Bought a 2013 Leaf... or At Least That's What the Papers Say

Hello,

just thought I'd introduce myself.

I live in Kansas City, MO and traded in my 2013 Hyundai Elantra for a 2013 Nissan Leaf S (quick charger installed) with 24k miles. it was nearly a 1 for 1 trade, so that was very nice. I have a 40 mile round trip commute currently, and am excited for the gas/maintenance savings.

However, during the purchase, the salesman informed me that there was a current recall on the airbag sensor, and that I would probably have to wait a week to drive the car home. I agreed and signed. I received a call last week that it would actually take 3 weeks to have my Leaf ready. That's a pretty infuriating experience when purchasing a vehicle. They gave me a loaner car in meantime, but I can't help but feel a bit misled by the time expectation upon purchase. It's giving me time to investiage electricians to install an outlet for an EVSE, but still highly frustrating. Did I do anything wrong?

But I digress.

Excited about eventually being a part of the Leaf owning community.

The topic title is a bit misleading - it reads as though you thought the car might be a 2012. Yes, I'm sure it' s frustrating waiting for the car. I believe the dealers have to perform all recall work before selling/delivering a car, though. Hopefully it won't take longer.

Congrats, Kansas City, MO has a healthy Chademo infrastructure. Way better than my home town of Knoxville, TN had last year. Not quite as good for the rest of your state as TN /NC is now.

Good news is the L2/DC chargers seem to be growing in number in most places.

Yes you did something wrong: you didn't walk away. Once you signed they would be in no hurry to get the car to you. Otherwise they would have overnighted the part from somewhere and had it installed post-haste.

jkline said:

Yes you did something wrong: you didn't walk away. Once you signed they would be in no hurry to get the car to you. Otherwise they would have overnighted the part from somewhere and had it installed post-haste.

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No, a bunch of people are waiting for the parts for this recall, including me. The difference is that dealers can't sell cars with open recalls, while those of us who already have the cars can keep driving them while waiting.

LeftieBiker said:

The difference is that dealers can't sell cars with open recalls, while those of us who already have the cars can keep driving them while waiting.

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Unless MO (or KS if the OP bought it on that side of the river) has a state law requiring such for used cars as well, that requirement only applies to new cars according to the NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/31/business/buyers-of-used-cars-are-left-to-find-recalls-on-their-own.html?_r=0 The article mentions that there is Federal legislation that was introduced to mandate the same for used cars, but that it hasn't gone very far in Congress.

Otherwise, this is a dealer policy, or perhaps a Nissan policy if the OP bought the car from a Nissan dealer.

The local dealer told me last week that the parts will arrive at the end of August or beginning of September. If true, this is not a good news for you. Since the dealer lied to you as "one week", I am hoping they did not lie to you about other stuff.

My next car probably won't be a Nissan, not because I don't like Nissan cars. Because I hate the Nissan dealers, which drove me crazy in multiple occasions in the past 3 years.

Best thing (in hind sight) would have been an agreement to loan you a Leaf while they were getting your Leaf ready... and have the agreement in writing.

LeftieBiker said:

The topic title is a bit misleading - it reads as though you thought the car might be a 2012.

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That's a fair point. My phrasing did not make that distinction.

dhanson865 said:

Congrats, Kansas City, MO has a healthy Chademo infrastructure. Way better than my home town of Knoxville, TN had last year. Not quite as good for the rest of your state as TN /NC is now.

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There's Chademo stations at my grocery store and near my work, so that aspect made a lot of sense. Traveling to St Louis is the only potential trip that will be challenging (we have an ICE vehicle for visiting family in Colorado and Texas). Hoping Nissan/KS/MO eventually give I-70 treatment similar to what Tesla has done, though I'm not holding my breathe.

RonDawg said:

Unless MO (or KS if the OP bought it on that side of the river) has a state law requiring such for used cars as well

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From what I've looked up, it does not seem to be on the books for either state. I could have missed something. Just new and certified pre-owned.

oko said:

The local dealer told me last week that the parts will arrive at the end of August or beginning of September. If true, this is not a good news for you.

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That is potentially the worst kind of news. I did call the dealer today and he said the parts were still "in transit". Which seems like an easy thing to say.

Stoaty said:

Best thing (in hind sight) would have been an agreement to loan you a Leaf while they were getting your Leaf ready... and have the agreement in writing.

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I wish I would have thought of that, though I wonder if that would've been possible, since unlike the coastal states, there are only a handful of Leafs available in this market. I'm not entirely sure they had another one.

jkline said:

Yes you did something wrong: you didn't walk away.

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I got what I considered to be a good deal on the car I wanted, and at the time I had little reason to think it would be any longer than what he said. I'm sure my lack of skepticism was my undoing here.

Eh, your lesson could have been worse. However, had they understood that a sale was going to evaporate because of this, they would have been highly motivated to get a part, even perhaps taking it off another car. That's the difference.

I'm not keen on the Nissan dealer in my town either.

My door panel that was to take "a week or two" to arrive took about 5 months to arrive. And of course the skin was already removed from the vehicle and disassembled waiting for the 1 week repair job part so the car was unusable for the whole period. Glad I have other vehicles...

I would go back and tell them that an ICE loaner is not acceptable. They need to deliver your car or you will go to the BBB. If you accept a loaner, make sure that it is costing them enough that they want to get your car fixed. I would ask for a new top of the line Leaf.

Thanks,
Dan

Danl said:

I would go back and tell them that an ICE loaner is not acceptable. They need to deliver your car or you will go to the BBB. If you accept a loaner, make sure that it is costing them enough that they want to get your car fixed. I would ask for a new top of the line Leaf.

Thanks,
Dan

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We were certainly anticipating not paying for gas for the past week, so the Nissan Note, while not the most inefficient ICE, is still a bit of a departure from our budget.

However, just got a call this morning. They think the part will ship on Monday, get here Wednesday, and take 20 minutes apply/fix.

natestaley said:

However, just got a call this morning. They think the part will ship on Monday, get here Wednesday, and take 20 minutes apply/fix.

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This reminds me an incident, not with a dealer, but with Time Warner. I canceled my service and was expecting a refund of $50. For six months or so, I called them, and every CSR, without exception, said that "your check is already printed and it is in the mail". Mind blowing lies, most possibly scripted by TW corporate itself. At the end of six months, finally someone who knows what she was doing, told me that my account was not closed, that's why I never received a check.

So when someone tells me "it is in the mail", I never believe them anymore. But given the trustworthiness and honesty of Nissan dealers, I'm pretty sure this is an exception and it will really be shipped on Monday.

Finally got my Leaf last Thursday. Love it. Has all 12 bars, but shows around 10% capacity loss, which seems reasonable for being a 2013. It's reading about 82 miles on a full charge.

Life throws you curveballs, though. I bought this car thinking I would simply need it for a 40 mile roundtrip commute. My work situation has changed, and I have a job offer that I may have to take in St Joseph, MO. It'd be a commute of about 47 miles each way from Parkville, MO. Luckily there's a quick charger up there, and several L2 stations. I'm not entirely sure what the work charging situation is. There does not appear to be anything between St Joe and KC in the way of EV charging, though I'm sure there's a 110 outlet somewhere in an emergency. Obviously I couldn't make the commute without charging in St Joe. From what I understand, using ChaDeMo daily wouldn't be the best thing for the battery. Do you guys think this could possibly be a practical commute, or am I SOL with the Leaf and basically just made a poorly timed/unlucky decision?

47 miles it totally doable in almost all circumstances, I can regularly get 70 miles in the summer with my '13S, 82 miles is a little optimistic. If you have a good way to charge halfway and can get back up to between 80-100% it just might work for you.
I don't believe you said but side streets are sometimes better for range than a freeway doing 70+ MPH, 60 is much better than 70+ if your traffic conditions allow. Don't worry about using the AC or other accessories, running the heat is the biggest killer of range, especially a S model.
120v charging is not very helpful for on the fly charging, to charge a battery thats down to 50% back up to 100% could take up to 10hrs, really only useful for overnight charging or if you drive very short trips.

Since you have an S with the 6.6kw charger onboard, even 20 minutes at an L-2 station would yield a 10% increase in charge. That might be enough to make the trip if you avoid 65+MPH speeds and lots of heater use. To put it another way, 10% charge is about the difference between the original commute and the new one.

That makes me feel a bit better. I'm willing to offer a cut out of my paycheck to have them install a 220 charger at work, but in the meantime the free chargers around town should cut it. My only worry has been that no matter what I will have to charge my car every day to get back home. There are some side country highways at lower speeds, but I think I'm just going to resign myself to the reality of being the guy that goes 5-10 under the speed limit on interstate. Not having cruise control for almost two hours a day will be an adjustment.

The lack of cruise control steered me away from leasing an S, and that in turn saved me from not having the heatpump, which would have made my 43 mile RT work commute impossible on the worst Winter days. Remember, though, that driving slower is almost always faster than sitting at an L-2 station. See if you can find a route with a 45MPH speed limit and a few 30-40MPH zones, and you may well not need to stop and charge. Another advantage your S has over earlier Leafs of all models is the air to air heater, which while it uses lots of power, provides heat fast, making it easier to run it intermittently. A 12 volt heated fleece throw can also keep you surprisingly warm, without draining the battery.

LeftieBiker said:

..... Another advantage your S has over earlier Leafs of all models is the air to air heater, which while it uses lots of power, provides heat fast, making it easier to run it intermittently. A 12 volt heated fleece throw can also keep you surprisingly warm, without draining the battery.

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Very true, I much prefer the heater on my '13S vs my '12SL. The '12 seems to take quite a bit longer to heat and as you said, is harder to run intermittently. In hindsight a '13 SV with the heatpump heater would have probably been a better choice for me in my cold climate but I didn't know the difference and neither did my salesperson, who knew very little of the Leaf :roll:
I've never really used cruise much, most all of my cars have lacked that feature so I didn't miss it so much but having it on my wifes Prius is nice for long trips, also keeps me from speeding to keep up with the traffic. I set it at 60-65mph and let other cars wiz by me, driving by my foot it's tempting to speed with everyone else. Note in heavy traffic or 2 lane roads I'll keep up with the flow but on less busy interstates where there is another lane or two, I ride in the slow lane and let others go around if they want to go faster.