TonyWilliams said:
Boomer23 said:
If you get close to 86 miles of range at an average of 4.0 mi/kWh or 98 miles of range at 4.5 mi/kWh, you shouldn't be concerned. Assuming we can believe the dash energy economy meter (a big IF, I agree), you'll be close to 21.5 usable kWh, which we believe is what the LEAF pack holds.
Which is exactly why we do range tests at a fixed speed, hence fixed power consumption on level, no wind dry hard surface roadways, tires at 36 psi (on the Ecopias... the new Michelins might be a little off).
Then, we can see the errors more clearly. If you car was doing funny business with the low end Gids, I would not trust it to be very accurate with the economy.
If the car can drive at 100km/hr ground speed (whatever that is on your speedometer, typically 65mph) for a distance of 84 miles, then you have 21kWh useable. On the flat terrain described above, it should be 4.0 miles/kWh. But, even if the economy showed some crazy number, the fact remains that the power consumed will be a constant.
Oh, and the battery needs to be close to 70F. If it's hotter, obviously it has a wee bit more oomph.
I did a new range test today, adhering as closely as possible to Tony's recommendations without risking running out of charge on the freeway or major highway. My results confirmed several things about my 2013 May built LEAF: Full range to Turtle was
88.9 miles, dash economy display read 4.1 mi/kWh at 100 kph steady speed, calculated usable capacity same as my earlier test at 21.7 kWh, and the car still demonstrates the same previously unexpected behavior that I saw during my first Turtle run and confirmed by stjohnh on his 2013 LEAF: below 10 Gids, driving
7 miles between 10 Gids and Turtle at 5 Gids.
Details:
LEAF SL, Premium, Built May 2013, Delivered June 15, 2013, odometer mileage at start of test: 1,942 miles.
Location Irvine to Hawthorne, CA and return, Ambient temp appx 68 degrees at test start.
Tire pressures set at 36 psi cold.
Climate Control and Radio off.
Measured 100 kph from LEAF diagnostic settings screen equals 63 mph for my LEAF
Cruise control at 63 mph
ECO mode on, B mode off
Windows closed, driver only aboard
Test performed on Interstate 405 North from Irvine and return same route beginning at 8:15 AM. 8/17/2013
ELM LEAF Battery App ("LBA") used for all readings except that original genuine Gid Meter was used to check Gids at full charge and compared with LBA at beginning of test.
Beginning readings at full charge (charge begun the previous night at 2 am, no end timer set):
Gids: 268 (Gidmeter and LBA agreed)
AH: 61.8 (LBA)
Health: 95.25% (LBA)
Battery Temps: 6 Bars on dash, 82.9 F, 81.2 F, 79.0 F (LBA)
Test data:
Drove 37.7 miles to first turnaround, indicated Gids approx 140, approx 50% Gids
LBW at 67.7 miles, 49 Gids
VLBW at 75 miles
Off freeway at 77.7 miles (purposely overshot start point because I had charge remaining) and return trip to home base on surface streets, reset and maintaining second (center screen) economy meter at 4.1 mi/kWh to match dash display for remainder of trip (both displays usually match on my 2013 car, unlike my 2011 car)
10 Gids at 81.8 miles
7 Gids at 84.9 miles
6 Gids at 87.0 miles
5 Gids and Turtle at 88.8 miles
Stopped at home base at 88.9 miles
End data at Turtle:
Miles driven; 88.9 miles (Dash odometer)
Dash and center screen economy displays = 4.1 mi/kWh
Data below is from LBA
Gids: 5
% Gids: 1.8%
SOC: 1.4%
Remaining kWh: 0.4 kWh
Battery temps: 92.6 F, 90.8 F, 87.6 F
AH: 61.8
Health: 95.56%
Max Voltage Diff: 106 MV (usually reads about 11 MV when car is fully charged)
Calculated usable kWh: 88.9 mi/4.1 mi/kWh = 21.68 kWh
kWh required to recharge to 100% full: 24.6 kWh
I realize that this test differs somewhat from a true Tony 100 kph range test to Turtle in at least two ways: 1) I did not continue at 100 kph until Turtle (though I did maintain an indicated 4.1 mi/kWh throughout the test, including resetting one economy meter at the 77.7 mile mark when I left the freeway), and secondly the battery temps were above Tony's recommended 70 degrees F, something I couldn't control.
Conclusions:
2013 LEAF SL full range 88.9 miles at 100 kph (mostly) and dash indicated 4.1 mi/kWh.
I've demonstrated again that my 2013 LEAF, at least, needs to be driven to Turtle to observe its actual range capability, because similar to my first Turtle run with this car, there were still,
unbelievably,
7 miles available from 10 Gids down to 5 Gids and Turtle. As I mentioned above, stjohnh saw the same behavior in his Turtle run with his 2013 May built LEAF. This battery behavior may be indicative of the way that new US built LEAF packs behave at low SOC. The pack behaves as if there is a hidden reserve of roughly 1.5 kWh below 10 Gids that isn't viewable in the Gid count. Unfortunately, I wasn't recording the full data set from the LBA, so I don't have the indicated remaining kWh at 10 Gids.
EDIT: Also, since this pack behavior at low SOC has now been duplicated on my car in a second Turtle test and also in another LEAF of similar build date, it appears to be a characteristic of this batch of LEAFs rather than a fluke or due to a very new pack that is still in the process of balancing or such a new pack that the BMS is still learning the pack.
Another conclusion is that my LEAF was able to demonstrate what appears to be full driving autonomy (range) with an Amp Hour reading of "only" 61.8 and Health of "only" 95%. Whatever is causing this widely seen recent drop in AH doesn't seem to be affecting actual driving range. So my recommendation is that folks shouldn't worry so much about dropping AH readings. They may be relatively meaningless in terms of battery health and range.
Also, the usual practice of estimating remaining range autonomy by calculating from Gids remaining will give a falsely low reading with my car (and possibly other new build 2013 LEAFs), leading the driver to predict less range than the car can deliver.
