Safety Open Leaf Reprogram bulletin?

[TomT]

I see no difference in regen post update. Gids are now 236 (238 previously) after the latest (third) full charge, still considerably up from the 220 I had before the update...

My theory is more optimistic, or pessimistic depending on how you look at it; what if they just changed the motor use profile to match the 2013, you know with more regen, etc?

 

[Digitalxrayguy]

I just had the car go in for a minor tire problem and I was told the update was available and asked if I had the time to leave the car for the recall. I did and it is now on. I don't have any real experience with the use of it yet as it was done late in the day 2 days ago and yesterday was not a drive the Leaf day. Mine is new to me after acquiring the Leaf from my brother-in-law weeks ago but it's a 2011 with 19K miles and down 1 bar. The bar did not come back! Next week I'll have practible experience to see if the accuracy improved since I'm on the edge of being able to make it to work and back without a charge. I often get home with 5 or so miles left on the GOM but sometimes have to stop in Hayward for a QC at a new Blink QC unit. The work order from the dealer states:

A P3227 LEAF ZEO REPROGRAM
CAUSE: ..
RECALL PERFORM FACTORY RECALL
3196 WM
PARTS: 0.00 LABOR: 0.00 OTHER 0.00 TOTAL LINE A: 0.00
,,,,19743 P3227 ZEO REPROGRAM PERFORMED CAMPAIGN P3227 X REPROGRAMMED
,,,,THE ON BOARD CHARGER AND THE HV BATTERY CONTROL UNITS X OK AT THIS TIME
,,,,X

So, if any improvements occur to the accuracy and range, I'll report back.

 

[Stanton]

Next week I'll have practible experience to see if the accuracy improved since I'm on the edge of being able to make it to work and back without a charge. I often get home with 5 or so miles left on the GOM but sometimes have to stop in Hayward for a QC at a new Blink QC unit.

May I ask how long (what speed) your work commute is? Seems kind of soon to be up against your normal daily routine (unless you recently changed jobs or something).

 

[Digitalxrayguy]

May I ask how long (what speed) your work commute is? Seems kind of soon to be up against your normal daily routine (unless you recently changed jobs or something).

Re: Stanton
The car is new to me by a few weeks. My brother-in-law had it in Fresno where the heat is more of a problem. He bought another EV that has better battery ventilation (Mitsubishi i) and the Leaf is living at my house in the Bay Area where I'm buying it. I really like the car. A dozen extra miles of range would be nice but this is doable. I commute 33 miles each way to office and back home. I started charging at work and was told I can no longer do so. I'm driving up a freeway with a maximum speed of 62, typically doing 58 to 60 as I look for big rigs to get behind and not worry about speed. No heat or AC in the AM but appreciate the AC in the afternoon. On the way home, traffic is usually pretty bad and sections without commute lanes are averaging 20, 25 mph. If commute lanes are moving fast, I hang over keeping the speed down but ready to jump over to the commute lane if a back up is coming up in front of me.

In Fresno, often above 105 in the summer, the car lost a bar and his concern was it losing more bars quickly which would bring the value down quickly. I charge to 100% during the week on the timer and 80% on the weekends.

Funny part is; where do I work? Berkeley, CA - probably the most liberal city in the US. Do they have good access to charging stations? No. Some of the worst. Plug share has a hole of "places to charge" in Berkeley and I don't want to bother people at their homes for regular charging so I drive conservatively (hard to get used to at first and I can make.

BTW, to all - great forum! Good community. I appreciate the advice and experiences to learn from.

 

[TimeHorse]

Re: Stanton
The car is new to me by a few weeks. My brother-in-law had it in Fresno where the heat is more of a problem. He bought another EV that has better battery ventilation (Mitsubishi i) and the Leaf is living at my house in the Bay Area where I'm buying it. I really like the car. A dozen extra miles of range would be nice but this is doable. I commute 33 miles each way to office and back home. I started charging at work and was told I can no longer do so. I'm driving up a freeway with a maximum speed of 62, typically doing 58 to 60 as I look for big rigs to get behind and not worry about speed. No heat or AC in the AM but appreciate the AC in the afternoon. On the way home, traffic is usually pretty bad and sections without commute lanes are averaging 20, 25 mph. If commute lanes are moving fast, I hang over keeping the speed down but ready to jump over to the commute lane if a back up is coming up in front of me.

Welcome to the bleeding edge club. Here in DC I have about the same commute parameters but have to deal with cold as well as hot and humid. So far no bars lost but I'm able to make the 70 mi daily even with the update; so no worse but AFAICT no better.

Anyway, I have a new theory which will be difficult to prove because the Nissan CHAdeMOs aren't very common yet. But here's the thing I observed: before the update, the SOC on the CHAdeMO typically read about 97% to mean 80%; since the update, 97% or so looks to be about 97%. Mind you, this is the result on only 1 prior test and one post test so I'd not call these results definitive but maybe the reason for the update is to update the software to write the SOC correctly on the CHAdeMO lines?

Jeffrey.

 

[pmarinac]

Re: Stanton
...
Anyway, I have a new theory which will be difficult to prove because the Nissan CHAdeMOs aren't very common yet. But here's the thing I observed: before the update, the SOC on the CHAdeMO typically read about 97% to mean 80%; since the update, 97% or so looks to be about 97%. Mind you, this is the result on only 1 prior test and one post test so I'd not call these results definitive but maybe the reason for the update is to update the software to write the SOC correctly on the CHAdeMO lines?

Jeffrey.

That's exactly what I was thinking. I always thought it was odd that when I plugged into a Blink DC charger it with only one bar remaining Blink would tell me I had 20-20% battery capacity and when I charged to 98% I would only be up to 10 bars (very reliably I could wait another half hour for the last two percent and be at a full 12 bars). Funny thing, the dealership did my reprogramming today and when they were done they plugged the car in for me, which I got a notice of via SMS. An hour later I was up by three bars from before the point where it started the charge. I don't recall it charging that fast on 220 before. Maybe the display has been recalibrated, but is there indication that the rate of charge has been modified at different levels of discharge?

 

[astrorob]

man - i wish i had known about this update. i happened to take the car in for service yesterday and they applied it. i could have done what gary suggested with GID measurements to add another data point.

i guess if this simply brings us up to 2013 standards then it's fine, unless there are known issues with how the battery computer reports stuff on 2013.

 

[TickTock]

I had my Leaf in the week prior to hearing about this update. Anyone know a way to tell if it has been applied (do a before and after capture of the software revision details)?

 

[TomT]

There is nothing you have access to that will give you that information. A Gid meter gives some kind of an indication because you will see a temporary change in your Gid level after charging but that is about it. The best bet is the invoice which will have it on it if it was done since they have to denote it to get reimbursed...

I had my Leaf in the week prior to hearing about this update. Anyone know a way to tell if it has been applied (do a before and after capture of the software revision details)?

 

[astrorob]

i am probably imagining things, but in ECO mode at least, it almost seems like the GOM is more resistant to downward calculations of range based on short-term energy demand, and a little more willing to calculate upward based on short-term energy demand. also i just drove 30 miles back and forth along the same path and when i got home the GOM was down exactly 30 miles. in the past i'd always get "charged" for more miles than i actually drove.

of course, N=1 so... big grain of salt.

 

[JimEG]

Just acquired a used 21k 2011 Leaf. In talking with Nissan Leaf support tonight they informed me I need this update. Anymore thoughts on this update? Good, bad, meh?

 

[Stoaty]

Just acquired a used 21k 2011 Leaf. In talking with Nissan Leaf support tonight they informed me I need this update. Anymore thoughts on this update? Good, bad, meh?

Get the update. Most 2011 Leafs have already had it.

 

[cwerdna]

Just acquired a used 21k 2011 Leaf. In talking with Nissan Leaf support tonight they informed me I need this update. Anymore thoughts on this update? Good, bad, meh?

http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=369302#p369302" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[TimLee]

Just acquired a used 21k 2011 Leaf. In talking with Nissan Leaf support tonight they informed me I need this update. Anymore thoughts on this update? Good, bad, meh?

There have been a lot of people unhappy with the P3227 update due to very negative changes on regenerative braking.
See http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=14807&start=100#p355152" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
There have been many requests for Nissan to fix that but so far they have not.
I am one of those still avoiding having it done for this reason.

The software change does include a correction on charging that did result in some LEAF on board charger failures when using some GE EVSE. So using that particular EVSE would present risk without P3227.

 

[QueenBee]

Just acquired a used 21k 2011 Leaf. In talking with Nissan Leaf support tonight they informed me I need this update. Anymore thoughts on this update? Good, bad, meh?

There have been a lot of people unhappy with the P3227 update due to very negative changes on regenerative braking.
See http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=14807&start=100#p355152" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
There have been many requests for Nissan to fix that but so far they have not.
I am one of those still avoiding having it done for this reason.

The software change does include a correction on charging that did result in some LEAF on board charger failures when using some GE EVSE. So using that particular EVSE would present risk without P3227.

Just to be clear AFAIC its a lot of perceived negative changes on regenerative braking. My LEAF had a negative change in regenerative braking prior to getting the update presumably from the the capacity of the pack decreasing, resistance of the pack going up, etc?

 

[TimLee]

Just to be clear AFAIC its a lot of perceived negative changes on regenerative braking. My LEAF had a negative change in regenerative braking prior to getting the update presumably from the the capacity of the pack decreasing, resistance of the pack going up, etc?

That is possible.
But I have yet to notice any significant changes on regenerative braking on my 23,000 miles one capacity bar loss (nearing two) LEAF that has not had P3227.
If it is battery aging, I'm going to wait on seeing bad regeneration before doing P3227.
And not use any GE EVSEs.

 

[TomT]

I now believe it is due more to battery degradation that anything else...

Just to be clear AFAIC its a lot of perceived negative changes on regenerative braking. My LEAF had a negative change in regenerative braking prior to getting the update presumably from the the capacity of the pack decreasing, resistance of the pack going up, etc?

 

[TimLee]

I now believe it is due more to battery degradation that anything else...

But how does anyone know that?
Very few people have avoided having P3227 done.
To avoid it you have to specifically instruct the dealer NOT to do it.
Most had it done by the dealer without them even knowing about it.
It would take quite a few non P3227 vehicles having observed loss of regeneration to prove the theory.

 

[gogetter]

I had this software update about a year ago. I thought I had the latest and greatest. But I soon realized that my typical range of 80 was now reduced to 60 miles per charge. This is charging to 100%. In the winter months here in Atlanta I get about 50 miles per charge. I checked with the dealer and they cannot roll back this update for the battery controller. The charger update seems fine. I think it does charge up a little quicker. So at least that's good. If i could find a way to put it back to the way it was I would do it. Any Ideas for anyone would be greatly appreciated. Has anyone else noticed this drop in range on the guess meter?

 

[iamchemist]

Below Timehorse posts details of the Safely Open Leaf Reprogram Bulletin. I have owned a 2012 LEAF since Jan. 2012, and yet I have never received any such Bulletin by mail or email from Nissan. Why have I never see this? Is there something that I have not properly signed up for at Nissan?