Battery Won't Last 100,000 Miles?

[Stoaty]

So it sounds like you are better off charging 4 or 5 hours every other day instead of charging 2 or 3 hours every day?

No, because the 2 hours will be considered only a half cycle. Better to charge every day, but only to 80%.

 

[Herm]

I have an idea that when nissan replaces a cell it will be a used item when available that matches the rest of the pack capacity.
I don't think nissan is going to keep throwing new cells into the pack.
I do wonder how low the car will allow the battery capacity to get 50%, 20%? When does it absolutely require a new battery?

It depends on the driver, if you have 75 miles of range and only drive 15 occasionally then you dont need more.

GM has stated they will repair the Volt's battery pack with modules of the same age and capacity as the rest of the pack.. They could use new modules if the BMS was sophisticated enough, and it probably is for both the Volt and Leaf.

 

[scottf200]

The advice seen often on this board about leasing for 3 years and then deciding whether to turn it in or purchase it after seeing how much battery capacity is left, seems to be good advice - at least based solely on the information in this thread.

We can hope there will be some extensive testing by Nissan techs when the leased vehicles are turned in. And that there will be documentation and expectations for people that buy all these leased EVs.

None of us (Leaf, Volt, Focus, etc) owners want the press to start writing uneducated and exaggerated articles on the dieing/dying electric batteries and heavy replacements. This will be brutal PR and one of my worse fears for the revolution.

 

[JJnHAWAII]

Viva la EV-revolution !!!

 

[surfingslovak]

I noticed this at the website Autoextremist in the "On The Table" section. One of the contributors went to AltCarExpo and gave his impression after driving various cars (he liked the Leaf). Fun read and not that different than the writeup from our own drivingelectric.blogspot. But here is what caught my eye:

Caveat about the whole event? The morning presentation by Nissan explaining that the battery pack in the Leaf will last less than 100k miles before replacing. They're expecting that of course there will be breakthroughs in technology that will allow stronger, faster, better ones to replace the old ones. Or that the old tech will be that much cheaper.

Did anyone catch the Nissan presentation? If so, did Nissan really say this? If not, what did they say?

I did catch one of the presentations Saturday. Our presenter did in fact focus too much on possible degradation. I commented on this afterward to my wife. I didn't specifically hear the 100K figure being mentioned though.

Unless Nissan has learned something new lately, they should train their presenters better. As many have said before, you don't hear salesmen for conventional cars playing up noise, smell and other bad attributes of their cars.

Elon Musk tweeted the other day that one of Tesla's Model S test cars eclipsed 150,000 miles.

https://twitter.com/#!/elonmusk/status/184799999043964928" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[coqui]

My Prius battery is lasting longer than 100,000, but that's not Li-Ion.

Leaf: 100,000 mi / 12,000 mi per yr = 8 yrs approx., 8 x 300 charges in a year = 2,400 cycles, however, I never go to turtle, so I suppose that those 2,400 partial charges are the equivalent of a smaller number of full charges. Is there a service message that pops up on the nav screen or dash, "Please replace cells 3 and 17" or something similar?

 

[adric22]

I certainly won't worry about the 100,000 mile mark for several reasons... First of all, I put about 9,000 miles per year on a car. That has been the case for the last 15 years. It would take 11 years for me to reach that point. Second of all, the main thing I need my Leaf for is my 10 mile daily commute. I've worked at the same job for the last 6 years and I don't expect a change. So as long as the car can hold up for that, I imagine I'll be fine. I leased my Leaf, but for financial reasons, not because I thought I'd need to turn it in. I fully expect 2 years from now that I will buy my Leaf and I'll probably do a 5 year loan so the payments should drop in half of what I'm currently paying.

 

[Herm]

The issue is high mileage drivers that purchased a Leaf to economize on gas.. drive 70 miles to the office, plug in and then drive 70 miles back to the home..

 

[RegGuheert]

Elon Musk tweeted the other day that one of Tesla's Model S test cars eclipsed 150,000 miles.

https://twitter.com/#!/elonmusk/status/184799999043964928" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That's good news, but I don't think we can readily apply that information to the LEAF since the batteries in the Model S have more range. Some Model S cars will include 300-mile batteries. With a larger battery you can cycle with longer trips and still use a lower DoD. As a result your battery will achieve both more cycles AND more miles per cycle.

OTOH, I seriously doubt Nissan thinks these batteries will need replacing at 100,000 miles or they would be crazy to warranty them for that long. IMO, their expectations would need to be at least 150,000 miles before they could consider such a long warranty.

 

[surfingslovak]

OTOH, I seriously doubt Nissan thinks these batteries will need replacing at 100,000 miles or they would be crazy to warranty them for that long. IMO, their expectations would need to be at least 150,000 miles before they could consider such a long warranty.

Exactly my point. Elon's tweet contains virtually zero factual information, aside from the mileage count. It proves however, that all EV manufacturers are doing either lab simulations or endurance tests that go far beyond the warranty coverage. Infer from that what you may.

 

[RegGuheert]

OTOH, I seriously doubt Nissan thinks these batteries will need replacing at 100,000 miles or they would be crazy to warranty them for that long. IMO, their expectations would need to be at least 150,000 miles before they could consider such a long warranty.

Exactly my point. Elon's tweet contains virtually zero factual information, aside from the mileage count. It proves however, that all EV manufacturers are doing either lab simulations or endurance tests that go far beyond the warranty coverage. Infer from that what you may.

It makes me wonder what type of life testing Nissan has been/is doing. Does anyone have links to information about such testing?

 

[EVDRIVER]

Elon Musk tweeted the other day that one of Tesla's Model S test cars eclipsed 150,000 miles.

https://twitter.com/#!/elonmusk/status/184799999043964928" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That's good news, but I don't think we can readily apply that information to the LEAF since the batteries in the Model S have more range. Some Model S cars will include 300-mile batteries. With a larger battery you can cycle with longer trips and still use a lower DoD. As a result your battery will achieve both more cycles AND more miles per cycle.

OTOH, I seriously doubt Nissan thinks these batteries will need replacing at 100,000 miles or they would be crazy to warranty them for that long. IMO, their expectations would need to be at least 150,000 miles before they could consider such a long warranty.

Define "last". Last means power output. The battery can have 10% capacity and still have spec power.

 

[EVDRIVER]

So it sounds like you are better off charging 4 or 5 hours every other day instead of charging 2 or 3 hours every day?

No, because the 2 hours will be considered only a half cycle. Better to charge every day, but only to 80%.

So the process of heating and cooling has no impact on life. One heat/cool cycle vs two? As an example, many amplifiers and devices that are left on 24/7 last far longer than those turned on and off. I would like to see the long-term data to back up your statement.

 

[surfingslovak]

So the process of heating and cooling has no impact on life. One heat/cool cycle vs two? As an example, many amplifiers and devices that are left on 24/7 last far longer than those turned on and off. I would like to see the long-term data to back up your statement.

I believe that this was discussed ad nauseam last year, and the year before that. I don't want to reignite that discussion, and since we don't have any conclusive real-world data on AESC cells beyond what the manufacturer has provided, there is really no point. We seem to have had consensus that shallow partial charges will significantly reduce cycling losses. It's tough to form an opinion based on limited data from just one year, but since cycling losses seem to be pretty minimal, it's up to individual owners to decide what's best for them. I would be more concerned about storage, both in terms of temperature and the average SOC the cells will be sitting at most of the time. Charging to a lower potential will facilitate a lower average SOC, which should be a good thing.

 

[RegGuheert]

Define "last". Last means power output. The battery can have 10% capacity and still have spec power.

If you can get the battery to 10% capacity I'm pretty sure you are close to finishing the job!

 

[Herm]

So the process of heating and cooling has no impact on life. One heat/cool cycle vs two? As an example, many amplifiers and devices that are left on 24/7 last far longer than those turned on and off. I would like to see the long-term data to back up your statement.

too much thermal mass to make much of a difference, our batteries dont have wild temperature swings.