So, owners what range are you getting ?

[bowthom]

Hello,
I have to reiterate, what I am seeing are anomalies not caused by me driving 70+ miles an hour, jack rabbit accelerating, using the heater without knowing or any other such nonsense. Car shows 2 bars and it only takes 10.6 kWh to charge it up. How does terrain, bad driving habits or using the heater affect that?

 

[evnow]

5.9 miles/SOC bar OR 1.6 kWh/SOC bar OR 3.7 m/kWh

Why are you looking at SOC bars ? They are a very rough way to figure out things like 3.7 m/kwh ... you just don't have that much granularity of data to start with. See the sticky on what the SOC bars represent to see how wide each bar can be ...

Use the m/kwh that Leaf dash displays. I've seen that to be a lot more consistant.

 

[bowthom]

Hello,
SOC bars is the only thing we have to look at to tell us how much battery we have left. If it changes from 1.1 to 1.7 kWh/SOC bar how am I to judge how far I can go? When my SOC gauge says I'm out of power am I to ignore it? I don't know until later that it only used 10.6 kWh.

 

[ERG4ALL]

Bowthom, have you tried charging from an L2 charger and then from the trickle charger? Is there any chance that you have a defective charger that will only charge 10 kWh? Using both might be able to tell whether it is the car or the charger that needs attention.

 

[bowthom]

Hello,
Well there is the problem that my blink is on the blink now so I have to use the mini evse but the car itself said it was discharged from and then recharged to 100%. Blink showed how many kWh and the time it took to charge verified the current. Even the dash estimated how long it would take to charge and it took only 60% of that estimate. So me thinks it is in the car. I suppose I could be chasing my tail, over thinking it but I think not. ;-) It's the inconsistency that bugs me, one day everything works great and the next I can't get the numbers to correlate.

 

[ERG4ALL]

Bowthom, if it's erratic like that the only thing I can think of is to have the dealer run a battery diagnostic or at least to download any error messages that may be stored in the software.

 

[GaslessInSeattle]

Excellent post, I appreciate be reminded of the physics of inertia and wind drag. In my TDI Jetta, going 60 vs 75 made a hude difference in MPG. Anyone getting a substantially reduced range and having charging troubles really should start with the dealer they bought the car through. It was made clear to me that when I signed the acknowledgement that the batteries would degrade over time that I was not signing my rights away to getting a true malfunction in the batteries fixed under warranty.

For me, I assumed from the EPA rating that under non ideal conditions like high speed highway driving, cold, hot etc, that I would be getting more like 60-70 miles of range. If I get less than that, I will be dissappointed.

g

planet4ever wrote: Included in that document are the five examples of range that are now familiar to us here on this board, from 138 miles ideal (constant 38 mph) down to 62 miles in a winter traffic jam. None of them shows more than 70 miles in highway driving.

My experience was the same. I not only had to agree on the reservation page that I understood the range issue, but also had to sign the disclosure document before I took delivery on our LEAF.

I've posted this before but maybe some are new. The drag goes up by the square of the speed. Thus, just a 5 mph increase in speed can use up a considerable amount of extra energy. For example, the extra energy required to go 60 mph vs 55 mph is 19%. The extra energy required to go 65 vs 60 is 17% and the extra energy to go 70 vs 65 is 16%. Looking at the total difference between 55 and 70 yields 62% (70 squared = 4,900 divided by 55 squared [3.025] equals 62% greater energy). It is easy to see why the government during the oil embargo of 1973 imposed a 55 mph national speed limit.

I just finished reading John Hofmeister's book "Why We Hate the Oil Companies". Hofmeister is former President of Shell Oil North America. It is an interesting book. In it he states that the U.S. consumes 21 million barrels of crude oil per day. 13 to 14 million barrels are imported from foreign countries. This causes the U.S. to hemorrhage over one billion dollars per day to foreign countries, some of which aren't particularly fond of the U.S.

As all you LEAFers know, the energy to propel the LEAF is nearly all (coal, nuclear, hydro, wind, solar, geothermal, natural gas) generated in this country providing jobs for its citizens.

What I am suggesting is that those with poorer than expected range test their cars by making some trips deliberately at the slow speeds to see if there is a battery problem before we start talking about class action suits. What is at stake is too important than to try to denigrate the LEAF's image because of poor driving habits or lack of attention to the paperwork they signed.

 

[garylai]

I have had my Leaf for about one week now, commuting six times. My commute is 45 miles round trip. When I get home I am down to 45 miles range left as measured on the dash (6 out of 12 bars). So I am getting about 90 miles range predicted. This is all in ECO mode, about 70% freeway driving at speeds 60-65 mph, no climate control, some stop and go traffic on the return trip. It's about what I expected and consistent with what Nissan published. I am experimenting with 80% charge to prolong the battery life and arriving home with about 23 miles of range left when I do this. I will probably keep charging at 80% unless I know I have an extra trip to take on a given day or if the weather forces me to use climate control.

My dash is telling me I am getting 4.5 miles/kWh. My Blink charger registers 11.2 kWh of energy pushed into the car per night. That's 45 miles/11.2 = 4.0 miles/kWh. I figure the difference is due to charging loss which I expected to be about 10% and measurement accuracy, so the two independent ways of measuring energy efficiency are agreeing. If I am truly getting 90 miles range on a full charge and using 4.5 miles/kWh, that means the usable capacity on which range is calculated is 20 kWh, which is consistent with what has been speculated.

So no surprises on my end, I am getting what I expected. Granted, I have changed my commute habits a bit. I have changed my route a little to avoid big hills, dress up or down rather than using climate control, accelerate moderately and cap speeds at 60-65 mph. These changes have added about 5 minutes each way to my commute (45 minutes rather than 40 minutes), but it's no big deal. I am loving my Leaf.

 

[starry]

Today I took my fully charged #1597 LEAF ("StanLEAF Steamer") on a trip from San Clemente to Vista CA and back. At the start, there was on battery indicator all 12 bars and 90 miles projected range. By the time I got (255 feet downhill) to the freeway onramp a mile away, the projected range was 96 miles. It went down to 46 miles after 33.4 miles traveled, mostly on freeways at 60 mph. Then trickle charged for 3 hours, drove 5 miles to lunch, then 35 miles back home, again mostly on freeways at 60 mph.. Battery bars were down to 2 bars and 15 miles projected range left after climbing back up (+255 feet elevation change) to the house.
Gregg

 

[gascant]

3-day old LEAF when I started out on my 30.5 mile commute this morning. It's 5 miles of surface streets and 25.5 freeway. I did the whole thing in ECO mode with keeping the freeway speed to 60 mph. Started out with 106 miles range and 12 bars, but upon arrival was at 61 miles and 8 bars left. It was 53 degrees outside and I just brought in a little fresh air (no heat). Grew 1.4 trees. Going home was a different story--rainy and 47 degrees with a fair amount of traffic and 1 accident backing things up. Used some heat to keep the windshield clear and warm myself (as I didn't bring a jacket). Got home with 2 bars left and 19 miles range. No appreciable hills. Grew 2 trees coming home since the stop and go on the freeway allowed ample regen opportunities. It's about what I expected, though slightly disappointed with the heater taking away range (a conscious choice).

 

[planet4ever]

My dash is telling me I am getting 4.5 miles/kWh. My Blink charger registers 11.2 kWh of energy pushed into the car per night. That's 45 miles/11.2 = 4.0 miles/kWh. I figure the difference is due to charging loss which I expected to be about 10% and measurement accuracy, so the two independent ways of measuring energy efficiency are agreeing. If I am truly getting 90 miles range on a full charge and using 4.5 miles/kWh, that means the usable capacity on which range is calculated is 20 kWh, which is consistent with what has been speculated.

You are assuming that zero bars = empty, or more specifically, zero usable capacity. Now that is a very conservative way to look at things, and I would agree if you start with that viewpoint you will have only somewhere around 20 to 21 kWh of usable energy in the battery. I keep saying 24 kWh because I believe you still have about a 3 kWh usable reserve left after the last bar disappears. I know that I was able to drive nearly ten miles with no bars visible, and without entering turtle mode.

Ray

 

[JohnnySebring]

In spite of launching to 38 mph at every stoplight, driving in very hill Seattle, 70+ on the freeway, Leave the climate control on auto, I easily get the 50 miles on 80% I expected. The only thing I do to extend range is max the regen braking and 1 pedal drive as much as I can. I got down to 1 bar tonight after a 58 mile joyride on the freeways, the lowest level I've discharged to. 50% of nominal range is what I expected for my habits and needs and LuckyLeaf does it well.

 

[Fishleafer]

How you drive and how fast make a huge difference.

I absolutely agree! my normal commute is 40 miles each way (37miles HWY with some hilly conditions), and I do keep the speed at 57mph with tire pressure at ~39psi, I use 4 bars on my way to work (high to low elevation) and 6 bars on my way home (low to high elevation). I also had 4 adults and 1 kids in the car, and drove 80miles round trip with from 12 bars to 1 bar.

 

[ERG4ALL]

The heater uses about three times the energy (1.5 kW vs 0.5 kW) that the A/C does so I use it seldom. I know that Nissan would not want to do anything that would detract from the LEAF's super green image, but I've thought that it would be neat to have a heater like the propane table-top models. You'd just screw on one of those quart canisters and have heat exchangers to get heat into the passenger compartment. Based on the heat that they create in the open, I would think you might be able to get by a week or so with a closed passenger compartment.

 

[AndY1]

The heating should be done via the car's A/C unit - the same way home A/C units can heat or cool the house/apartment. Efficiency factor would be around 3, so only 1/3 of the energy would be used for the same amount of heating as with current (resistor) heater.

 

[ERG4ALL]

I agree if Nissan would use the latest R140 refrigerant. We have some Mitsubishi super efficient heat pumps that have put out usable heat down to 5 degrees above zero, but I expect that would drive the price of the car up. As a comparison in the A/C mode those heat pumps put out a SEER of 25 (12,000BTU) and SEER 26 (9,000BTU). For what little heat is needed at least in the roll-out states I'd settle for anything but resistance heat. If the battery is only good to around zero, the heat pumps may work.

 

[Coffee_Slurry]

I'll tell you what...

If I drove my Toyota V6 like I drive my Leaf, I would get 10mpg!

So I'm only getting 60 miles of range.. I'm loving it.
Stomp on the GO pedal.. it's cheap!

I drive like gasoline is back to $0.35/gallon.
I'm going to pay for it in front tires, though.

 

[gascant]

Day 2 of commuting--when I checked the owners portal this morning it said I had 100% charge but only 61 miles of range. I fretted all through breakfast and my shower, only to find that I actually had 97 miles range when I started (or booted up) the LEAF. Today was pretty much a carbon copy of yesterday (except for the accident) and I arrived home after 61 miles with 20 miles range and 3 bars remaining.

Also I had been expecting the charge to take 6 hours based on SOC and 3.3 kW charger but it only took 5. Does anyone else have that experience? Tonight the OP is saying 5:30 for essentially the same charge.

 

[TonyWilliams]

Started with 103 mile range this morning went 60 real miles on the freeway, half at 65 in Eco, and half at 60 in Eco. At the end of the trip had 28 miles left on the range meter. So that would make 89 miles total for a variance of 14 miles. Not too far off the mark.

I did something similar yesterday. Started with 100% charge, and showing 103 miles on the crazy meter. Using my "6/60" strategy (each gas tank energy bar is worth 6 miles at 60 mph on the freeway), and 12 bars times 6 would be 72 miles available. I needed to go 75.

I didn't use ECO at all, because I'm not convinced there's much savings at speed. I did get a little lost, and added a couple extra miles, so now I was really pushing it.

I drove the last few miles of city streets as close to 38 mph as I could. I finished the trip with about 2 miles remaining (it was in the dashes).

 

[TonyWilliams]

Also I had been expecting the charge to take 6 hours based on SOC and 3.3 kW charger but it only took 5. Does anyone else have that experience? Tonight the OP is saying 5:30 for essentially the same charge.

Today was the first time I went over 5 hours for an 80% recharge (after completely emptying the electric gas tank, in the dashes for range).

Started charge at 12:10am, and ended at 5:12am