Rapid SOH loss since purchase.

[SageBrush]

Painful story.
I was one of those who thought that LeafSpy could identify a reset LEAF, and if my posts mislead you I am deeply sorry.

Who was the dealer/seller ?

 

[alozzy]

I learned from these forums that AHr was the only value that couldn't be messed with, but based on your experience it sounds like nothing can be relied on to determine if a BMS reset was performed. So sorry that you've been victimized like this.

If you do a VIN search on your vehicle, you may be able to find the service record or at least how often the ownership changed hands. Carfax report would help for that too.

If you can determine, based on the service record, that the BMS was reset by the same dealer who sold you the car, then that might give you leverage with them. It wouldn't hurt to go back to the dealer with your degradation findings and see what they have to say.

Supposedly, only a Nissan dealership has the equipment to perform a BMS reset and three separate things have to be reset (VLBW, LBW, and meter, if memory serves). There's zero chance of routine maintenance causing a BMS reset, it would have to be deliberate, so this would have to be deliberate fraud.

Read the thread below, as it provides details on how an owner was similarly victimized and apparently she got her battery pack replaced:

http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=18539

 

[Reddy]

So much for having an easy way to identify resets. Does the SOH and Ahr drop in tandem to their pre-reset values ?

Here is SOH (top) and Hx chart. They do appear to follow Ah curve.

(sorry for messy chart)

Leafspy is not a solution to identify resets. It is good to take a more detailed view at the battery SOH instead of looking at battery bars on the dash. But with common sense it may be deduced that, for example, 2014 car that lived in hot climate and with 20K miles on the clock, will not have 96% SOH and is likely been tampered with. One thing did not get reset was L1 L2 L3 charge counters. That may be a clue that in absence of recent battery replacement, it is not likely that a car with 203 L3 and 1600 L1/L2 charges will have 96% SOH or 62Ah battery stats.

Edit: Here is Leafspy screenshots before and after reset:

HOLY SHIRT SLEEVES! I too was under the impression that LeafSpy would assist in identifying good batteries. Now apparently there is nothing to protect people when purchasing a used Leaf. I think I might just re-evaluate and tell everyone to avoid Nissan Leafs like the plague. Good job Nissan. If anyone had a shred of compassion left for you, I think it just evaporated. Given their history, I doubt that I will even recommend Leaf 2.

 

[alozzy]

This thread provides some hope too:

https://www.reddit.com/r/leaf/comments/41kssz/convince_me_not_to_get_a_used_leaf/

bmk789: I actually just got it back from the dealer a couple days ago. Nissan decided to cover the cost of the battery, my cost for the battery replacement was about $850. Whole process took about a month. My experience with the dealer wasn't great by any means but overall I'm just happy I got a new battery for $850. If you have any other questions feel free to ask!

 

[cwerdna]

Woah. Re: the reset, why?...

The owner had a rugged tablet looking handheld diagnostic computer that plugged in to diag port on the Leaf. Seller went through scanning and clearing any DTCs that it could find in front of me. We got to battery section and battery health data and before I realized what it was, the seller tapped on battery reset as if was another DTC clear dialog. I did not react in time to stop it. Luckily I pulled battery data before reset with my Leafspy and screen saved it. I forgot to take a picture of the diagnostic computer that was used. It did look fairly expensive. I could try to contact the seller again to ask what computer it was.

http://www.nissan-techinfo.com/Home.aspx has a Purchase link that points to http://www.nissantechmate.com/.

https://techmate.service-solutions.com/en-US/Pages/ItemDetail.aspx?SKU=J-54201 looks like what a Consult III plus laptop should look like. Since it mentions Toughbook, it’s probably one of the Panasonic Toughbook line (http://business.panasonic.com/toughbook/laptop-computers.html), possibly an old discontinued (for consumers) model.

Handheld would be unusual but not 100% surprising, if it's an unauthorized tool.

 

[AntronX]

...Handheld would be unusual but not 100% surprising, if it's an unauthorized tool.

Pretty sure it was Autel MaxiSys Pro (MS908 Pro) based on how I remember it looked like.
EDIT: Contacted the seller, he insisted it was official Nissan Consult computer. But I am 100% sure it was touchscreen tablet and not a laptop.

 

[LeftieBiker]

One thing that is unusual about your car is the mileage. 75,000 miles is more than we've seen with other resets, and I have to hope that this factor makes a difference, somehow. Or maybe it takes multiple resets, over time, to "unlock" the AH reading and make it vulnerable to being reset.

 

[kingjamez]

One thing that is unusual about your car is the mileage. 75,000 miles is more than we've seen with other resets, and I have to hope that this factor makes a difference, somehow. Or maybe it takes multiple resets, over time, to "unlock" the AH reading and make it vulnerable to being reset.

My car has 20500 miles on it now and it clearly had some manipulation of the Ah reading before I bought it. My curve looks very similar to the first part of AntronX's curve which means that I could have months of continual "virtual" degradation.

Fortunately, if I follow the same path as AntronX's by the time the "real" value is reached, I'll still be under warranty if needed.

I should'a been patient and found an early '13 with 9 bars for a steal... oh well.

-Jim

 

[LeftieBiker]

Is it possible your car had more than one reset?

 

[kingjamez]

Is it possible your car had more than one reset?

Do you mean for miles too? Unlikely, I saw the carfax report and everything looked good (except that it came from Georgia, like all off-lease cars seem to recently).

-Jim

 

[LeftieBiker]

Is it possible your car had more than one reset?

Do you mean for miles too? Unlikely, I saw the carfax report and everything looked good (except that it came from Georgia, like all off-lease cars seem to recently).

-Jim

No. I'm talking about having the BMS reset more than once, over a longer period of time. Maybe that is what can "unlock" the AH reading from the BMS and allow it to be reset.

 

[silverone]

Leafspy is not a solution to identify resets. It is good to take a more detailed view at the battery SOH instead of looking at battery bars on the dash. But with common sense it may be deduced that, for example, 2014 car that lived in hot climate and with 20K miles on the clock, will not have 96% SOH and is likely been tampered with. One thing did not get reset was L1 L2 L3 charge counters. That may be a clue that in absence of recent battery replacement, it is not likely that a car with 203 L3 and 1600 L1/L2 charges will have 96% SOH or 62Ah battery stats.

Edit: Here is Leafspy screenshots before and after reset:

I haven't had the same kind of drop that you had over your first two months, but with the wild swings I get and well over 2100 L1/L2's, the result looks similar if only looking at start and end date. Doh!

 

[alozzy]

Earlier in this thread, Antronx stated this:

After battery stats data reset, everything gets set to as if battery cells were brand new. So the data becomes: 66 Ah, 100% SOH, 100% Hx regardless of charge state. Leafspy just displays what BMS is reporting after reset

Based on that, it would seem that LeafSpy offers zero value to prospective buyers of used Leafs who are trying to assess battery condition. I guess about the best anyone can do is to avoid buying a Leaf that ever spent significant time in a hot climate.

When I purchased my Leaf in January, I likewise assumed that LeafSpy was providing valuable data with regards to AHr. I purchased, based on the peace of mind that the battery health was good - or so I thought.

I'm going to start telling anyone that's considering a Leaf that no assumptions can be made about the battery health and it's a straight up gamble.

Shame on Nissan for making it too easy to reset the BMS stats like this. At the very least, they could have provided OBD2 counters of historical values for SOH and AHr that couldn't be erased (i.e. store that historical data, encrypted and secured, on nvSRAM or other non-volatile memory). That way, at least software like LeafSpy could pull that historical data for comparison to current values, since those values should never go up in a significant way. Would be pretty obvious then if a BMS reset was done.

 

[LeftieBiker]

Before we toss LeafSpy, I think we should try to figure out what's going on in this one case, and see how widely it applies. This doesn't explain the cases where the BMS was reset, but the AH didn't revert to the brand-new reading.

 

[kingjamez]

Before we toss LeafSpy, I think we should try to figure out what's going on in this one case, and see how widely it applies. This doesn't explain the cases where the BMS was reset, but the AH didn't revert to the brand-new reading.

Right, in my case I don't "know" that my BMS was reset, only that it is acting just like the BMS from the car that was reset.
What additional testing can I do within leafspy to figure out what is going on?

BTW: 55.75Ah SOH: 84% as of today.. the tanking continues.

Interestingly, the uptick in the graph is where I did two QC's in one day. The car has had 4 total QC's

-Jim

 

[alozzy]

What's relevant :

- Leaf Spy relies on metrics reported to it by the BMS and other onboard diagnostics data
- A BMS reset makes all battery health indicators reset to factory defaults

If both statements are true, then I don't see why anyone would rely on Leaf Spy as an indicator of battery health. I'm not blaiming Leaf Spy, as it's just reporting the values told to it by the BMS and other system metrics.

What's needed is a more direct method of gauging battery health, one that bypasses the BMS since anything reported by the BMS appears to be susceptible to tampering.

My 2 cents anyways...

 

[baustin]

Another question to consider is are there more than one type of BMS reset available? The BMS resets that have been reported in the past are the same as what happens with some Software Updates to the Leaf. The other data is reset, but the Ahr reading has stayed the same, leading to that as the relied upon figure to determine if a reset was done. It is possible that there is also a 'factory default' type of reset available that resets all the BMS data to the same as when the pack was built. The BMS reset used to be associated with unscrupulous dealers. Maybe there are now more 'ignorant' dealers that are just doing as the one user reported, and going down the list resetting everything available.

 

[GerryAZ]

I think it is too soon to tell whether Kingjamez' car was reset or the drop in numbers is due to it sitting on the dealer lot for a while and now being driven/charged gently. My 2015 will drop the AHr, SOH, and Hx numbers significantly if I drive it gently and recharge without discharging down toward LBW (L1 or low current L2 charging also seems to depress the numbers more). The numbers come back up when I return to my normal usage pattern of fairly deep discharge and full charge using 30-ampere L2. QC will improve the numbers even more. I also see as much as 1 AHr or more difference between Leaf Spy numbers after charging overnight, after parking at about 60% SOC, and at the end of the day before charging. The highest numbers are at midday and the lowest are after charging.

 

[LeftieBiker]

Another question to consider is are there more than one type of BMS reset available? The BMS resets that have been reported in the past are the same as what happens with some Software Updates to the Leaf. The other data is reset, but the Ahr reading has stayed the same, leading to that as the relied upon figure to determine if a reset was done. It is possible that there is also a 'factory default' type of reset available that resets all the BMS data to the same as when the pack was built. The BMS reset used to be associated with unscrupulous dealers. Maybe there are now more 'ignorant' dealers that are just doing as the one user reported, and going down the list resetting everything available.

Yes, indeed. We know that not all resets " ...makes all battery health indicators reset to factory defaults." That actually seems to be the exception, so it makes sense to find out what is going on.

 

[AntronX]

One thing that is unusual about your car is the mileage. 75,000 miles is more than we've seen with other resets, and I have to hope that this factor makes a difference, somehow. Or maybe it takes multiple resets, over time, to "unlock" the AH reading and make it vulnerable to being reset.

My car is 2011SL that had new battery installed in 08/2014 at 60K miles. The seller drove it for 15K miles and sold it to me in 05/2016. The replacement battery is 295B0-3NF9E which I believe is a 2015 "lizard" battery. I wonder if the new 2015 battery BMS could have a different reset behavior compared to original 2011-2014 pre-lizard batteries?