How hard is Georgia on batteries?

[BuckMkII]

A dealer near me has a 2014 Leaf with 26,000 miles that Carfax show spent it's life in suburban Atlanta. I know that's not one of the coolest places, but that it's also not Phoenix hot or even Bakersfield hot.

My hope would be to get at least 10 years before the 80% charge range drops to 20 miles. Is that realistic? How much should that history cool my enthusiasm for this car?

[LeftieBiker]

It really depends on your range needs now and in the future, how much capacity the car has lost, and how hot it is where you live. (Please add your location to your user signature line.) You need to check the pack with LeafSpy; how much capacity it has lost should give you a good indication (depending on where you live) of how much it should lose in the next few years. There is a range chart here that will show you how far the car can go as it loses bars. Hopefully someone else will link to it.

[cwerdna]

Range charts at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=101293. There are links to versions assuming various levels of capacity loss.

10 years from original in-service date or 10 years from now? I think if the OP wants the best longevity, a '15 from a cool climate would be the best bet, if not a '14 from a cool climate.

[BuckMkII]

I'd found that range chart, but not any predictions (however risky they might be) of projected bars lost going forward beyond the ages of existing Leafs. It would be interesting if someone with some expertise in batteries could post some guesses about miles, charging rates, years and summer temperatures and when the packs are going to be getting REALLY sick, like 5, 4, 3 bars remaining. Obviously, that's a complex matrix fraught with assumptions, but inquiring minds want to know.

Ten years from now was what I was thinking of.

My location is in my profile field where everyone else's is.

[LeftieBiker]

Sorry about the location thing. The only way to know how well these packs will age is to watch them age, as there were no extremely similar units before 2011. We can say that the early packs are a poor bet to last 10 years, but all we can really say about the 4/2013+ packs is that time seems to be much less a factor than heat.

[cwerdna]

Sorry about the location thing. The only way to know how well these packs will age is to watch them age, as there were no extremely similar units before 2011. We can say that the early packs are a poor bet to last 10 years, but all we can really say about the 4/2013+ packs is that time seems to be much less a factor than heat.

Yep.

Stoaty had put together a degradation model (http://www.electricvehiclewiki.com/Batt ... ging_Model) for the crap '11 and '12 packs. AFAIK, it hasn't been updated for the 4/2013+ build date batteries nor the model year '15 "lizard" batteries (http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=17168).

And, it seems like the 30 kWh packs in the '16 SV and SL (and "S 30") and '17 aren't holding up very well. Either that, or we're seeing defective packs in those.

Leaf only came out in December 2010, so it's pretty difficult to know for improved packs.

The key problem is that Nissan (AFAIK) has never publicly released any temp vs time degradation data for ANY of their batteries. And, we don't know how many revisions of battery chemistries there have been nor when they happened other than the lizard reference.

AFAIK, the closest we know in terms of degradation data from Nissan is http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.p ... 78#p230478 and http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.p ... 75#p230575 back during the Phoenix degradation fiasco along with a paper at http://www.nec.com/en/global/techrep/jo ... 120112.pdf published 1/12 referring to a newly developed cell. AESC is the Nissan/NEC joint venture that produces the Leaf's batteries: http://www.eco-aesc-lb.com/en/aboutus/company/. One can only presume that this or something derived from it got deployed starting 4/2013 or with model year 2015 "lizard" batteries.

[SageBrush]

I had a chance to compare 2013 Leafs from N. California and GA while I was shopping a couple of months ago. The GA packs already had about 10% more SoC loss than N. California in 3 - 4 years. By that I mean 75-85% Vs 85-95%. So somewhere in the range of double the rate of aging.

To answer your question: hard

The only saving grace here is that battery aging slows down as the years go on. Maybe not by a lot, but enough that you cannot simply double the loss from the first 3 years to know where the pack will be at 6 years. My somewhat WAG is double at 7-8 years what you lost in the first 3.

[LeftieBiker]

I had a chance to compare 2013 Leafs from N. California and GA while I was shopping a couple of months ago. The GA packs already had about 10% more SoC loss than N. California in 3 - 4 years. By that I mean 75-85% Vs 85-95%. So somewhere in the range of double the rate of aging.

To answer your question: hard

The only saving grace here is that battery aging slows down as the years go on. Maybe not by a lot, but enough that you cannot simply double the loss from the first 3 years to know where the pack will be at 6 years. My somewhat WAG is double at 7-8 years what you lost in the first 3.

Were you able to see the build dates? The apparent chemistry change in April of 2013 will play Hell with any attempt to just compare 2013 cars as one group.

[BuckMkII]

I had a chance to compare 2013 Leafs from N. California and GA while I was shopping a couple of months ago. The GA packs already had about 10% more SoC loss than N. California in 3 - 4 years. By that I mean 75-85% Vs 85-95%. So somewhere in the range of double the rate of aging.

To answer your question: hard

Thanks, good answer!!! I guess I will pass on that car and be patient.

Do you know where in NorCal those cars were from? I lived in San Francisco (the Fillmore and then Noe Valley) for three years, so I know how much variation there can be across rather short distances in the Bay Area. I saw one that looked attractive until I saw on Carfax that it appeared to have lived just south of Sacramento. That seemed too hot.

Another had all its location data in Fremont. A harder call, since, while I hardly ever went to Fremont, my impression is that the part near the Bay would be excellent, but that the car could very well have been commuting to/from Livermore, which would be pretty bad. Ditto San Jose cars which could be living fairly gently in Sunnyvale or suffering in Morgan Hill (I used to go mountain biking at Henry Coe State Park, so I associate Morgan Hill with an inferno).

This is driving me nuts!

[BuckMkII]

You need to check the pack with LeafSpy; how much capacity it has lost should give you a good indication (depending on where you live) of how much it should lose in the next few years.

Are you thinking of the method described here http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.p ... 20#p494600
or is there another I haven't noticed or bookmarked?