TL
R - If you knew then...what you know now... Maybe. Probably.
Turning Mr. Peabody’s Wayback Machine to April, 2010, there I was reading somewhere an announcement that Nissan is going to manufacture an all-electric hatchback with a 100-mile range and deliver it the following year. And that they were taking reservation deposits of $99.00. Are they kidding? Who buys a non-existent car like that? As a geeky early tech adopter, sign me up! and for what would be called the “SL.”
As deliveries slowly began in late 2011, I saw my car changed to a 2012. My anxiously awaited delivery in February, 2012 was an amazing event. As the first or second LEAF sold at that dealership, it was almost as big a deal for them as for me. I met almost everyone at the dealership including the owner, and the LEAF-trained technician who would be the sole person working on my vehicle. Saw the service bays, tools, and charging station at the bay all specific to the LEAF. Lots of coffee, pictures, handshaking, and a detailed introduction to the vehicle from my sales person who was very knowledgeable about the actual LEAF. He got me set up with CARWINGS, and we all were impressed with the fit and finish of this beautiful Japan-made car. A short time later my wife and I were off in an incredible vehicle the likes of when neither of us had seen but were enjoying immensely.
Despite the sales person’s suggestion to lease the vehicle, we decided to buy it anyway. Possibly a mistake but today I’m not sure that really matters much.
Initial Surprise #0: hey, the nav features suck. This was, for me, one of the most convoluted non-intuitive intentionally-annoying interfaces I’d seen, especially coming from my Magellan GPS with it stupidly-simple interface. But wait, you can’t even use it if you’re moving, nor can the passenger. Ugh. A bit of the bloom is off the rose. Couple that with the nag screen EVERY SINGLE TIME YOU START THE FRIGGIN’ CAR.
Surprise #1: hey, this doesn’t really have a 100-mile range. Got well and truly screwed on this factoid.
Surprise #2: hey, you can’t go anywhere. There was really no charging options enroute outside Nissan dealerships so any trip was from dealership to dealership and with a long time spent at each. I had a quickcharge port on my SL but there were no DCFC’s in the entire state at the time and for years to come.
Surprise #3: hey, cold weather sucks. While the early days were cold, we had a new battery and didn’t really notice battery cold-weather impacts that much. Then came the following winter in Ohio and by that time and with this forum’s informative postings, we were acutely aware of the cold-weather range loss. Even a 60-mile round trip with heated seats, steering wheel, and cabin heat mostly on Interstates at 65mph was a bit of an anxious drive.
Surprise #4: hey, overall range drops like a rock. Even with baby-tender care to use the 80% charging option at all times and with low usage, first bar drop happened at less than 6,000 miles. That was at year 3. Lost 2nd bar in year 5 at less than 10,000 miles. Had I been putting more miles on the vehicle, I may have qualified for a battery replacement, and today I still have 10 bars at just under 13,000 miles.
Surprise #5: hey, CARWINGS sucks. When it works it was amazing...but that was less than half the time. If the servers weren’t glitchy, the cell network was, or the car was parked where there was weak-to-no signal, or I was holding my phone wrong (iPhone4, remember AntennaGate), or some other wacky reason.
Surprise #6: AT&T’s 2G network was on life support and the plug pulled, requiring a $199 “investment” if I wanted to continue using the CARWINGS services. So I “invested” and it worked but not a lot better than before. At least I had none of the 12v battery issues others have had.
Surprise #7: hey, the maps are woefully out-of-date, and updates are expensive and also woefully out of date. Didn’t really matter much as I much earlier found navigation to be an exercise in futility. See Surprise #0. And iPhone tools for navigation were far superior anyway.
Today, I look back and say I had one of those typical “early adopter” experiences. I paid a lot for the chance to be first on the block with an all-electric commuter vehicle, giving me first-hand knowledge of EV ownership, service, operations, upsides, and downsides. And for all of that I’m thankful. My maintenance costs have been minimal as expected, I can change my own cabin filter and wiper blades. The reliability has been superb outside of CARWINGS and now EVConnect which for me is no better. Many of the items of suckage above are still items of suckage today. But mostly my overarching emotion is disappointment. I’m disappointed that Nissan didn’t take this bold first vehicle and parlay that into an amazing first-mover advantage, eclipsing anything Tesla and others could possibly have done. I had expected significant range increases with subsequent models and it took years to add paltry amounts. Even today’s 150-mile range is non-competitive against 300-mile vehicles from Chevy and Tesla. I understand not everyone needs longer range, but for a vehicle to be an ICE replacement, I think a 300-miles range is the minimum needed.
So now I have my 310-mile range Tesla Model 3, which continuously amazes me. The new feature updates, wonderful navigation, and range gave me my first change to NOT need an ICE and I now have two EV’s. I kept my 2012 LEAF as a 2nd around-town vehicle and the fact that I still like it. It is far easier for me to get into and out of the LEAF and for our relatively mild winters here in North Carolina now, I still enjoy the steering wheel heater.
And at the end of next month I’ll have 7 years with my early-adopter car. I wonder when it’ll be time to say goodbye, and get that 2nd Tesla.