2019 Leaf battery overheating

[LeftieBiker]

This reminds me of the time when Toyota visibly stopped innovating on the Prius. People tried fitting various batteries to enable plugin feature but if there is no drive from the top it's all pointless. With the Prime it's too little too late.

You don't know about the 2012-2016 Prius PHEV? It certainly has its deficiencies (like no electric heat or heated steering wheel) but it's essentially Toyota copying what the backyard innovators did in the Aughts.

As for the overheating issue, maybe it's time to just consider our various opinions registered? I'll probably add something to the used Leaf buying guide about the 40kwh Leaf, at least. It definitely isn't suited to driving that requires more than one QC a day, or for hot climates and QC together...

 

[Astros]

Actually the opposite is the case. You think you have real numbers, but can't prove them, but insist that they are. Let me repeat, if your only source for your claim is a piece of software that cannot be verified and an internet entertainer who is also using the same unverifiable method, then you do not have credible data.

This is an incredibly frustrating thread. LeafSpy is a tool that provides several measurements, reported by the Leaf's computer.

One measurement is of something called a "GID", which is an arbitrary and uncalibrated unit. However, it is easy to determine through experiment that that measurement is linearly correlated with the usable battery capacity remaining, and that can be used to estimate driving range. The Leaf also provides a measurement of estimated range. Especially for pre-2018 Leafs, that measurement has a complex relation to the actual driving range remaining, to put it mildly.

Another measurement is of the battery state of health. This changes much more slowly than the state of charge, so it is harder to run an experiment. However, it is seen to decrease over time and correlate with usable range from a 100% charge. It can also be used to predict when a Leaf will lose the next bar of capacity. Since the Leaf doesn't lose a bar until it has lost 16% of its capacity, someone buying a used Leaf has no way to tell if the car has 5% or 15% degradation from any information the dealer can give you, or from any gauge in the car unless you charge the car to 100% and drive on the freeway for an hour.

Now, you could argue that it would be better to get factory calibrated measurements instead. That would be great, but we don't have that. We do have a tool for making measurements, however, and there are many people on this forum who have taken the time and effort to perform experiments and calibrate that tool themselves. Perhaps this effort is "entertainment" for some of us, but the result is valuable for those of us who rely on the Leaf for transportation and need to sometimes stretch it limits.

 

[metricus]

Actually the opposite is the case. You think you have real numbers, but can't prove them, but insist that they are. Let me repeat, if your only source for your claim is a piece of software that cannot be verified and an internet entertainer who is also using the same unverifiable method, then you do not have credible data.

Sorry, but that your claims just don't hold up to even the most cursory scrutiny.

Right, and the Earth is flat and we never landed on the Moon.
Got it!

 

[LeftieBiker]

Right, and the Earth is flat and we never landed on the Moon.
Got it!

Incorrect. We never landed on the moon and the Earth is flat unless Nissan confirms those facts.

 

[metricus]

Sorry, but that your claims just don't hold up to even the most cursory scrutiny.

At the end of the day the reality is that the overheating problems have accumulated to a level where it makes the Gen 2 Leaf PROBLEMATIC to use.

Again conjecture with no basis.

In other words the fact that after 235 miles the temp gauge was on red an the QC was only at 14kW is conjecture with no basis to you?

Or are you calling me a liar? How about you stop insulting our intelligence.

Don't you have better things to do in life other than spend your time on a forum where you disagree with everyone because you think they are lunatics?

Get a life man!

 

[cwerdna]

BTW, below is a history lesson regarding OE for some of the newer folks here. Back during the Phoenix capacity loss fiasco (http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?t=9694) at which time the '11 and '12 Leaf came w/NO capacity warranty and Nissan had made all sorts of statements to the effect of we don't need thermal management and that the battery after 10 years should have 70 to 80% remaining capacity, on average (more at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=508974), OE IIRC was busy trying to downplay and deflect the issue. At that time, we had even a 4 bar loser when the car had been out only 21 months.

A range test was later run: https://web.archive.org/web/20160113132627/http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=228326.

TonyWilliams pointed to some of his nuttiness at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=221444#p221444 and at some point, for reasons only known to him, he decided to go back and wipe most of his own posts. I posted my discovery of that at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=227337#p227337. Folks involved weren't thrilled about that.

A few of his wiped posts are available via archive.org like https://web.archive.org/web/20120912093153/http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=207105.

Although OE sometimes posts useful info and has some contacts at Nissan corporate, I think at least some folks here have learned something about his biases and agenda... If you tire of arguing w/him, just add him to your foes list.

 

[LeftieBiker]

If it helps, I promise to read his posts and to respond with corrections if he writes anything contrary to known facts, or to reality in general. We don't need numerous people getting upset and responding - all it takes is one with reasonable credibility. If this poster is upsetting you, put him on your Foes list and don't worry that no one will respond.

 

[metricus]

If it helps, I promise to read his posts and to respond with corrections if he writes anything contrary to known facts, or to reality in general. We don't need numerous people getting upset and responding - all it takes is one with reasonable credibility. If this poster is upsetting you, put him on your Foes list and don't worry that no one will respond.

Done!
Thank you!

It's not about being upset it's that his motives look highly dubious. To me he's a paid troll assigned to irritate and distract from the subject at hand. Which tells me that Nissan is extremely worried about this issue becoming mainstream. His fixation on LeafSpy also tells me that Nissan is pissed that people worked around their deceptive acts and is fighting its spread by all means.
The more he manages to annoy users the less they will be logging into the forum.

You can count on me ignoring anything about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. :evil:

 

[LeftieBiker]

Thanks. And don't be too sure about the paid troll part. Fanboys can behave exactly the same way.

 

[WetEV]

Thanks. And don't be too sure about the paid troll part. Fanboys can behave exactly the same way.

Of which there are many on this forum. Mostly Tesla fanboys.

 

[LeftieBiker]

Thanks. And don't be too sure about the paid troll part. Fanboys can behave exactly the same way.

Of which there are many on this forum. Mostly Tesla fanboys.

Yes, and the Web is full of fanboys - especially in car forums.

 

[metricus]

BTW, below is a history lesson regarding OE for some of the newer folks here. Back during the Phoenix capacity loss fiasco (http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?t=9694) at which time the '11 and '12 Leaf came w/NO capacity warranty and Nissan had made all sorts of statements to the effect of we don't need thermal management and that the battery after 10 years should have 70 to 80% remaining capacity, on average (more at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=508974), OE IIRC was busy trying to downplay and deflect the issue. At that time, we had even a 4 bar loser when the car had been out only 21 months.

A range test was later run: https://web.archive.org/web/20160113132627/http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=228326.

TonyWilliams pointed to some of his nuttiness at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=221444#p221444 and at some point, for reasons only known to him, he decided to go back and wipe most of his own posts. I posted my discovery of that at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=227337#p227337. Folks involved weren't thrilled about that.

A few of his wiped posts are available via archive.org like https://web.archive.org/web/20120912093153/http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=207105.

Although OE sometimes posts useful info and has some contacts at Nissan corporate, I think at least some folks here have learned something about his biases and agenda... If you tire of arguing w/him, just add him to your foes list.

WOW!

It's obvious he has an agenda. Whether he is paid or not is irrelevant. I doubt he is just a Fan Boy. If he also has ties at corp then we start having too many coincidences.

As for me I will continue to post my observations and I appreciate reading everyone else's.

 

[OrientExpress]

And just what is my agenda?

 

[metricus]

Here's another drive I took yesterday. Outside temp was around 22C (72F) ending up at 24C by the time I got home. Nice weather!

Left fully charged, no DCFC. Left with 25C battery temp. Went shopping and returned home after some 150 km with 40C battery temp. No Turnpike drive, 55 mph roads.
Then went to a party. The car remained outside some 4-5 hours or so. When I arrived home I still had 35C on my battery. Plugged in overnight as the charge was at 15%. This morning the battery temp is at 28.8 while the temp in my garage is 18C.

Conclusions:
A. 0.1C/km is a good reproducible number. Despite the mild weather you can count on your battery's temp steadily creeping up on you while you drive.
B. The temp gauge is clearly designed to mask the overheating issue. I started with the gauge in the middle. It stayed there until the temp reached 35C then jumped to first notch after middle. If I did not have LeafSpy I would have thought all is OK and temp is stable.
C. There is virtually no way I can ever charge at full power. If I leave fully charged I will surely get to 40C by the time I need to QC. At that temp my charge will be seriously throttled.
D. I can imagine that sometime during winter the car will reach a heat transfer balance in which we may see the temp decrease wile driving or thanks to LeafSpy we could let it cool right to that sweet spot when you can get a full power DC charge. However this will never happen during mild or hot weather.
E. The only way i could achieve a fast DCFC in this weather is if I let it discharge and take a morning trip to a DC charger. Obviously this would be just for testing purpose and would have no practical use in daily life.

In other words the advertised QC speed is the exception not the rule.

 

[OrientExpress]

In other words the fact that after 235 miles the temp gauge was on red an the QC was only at 14kW is conjecture with no basis to you?

Or are you calling me a liar? How about you stop insulting our intelligence.

Don't you have better things to do in life other than spend your time on a forum where you disagree with everyone because you think they are lunatics?

Get a life man!

The issue isn't that you are lying, it's just that you don't have a good understanding of what you are arguing about. the bottom line is that if you don't like you car, then get rid of it and get a car that satisfies you.

 

[SageBrush]

Conclusions:
A. 0.1C/km is a good reproducible number. Despite the mild weather you can count on your battery's temp steadily creeping up on you while you drive.
B. The temp gauge is clearly designed to mask the overheating issue. I started with the gauge in the middle. It stayed there until the temp reached 35C then jumped to first notch after middle. If I did not have LeafSpy I would have thought all is OK and temp is stable.
C. There is virtually no way I can ever charge at full power. If I leave fully charged I will surely get to 40C by the time I need to QC. At that temp my charge will be seriously throttled.
D. I can imagine that sometime during winter the car will reach a heat transfer balance in which we may see the temp decrease wile driving or thanks to LeafSpy we could let it cool right to that sweet spot when you can get a full power DC charge. However this will never happen during mild or hot weather.
E. The only way i could achieve a fast DCFC in this weather is if I let it discharge and take a morning trip to a DC charger. Obviously this would be just for testing purpose and would have no practical use in daily life.

In other words the advertised QC speed is the exception not the rule.

Yep,

Although (D) is a ymmv since you are presuming that L2 destination (overnight) charging is available. That is certainly the case from home but perhaps not on trips. The problem with trips is that the battery will accumulate heat day by day in moderate or warmer temperatures. Hard to say whether it will get to the threshold where DCFC is limited even for one morning charge a day but it would not surprise me in the summer. We should also remember that as the battery ages the heat generation will increase with changes in internal resistance.

All in all, the 40 kWh LEAF is an extended commuter car. If it is cheap enough and bought with that use case in mind people will likely be satisfied. The 62 kWh LEAF is a super-extended commuter car.

 

[metricus]

You don't know about the 2012-2016 Prius PHEV? It certainly has its deficiencies (like no electric heat or heated steering wheel) but it's essentially Toyota copying what the backyard innovators did in the Aughts.

I don't want to run off topic but yes, I know. It was a limited edition though and never arrived to PA. I think just like with the Volt the manufacturer has found that making a PHEV that has some decent EV autonomy is not a sustainable business option. You are basically building 2 cars in one. Toyota has invested a lot in researching, perfecting and marketing the Prius and at this point they just ride the wave to get their money back.

As for the overheating issue, maybe it's time to just consider our various opinions registered? I'll probably add something to the used Leaf buying guide about the 40kwh Leaf, at least. It definitely isn't suited to driving that requires more than one QC a day, or for hot climates and QC together...

Yes, there have been many informative posts on overheating for which I'm thankful. (except the harassing noise from OE)

At the end of the day there are 2 major overheating sources that compounded together result in the daily range limitation (~400km/250mi):
1. Driving which generates roughly 0.1C/km
2. Charging which generates 0.25C/%SOC

Obviously, these are not hard numbers but a good thumb rule for temperate climate. Hard fact is that I could not count on my car anymore after a 235 mile trip. Period.

Another conclusion so far is that 2019 Leaf has exactly the same RapidGate behavior as the 2018 tested by Bjorn. My numbers follow his red graph with precision.

IMHO there is more to the reason Nissan has not deployed the software "fix" to US. I think they have enough US driving pattern statistics to see that changing the graph would only result in more people ending up in turtle mode which is a far worse blow to reputation than the RapidGate complaints. Together with the evidence that they are removing 50kW and 40 min QC speed claims, this tells us that Nissan is in damage-control mode.

 

[metricus]

Although (D) is a ymmv since you are presuming that L2 destination (overnight) charging is available.

Sorry for not being clear. No I did not refer to that.
I was assuming that:
1. Either the driving heat gain would stop allowing me to DC charge at "50kW"
2. Or I would arrive at a DC charger warm but due to my leaf Spy I could see that the car is cooling off fast enough and if I wait another let's say 10 min I could be able to initiate a full speed charge.

There are a lot of assumptions and I have really no idea how this car will behave in winter. I will certainly post my findings though.

 

[paraski40]

Please, do not forget to sign the petition to put pressure on Nissan to make the upgrade available to North-Americas customer.

https://www.change.org/p/nissan-north-america-fix-rapidgate-for-early-2018-leaf-buyers

 

[DaveinOlyWA]

Here's another drive I took yesterday. Outside temp was around 22C (72F) ending up at 24C by the time I got home. Nice weather!

Left fully charged, no DCFC. Left with 25C battery temp. Went shopping and returned home after some 150 km with 40C battery temp. No Turnpike drive, 55 mph roads.
Then went to a party. The car remained outside some 4-5 hours or so. When I arrived home I still had 35C on my battery. Plugged in overnight as the charge was at 15%. This morning the battery temp is at 28.8 while the temp in my garage is 18C.

Conclusions:
A. 0.1C/km is a good reproducible number. Despite the mild weather you can count on your battery's temp steadily creeping up on you while you drive.
B. The temp gauge is clearly designed to mask the overheating issue. I started with the gauge in the middle. It stayed there until the temp reached 35C then jumped to first notch after middle. If I did not have LeafSpy I would have thought all is OK and temp is stable.
C. There is virtually no way I can ever charge at full power. If I leave fully charged I will surely get to 40C by the time I need to QC. At that temp my charge will be seriously throttled.
D. I can imagine that sometime during winter the car will reach a heat transfer balance in which we may see the temp decrease wile driving or thanks to LeafSpy we could let it cool right to that sweet spot when you can get a full power DC charge. However this will never happen during mild or hot weather.
E. The only way i could achieve a fast DCFC in this weather is if I let it discharge and take a morning trip to a DC charger. Obviously this would be just for testing purpose and would have no practical use in daily life.

In other words the advertised QC speed is the exception not the rule.

Your drive is ONE example of what can happen. A lot of people think I (along with others) are crazy for going thru the lengths we go thru to get more from our LEAF including Eco mode, hypermiling, neutral driving, varying speeds to take advantage of altitude changes, etc.

What causes the heat is power going in AND out of the pack. Minimize the wild power swings and you reduce heat gain. That is Eco's primary job and no I do not feel like "I am driving underwater"... :roll:

Most people refer to neutral driving as "free miles" and that is a good description as its minimal charge thru the pack. Obviously not always a good idea but can be very beneficial if used in the right situations.

Last week I did a 141 mile trip that included two QCs. Left home with 50% charge, hit first QC at 41% charged up, hit 6 TB's (dead center) and 99º. Hit a LOT of traffic going home and stopped for 2nd QC ONLY because traffic was at a near dead stop and had to get out of the car. That helped with temp issues no doubt. 2nd QC 39 KW with pack at 93º

Unlike "some" people's opinion, the center tick (AKA as TB 6) is only optimal in the middle of its temperature range so despite everything "looking" normal, it was far from it.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/162442713806531/permalink/2390521797665267/