EV (electric vehicle) News and Discussion

Forums › Transport (cars, bikes and boats) › EV (electric vehicle) News and Discussion

1 | ... | 749 | 750 | 751 | 752 | 753 | 754 | 755 | 756 | 757 | 758 | 759 | ... | 771

8865 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 9545

Trusted

2degrees

Lifetime subscriber

#3471616 19-Mar-2026 09:19

HarmLessSolutions:

This little gem came into my Reddit feed today. Satire of course but very close to the mark in reality.

Likewise this one from Aus.

iPad Pro 11" + iPhone 15 Pro Max + 2degrees 4tw!

These comments are my own and do not represent the opinions of 2degrees.

sen8or

1897 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 1402

#3471623 19-Mar-2026 09:55

If other car dealers are as busy as we are, there'll be a lot more "Justin's" in the offices across the land.......

kangaroo13

87 posts

Master Geek
+1 received by user: 90

#3471630 19-Mar-2026 10:28

fastbike:

Now, on the exciting front, my Aria heads across the Strait (not the mined one) tonight so should be ready to collect from dealer on Monday. I wanted the larger battery so ended up with AWD model with a high trim spec.

Aria https://spectrum.ieee.org/ev-battery-swapping-aria-ev or Ariya https://www.nissan.com.au/vehicles/browse-range/ariya.html ?

I assume the latter, unless you're part of a very exclusive club. (The Aria is a very interesting idea, nevertheless, and great work by the Dutch students)

fastbike

443 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 317

#3471662 19-Mar-2026 12:23

kangaroo13:

Aria https://spectrum.ieee.org/ev-battery-swapping-aria-ev or Ariya https://www.nissan.com.au/vehicles/browse-range/ariya.html ?

I assume the latter, unless you're part of a very exclusive club. (The Aria is a very interesting idea, nevertheless, and great work by the Dutch students)

Good catch 😀 The first link looks very interesting though.

Otautahi Christchurch

fastbike

443 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 317

#3471667 19-Mar-2026 12:34

SaltyNZ:

Likewise this one from Aus.

That is brilliant .... and some of the others are equally witty. Good to have a laugh in serious times.

Otautahi Christchurch

Scott3

4176 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2990

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3471807 19-Mar-2026 17:15

Sub $5k Nissan leaf's are down to just 33 listings on trademe.

Would advise anybody considering buying one of these to take a lot of care.

As an example there is a 2013 with a 4 bar, 46% health battery, asking $3750. Seller is advertising 100km of range, despite the dash photo showing 44 km of range at 73% charge, which works out to 60km when fully charged (and the leaf is well known to be very optimistic with it's dashboard range estimate). Pre Iran, they would have been lucky to get interest at $500. For reference 2011 - 2013 leaf's loose about 5 percentage points of battery health a year, and once you go below about 45%, the odd cell with go weak, and the car will shut down when going up a steep hill etc. So a car like this is very much end of life.

There is somebody asking $4k for a 2014 with 3 bars...

Some people are going to get very burnt panic buying end of life leaf's for thousands of dollar's.

Would advise anybody here considering a leaf, to avoid anything 2013 or older (less degradation resistant battery chemistry), any 30 kWh (They can be fine, but have a greater risk of randomly dropping cells), and anything below 60% state of health (8 bars). 2014+ 24 kWh with 8+ battery bars would the minimum I would recommend...

FYI bars & Health table.

100% to 85% = 12 bars (15%)
85% to 78.75% = 11 bars (6.25%)
78.75% to 72.5% = 10 bars (6.25%)
72.5% to 66.25% = 9 bars (6.25%)
66.25% to 60% = 8 bars (6.25%)
60% to 53.75% = 7 bars (6.25%)
53.75% to 47.5% = 6 bars (6.25%)
47.5% to 41.25% = 5 bars (6.25%)
41.25% to 35% = 4 bars (6.25%)
35% to 28.75% = 3 bars (6.25%)
28.75% to 22.5% = 2 bars (6.25%)
22.5% to 16.25% = 1 bar (6.25%)

And if you can swing it, the 40 kWh leaf is a heap better than the 24 & 30 kWh

Lenovo

Shop now for Lenovo laptops and other devices (affiliate link).

CokemonZ

1106 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 313

#3471862 19-Mar-2026 21:16

Scott3:

Sub $5k Nissan leaf's are down to just 33 listings on trademe.

Would advise anybody considering buying one of these to take a lot of care.

As an example there is a 2013 with a 4 bar, 46% health battery, asking $3750. Seller is advertising 100km of range, despite the dash photo showing 44 km of range at 73% charge, which works out to 60km when fully charged (and the leaf is well known to be very optimistic with it's dashboard range estimate). Pre Iran, they would have been lucky to get interest at $500. For reference 2011 - 2013 leaf's loose about 5 percentage points of battery health a year, and once you go below about 45%, the odd cell with go weak, and the car will shut down when going up a steep hill etc. So a car like this is very much end of life.

There is somebody asking $4k for a 2014 with 3 bars...

Some people are going to get very burnt panic buying end of life leaf's for thousands of dollar's.

Would advise anybody here considering a leaf, to avoid anything 2013 or older (less degradation resistant battery chemistry), any 30 kWh (They can be fine, but have a greater risk of randomly dropping cells), and anything below 60% state of health (8 bars). 2014+ 24 kWh with 8+ battery bars would the minimum I would recommend...

FYI bars & Health table.

100% to 85% = 12 bars (15%)
85% to 78.75% = 11 bars (6.25%)
78.75% to 72.5% = 10 bars (6.25%)
72.5% to 66.25% = 9 bars (6.25%)
66.25% to 60% = 8 bars (6.25%)
60% to 53.75% = 7 bars (6.25%)
53.75% to 47.5% = 6 bars (6.25%)
47.5% to 41.25% = 5 bars (6.25%)
41.25% to 35% = 4 bars (6.25%)
35% to 28.75% = 3 bars (6.25%)
28.75% to 22.5% = 2 bars (6.25%)
22.5% to 16.25% = 1 bar (6.25%)

And if you can swing it, the 40 kWh leaf is a heap better than the 24 & 30 kWh

To add some real world experience.

I own a 2013 24kwh leaf with 4 bars and ~39.5% SoH.

For work I drive from Birkenhead to Mt Wellington and back - so a mix of stop start and motorway (39.8 kms) and it will take approx 35% of my battery one way, so 70% return.

The car also complains at 43% that the battery is low and I need to find a charger. This is a little before I hit the harbor bridge on the way home.

So make sure it will do what you want.

And the range decreases every year.

For now its fine, but starting to feel a little tight.

bfginger

1330 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 191

#3471885 19-Mar-2026 23:49

The 30kWh Leaf had a couple of battery management software problems. The first was it misdiagnosed the battery's state of health and would increasingly under-report it over time. The second was a failure to appropriately throttle charging speeds when DC charging leading to the battery being cooked and damaged. Nissan released a software update for the first problem, and there are third party fixes available for the second problem which I presume would include the fix for the first problem. If you can find at the right price a low mileage 30kWh Leaf which hasn't been DC charged it shouldn't be a bad option so long as you get the BMS updates installed.

Scott3

4176 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2990

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3471893 20-Mar-2026 01:56

CokemonZ:

Scott3:

Sub $5k Nissan leaf's are down to just 33 listings on trademe.

Would advise anybody considering buying one of these to take a lot of care.

As an example there is a 2013 with a 4 bar, 46% health battery, asking $3750. Seller is advertising 100km of range, despite the dash photo showing 44 km of range at 73% charge, which works out to 60km when fully charged (and the leaf is well known to be very optimistic with it's dashboard range estimate). Pre Iran, they would have been lucky to get interest at $500. For reference 2011 - 2013 leaf's loose about 5 percentage points of battery health a year, and once you go below about 45%, the odd cell with go weak, and the car will shut down when going up a steep hill etc. So a car like this is very much end of life.

There is somebody asking $4k for a 2014 with 3 bars...

Some people are going to get very burnt panic buying end of life leaf's for thousands of dollar's.

Would advise anybody here considering a leaf, to avoid anything 2013 or older (less degradation resistant battery chemistry), any 30 kWh (They can be fine, but have a greater risk of randomly dropping cells), and anything below 60% state of health (8 bars). 2014+ 24 kWh with 8+ battery bars would the minimum I would recommend...

FYI bars & Health table.

100% to 85% = 12 bars (15%)
85% to 78.75% = 11 bars (6.25%)
78.75% to 72.5% = 10 bars (6.25%)
72.5% to 66.25% = 9 bars (6.25%)
66.25% to 60% = 8 bars (6.25%)
60% to 53.75% = 7 bars (6.25%)
53.75% to 47.5% = 6 bars (6.25%)
47.5% to 41.25% = 5 bars (6.25%)
41.25% to 35% = 4 bars (6.25%)
35% to 28.75% = 3 bars (6.25%)
28.75% to 22.5% = 2 bars (6.25%)
22.5% to 16.25% = 1 bar (6.25%)

And if you can swing it, the 40 kWh leaf is a heap better than the 24 & 30 kWh

To add some real world experience.

I own a 2013 24kwh leaf with 4 bars and ~39.5% SoH.

For work I drive from Birkenhead to Mt Wellington and back - so a mix of stop start and motorway (39.8 kms) and it will take approx 35% of my battery one way, so 70% return.

The car also complains at 43% that the battery is low and I need to find a charger. This is a little before I hit the harbor bridge on the way home.

So make sure it will do what you want.

And the range decreases every year.

For now its fine, but starting to feel a little tight.

I sold my leaf at 66% health, so don't have any real world experience of really low health leaf's.

Really impressed that a 39.5% Health leaf is eating up a 40 km round trip without issue. Assume you need to charge to 100% every time?

At 66% health, my low battery warning would come on at something like 23%. Main issues compared to the start of my ownership where: slightly less range, fickle battery charge level monitoring below 20% (Occasionally would start dropping super fast), and degraded fast charge performance (speed was dropping a lot by 50% charge, and by 75% it was down to single digit kW's. At 85% it was so slow the 50 kW chargers would cut out. These this basically made it unworkable for anything long distance, but was a sweet commuter.

fastbike

443 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 317

#3471897 20-Mar-2026 05:36

If circumstances do force you to look at one of the 30kWh models (or tbh any Leaf) insist on the seller doing a LeafSpy scan while you are there, preferably when the car has less than 50% SoC and is under load.

You'll be able to see any weak cells - the greater the cell imbalance the weaker the battery is and the worse that range and power delivery will be (which affects speed and hill climbing).

I'm helping a colleague who is looking to buy a 24kWh model from his ex wife, who is buying a 2019 40kWh model (don't ask) as I have the dongle and licence

Otautahi Christchurch

Scott3

4176 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 2990

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3472030 20-Mar-2026 16:22

In Aussie, the cheapest 24 / 30 kWh leaf on carsales is asking AUD 10k. Cheapest other EV is AUD 16k (either a 40 kWh leaf or a MG ZS EV).

So despite people buying the old leaf's like crazy, NZ is still fortunate to have a much deeper used EV marketplace from an Earlier EV boom.

Geekzone support

Support Geekzone with one-off or recurring donations Donate via PressPatron.

wellygary

8810 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 5287

#3472033 20-Mar-2026 16:27

Scott3:

In Aussie, the cheapest 24 / 30 kWh leaf on carsales is asking AUD 10k. Cheapest other EV is AUD 16k (either a 40 kWh leaf or a MG ZS EV).

So despite people buying the old leaf's like crazy, NZ is still fortunate to have a much deeper used EV marketplace from an Earlier EV boom.

Although OZ never had second hand leafs ( leaves?) like NZ did...

When the shutters went up on the local manufacturing across the ditch, The dealers did a stitch up on the Federal government to preserve their profit margins and cushy dealer service plans.... Importing 2nd hand Vehicles is incredibly restrictive and pretty much impossible to stand up as a business model

fastbike

443 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 317

#3472034 20-Mar-2026 16:28

Scott3:

In Aussie, the cheapest 24 / 30 kWh leaf on carsales is asking AUD 10k. Cheapest other EV is AUD 16k (either a 40 kWh leaf or a MG ZS EV).

So despite people buying the old leaf's like crazy, NZ is still fortunate to have a much deeper used EV marketplace from an Earlier EV boom.

No even an earlier boom, I still see ZE0 models on the JDM auctions and judging by recent number plates they are still being imported, even though over 10 years old now.

Otautahi Christchurch

gzt

18683 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7824

Lifetime subscriber

#3472573 23-Mar-2026 13:27

Now would be a good time for PakNSave and supermarkets generally to start providing EV charge discount vouchers instead of petrol.

richms

29099 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 10209

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#3472576 23-Mar-2026 13:31

Problem is they are competing with home charging where most people charge so it will be the same as fuel discounts, people get way more than they can use.

Richard rich.ms

1 | ... | 749 | 750 | 751 | 752 | 753 | 754 | 755 | 756 | 757 | 758 | 759 | ... | 771