Coffee_Slurry
Well-known member
Then we're also more informed than the LEAF Tour spokespersons and anyone who listened to them.palmermd said:
They said pretty much exactly that, to the letter, at the Drive events, did they not?
Barrons' reporter runs Leaf flat in Manhattan
- Thread starter DeaneG
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They said pretty much exactly that, to the letter, at the Drive events, did they not?
DeaneG
Well-known member
Correct, so a 4-minute additional charge would have taken her home. Nothing wrong with that as long as it is noted in the nav system.wcanl said:
palmermd
Well-known member
wcanl said:
she ran out of charge 0.8 miles from home. How long would she have had to sit there waiting to get enough of a buffer to feel safe to drive home. 15-30 minutes? bet she would have spent the time to make sure she got home when the car kept saying to stop and find a charge station, if it had directed her to one.
leaf561
Well-known member
It is also the perception. In ICE cars, when you get the red light for fuel, you know you have 1 or 2 gallons in reserve and you could easily go another 10 or 20 miles.
Also, it seems when the LEAF gets closer to running out of charge, it just gives two dashes, which could be misleading for some.
I understand EV is not for everyone, but by expecting to change driving habits is not going to work on a car which is sold to the mass.
In Bay Area traffic, I don't think I can drive less than 65 MPH on the freeway. And my drive to work is around 65 to 70 miles round trip.
Anyway, the reporter had some good points. If you are driving to new place, you are bound take a wrong exit or lose your way. And it could turn out to be costly...
Also, it seems when the LEAF gets closer to running out of charge, it just gives two dashes, which could be misleading for some.
I understand EV is not for everyone, but by expecting to change driving habits is not going to work on a car which is sold to the mass.
In Bay Area traffic, I don't think I can drive less than 65 MPH on the freeway. And my drive to work is around 65 to 70 miles round trip.
Anyway, the reporter had some good points. If you are driving to new place, you are bound take a wrong exit or lose your way. And it could turn out to be costly...
TRONZ
Well-known member
So a "reporter" gets in a car, drives it till it's empty....... AND???? What did she think a car would do???? :roll:
Seems like it. But she also failed to mention what the DTE indicator read at various points along the way.wcanl said:
Nice strawman. But as for the actual drive in question - it's clear she made no effort to drive conservatively as she was firmly parked in the #1 lane on the segments which had her on the highway.wcanl said:
In 2 years we'll likely have all these early adopter issues worked out, but there will still be a lot of work to do - but you're most likely right.wcanl said:
As others said - she only needed 5 minutes of L2 charging to get her home.wcanl said:
At the drive event I was at, the spokesman was very careful to state that YMMV and showed the various DTE scenarios. I do think that Nissan should probably emphasize the EPA estimated 73 mile range as that seems to be a better indicator for most people's driving style rather than the 100 mi LA4 range.GroundLoop said:
ERG4ALL
Well-known member
A couple of points. Being and early adopter and originally from Detroit, I look at the LEAF similarly to when Henry Ford came out with the model T. Others may not know that he had started and floundered a couple of times before the model T came out. I liken that to the many EVs that have been built and even marketed without much success.
When something needed fixing he would make changes right in the middle of a model year. Enthusiasts have to know what month the car was made to be able to correctly restore these vehicles. That was true even when the model A was in production. I liken this to the changes that we will see to fix these various pesky items people complain about.
The point is we may be the vanguard of a whole new way of personal transportation and can expect what is past is prologue. I imagine that in the very beginning that people would have told him that the car would never be a success. After all how are you going to go anywhere when you can't get gasoline? In the very beginning before gasoline stations, gasoline was sold at pharmacies. Also, people would say that there were no roads that you could navigate when the spring turned them into mud holes. Then what happened? Because there was a demand the infrastructure got built. That is why I am a firm supporter of EVs and the LEAF in particular as being the first practical, affordable EV.
The second point regarding PHEV is that they still use gasoline which will do nothing but increase in price. At the same time we see Moore's law (albeit with a smaller annual increase) at work with the price of renewable energy, in particular decreasing cost per watt of photovoltaic.
For example let's say the effective range for the average driver is 72 miles per charge. In the Phoenix area the off-peak electrical cost is 3 cents per kilowatt hour. With the charge being 24 kWh then a full charge would cost 72 cents. My PT Cruiser on a good day gets 24 miles per gallon. Thus, for the 72 miles, it costs me 3 gallons of gas or about $10.80. You can play with the numbers for your particular case but I'm sure it will always favor electricity over oil.
When something needed fixing he would make changes right in the middle of a model year. Enthusiasts have to know what month the car was made to be able to correctly restore these vehicles. That was true even when the model A was in production. I liken this to the changes that we will see to fix these various pesky items people complain about.
The point is we may be the vanguard of a whole new way of personal transportation and can expect what is past is prologue. I imagine that in the very beginning that people would have told him that the car would never be a success. After all how are you going to go anywhere when you can't get gasoline? In the very beginning before gasoline stations, gasoline was sold at pharmacies. Also, people would say that there were no roads that you could navigate when the spring turned them into mud holes. Then what happened? Because there was a demand the infrastructure got built. That is why I am a firm supporter of EVs and the LEAF in particular as being the first practical, affordable EV.
The second point regarding PHEV is that they still use gasoline which will do nothing but increase in price. At the same time we see Moore's law (albeit with a smaller annual increase) at work with the price of renewable energy, in particular decreasing cost per watt of photovoltaic.
For example let's say the effective range for the average driver is 72 miles per charge. In the Phoenix area the off-peak electrical cost is 3 cents per kilowatt hour. With the charge being 24 kWh then a full charge would cost 72 cents. My PT Cruiser on a good day gets 24 miles per gallon. Thus, for the 72 miles, it costs me 3 gallons of gas or about $10.80. You can play with the numbers for your particular case but I'm sure it will always favor electricity over oil.
Jimmydreams
Well-known member
wcanl said:
I have stopped at my dealer twice to 'top off' when I thought I needed a few extra miles to make it home. One time I just sat there talking with my salesman about the car (plenty to talk about to take up the time spent charging) and the second time I only added 10 miles to the display so I took the time to call a family member. MOST of us have smart phones that have enough aps and connectivity to help make the 30-40 minutes spent 'topping off' to good use. If it's the exception rather than the rule, spending the time to 'top off' isn't a big deal when you think about the options.
TomT
Well-known member
Top Off is probably a bad term in this context since it implies that you are close to full and just putting in a bit of charge to fill it the rest of the way up. In actually, the opposite will probably be true: You are low or certainly nowhere near full, and are just putting in enough charge to get you where you need to go...
Jimmydreams said:wcanl said:
I have stopped at my dealer twice to 'top off' when I thought I needed a few extra miles to make it home. One time I just sat there talking with my salesman about the car (plenty to talk about to take up the time spent charging) and the second time I only added 10 miles to the display so I took the time to call a family member. MOST of us have smart phones that have enough aps and connectivity to help make the 30-40 minutes spent 'topping off' to good use. If it's the exception rather than the rule, spending the time to 'top off' isn't a big deal when you think about the options.
palmermd
Well-known member
ok, how about off-bottoming? You are correct, it is a bad term for this application, but you get the idea.
KeiJidosha said:
evnow said:
Yes, she didn't plan very well. But isn't one of the draws for a Leaf that EVs can be mainstream? How can we argue for tax dollars to build infrastructure if EVs can't work for the average Joe?
An average person has an IQ of 100. And it's worth remembering even in our conversations here that there's a difference between being less smart and being an idiot.
leaf561 said:
The EV community, designers, proponents, and time itself will have to work together if EVs will actually become mainstream.
leaf561
Well-known member
copdoc said:
I agree. There is a lot of catch-22 scenarios out here. I am glad Nissan took the first step and it is time for the infrastructure group to make their next move. Which they are doing.
Also like every thing in US, the private sector has to see $$$ in this. Just like StarBucks started providing paid WiFi during the early days and others followed them, someone like McDonalds or Burger King should start placing charging stations and charge a dollar (or 2) to charge. And we can hope that others will do the same. Unfortunately, unlike WiFi where you just need a WiFi router and high bandwidth, the electric charging station setup cost will be very high. Also being serialized, the ROI is less.
charlie1300
Well-known member
For the Leaf to be a mass market vehicle, it will have to work for people who approach their drive like Ms. Milak ; driving in the left lane when being warned of low battery, depending on the Nav system to automatically update public charging station info, assuming the dash displays are completely accurate. So Nissan has its work cut out for it. EV enthusiasts will be able to adjust to all those things, the average car buyer will not.
For starters, maybe there should be a range display of the miles to the first red bar, not to completely empty. Then you have an analog to an ICE, where you still have 20-30 miles left when the fuel gauge is on E.
For starters, maybe there should be a range display of the miles to the first red bar, not to completely empty. Then you have an analog to an ICE, where you still have 20-30 miles left when the fuel gauge is on E.
sproqitman
Well-known member
I think you've captured it perfectly. Nissan, to date, has positioned the LEAF as having "magical powers", that will automatically direct you to a charging station when you run low on fuel. As a result, some folks are ignoring the usual warning signs and expecting the car to think for them. If you instead treated it like a normal gas-engined car, you'd start thinking about where the nearest charging station was when the fuel gauge got to the last blue bar, and start getting really nervous then the warning light began flashing.charlie1300 said:
I think it's worth pointing out that if Ms. Malik had pulled into a gas station, she probably could have plugged in for an hour or two and gotten enough electricity to make it the rest of the way home.
blackvalkyrie
Member
- Joined
- Mar 6, 2011
- Messages
- 13
Gonewild said:
Why plan a 75 mile trip with a vehicle that claims a 100 mile range? I suppose to see if the claims are true. It would appear that the reporter did her job IMHO. I thought it was a good report.
FYI journalists typically test conventional vehicles for their claimed range. Some pass, some fail. Nothing new.
garygid
Well-known member
The slow startup of the CARWINGS charging location database is partly to blame.
Some owners are reporting ample Low Battery warnings, and a "usable" Turtle Mode.
Others have never gotten their car anywhere close to Low Battery.
However, there are a few apparently-credible reports of the remaining Range and SOC indicating more than enough to get home, but the car exibiting "Unintended Deacceleration" before arriving at the destination.
There appears to be little or no warning, and essentially no Turtle-Mode range.
In this "UD" case, it APPEARS that the car is overly-optimistic about its remaining usable SOC, and fairly abruply finds out (probably from another part of the Battery Management System) that it is required to slow and stop.
Using made-up numbers for illustration: IF, with "constant" driving conditions and style, the car displays a Range of 20 miles but stops (with little or no warning) after only 10 miles, that is a 200% estimation error, and something is wrong with the way the warning system is implemented.
I suspect that the SOC estimation method is not sufficiently accurate, especially when the battery cells are not well matched or equalized. Unfortunately, there appears to be no display that warns the driver of an un-balanced condition.
Nissan needs to "correct" (improve) the estimation method, and get the CARWINGS charging-location database populated.
Is the charging-locator function "activated" only when you reach Low Battery, or can it be manually activated at any time?
Some owners are reporting ample Low Battery warnings, and a "usable" Turtle Mode.
Others have never gotten their car anywhere close to Low Battery.
However, there are a few apparently-credible reports of the remaining Range and SOC indicating more than enough to get home, but the car exibiting "Unintended Deacceleration" before arriving at the destination.
There appears to be little or no warning, and essentially no Turtle-Mode range.
In this "UD" case, it APPEARS that the car is overly-optimistic about its remaining usable SOC, and fairly abruply finds out (probably from another part of the Battery Management System) that it is required to slow and stop.
Using made-up numbers for illustration: IF, with "constant" driving conditions and style, the car displays a Range of 20 miles but stops (with little or no warning) after only 10 miles, that is a 200% estimation error, and something is wrong with the way the warning system is implemented.
I suspect that the SOC estimation method is not sufficiently accurate, especially when the battery cells are not well matched or equalized. Unfortunately, there appears to be no display that warns the driver of an un-balanced condition.
Nissan needs to "correct" (improve) the estimation method, and get the CARWINGS charging-location database populated.
Is the charging-locator function "activated" only when you reach Low Battery, or can it be manually activated at any time?
palmermd
Well-known member
garygid said:
Nobody knows because there are no stations in the database.
Jimmydreams
Well-known member
garygid said:
Any time you press the blue button on the steering wheel, the nav will show you the range remaining (the white circle) an any charging stations (or lack therof) that Nissan lists. Your nav will also show any places where you have plugged in in the past. My nav shows ONLY 3 charging stations in the LA/San Diego area: 1 at Long Beach where my car was delivered and prepped, one at my dealer, and one at my house.
That's it.
Nissan, get with the program. :x
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