New owner, learning new math

Had my Leaf about a week now, trying to figure out the new math based on my driving around yesterday... This was from an 80% charge. Nice day in the 60-80 degree range here in Dallas.

The 4.2 drives were me in ECO mode, the rest were my wife driving like she always has. Do these numbers make sense?


"Date","Trip ID","Electricity Used (Total) (kWh)","Electricity Used (Consumption) (kWh)","Electricity Used (Regeneration) (kWh)","Distance Traveled (mile)","Energy Economy (mile/kWh)","CO2 Tailpipe Emission Reduction (lbs)"
"2012-04-05","1","1.5","2.1","0.6","6.6","4.2","4"
"2012-04-05","2","1.6","2.1","0.5","6.6","4.2","4"
"2012-04-05","3","0.9","1.2","0.3","2.2","2.6","2"
"2012-04-05","4","0.9","1.2","0.3","2.8","3.1","2"
"2012-04-05","5","1.8","2.5","0.7","5.7","3.1","4"
"2012-04-05","6","1.8","2.5","0.7","5.6","3.1","4"

Total Miles: 29.5
Total KwH used: 8.5
Remaining Miles: 21
Charge bars remaining: 2

That adds up to 50 miles. The GOM (yes, I am learning the lingo) estimated range on 80% charge is 84 miles which only seems off by about 40% or so.

I am sure I have a lot of reading to do to understand all these numbers, but for the type of driving it was, that range seems surprisingly low. Thoughts?

Cheezmo said:

I am sure I have a lot of reading to do to understand all these numbers, but for the type of driving it was, that range seems surprisingly low. Thoughts?

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The range does seem low, but so do your wife's mi/kWh ratings. Have you ridden with her to see what the difference between your driving and hers is? I could understand a low reading every now and then due to a short trip anomaly, but 2.6 mi/kWh is REALLY low and even for the other 2 trips of decent distance, 3.1 seems very low. Granted, I do think it takes some getting used to developing good driving habits. Her regen power is pretty high which would suggest she is doing a lot of slowing/stopping. And while regen is a good thing if you're going to be doing that anyway, it can work against you if you're constantly gunning it followed by stopping it. Unfortunately a lot of people drive this way, staying RIGHT on the tail of the person in front of them and besides being dangerous (in my opinion) it's horribly inefficient.

The other thing that looks a bit funny is that you used 8.5kWh from the battery, starting from an 80% charge and you have only 2 bars showing. That seems pretty low too. I would've expected 3 or maybe 4. Maybe it just clicked down to 2 though.

The 21 on the GOM is basically because it's assuming your wife is going to keep driving the car and getting 3.1 mi/kWh. If you started driving the car you would probably gain miles back.

When you note the mileage on the GOM just after charging, I've found that it does tend to overestimate the mileage remaining at the top end, so you'll usually experience a really quick drop. However, I've also found that if you can achieve around 4.1 mi/kWh you should be able to more or less hit the # of miles it shows. So that's your target.

The car we replaced was a 1997 BMW M3. That probably explains a lot

Probably just need to use 100% charge on her days. I doubt I can sell her on ECO mode.

You didn't say where you got those numbers. Maybe Carwings? That's a questionable source of data.

The total miles/kW comes out around 3.5. That's not unreasonable for your distance. I went through this, too. Remember that there's another 10 miles or so after "empty", so that makes 60. Then, if you charge to 100%, that gets you to 75. Which is a reasonable real-world range, if you ignore all the efficiency techniques.

Cheezmo said:

Had my Leaf about a week now, trying to figure out the new math based on my driving around yesterday... This was from an 80% charge. Nice day in the 60-80 degree range here in Dallas.

The 4.2 drives were me in ECO mode, the rest were my wife driving like she always has. Do these numbers make sense?...
I am sure I have a lot of reading to do to understand all these numbers, but for the type of driving it was, that range seems surprisingly low. Thoughts?

Click to expand...

It, all depends on what type of driving you did, your speed and ascent/descent being the largest variables.

There are many previous threads on this topic, you may want to take a look at.

For the question of how speed effects m/kWh on level drives, the factors at the top of the range chart here:

http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=101293#p101293" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Are very close to correct, though personally I am somewhat less confident in the chart's breakdown by bars, and believe some of the adjustment factors at the bottom, still need some work.

You might want to look at this current thread, where I have posted some of my LEAFs longer term CW info, and also will be posting the results of several recent drives, breaking down the day's driving into separate "trips", to show more about how regen and energy recovery on descent, shows up in M/kWh on CW.

http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=31&t=8437&start=10" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

gbarry42 said:

You didn't say where you got those numbers. Maybe Carwings? That's a questionable source of data.

Click to expand...

The only part that's questionable is the start and final GOM reading. The other data is probably reasonably accurate (unless it's missing a trip due to a "Decline" on the startup screen).

i have never seen numbers like that, but then even in my ICE i dont race to stop lights, drive 75 on the freeway all the time and go 5-10 miles over the speed limit on city boulevards.
part of the thing is learning to drive as if gasoline is expensive and translating that to the Leaf.
Some people can only learn it with a much more finite range.

Cheezmo,
Yes that does look like CarWings data, on "the new owner" section of CarWings. And yes, you are going to have to drive more conservatively to get your miles per kWh rate up, as lpickup is mentioning.

By comparison, I live in a valley and do some considerable climbing to get to work every weekday. And yet by now (4 months of ownership) I have gotten my miles per kWh up to 4.9 on average. I know my hillclimbing beats anything you've got out there in Dallas!

Edit: Oops - Plano - well, that's close enough :lol:

2 Bars remaining might be 30% (there are ROUGHLY 1.5 invisible bars as a hidden reserve), and at 3.1 (the GOM is using the most recent "several" minutes driving "economy"), a full tank might only give about 21 x 3.1 = 65 miles and 30% of that is about 20 miles.

See the 1st link in the signature of any post by TonyWilliams and print out his Range/Economy chart. That will help a lot.

Also, your driving styles will gradually change, as your desire to go farther gets stronger!

Welcome to LEAFing.

Find (or start) a LEAF-Gathering in your area.

edatoakrun said:

Are very close to correct, though personally I am somewhat less confident in the chart's breakdown by bars, and believe some of the adjustment factors at the bottom, still need some work.

Click to expand...

When folks have LEAFscans, I'm confident that we'll have a renewed chart!!!

I live in Garland and and yesterday (4/5) I charged to 80%, then commuted to work and back. The trip odometer said 38.9 miles and I had 2 bars remaining when I got home. The dash said 5.2 m/kwh. This is normal for me as the morning commute is cooler and I get about 3.9 m/kwh for that run. I do use eco mode, as I prefer engine braking to using the brakes.

Btw, what color car do you have? I saw a silver one (just like mine) yesterday as I drove thru Plano.

Mine is red.

Another quick noob question, I see there was a firmware update in March, since I took delivery on March 29, is there a quick way to tell if I have it? An alert when you open the driver door with the power on?

Didn't know about the possibility of missed trips due to decline on the screen. But I think that data includes all the trips we remember taking that day. I'll have to make sure we always accept (does never answering it = decline?).

I will definitely watch for group meetings there seems to be a group based around the McKinney dealership.

Cheezmo said:

Mine is red.

Another quick noob question, I see there was a firmware update in March, since I took delivery on March 29, is there a quick way to tell if I have it? An alert when you open the driver door with the power on?

Didn't know about the possibility of missed trips due to decline on the screen. But I think that data includes all the trips we remember taking that day. I'll have to make sure we always accept (does never answering it = decline?).

I will definitely watch for group meetings there seems to be a group based around the McKinney dealership.

Click to expand...

With the car on READY and in D, and you FOOT ON THE BRAKE FULLY STOPPED, open the door.

You should see "Shift to Prange" on the driver's info screen.

TonyWilliams said:

Cheezmo said:

Mine is red.

Another quick noob question, I see there was a firmware update in March, since I took delivery on March 29, is there a quick way to tell if I have it? An alert when you open the driver door with the power on?

Click to expand...

With the car on READY and in D, and you FOOT ON THE BRAKE FULLY STOPPED, open the door.

You should see "Shift to Prange" on the driver's info screen.

Click to expand...

Also see this thread for instructions to check some (but I think not all) of the software versions: http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=5176" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I also took delivery in March, but mine was a 2011 demo. Going through the process in that thread confirmed that the dealer never bothered to apply the updates before selling it to me. Now to decide whether it's worth taking in specifically for that, or wait until the first "service" interval. Don't think there's anything major that I'm missing.

Cheezmo said:

I'll have to make sure we always accept (does never answering it = decline?).

Click to expand...

Yes, not answering it = decline.

I don't know whether that means it just queues up the trip for the next time you hit "Ok" or not, but if you want to make certain, just hit Ok every time.

Cheezmo said:

Had my Leaf about a week now, trying to figure out the new math based on my driving around yesterday...

Click to expand...

In the (mostly) flat DFW Metroplex on a nice, calm 70 degree day, the main thing that affects your range is your speed. The power required to overcome wind resistance varies in proportion to the square of your speed. Of course, the miles covered per unit of time varies in direct proportion to your speed. This means that the efficiency (m/kwh) varies in inverse linear proportion to the speed. For example, if your efficiency at 35 mph is 6.3 m/kwh, you can estimate that your efficiency at 70 mph will be about 3.2 m/kwh. Tony Williams' fine range chart confirms the above relationships fairly closely. So you see, the old math works just fine!

ETA- Stated more simply, the efficiency of the 2011-12 LEAF at any speed between 35 and 70 mph can be estimated by the following formula:

Efficiency (in m/kwh) = 231/Speed (in mph).

For example, at 60 mph, Efficiency = 231/60 = 3.9 m/kwh.