Tracking my Leaf Mods and accessories.

theleafer · Feb 27, 2014

In this thread I will be displaying what I have done to my leaf. Nothing will be intrusive or potentially warranty voiding. I am embarking on a small solar project, that will be the main focus of this thread. For now I will just start With what I have done thus far to the car.

This was my first thing. I wanted to protect the seats and add some fun and livelyness to the all black interior of my leaf. I got these off of amazon. They look great, seem to be of pretty good quality and were an amazing deal: Mats, front and rear seat covers and headrest covers, 4 floor mats, steering wheel cover and seat belt covers all for $30

mwalsh · Feb 27, 2014

Your image tag needs to go to the actual image, not the web page the image is presented on. Like so:

crabasa · Feb 27, 2014

Can you please provide direct links to purchase these items? They look great!

--Carter

garsh · Feb 28, 2014

crabasa said:
Can you please provide direct links to purchase these items? They look great!

I'm guessing it's these: OxGord Seat Cover & Mat sets, ~$20 + $10 S&H.
Several sets with different colors to choose from.

theleafer · Mar 3, 2014

Thank you for the pointer on the images. Yes, the covers are the Oxgard set. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00H7GZWX0/ref=oh_details_o04_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There are many different color choices, I just really liked the look of the red on black.

theleafer · Mar 3, 2014

I live an active life style and during my free time I enjoy skiing and biking. Luckily, there is a ski mountain which is 34.5 miles away. I have yet to attempt to make it up because I know that I will be getting very close with my range due to the 2,129 ft. elevation change and the fact that I live on what is known as the South Hill area meaning that I will have to drive up the mountain and than drive up another hill on the way home. That being said, here is my ski set up.

The crossbars can be found here.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002MABM8/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So far I have not noticed any big impact on my range and they are actually very quiet even with my large 6 pair/4 snowboard racks.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004JME5SI/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

thedak · Mar 3, 2014

Ummmm.....

:shock:

theleafer · Mar 5, 2014

I am beginning my aforementioned solar project. I am starting on a very small scale for now.

Currently, I have a 1.5 watt solar panel hooked up to a 12v battery I found around my house and that feeds a 750watt inverter. Currently this system feeds my desk light and phone charger. Due to the recent lack of sunny days in eastern Washington, I have not been able to have a very good test of the system. My ultimate goal of the overall project is to build a system that will be capable of putting even something so small as 5-10 miles back into the leaf's battery during the course of a work day.

QueenBee · Mar 7, 2014

theleafer said:
Currently, I have a 1.5 watt solar panel hooked up to a 12v battery I found around my house and that feeds a 750watt inverter. Currently this system feeds my desk light and phone charger. Due to the recent lack of sunny days in eastern Washington, I have not been able to have a very good test of the system. My ultimate goal of the overall project is to build a system that will be capable of putting even something so small as 5-10 miles back into the leaf's battery during the course of a work day.

I'm interesting to see what kind of math you are doing to come up with something reasonable and what kind of design. Are you planning on charging a bunch of lead acid batteries, then connecting them to a inverter back to AC then to an EVSE then to your LEAF? Seems like a whole lot of cost, work, and inefficiency. I'd be more willing to guess that the mileage lost from hauling all that around would be more than could be gained.

The money would be better spent on putting solar PV on your roof considering our states great incentives and the federal credit.

theleafer · Mar 8, 2014

QueenBee said:
theleafer said:

Currently, I have a 1.5 watt solar panel hooked up to a 12v battery I found around my house and that feeds a 750watt inverter. Currently this system feeds my desk light and phone charger. Due to the recent lack of sunny days in eastern Washington, I have not been able to have a very good test of the system. My ultimate goal of the overall project is to build a system that will be capable of putting even something so small as 5-10 miles back into the leaf's battery during the course of a work day.

Click to expand...

I'm interesting to see what kind of math you are doing to come up with something reasonable and what kind of design. Are you planning on charging a bunch of lead acid batteries, then connecting them to a inverter back to AC then to an EVSE then to your LEAF? Seems like a whole lot of cost, work, and inefficiency. I'd be more willing to guess that the mileage lost from hauling all that around would be more than could be gained.

The money would be better spent on putting solar PV on your roof considering our states great incentives and the federal credit.

Right now I am thinking of doing the lead acid batteries. I realize the complete inefficiency of the project, I am doing it more to see how much I can actually put back into the pack. Ideally I would tap straight into the battery pack but as the car is being leased I do not want to get into the car's hardware.

QueenBee · Mar 8, 2014

theleafer said:
Right now I am thinking of doing the lead acid batteries. I realize the complete inefficiency of the project, I am doing it more to see how much I can actually put back into the pack. Ideally I would tap straight into the battery pack but as the car is being leased I do not want to get into the car's hardware.

Experimenting is fun but I'd develop your hypothesis before actually spending money and time. Based on your comments one hypothesis might be that using solar panels in the car you could collect 5-10 miles of range during an eastern Washington summer day. Then you could figure out how many watts of solar panels you would need to produce that much electricity and how many lead acid batteries you would need to store it.

theleafer · Mar 11, 2014

Thank you for your input, After doing some research and measuring the roof of my LEAF I have found some panels that seem promising. These panels measure 40inches by 25 inches, This means that I will easily be able to fit 3 panels on the roof. I would love to squeeze in a fourth. With 4 panels on the roof I would have a total of 400 watts. With this out put, assuming perfect conditions, I would be able to gain back 11 miles in a 7 hour time period. If I could put this much electricity back into the battery pack, I would consider this a success.

Here are the panels that I am considering:
http://www.amazon.com/Yosisun-Watts-Polycrystalline-Solar-Photovoltaic/dp/B00HIZHZXA/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top?ie=UTF8&colid=TOWN1U7K6WPM&coliid=I3A3NHNARAO1DI" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Does anyone know of I way that I can go straight into the batteries without having to go through a separate battery pack, inverter, evse and on board charger without severely voiding the warranty?

QueenBee · Mar 11, 2014

theleafer said:
Thank you for your input, After doing some research and measuring the roof of my LEAF I have found some panels that seem promising. These panels measure 40inches by 25 inches, This means that I will easily be able to fit 3 panels on the roof. I would love to squeeze in a fourth. With 4 panels on the roof I would have a total of 400 watts. With this out put, assuming perfect conditions, I would be able to gain back 11 miles in a 7 hour time period. If I could put this much electricity back into the battery pack, I would consider this a success.

Here are the panels that I am considering:
http://www.amazon.com/Yosisun-Watts-Polycrystalline-Solar-Photovoltaic/dp/B00HIZHZXA/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top?ie=UTF8&colid=TOWN1U7K6WPM&coliid=I3A3NHNARAO1DI" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Does anyone know of I way that I can go straight into the batteries without having to go through a separate battery pack, inverter, evse and on board charger without severely voiding the warranty?

A few things to note: That is the STC rating and not the PTC rating. There will also be loss from the usual sources: soiling, wire loss, inverter loss, panel age, season, weather, tilt angle of the panels, shade, temperature, orientation relative to due south, etc.

If you made an charger that could increase the voltage up to ~400 volts and could talk chademo to the car you could get power in through the DCQC port, although I don't know if the car would get angry at how low the charging would be.

If instead of spending $460 on those panels and carrying them in your car or mounting them to your car you bought one $225 250 watt panel and a $120 microinverter and set it on the southern side of your house I'll guarantee you'll produce more power over the year with the 250 watt panel.

theleafer · Mar 26, 2014

Finally received my Juice box evse. This is a 60A 240V 15KW charger. It is overboard for the leaf but I got it in the hopes of future-proofing for future electric cars that we may buy. The best thing about this, in my opinion is that I can now keep my Nissan supplied charger with me. The much faster charger is also a huge plus. These chargers are basic but are much cheaper than getting a "name brand" and for the price you get a lot of bang!
http://www.emotorwerks.com/products...-open-source-level-2-15kw-ev-charging-station

theleafer · May 8, 2014

I got my 250 watt solar panel on Monday. It is exciting to see the pieces coming together! Here is a picture of the panel in the shop.

Here is a picture of the panel on my roof racks for fitting. It is a little tighter than I thought but it works. I am going to try work out a solution to get it as close to the roof as possible in order to reduce aerodynamic drag. Ideally I would use thee peel and stick variety of panels but I just can't justify the watts per dollar. Ultimately the panel will end up on my house after my experiment concludes so I didn't see the point in getting something super specialized. I can't wait to get it hooked up and start utilizing the sun's energy!

theleafer · May 8, 2014

Here is my 2500 watt Cobra power inverter. Orginally I tried plugging my OEM EVSE into my 750 watt inverter just to see if it would even accept the power from a modified sine wave inverter. All I got was flashing from the ready light which means that the ground cable is not connected. As a result, my purpose bought inverter has grounded outlets and as a bonus will display the amount of volts and watts being pulled from the outlets.

Ingineer · May 16, 2014

FYI: The few miles that your PV gives you will likely be lost by the extra drag caused by having them on your LEAF.

Put them on your house, where they can work all day, every day. This way you can use the grid as a storage system and not bother with anything in your LEAF.

-Phil

gbarry42 · May 16, 2014

Did you spot that extra feature on the inverter? "5V USB output"! Here, I think, is the killer feature. You'll be able to charge your phone with this setup! Well, keep us posted. Someone's got to try it, if only to serve as a lesson to others.

QueenBee · May 17, 2014

gbarry42 said:
Did you spot that extra feature on the inverter? "5V USB output"! Here, I think, is the killer feature. You'll be able to charge your phone with this setup! Well, keep us posted. Someone's got to try it, if only to serve as a lesson to others.

You can do the math without trying it. He math should indicate that's it is not worth the effort and putting that effort into solar PV on your roof will have a real payback.

theleafer · Jun 6, 2014

Ingineer said:
FYI: The few miles that your PV gives you will likely be lost by the extra drag caused by having them on your LEAF.

Put them on your house, where they can work all day, every day. This way you can use the grid as a storage system and not bother with anything in your LEAF.

-Phil

Phil, I am aware that the drag induced by the panel will possibly be more that what my PV charging set up will ever give back to me. This is intended to be an experiment for my senior design project and a proof of concept. After my independent study project period is over I will be mounting this on my roof and the batteries and inverter will be used either as back up power or used to run deck lighting. Thank you for your input though!

Tracking my Leaf Mods and accessories.

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