Very close to getting a Leaf SL

[CincyLeaf]

Thank you very much for this chart. I will save it as I'm sure it can be useful in the beginning. The one I found was in Columbus, Ohio, and there is a level 2 charger almost halfway between there and Cincinnati. I used plugshare's website to find the charging stations. In that particular case it seems like I would be able to make it home. But I'm guessing it won't be easy depending where I find one. If I have to limit the search radius even further it's going to be very hard at this time finding a used Leaf.

By the way I have noticed that Walmart's are starting to show up with the DC faster chargers, that would be great for our area.

 

[powersurge]

get the "Chargepoint" app on your phone which gives you the location of every charging station you can go to in the entire U.S. a great charging network because it is mostly free to charge everywhere on your trip

 

[DanCar]

Keep in mind that once the Bolt is in production the resale value of a 2013 leaf will likely drop some. Will drop again once the next gen Leaf with 200 mile range is announced, perhaps early next year. Will likely drop in resale value again once the Tesla Model 3 is in production. The 186 mile e-golf is rumoured to be in the pipeline.

 

[cwerdna]

get the "Chargepoint" app on your phone which gives you the location of every charging station you can go to in the entire U.S. a great charging network because it is mostly free to charge everywhere on your trip

I would much rather use Plugshare than the Chargepoint app. (I have both.)

There actually is very little free L2 (and even less free L3) charging in the SF Bay Area, where I live.

 

[CincyLeaf]

Thanks. I don't have my LEAF but I have gotten both the plugshare and charegepoint apps .

 

[DNAinaGoodWay]

PlugShare includes all the ChargePoint stations, and is easier to use.

 

[cwerdna]

Also, before using ANY public charging where there's a card, app, code, etc. (any sort of authentication needed), it is a good idea to get accounts and cards on those networks AND activate those cards first.

I have all too often heard of people griping about their experience of having to make phone calls to charge because they didn't do that. And, I think I've heard of people also having to pay extra $ (vs. having a working card) to charge via phone.

IMHO, it is a waste of time to the above at a station instead of actually charging there during that wasted time.

 

[CincyLeaf]

I had an appointment at that Nissan Dealership today but decided not to go. I need to wait and get the leaf spy set up probably first. Also don't want to rush into the first good deal. I think there will be many 2013's coming back from lease this year. I wouldn't mind finding one from a private owner as well, probably get a little more leverage on negotiations and you also get to know the whole car history. The one I liked was at about $13000 which isn't a bad deal for my area for a '13 SL, but I would feel like I got a deal around $12k.

 

[rogersleaf]

I had an appointment at that Nissan Dealership today but decided not to go. I need to wait and get the leaf spy set up probably first. Also don't want to rush into the first good deal. I think there will be many 2013's coming back from lease this year. I wouldn't mind finding one from a private owner as well, probably get a little more leverage on negotiations and you also get to know the whole car history. The one I liked was at about $13000 which isn't a bad deal for my area for a '13 SL, but I would feel like I got a deal around $12k.

It's not my intent to talk you out of buying a used LEAF. Two years of leasing LEAF in Ohio has been both an enjoyable and educating experience. A few recommendations I would like to pass along from my own experience:
1). I would lease a LEAF, unlikely I would want to outright own one. This is primarily due to having the absolute worst resale/depreciation I've ever experienced with a vehicle.
2). I would not consider a LEAF without L2 charging in your home. Yes, L1 will likely work for your 30 miles/day anticipated usage but the recovery time will severely limit usage of the car. And, public charging of any type in Ohio is sparse, unreliable, dealer-based & sometimes restricted, and likely cheaper to operate a gas-guzzling full-size SUV at $2.50/gal if paying charge network pricing. In addition, the "Free-loading" electric car charging culture does not exist in Ohio. Basically home L2 charging is a necessity to make the car economical and practical in this part of the country.
3). I found out quickly the LEAF is not a very good Winter usage car in this climate as it consumes insane amounts of electricity at temperatures below freezing, which will drastically cut into usable range. At moderate temperature damp-cold conditions, it will struggle to keep the windshield defogged. With snow/ice, good luck maintaining enough interior temp to keep the windshield clear of ice. The strength or flexibility of the HVAC system is not the issue, the electricity usage cuts so deeply into the usable range the car becomes impractical. Mine is basically parked from November to March in favor of an ICE vehicle that makes real heat from real fire.
4). Given #2 and # 3, clean out your garage to store indoors to keep the batteries as warm as possible and be prepared to pre-warm the car while hooked to the L2 supply. Once the battery temp gauge drops below 3-4 bars, the usable range drops considerably.
5). As for buying a used LEAF and especially a unit that likely came from any warm-climate state, would not consider without plugging into LeafSpy beforehand. Not sure how that is done without having a LEAF to plug into beforehand to configure the elm327 & phone.
6). Please realize that the $12K - $13K retail LEAF is likely worth $7 - $8K on trade to get rid of it should you realize 6 months from now that it does not meet your needs or your needs change. Similar to what I was once told about owning a Dodge..."You don't buy a Dodge, you marry it."

So, plan accordingly and best of luck with your decision.

 

[jjeff]

While I agree with much of what Roger said, I think he's being a little pessimistic about cold weather use, and my S Leaf only has the resistive not more efficient heat pump heater. True the range can approach 40 miles on a 90% SOH battery but thats only when the temp gets zero(F) or below, just below freezing(20s F) I can get 60 miles without much effort. True the heater won't cook you out like an inefficient ICE but the Leaf heater does have the advantage of heat much quicker than a ICE and if you use the preheat feature you can start out with a toasty car, even when it's in the teens outside. AFA handling, the Leaf is one of my better cars for handling in ice and snow, and thats with the stock Ecopia tires, I can only imagine it would be better with winter tires.
Overall for my occasional 60 mile commute(with opportunity for about a 1hr 20a L2 charging 1/2 way) I was able to make it just fine this past winter, and I live in the relatively cold MN. Oh and while the Leaf does tend to occasionally fog/ice up in the winter I was able to greatly reduce that by making sure to wet vac out my Weather Tech floor mats whenever they filled with water, generally after most snowfalls. With an ICE vehicle and it's massive amount of hot air it's able to evaporate the water but on a Leaf water on the floor tends to only slowly evaporate and condense on the windows.

 

[CincyLeaf]

Well I guess that dealer wasn't joking when he said he was receiving lots of attention for his Leaf's. He had 10 on his website earlier in the week and he is now down to 7. The one I was interested in was sold as well.

 

[CincyLeaf]

It's not my intent to talk you out of buying a used LEAF. Two years of leasing LEAF in Ohio has been both an enjoyable and educating experience. A few recommendations I would like to pass along from my own experience:
1). I would lease a LEAF, unlikely I would want to outright own one. This is primarily due to having the absolute worst resale/depreciation I've ever experienced with a vehicle.
2). I would not consider a LEAF without L2 charging in your home. Yes, L1 will likely work for your 30 miles/day anticipated usage but the recovery time will severely limit usage of the car. And, public charging of any type in Ohio is sparse, unreliable, dealer-based & sometimes restricted, and likely cheaper to operate a gas-guzzling full-size SUV at $2.50/gal if paying charge network pricing. In addition, the "Free-loading" electric car charging culture does not exist in Ohio. Basically home L2 charging is a necessity to make the car economical and practical in this part of the country.
3). I found out quickly the LEAF is not a very good Winter usage car in this climate as it consumes insane amounts of electricity at temperatures below freezing, which will drastically cut into usable range. At moderate temperature damp-cold conditions, it will struggle to keep the windshield defogged. With snow/ice, good luck maintaining enough interior temp to keep the windshield clear of ice. The strength or flexibility of the HVAC system is not the issue, the electricity usage cuts so deeply into the usable range the car becomes impractical. Mine is basically parked from November to March in favor of an ICE vehicle that makes real heat from real fire.
4). Given #2 and # 3, clean out your garage to store indoors to keep the batteries as warm as possible and be prepared to pre-warm the car while hooked to the L2 supply. Once the battery temp gauge drops below 3-4 bars, the usable range drops considerably.
5). As for buying a used LEAF and especially a unit that likely came from any warm-climate state, would not consider without plugging into LeafSpy beforehand. Not sure how that is done without having a LEAF to plug into beforehand to configure the elm327 & phone.
6). Please realize that the $12K - $13K retail LEAF is likely worth $7 - $8K on trade to get rid of it should you realize 6 months from now that it does not meet your needs or your needs change. Similar to what I was once told about owning a Dodge..."You don't buy a Dodge, you marry it."

So, plan accordingly and best of luck with your decision.

Thank you for all this information, although I'm asking myself a ton more questions now.

1) The financial aspect of buying a leaf is very interesting to me, and I think I will have to dive down and do a proper analysis. I personally don't like Leases in general and also try to avoid car payments. With the leaf the lease is attractive because of the battery technology and that has to be taken into account. The benefit of buying used is the the car has already taken a pretty hard depreciation hit ~65% but I would imagine that it could take an additonal 50%-65% hit in the next three years. I will have to run some numbers and post back on here, I think this could be a very interesting point/discussion.

2) Unfortunately I called the electrician that built my Condo and says that they could not run 220V to my garage because of where it is located in relation to the breaker box. So I either need to give it up or come up with another solution. I live in the Cincinnati area and more chargers seem to be popping up which I think is great. Luckily there is a Nissan dealer between my house and my work which has a CHAdeMO charger. So I could imagine stopping by there to top off for free. I believe it takes 30 minutes to charge to 80% from empty, therefore I imagine it would take me 15 to 20 minutes to charge from wherever I am starting at. If I can find a way to charge at work on the L1 then I wouldn't even be worried at all.

3) I need to read up a lot more on accounts of using the leaf during the Winter. We can have some pretty bitter cold days here approaching 0 at times. I am also very curious to know more of how good the Heating and AC system is in that car. I am pretty spoiled today with mine, the AC system is very strong and I imagine that I will definitely notice the difference.

Back to doing more research....

 

[jjeff]

When I said with morning preheat you can start off with a toasty warm car, that was on 240v, on 120v preheat doesn't really work very well and will actually take power from the cars battery. On 120v I've read it's best to just run preheat for 5 minutes or so to warm the windshield and such, any longer than that and you'd probably be just as good driving the car and running the heat. Note in the single digits or below the heat-pump heater isn't really more efficient than the resistive heater, you mainly gain efficiency in warmer above freezing temps.
Another option for 240v is if you have 2 separate 120v circuits in your garage that happened to be out of phase, you could get 240v with something like a Quick220v adapter but they should really be on dedicated circuits and for sure not shared with a neighbors garage.

 

[Jedlacks]

It took me over two years of research to finally buy a used Leaf. Before then it was another year or so of me wondering if it is something I could live with. If I was pressed for time I would have just leased one, but I have done leases in the past and I ended up buying the car.

The Leaf I bought was a '15 SV with 8,500 miles and DCQC. I bought it for a little over 15K after I ran Leaf Spy and was comfortable with what I saw. The Nissan dealer was offering me a Lease that would have cost me a little over $2,000 more at the end, and I would have NOTHING to hang on to. If my Leaf dies and becomes a door stop, at least I would have SOMETHING to show for the money I spent.

This car may last me a long time, because I take care of the battery. After a full charge I can drive 100-110 miles easily. With all that said, I would go further to admit that the Leaf is not for everybody.

 

[Reddy]

All good advice from others. I'll also add, if you want to charge at a specific dealership in the future, make sure that you purchase from THAT dealership. Also, keep a good personal relationship with several of the managers, stop by once a week or so to say hi and make them think you might trade in someday. Some dealerships only allow charging by their customers. It sucks to find that out after the fact.

Also, for 30 mi RT commute in sub-zero temps you may be right at the edge. If you have another car, can telecommute or call in sick/vacation/weather restriction then I'd say you're fine. Always plan for the worst case, have multiple alternatives and then make your decision. Worst case: sub-zero, head wind BOTH ways (yes, that happened to me on Friday on my bicycle commute and can easily happen when a winter front blows through the midwest), snow/ice/standing water on the road causing more friction, stopped traffic for an hour or so (you'll need to turn off the heat to conserve electrons). All others will be a piece of cake compared to this. Driving in 105 F with A/C is actually pretty easy. The Leaf and all EVs are much more efficient at producing cooling because the A/C compressor is located on a hot gasoline engine!

Level 1 trickle charging can work when driving LESS than 50 mi/day, even less in winter. However, pre-heating can produce less heat (especially with 2011-2012, all S models, 2013+ with heat pump work pretty good). If you park inside a garage, then the overnight temps don't reach ambient and the car is easir to pre-warm. This isn't the case if you park outside on the driveway and outside at work. In these cases, clearing ice/snow is more difficult in the Leaf vs the gas car (where people turn on the vehicle for 30+ min getting 0 mpg, but at least put out lots of heat on the windshield). Having a pre-warmed EV in my garage is one of the best things for my 4 mi commute. I don't like pre-warming my gas-guzzler, so it always just started warming up after about 3 mi of driving, just in time to arrive at work.

Finally, if you have another car, driving an EV is much easier. You can pick and chose cars based on distance and temperatures (as a previous poster did). If you will only have one car, then 100% battery EVs require a bit more thinking and commitment. It's still doable for some, but not everyone. I usually recommend the Volt for the younger, single car person. It's less roomy, but still a good car for some.

 

[LeftieBiker]

2) Unfortunately I called the electrician that built my Condo and says that they could not run 220V to my garage because of where it is located in relation to the breaker box. So I either need to give it up or come up with another solution. I live in the Cincinnati area and more chargers seem to be popping up which I think is great. Luckily there is a Nissan dealer between my house and my work which has a CHAdeMO charger. So I could imagine stopping by there to top off for free. I believe it takes 30 minutes to charge to 80% from empty, therefore I imagine it would take me 15 to 20 minutes to charge from wherever I am starting at. If I can find a way to charge at work on the L1 then I wouldn't even be worried at all.

The details aren't clear enough, but if a new 120 volt line can be run, then you have two more choices: a 120 volt, 20 amp circuit, with an upgraded 120 volt EVSE set to charge at 16 amps, or ... first we need to know if the problem is that NO new line can be run, or if it just can't be 240 volts.

 

[rogersleaf]

Despite the somewhat negative comments I made about Winter use, the LEAF is still by far the best grocery-getter I've ever had. That cold weather, short-cycle use is one of the best applications for the LEAF. The heated steering wheel and seats are excellent. In addition, there is a good feeling of satisfaction knowing that I'm not leaving a fog of poorly burned hydrocarbon from an ICE that never gets to an efficient operating temp on short trips.