My winter range experience so far...

[Goodtohave]

So here in Montreal the weather is colder and the snow tires are on...

The cold itself is not a problem for the batteries holding charge so far, I charge at level 2 and preheat.

I find getting into a warm car with 90% on my Dash Display is fine (I get a about 94% if I don't preheat with the timer).

The snow tires make the biggest difference. Going from the hockey puck ecopias to Toyo snows I think kills the range by 20-25%. Then the range reduces even more with the heater.

I used to get 120-140 KM per charge in mixed city highway.

Yesterday at -9 Celsius and 5 short trips I managed 70KM, hit 1 bar with 19% remaining.

It will be a challenging winter but I love the car and will make it work.

On the plus side short trips in cold weather uses a ton of gas in my other car...and I love the preheating in the leaf. Beats using a remote starter. In the evenings and on the weekend when I do short trips and have lots of battery to spare I preheat and then just leave the car on when I park it for 10 minutes to run in and out of shops et and it is a pleasure to always have a toasty warm car.

I pumped the Toyo's to 38 psi but they are soft snow tires, they have to be for traction. You can feel the resistance when you drive.

As for the heater I use it minimally after a good preheat and will be wrapping all the heater hoses and prestone reservoir. I bought a small vent thermometer and it gives off 135-140 degree F heat at idle and down to 110 on the move, shows how much is lost to the wind.

I have already done over 11000 km in 6 months , I will make it work this winter one way or another.

Just a shame we only have one Level 3 in Montreal, it just opened and is nowhere near where I live or drive.
Wish me luck!

The 2013 heater would be nice but I got a great deal on the 2012 and there are no 2013's around here, my dealer has 4 signed contracts and managed to get only one.

 

[KillaWhat]

We just had a run of days in the -5 to -6 Celsius range thanks to you guys lending us some Canadian air.

Flashing back to last winter.
Range takes a serious blow.
Still workable, and still paying $0.02 per mile, so it's just another thing to deal with, and need to keep a better eye on SOC.

I don't switch to snow tires;If it snows I take something with more clearance.

The only good thing is in the Spring you feel like your range is amazing.

 

[XeonPony]

-9 cold?!

at -30 I noticed the biggest reduction in range, the ice crystals groing on the window forced me to use the defrost in heat only mode allot and I mad it to work at 64Km with about 19% left, it warmed up to -25 and by end of work 9hours the battery was at a meer 85% with no heat usage and very conservitive driving I made it home with 4% on the battery as I pulled into home.

tire pressure 40-45psi (I can't recall exactly)

at -16 L1 charging gets very slow as well, l2 charging is slower as well but no where near as bad.

-15 and up with the 2013Sv seems to be no issue

-5c no issues charges to 100% on L1 in 9 hours usualy make it to work with 35 to 40% remaining soc
-15 no issues to speak of other then a cold drive, L1 charging will get me in the upper 80's to 90's soc thats from 30% soc
-20 Geting to work no prob, certaqinly colder and more defrost needed, get to work in the low 10-30 soc's and get to 70-85 in 9H in L1 charging and tend to get home in the 10 to 7 soc range.
-30 it is pucker time!

every day it is 80KmpH for 64Km each way and is through mostly level highway up to near the end where it gets hilly, so a good mix, with piss poor patches on the road.

 

[Goodtohave]

Hey I didn't say -9 was cold! I am Canadian too

It has been pretty mild so far.

I bought my car new in May but it was built in November 2011 so the fact that I can get as much as 95% charge is pretty good .

As far as no snow tires that is not an option. You have to run snows here, even if it was not the law you would be crazy not to. For the first time I bought non studded tires. the noise in such a quiet car would be nuts. I may go from 38psi to 40-42.

Instead of using the timer to charge in the middle of the night and not plugging in at oher times I now just charge it as often as I can. I may have my stock charger upgraded to level 2 and use it in my unheated garage. At least it will be out of the wind and snow.

Spring will make me feel like I can go anywhere!

 

[shima]

Drove 2011 today in the cold. Started it with 33km on the range-o-meter, and its -2'c outside.
Heated it up, started driving in the city. Drove for about 30km, range went down to 6km. Not bad I think

I'd expect 2013 model to be 20% better than that.

 

[Goodtohave]

Interestingly the Dash Display shows battery "health" which was about 90% in mid summer, up to 99.52 in cool weather and back to about 95% in the cold.

Cold seems to be better then hot weather in the long run for the health of the battery