New owner - praise, gripes, questions, and a strange issue

[QuakingLeaf]

Owner of a new Leaf S, mainly for wife's local jaunts.

Praise:
* Quick acceleration, if needed.
* Comfortable seating, and roomy for 4-5 occupants.
* Rearview camera with Charge Pkg.

Gripes:
* Nissan advertising MPGe, instead of Range. Understand that a lot depends on various factors; however, best/worst case estimates could have been provided.
* Dealer advertised range assumes 100% charge, whereas, one is admonished if charging over 80%, thereby reducing the range further.
* S trim does not have a hybrid heater. Nowhere does Nissan mention the impact of that on the range (reduced). Nissan Support line indicated up to 20% less range when the heater is activated.
* Therefore, 80% charge limit, and turning on the heater (in S trim) in the winter months, would bring down the range substantially.
* Charge Timer on the S is ridiculous. Can't fathom why Nissan would not provide a Start Time too, like in the NAV trims, SV and SL. Chastising for buying the S trim?!

Question:
* I have a feeling that I signed some document at the dealership agreeing to not frequently charge to 100%, or be in violation of the Lease terms. Am I dreaming, as I can't find any such document in my file?

Stupid Quality Issue:
* Within minutes of driving off the dealer's lot, increased the cabin fan speed - experienced a loud sound, like a turbo-prop aircraft engine, and heavy vibration in the front console and floorboard.
* After a lot of stripping by the dealer the next day, a hood insulation plastic fastener was found hanging off the blower impeller.
* Hence, the QuakingLeaf username. My Nissan Quest (first year) was returned under Lemon Law - deja vu all over again.
* Nissan QC missed it, dealer Service Dept missed it before handing over the vehicle. Felt real bad that a new car had to be stripped so much - mechanics mess up a few things sometimes when doing that.

 

[davewill]

First off, please fill out your user profile, particularly your location. It will help endlessly with questions and discussions (especially WRT range).

Second: You absolutely did NOT promise to charge it only to 80%. Charge to 100% any time you think you need to. It will have no effect on lease or warranty issues. The paper you signed merely agreed that range was variable...essentially it was a formal, "Your mileage may vary".

Third: Don't get too down on the S charge timer. The end timer is actually VERY useful and will work for most needs.

Fourth: We all hate the way Nissan and the dealers advertise the range on this car. Many, many people have been fooled into thinking they will get "100 miles". It's idiotic that they still do this.

 

[LEAFfan]

Gripes:
* Nissan advertising MPGe, instead of Range. Understand that a lot depends on various factors; however, best/worst case estimates could have been provided.

The mileage range is listed on the car's sticker. I believe it is 75 miles which is an average of an 80% charge and a 100% charge. Of course if you use your heater (instead of heated seats/steering wheel) in cold weather, you're going to get a lot less. It isn't just the heater though in cold weather, but your BP won't hold as much capacity when it's cold.
You should have added another gripe: the salesperson sold you a 3-year lease instead of a two-year. Two year leases for the 2013 are a better deal. In 2011, 3 year leases were a MUCH better deal than a two.

 

[TomT]

Perhaps not, depending on what sales and other taxes are in his area... On a two year, you are spreading them over a shorter time frame and they will reoccur if you reup on another lease or purchase.... And in California, he'd loose the $2,500 state rebate on a two year...

You should have added another gripe: the salesperson sold you a 3-year lease instead of a two-year. Two year leases for the 2013 are a better deal. In 2011, 3 year leases were a MUCH better deal than a two.

 

[LEAFfan]

Perhaps not, depending on what sales and other taxes are in his area... On a two year, you are spreading them over a shorter time frame and they will reoccur if you reup on another lease or purchase.... And in California, he'd loose the $2,500 state rebate on a two year...

True, so maybe the OP is in CA? If they aren't, and there's no restriction like in CA, then the two year is better because the residual is much higher to make it less expensive to lease unless they want to buy at the end of the lease.

You should have added another gripe: the salesperson sold you a 3-year lease instead of a two-year. Two year leases for the 2013 are a better deal. In 2011, 3 year leases were a MUCH better deal than a two.

 

[UBUYGAS]

Today I drove 61 miles and had 50% battery left.

That's 122 mile range. That's at 100% charge. At 80% I could have gotten 97.6 miles.

 

[TomT]

Yep, he is in Fremont...

True, so maybe the OP is in CA?

 

[RonDawg]

As far as 100% charging, what will get you in trouble with Nissan (by voiding your warranty) is "Charging the lithium-ion battery full on a daily basis despite the lithium-ion battery keeping a high state of charge level (98-100%)." This is taken directly from the 2012 Nissan New Electric Vehicle Limited Warranty booklet. The one for your 2013 should be similar.

Nissan recommends charging only to 80% to prolong battery life (and has a "Long Life Mode" to limit charging to 80% if enabled) but aside from the above scenario, charging to 100% does not void the warranty. However, if you need a full charge to get you through your day, by all means do so. For those in this situation, it is recommended to not leave the car at 100% for long periods of time, especially in hot weather, and should set charge timers accordingly to minimize the amount of time the car spends with a full battery.

 

[LeftieBiker]

As for the heater, if you search this forum (or, hopefully somebody will provide a link, as the searches don't work well) you can substantially reduce its power consumption in two ways: you can insulate the hoses that carry the heated liquid, and you can buy a modified control unit (IIRC) from the same guy who upgrades EVSEs ("charge cables") to handle 240 volts. It's amazing to me that Nissan doesn't insulate the heating system, but there you have it.

Bottom line (and this applies to all makes): don't research your lease at the dealership.

 

[TomT]

To elaborate, what they mean is that you constantly top up the battery to 100% when it is already at a high level of charge (say, over 97%). Charging to 100% every night from a low state of charge will not void the warranty and is not what they are referring to...

As far as 100% charging, what will get you in trouble with Nissan (by voiding your warranty) is "Charging the lithium-ion battery full on a daily basis despite the lithium-ion battery keeping a high state of charge level (98-100%)." This is taken directly from the 2012 Nissan New Electric Vehicle Limited Warranty booklet. The one for your 2013 should be similar.

 

[dgpcolorado]

Today I drove 61 miles and had 50% battery left.

That's 122 mile range. That's at 100% charge. At 80% I could have gotten 97.6 miles.

Not necessarily. The car shouldn't get down to zero percent charge even at turtle. But the measured state of charge isn't linear, so you might, indeed, be able to do 122 miles. If you could make 124 miles you could join the elite 200 km club, although taking the car to turtle likely isn't good for the battery.

 

[cwerdna]

My Nissan Quest (first year) was returned under Lemon Law - deja vu all over again.

Yep. The Quest, QX56 and Armada (I tihnk) units for the 1st model year or 2 coming out of the brand new Canton plant were notoriously bad. It got media attention and some of them got the reputation for having the worst reliability in Consumer Reports of any vehicle in their class (or possibly even of all vehicles) at least once.

As for the heater, if you search this forum (or, hopefully somebody will provide a link, as the searches don't work well) you can substantially reduce its power consumption in two ways: you can insulate the hoses that carry the heated liquid, and you can buy a modified control unit (IIRC) from the same guy who upgrades EVSEs ("charge cables") to handle 240 volts. It's amazing to me that Nissan doesn't insulate the heating system, but there you have it.

Re: the modified control unit, are you talking about http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=148844" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;? If so, I think that's pointless for the '13. The '13 already has a dedicated heater on/off button and there seem to be no way to turn the temperature up/down unless one of these is on: heat, AC, auto. So, the heater won't turn on "unknowingly". I can run the blower at full w/o the AC or heater coming on.

 

[LeftieBiker]

You're right about the control unit. That leaves insulating the heating system from exposure to cold outside air.

 

[QuakingLeaf]

Thanks for all the responses.

1) Didn't depend on dealers for details regarding Range, Hybrid Heater, Lease, etc. Did my own research, and, yet, decided to go for the Leaf. Just wish that Nissan would be upfront with the technical details, and not force customers to go hunting for them.

2) For personal reasons preferred the 3-yr lease over the 2-yr.

3) Not sold on the idea of S trim not having a START time for the Charge Timer.
(a) If just the END time is such a great idea, why do the SL and SV trims have the START time?
(b) Consider a scenario where the instrument panel indicates 10-hr charge time for the condition of the battery. Now consider the off-peak utility rate to be from 11 PM - 7 AM. Therefore, if the END time is set for 7 AM, and the timer is turned on, charging would begin before 11 PM, if allowed to. There goes the benefit of off-peak rate, unless you wait till 11 PM to turn on the timer/charger manually.
(c) It would take the minutest space in the car's computer memory to store the START time, and a couple of extra lines of code to execute it.
(d) Agreed that just the END time would be a brilliant idea for kitchen appliances like a coffee maker, or toaster. Need breakfast at 6 AM, everything will be ready, and piping hot at that hour, w/o having to wait!!

4) Is the power consumption lower for seat heater + steering wheel heater vs. cabin heating (via blower)?

Thanks again!

 

[cwerdna]

3) Not sold on the idea of S trim not having a START time for the Charge Timer.
(a) If just the END time is such a great idea, why do the SL and SV trims have the START time?

You can blame Nissan for removing it/not including on the cheaper S trim. Prior to '13 model year, there was no S trim. All Leafs had nav, Carwings, start & end timers, etc.

 

[RonDawg]

Some EVSEs also have a delay start timer, which helps to mitigate the issue of charging starting before the start of an off-peak rate.

Yes using seat and steering wheel heaters uses far less electricity than using the resistance cabin heater. I believe these features were optional on the 2011 and were made standard on the 2012 and later models, as it does save quite a bit of juice. I don't know if the hybrid heater of the 2013 SV/SL is more or less efficient than the seat/steering wheel heaters.

 

[planet4ever]

3) Not sold on the idea of S trim not having a START time for the Charge Timer.
(a) If just the END time is such a great idea, why do the SL and SV trims have the START time?
(b) Consider a scenario where the instrument panel indicates 10-hr charge time for the condition of the battery. Now consider the off-peak utility rate to be from 11 PM - 7 AM. Therefore, if the END time is set for 7 AM, and the timer is turned on, charging would begin before 11 PM, if allowed to. There goes the benefit of off-peak rate, unless you wait till 11 PM to turn on the timer/charger manually.
(c) It would take the minutest space in the car's computer memory to store the START time, and a couple of etc lines of code to execute it.

• When I had a 2011 SL I played around with the timer settings and finally concluded that end-only timing worked best for my needs. You won't have the fun of getting caught in the start timer traps, so you will just have to trust us; sometimes simpler is better.
• Sorry, that's an impossible invented scenario for you if you have the EVSE Upgrade. It will never take ten hours to charge; probably never more than five hours. I understand that there is a utility in southern CA with only a four hour "super offpeak" window but even for them it wouldn't be a valid criticism unless the rate after the super offpeak time was higher that the rate before that time. If you need to eat a bit of more expensive electricity, why does it matter whether you do it before or after the best rate?
• We're not talking about "the car's computer" here. The car has many computers. In the SV or SL models there is a console computer, and that is where all the timer logic is. For the S model they removed that computer altogether to cut cost. In all models there is a trip computer which controls the funky display at the bottom center of the dash. My guess is that it is very rudimentary. For the S model they had to cram the climate timer and charge timer logic into that existing program, along with some other settings that are handled by the console computer in the SV and SL. They could well have had problems with amount of program space, richness of linkage conventions, number of interrupt ports, or a variety of other things. It is not easy to add new function to old firmware. They also had a user interface problem. The console computer had a touchpad for input. The trip computer has two buttons. Period.

Ray

 

[LEAFfan]

4) Is the power consumption lower for seat heater + steering wheel heater vs. cabin heating (via blower)?

Absolutely, much lower than the new heat pump.

 

[UBUYGAS]

I had my window and sunroof open plus my stereo on both ways. Maybe next time I'll try it again

a good buddy of mine lives 113 miles away and I can take US1/9 which is 35 to 50MPH with at least 75% of it being 35MPH. I might have to try that one day soon.

Today I drove 61 miles and had 50% battery left.

That's 122 mile range. That's at 100% charge. At 80% I could have gotten 97.6 miles.

Not necessarily. The car shouldn't get down to zero percent charge even at turtle. But the measured state of charge isn't linear, so you might, indeed, be able to do 122 miles. If you could make 124 miles you could join the elite 200 km club, although taking the car to turtle likely isn't good for the battery.

 

[cgaydos]

So, regarding the 80%/100% issue and the question of charging timers.

The whole issue can get very complicated if you try to consider every possible factor. We have 2 LEAFs shared by 5 drivers and needed a *simple* system that took good care of the battery while also allowing drivers to use the maximum range when needed. The timers are too prone to mistakes - especially with multiple drivers changing the settings - and can lead to "oh crap" moments when you are ready to drive the car and find it didn't charge as much as you thought.

So, we ended up with this simple rule:

1) Both cars are plugged-in at all times when at home with the charging timers set to charge to 80% 7x24.
2) When extra range is needed the driver turns off the charging timer about an hour or so before the trip begins so that the battery is at 100% for that trip.

Regarding range:

This is why this is still an early adopter vehicle. All new LEAF drivers have to learn to adapt to the range of the car. Once you do learn and adapt something like 98% or so of us love it and find it more convenient and cleaner than dealing with gas stations. But there is a period of adjustment at the start. In addition, what you will learn is that the range varies widely - in ideal conditions a range of over 100 miles on a single charge is a given. But factors that can reduce range are many: speeds over 60 mph, elevation climbs, heater usage (less so with the heat pump in the 2013 SV/SL), colder temps (reduces battery performance), countervailing winds, rain/snow (adds friction), and of course driving styles (look up "hypermiling" to see the best driving styles). You'll get used to these and find your own comfort zone.