Using Charge Timer is it good practice

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rosh

New member
Joined
Feb 10, 2017
Messages
4
I am a new owner of used 2015 Nissan Leaf S.
I usually use 40% of the batter on a typical day. When I get home I plug in the cable to Leaf and have set the charge timer to 6 am. Is this a good practice for the battery, so that it lasts longer ?
I use 110V charging.
I have noticed the leaf doesn't start charging until later and turns-off at 6 am. I usually leave the house around 8, the cable is still plugged in until then.
 
rosh said:
I have noticed the leaf doesn't start charging until later and turns-off at 6 am.
Well, that is what you asked it to do and as LeftieBiker said, your approach is a good one.

There is one thing you should know about the LEAF and charging with the timer however. If you check the data using LEAFSpy where it reports the number of L1/L2 charges the car has had, it will report 2 charge cycles for every one time you actually charge the car. One cycle will get counted when you first plug in the J1772 handle into the plug and the car reads the amperage draw that the device you plugged in will allow (that will be 12.5 amps for the 120 volt charging cable that came with the LEAF) and a second cycle will be added when the car actually starts charging. It doesn't matter that the car "double counts" charging cycles when using the timer, just something to know if you are ever looking at the data that LEAFSpy reports.
 
Can you charge to 80% limit? Don't charge to 100% if you never need it.


It is recommended to have Level2 charger at home for everyday use.
It is more efficient to charge on 230V. Also much faster.
Even if you don't need charging speed you'd rather pay less for electricity over the year.
 
Rosh, I have your same car... I say don't use any timer. The car turns the charging off when it reaches 100% anyway. Get the Level 2 (240v) charger ASAP, where you will have a much more useful car then.

Don't listen to the naysayers to only charge up to 80% The 2015 (I have it also) is fine up to 100% I charge to 100% DAILY, have 30K miles, and my battery is still like new. The only thing I do is not charge up to 100% and leave the car sitting over the weekend. If you are not going to drive the car on the next day, leave the charge at 50-70% so the battery does not sit fully charged for days at a time.
 
I have the time set to right before I leave. That way it's not sitting at a high state of charge for long. I have a 2013 US model so I also have the 80% option, which I normally use. If you have a 2015 US model you won't have that option. But 2015's from other countries do have that option.

I also do it to help increase battery temperature in the winter, right before I drive. It doesn't seem to do much, but I think it helps a little.

That battery charger timer can also allow you to charge when electric costs are low. In some places the cost of electricity is lower during the night. Do check with your electric company and make sure your charging stops before the price increases. I think that would be the most important.

If you can't charge to only 80% could you charge every other night? For an example, one day you go from 100% to 60% or 65%, then the next day you go down to 20% to 30%. If you'd get below 20% it wouldn't be worth it. And you may want the 100% for something unforeseen. But it would be a bit better for the battery.
 
I got burned a couple times when charging in the wild by forgetting to over-ride the charge timer and charge percent from 80% to 100%. So I turned both off a few months ago and my mental state is much happier. I was leaving notes for myself on if my timer was on and if I was 80% or 100%, and was always double checking. Plus I dreaded explaining to my wife how to adjust these details should she need to charge. Now if I find a free charger in the wild I just plug in and it fills up to 100%, and if I charge at home I can always adjust the charge time and percent with my JuiceBox.
 
SurfHawk said:
I got burned a couple times when charging in the wild by forgetting to over-ride the charge timer and charge percent from 80% to 100%. So I turned both off a few months ago and my mental state is much happier. I was leaving notes for myself on if my timer was on and if I was 80% or 100%, and was always double checking. Plus I dreaded explaining to my wife how to adjust these details should she need to charge. Now if I find a free charger in the wild I just plug in and it fills up to 100%, and if I charge at home I can always adjust the charge time and percent with my JuiceBox.

There is a timer override button on the dash for just that purpose. Just press that until the center blue light goes on (on the dash). Then it doesn't matter what you have set for the timer (overnight charge / 80% / etc). The car will immediately charge to 100%. Easy.
 
GetOffYourGas said:
SurfHawk said:
I got burned a couple times when charging in the wild by forgetting to over-ride the charge timer and charge percent from 80% to 100%. So I turned both off a few months ago and my mental state is much happier. I was leaving notes for myself on if my timer was on and if I was 80% or 100%, and was always double checking. Plus I dreaded explaining to my wife how to adjust these details should she need to charge. Now if I find a free charger in the wild I just plug in and it fills up to 100%, and if I charge at home I can always adjust the charge time and percent with my JuiceBox.

There is a timer override button on the dash for just that purpose. Just press that until the center blue light goes on (on the dash). Then it doesn't matter what you have set for the timer (overnight charge / 80% / etc). The car will immediately charge to 100%. Easy.
Yes on your '11 and '12 but not '13 and '14 where the 80% option is separate from the charge timer and just pushing the timer-override button won't change a 80% setting to 100%, you need to actually change the separate setting to 100% to get 100% charging :)
 
jjeff said:
GetOffYourGas said:
SurfHawk said:
I got burned a couple times when charging in the wild by forgetting to over-ride the charge timer and charge percent from 80% to 100%. So I turned both off a few months ago and my mental state is much happier. I was leaving notes for myself on if my timer was on and if I was 80% or 100%, and was always double checking. Plus I dreaded explaining to my wife how to adjust these details should she need to charge. Now if I find a free charger in the wild I just plug in and it fills up to 100%, and if I charge at home I can always adjust the charge time and percent with my JuiceBox.

There is a timer override button on the dash for just that purpose. Just press that until the center blue light goes on (on the dash). Then it doesn't matter what you have set for the timer (overnight charge / 80% / etc). The car will immediately charge to 100%. Easy.
Yes on your '11 and '12 but not '13 and '14 where the 80% option is separate from the charge timer and just pushing the timer-override button won't change a 80% setting to 100%, you need to actually change the separate setting to 100% to get 100% charging :)

Really? Never knew that.
 
Yeah the timer over-ride button was easy enough to remember, but as jjeff said for the 2013 you have to have the car on and navigate through the clunky menu (on an S model) to change from 80 to 100. Half the time I'd have the car turned off and over-ride button hit when I'd remember about the 80% setting, so I'd need to turn the car back on, navigate through, turn off again, hit over-ride again. It's like changing the time on your clock radio every time you want to charge in the wild.
 
SurfHawk said:
Yeah the timer over-ride button was easy enough to remember, but as jjeff said for the 2013 you have to have the car on and navigate through the clunky menu (on an S model) to change from 80 to 100. Half the time I'd have the car turned off and over-ride button hit when I'd remember about the 80% setting, so I'd need to turn the car back on, navigate through, turn off again, hit over-ride again. It's like changing the time on your clock radio every time you want to charge in the wild.
Because of that and also because I'm finding myself charging more and more in the wild for free, I just leave mine set to 100% most of the time and if for some reason I charge at home and want to stop at less than 100% I just remember to unplug the car at the approximate time it will be at the charge I want. I agree, it's a PIA to constantly have to change the 80/100% option, of course we shouldn't complain, after '15 they totally took away the 80% option, which I wouldn't like either.
 
jjeff said:
..after '15 they totally took away the 80% option, which I wouldn't like either.

Actually for US/Canadian cars that option went away for MY 2014. In other countries where the Leaf is sold the option still exists.
 
SurfHawk said:
Yeah the timer over-ride button was easy enough to remember, but as jjeff said for the 2013 you have to have the car on and navigate through the clunky menu (on an S model) to change from 80 to 100. Half the time I'd have the car turned off and over-ride button hit when I'd remember about the 80% setting, so I'd need to turn the car back on, navigate through, turn off again, hit over-ride again. It's like changing the time on your clock radio every time you want to charge in the wild.

It's crazy to me that something so easy on a '11/'12 Leaf became so difficult on a '13+ Leaf. I guess it's just an unintended consequence of removing the 80% limit from the timer. Some engineer(s) at Nissan didn't think that one through all the way.
 
No, the 13/14 cars have BOTH methods of choosing 80%. If you do it in settings, the override button doesn't affect it, but if you set a charge % using the timer, the override button makes it use the value from the settings instead of the timer.
 
Staque said:
No, the 13/14 cars have BOTH methods of choosing 80%. If you do it in settings, the override button doesn't affect it, but if you set a charge % using the timer, the override button makes it use the value from the settings instead of the timer.
The "S" models are probably different than the SV/SL models then. On my '13S the only way to have charging stop at 80% is to enable the one and only 80% option in the cumbersome menu, the charging timer just has a stop or departure time.
 
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