2021 Leaf40 will not Charge on a DC unit

Hi all - I am new here but I'm about 60 months and 13,000km in to Leaf ownership.

I am having a problem whereby I can't charge my leaf on any DC charging unit.

Up until the last few weeks I've never been out of home charging range which is great .. but I was caught out badly when I did venture out of range and discovered that my car will not accept a charge from any DC unit. I ended up having to use a public AC charger to get home and spent hours waiting for enough range.

It has been in to the dealer twice and they still have no idea what the problem is - apparently they are back and forth with Nissan but they are none the wiser. There is no issue with my charging accounts (as I have been able to charge the loan car I had last week) and the dealer has also tried to no avail.

I am now at the end of what my patience will tolerate and while waiting for Nissan to either figure it out or replace the entire charging unit (which I assume they don't want to do) .. I am hoping that someone here my have some insight or have heard of the problem before?

What do you see or hear when plugging in to charge--any beeps, blue lights, relays clacking, charge indicator light or error light on the dashboard?

The dealer would have the Nissan Consult tool to connect into the OBDII port to retrieve trouble codes or examine the data fields during DCQC plug in. Any DTCs will have a troubleshooting procedure to check possible culprits such as wiring or connector issue first. There could be a blown fuse in the PDM but i don't think that is considered a service item in the FSM, they just replace the entire unit.

Thanks for the reply.

There are no errors showing on the car and no sequence of lights on the dash when the DC unit is plugged in .. and I’ve tried a good few DC chargers.

the dealer is telling me that they are getting no error messages either - so according to them it is a mystery.

I'm not sure how having a charge timer set would affect a QC session, but check that possibility.

TFP2000 said:

Thanks for the reply.

There are no errors showing on the car and no sequence of lights on the dash when the DC unit is plugged in .. and I’ve tried a good few DC chargers.

the dealer is telling me that they are getting no error messages either - so according to them it is a mystery.

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Can you make a video of an attempt? It almost sounds like the QC port is not even wired up at this point if you've tried it at multiple QC stations.

If I am near a QC I'll take a video but at this stage I don't even bother trying.

I am now loosing my patience with Nissan .. they have still no idea how they are going to deal with this problem .. apparently they will call me at some stage this week.

At one stage when I was trying to charge it another Leaf pulled in beside me and the driver had a look - he made a comment that the charger wasn't even locking - so everything points to a problem in the actual physical connection between the leaf and the charger. But Nissan seemed to spend about a week being convinced it was a problem with my Charging Card accounts - rather than looking at the car

TFP2000 said:

...
the driver had a look - he made a comment that the charger wasn't even locking - so everything points to a problem in the actual physical connection between the leaf and the charger.

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Oh that is a very important piece of information--that lock switch initiates the communication between the car and the Chademo charger. Without that signal there should be no charging.

Where are you located? Does Plugshare have good coverage where you're at? If so, can you post Plugshare URLs or addresses of the chargers you've tried? We can take a look at the check-ins.

Post a high res photo of the CHADEMO charging port of your LEAF. There's a possibility that a physical obstruction of some kind is preventing proper engagement. In particular, inoperative proximity detection seems like a good possibility.

Coincidently I saw this video just this morning. Now it’s a different version of the Leaf, I understand that, but the issue seems similar. On this video go to the 10 minute mark to hear the Chademo part. Apparently this guy was told it was a wiring issue.

[youtube][https://youtu.be/mAB8p1Rg2S4/youtube]

cwerdna said:

Where are you located? Does Plugshare have good coverage where you're at? If so, can you post Plugshare URLs or addresses of the chargers you've tried? We can take a look at the check-ins.

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I'm based in Ireland !! I've tried 7 different DC chargers by a couple of different providers. At a few of them people were using them before and after me so I know the chargers have been working. Also the providers can see that I tried to initiate a charge with my card but that no charging took place due to the car not being plugged in !

I'll have a good look for any physical obstruction in the Chademo port but I'd assume the dealer has already tried that!

Anyway - it is going back in to the dealer on Monday - I will be taking a new Leaf62 as a loaner while it is being looked at and you can be sure I won't be handing it back until it is 100% fixed. If they don't have a resolution by the end of the week I will be insisting on a full refund or brand new replacement and I'll hold on to the 60 until they make their minds up

finally some light at the end of the tunnel.

Between the dealer and Nissan they have decided the PCM (Power Control Module) is faulty - but a replacement is 'a couple of weeks away' !!

So now it is the waiting game ... and in the mean time I'm limited driving within range of the house only. Thankfully I have a BMW PHEV on the driveway as well