kWh LEAF...and one of those was on Friday - there and back - between 6am and 9pm. A total of about 688km per return trip (the route I took)....so 1400km in 4 days with a total of 16 fast charges and two slow charges.

On Thursday morning my SoH was 84.92%. It's usually 87%, but I hadn't driven the car much for a several days and the battery was 13C. After all this driving my SoH was 89.5% and the battery at that point was 38C. The heavy use and charging had warmed the battery up and increased it's effective capacity. It was 23.9kWh available at 100% on Thursday morning....and this morning (Sunday) it was 25.1 kWh - an increase of 1.2kWh or about 10km.

I know warming the battery up does improve the SoH and as it cools the SoH will fall.....but if you drive a lot, you're keeping it warm. :-)

Plus the one-day return trip with a 3 hour turn-around was really only possible thanks the EvsEnhanced firmware update.....that slows the charging rate down to keep the battery (relatively) cooler......but warm enough to see the SoH got up by 4.5% from Thursday to Sunday.

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#2271971 8-Jul-2019 18:11

MarkH67:

Guilliman: It's just now in the last week or so lost it's first bar.

Funnily enough on my 2015 24kWh Leaf I haven't yet lost the first bar. I have added over 32,000 km to the odometer and I've worn out the front tyres, but I still have 12 bars.

Funnily enough on my 2015 24kWh Leaf I have lost the first bar. I have added over 65,000 km to the odometer. 🤡

Please keep this GZ community vibrant by contributing in a constructive & respectful manner.

Guilliman

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#2272275 9-Jul-2019 10:54

Sorry if this has been already answered but what determines the range estimation, in my case when unplugging from an overnight wall charge and starting up for the work commute?

Highest I've seen a few times was 160km, I think lowest might have been 138km, average seems to be around 145km. I didn't have any significant variation in my weekly commute patterns until recently when I actually starting trying different return routes via apple maps to beat congestion.

I imagine ambient temperature conditions come into consideration [e.g. summer vs winter]?

Another thing I'd just like to double-check is charging outside with exposure to the elements. We have a second floor balcony which can partially shelter the charging ports under ideal conditions and if I'm close enough to the garage door [so I can still open it!]. Reason I ask is I see you can get covers to enclose the ports when they're open and a cable is plugged in, worth bothering with?

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#2272289 9-Jul-2019 11:15

They call it a 'guessometer' for very good reasons!

Yes, both anecdotal observation of our Leaf and data published on Flip the Fleet's website supports the theory that lower temperatures result in lower range; ours typically reports a range about 15km lower in winter than in summer.

Have you tracked your 'fuel economy' over time? I have a habit of re-setting this every week, and if you have a Leaf with the CarWings interface it'll track earlier results. That also shows how our economy was significantly worse in winter than summer.

Like any car, economy in the Leaf is strongly affected by how you drive as well as where (open road vs city etc). But the GOM readings are somewhat farcical in terms of providing an accurate distance remaining, especially when shifting from say steady city driving to open road driving - this can drop incredibly quickly, giving a real scare in potential range (I recall our first open road trip in our Leaf - we were so worried by the huge drop-off we returned home and took our ICE car instead!)

As for covering the charging port - we charge ours in all weather conditions outside, and I've never worried about this. My biggest concern is my kids not bothering to put the rubber cap on the cable plug when it's not in use, lazy %#$%s.

tdgeek

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#2272297 9-Jul-2019 11:19

jonathan18:

My biggest concern is my kids not bothering to put the rubber cap on the cable plug when it's not in use, lazy %#$%s.

Dont worry about that! My little sister, maybe 3 or 4 helped my Dad fill the car up, put the hose in, filled it up, with H20. Very helpful :-)

Guilliman

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#2272384 9-Jul-2019 13:35

Ah yes, Carwings. I'm not sure I can use that. I tried to understand what the deal was with NissanConnect and relevant apps but I don't think my Leaf will support that. It's a Japanese import but with Instrument cluster and stereo changed with UK versions. I understand using any remote management features is dependant on one of the car modules and they're country/market specific?

I should probably look more in detail into that.

"Lose it. It means go crazy. Nuts. Insane. Bonzo. No longer in possession of one's faculties. Three fries short of a happy meal...WACKO!" - Col O,Neill

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#2272392 9-Jul-2019 13:56

Sorry, I only mentioned Carwings to differentiate the Japanese Leafs with the combined stereo/control unit to the base model that has a standard double DIN stereo. The latter manages all its settings via the screen directly above the steering wheel, whereas the former uses the colour LCD screen to manage car settings like charging timers, fuel economy history etc.

In other words, given you have the stereo/control unit, you'll be able to track fuel economy over time with the 'history' screen.

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