2018 LEAF Test Drive Events

DarthPuppy said:

One design error, IMHO anyway, is moving the econ button from the steering wheel controls to the center console. When I'm trying to merge onto a freeway and realize I need more acceleration is not the time for me to start looking at the center console to turn off the econ mode. True, it is driver error to not anticipate that and turn it off before you get onto the on ramp. But from experience, it is easy to get distracted and not have the econ mode off until you really need it off. And I find the steering wheel button much more reliably and quickly accessed on my Leaf than on my Highlander Hybrid which has it on the center console.

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Eco mode does not limit max power. The full 80kW is available regardless. At least that's how it's worked on LEAF so far...

OrientExpress said:

There is an adjustment for the cruise control as to har far it sees and how quickly it accelerates back to the set maximum speed. it's on the steering wheel, and is represented on the instrument cluster bay thereat of a car and three adjustable bars.

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This is true. You can set following distances for 1, 2 or 3 but the key thing to remember is that its not autonomous driving. You need to help it and part of that help is setting the correct speed for conditions.

This is the mistake I made on my WA gridlock drive. I had ACC set for 62 MPH but already knew that wasn't going to happen. It was "my" setting that was in error. Setting a realistic speed for conditions still would have covered the random speed ups and slow downs and likely provided a less "adventurous" drive.

Good to know about the variables that can be set. When we were on the freeway the host activated the ProPilot which I'm guessing used the speed we were travelling at the time it was set. When the conditions changed, I was not privy to how to adjust the setting. As I'm pretty good about reading through the owners manual of new cars I get, I would learn that pretty quick once I get one and am no longer on a short term test drive.

Can the view range be increased beyond 3 car lengths? That is what would really be necessary for it to make appropriate decisions in the situation without override or corrective setting changes on my part in the scenario I encountered. It was following the car in front with a 3 car length gap. But it was when that car left the lane that it no longer perceived the need to slow down. I'd hate to think it wouldn't start to slow down until it got to 3 car lengths of the stopped cars in front of us. Also the view range would need to be set independent of the following distance. While I would want it to view say 10 car lengths for decision purposes, I wouldn't want it to do trail more than 3 car lengths behind a car that is in lane and maintaining appropriate speeds.

DarthPuppy said:

Good to know about the variables that can be set. When we were on the freeway the host activated the ProPilot which I'm guessing used the speed we were travelling at the time it was set. When the conditions changed, I was not privy to how to adjust the setting. As I'm pretty good about reading through the owners manual of new cars I get, I would learn that pretty quick once I get one and am no longer on a short term test drive.

Can the view range be increased beyond 3 car lengths? That is what would really be necessary for it to make appropriate decisions in the situation without override or corrective setting changes on my part in the scenario I encountered. It was following the car in front with a 3 car length gap. But it was when that car left the lane that it no longer perceived the need to slow down. I'd hate to think it wouldn't start to slow down until it got to 3 car lengths of the stopped cars in front of us. Also the view range would need to be set independent of the following distance. While I would want it to view say 10 car lengths for decision purposes, I wouldn't want it to do trail more than 3 car lengths behind a car that is in lane and maintaining appropriate speeds.

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the "3" does not mean 3 car lengths. On my drive I noticed the following distance was controlled by speed. With a setting of 3 on the freeway, it was simply way too much. There was literally enough room for 3 cars to cut in at once so even a following distance of "1" was like 3-4 car lengths

but on surface streets, the following distance was less so have to think the actual distances are speed controlled. Rule of thumb says one car length per 10 mph of speed (granted in reality no one follows that rule!) so guessing Nissan loosely based their setting on that.

Eventually on the freeway, I set my follow to 1 and that worked great as long as no one was making lane changes, etc. Even constant speed changes were ok.

In town, one was too close but my set speed was 35 mph, so I changed it to 2 and that worked well.

Its my feeling that when the LEAF zeros in on a car to use as its "leader" it does fine. Its when the LEAF has to find another leader, the time it takes is where my confidence in ACC waivers. So, not a driver in any sense but definitely allows me to take micro breaks.

Its simply learning the car and what it can and cannot do.

Hopefully 3 means 3 seconds which is an appropriate following distance (4 is better). Of course almost nobody does this because they have no clue about physics or reaction times. As is clearly evident by listening to morning traffic reporting and the invariable list of accidents. And even the slowness of traffic is partly due to short following distances which force abrupt braking maneuvers. Full autonomy if it ever comes is going to severely annoy people because of the lack of tailgating. :lol:

Until it gets more advanced, I would view it as more of a backup capability - something to maintain safety for those times I need to change from glasses to sunglasses or when dealing with a sneeze. Out on the open road, it would be more beneficial. But on SoCal freeways, it will require substantial oversight and adjustments to the above mentioned settings to function properly.

Still good to have on the vehicle IMO.

DarthPuppy said:

Until it gets more advanced, I would view it as more of a backup capability - something to maintain safety for those times I need to change from glasses to sunglasses or when dealing with a sneeze. Out on the open road, it would be more beneficial. But on SoCal freeways, it will require substantial oversight and adjustments to the above mentioned settings to function properly.

Still good to have on the vehicle IMO.

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I would not be using it for any more than that. Because of the huge amount of time spent in car, I carry food, water, etc. Enough time to grab a sandwich out of the cooler is all I really need.

I had my test drive earlier today. Car was a fully loaded SL w/power seats and ProPilot Assist. It had over 8330 miles on it and TN manufacturer plates. I forgot to take of a pic of the door sticker to see its build month.

I really liked the extra power. Unfortunately, I'm not at all used to the analog gauge on the right for the speedo since neither of my cars has that. I was once up to 80 mph before I knew it. The car felt quieter than my '13 Leaf.

I liked ProPilot Assist but perhaps I should've done more reading up on it. It did let me let go of the steering wheel for at least several seconds before it started warning. Was cool to feel it slightly turning the wheel to follow the lanes and to see it actually following. I didn't try using it while staying in rightmost lanes to see if it had a tendency to want to exit.

brotherjethro said:

The other thing I tried was the ProPilot feature. Basically, when you're on the highway, with cruise control on, the car will try to steer itself, maintaining a centered position in your lane. I knew I wouldn't like this, as my wife's 2017 Honda CRV has this and I've tried it in there. The feeling is like someone else is trying to help you steer, and they have different ideas about where the car should be than you do.

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I can't say I dislike it, but I concur with your latter observation. It felt like it wanted to be further to the right in a lane than I normally would be. I have no idea if that was just a feeling/illusion or if I actually happen to drive too far too the left all the time.

I was able to set the ProPilot Assist/cruise to above 62 mph. I don't think you can leave the digital speedometer (w/compass) w/screen up when ProPilot Assist is on. I didn't want to futz with it too much while on the highway.

e-Pedal was interesting w/no forward creep. Felt similar to driving a BMW i3. The ride along guy had very strong opinions about creep. He felt it was stupid, unnecessary and didn't belong on EVs.

I liked the blind spot warning mirrors. I totally forgot to test lane departure warning.

It was interesting that in the modes I was in, the GOM value wasn't very prominent. I think that's a good thing.

It seems a lot of options have been crammed into/added to the dash display. Gone are the squares and dot/circle buttons. Now you operate a d-pad w/ok and back button on the steering wheel. It many of the options that were on the nav system have been moved to the dash display. Not sure if they've been moved or duplicated. I eventually got the hang of the UI conventions. There will be somewhat of a learning curve vs. those used to how trip computers work on earlier Nissans (including '11 to '17 Leaf).

Too bad the charging lock options (auto, lock or unlock) have been moved to a menu instead of the physical switch.

Was interesting that the time estimates let you set the charge rate and then it'd point to different parts of the whole (e.g. 1/2, 3/4, full) and give you times at at given charge rate (e.g. 3.6 kW). It looked like it even had one for 50 kW.

Nav system is totally different than the one in my '13 SV. Was neat to see (small) artwork for each of the XM Sirius channels.

They had the huge 120 volt/240 volt L1/L2 EVSE in the trunk. I was finally able to hold the plug and remove/reattach the 120 volt adapter.

Overall, the car's a very nice improvement. Hope the longer range (60 kWh?) car will be reasonably priced and finally have liquid cooling of the battery.

cwerdna said:

I had my test drive earlier today. Car was a fully loaded SL w/power seats and ProPilot Assist. It had over 8330 miles on it and TN manufacturer plates. I forgot to take of a pic of the door sticker to see its build month.

I really liked the extra power. Unfortunately, I'm not at all used to the analog gauge on the right for the speedo since neither of my cars has that. I was once up to 80 mph before I knew it. The car felt quieter than my '13 Leaf.

I liked ProPilot Assist but perhaps I should've done more reading up on it. It did let me let go of the steering wheel for at least several seconds before it started warning. Was cool to feel it slightly turning the wheel to follow the lanes and to see it actually following. I didn't try using it while staying in rightmost lanes to see if it had a tendency to want to exit.

brotherjethro said:

The other thing I tried was the ProPilot feature. Basically, when you're on the highway, with cruise control on, the car will try to steer itself, maintaining a centered position in your lane. I knew I wouldn't like this, as my wife's 2017 Honda CRV has this and I've tried it in there. The feeling is like someone else is trying to help you steer, and they have different ideas about where the car should be than you do.

Click to expand...

I can't say I dislike it, but I concur with your latter observation. It felt like it wanted to be further to the right in a lane than I normally would be. I have no idea if that was just a feeling/illusion or if I actually happen to drive too far too the left all the time.

I was able to set the ProPilot Assist/cruise to above 62 mph. I don't think you can leave the digital speedometer (w/compass) w/screen up when ProPilot Assist is on. I didn't want to futz with it too much while on the highway.

e-Pedal was interesting w/no forward creep. Felt similar to driving a BMW i3. The ride along guy had very strong opinions about creep. He felt it was stupid, unnecessary and didn't belong on EVs.

I liked the blind spot warning mirrors. I totally forgot to test lane departure warning.

It was interesting that in the modes I was in, the GOM value wasn't very prominent. I think that's a good thing.

It seems a lot of options have been crammed into/added to the dash display. Gone are the squares and dot/circle buttons. Now you operate a d-pad w/ok and back button on the steering wheel. It many of the options that were on the nav system have been moved to the dash display. Not sure if they've been moved or duplicated. I eventually got the hang of the UI conventions. There will be somewhat of a learning curve vs. those used to how trip computers work on earlier Nissans (including '11 to '17 Leaf).

Too bad the charging lock options (auto, lock or unlock) have been moved to a menu instead of the physical switch.

Was interesting that the time estimates let you set the charge rate and then it'd point to different parts of the whole (e.g. 1/2, 3/4, full) and give you times at at given charge rate (e.g. 3.6 kW). It looked like it even had one for 50 kW.

Nav system is totally different than the one in my '13 SV. Was neat to see (small) artwork for each of the XM Sirius channels.

They had the huge 120 volt/240 volt L1/L2 EVSE in the trunk. I was finally able to hold the plug and remove/reattach the 120 volt adapter.

Overall, the car's a very nice improvement. Hope the longer range (60 kWh?) car will be reasonably priced and finally have liquid cooling of the battery.

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Thanks for the write up! Was hoping more people would do this as I admit to having missed so much even after TWO test drives so I am glad to pick up additional info especially considering the multitudes of screens and options I did not see.

So do you think there is any possibility that custom charge levels are available? This is something that is still not been confirmed in one way or another. Everyone I asked says no but in reality; not sure I have talked to the one person who knows everything either

I was able to have a somewhat off the record conversation with the guy developing Nissan Connect and he implied that it would have several features in it as well. He didn't want to be specific because they were still investigating adding new features even at that late date. With 4G connectivity, it would be easy to OTA SW updates.

Nubo said:

Hopefully 3 means 3 seconds which is an appropriate following distance (4 is better).

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In our CR-V, the display is bars, not numbers, but each one equates to 1 second, so you can choose a gap of 1-4 seconds. This seems like the right way to do it and is probably what Nissan did.

The thing I dislike about these radar-adaptive cruise control systems is that if you leave a reasonable gap, then people will keep cutting in between you and the car you're following, causing the system to slow aggressively and then accelerate again when the distance is right. This is annoying for everyone in the car, and probably even more so for the cars behind you (who are usually following too closely).

I didn't try this in the Leaf (no traffic), perhaps it is less aggressive than Honda's system.

DaveinOlyWA said:

So do you think there is any possibility that custom charge levels are available? This is something that is still not been confirmed in one way or another. Everyone I asked says no but in reality; not sure I have talked to the one person who knows everything either

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I think I went thru all or pretty much every UI menu and category available (by going left and right) on the dash display (not the nav system) and didn't see anything that related to adjusting max charge level (e.g. stopping at 80% or whatever). But, now you have me wondering if I could've interacted (used the d-pad) with that charge time estimate screen...

IIRC, all the settings were in the rightmost category (gear icon).

I didn't explore the nav system that much. Felt very alien to me due all the changes. Not sure if if the '16 or '17 Leaf's nav system is closer to the '18.

Unrelated: I also confirmed the test drive vehicle also had the slide-on-rod sun visors.