serdriver said:
Has the original poster ever figure this out? I;'m having the same problem on a new 2022 Leaf SV.
I had a 2018 Leaf SV and my epedal worked like it should: it always slowed down the car, regardless of SOC. With my new 2022 Leaf SV, sometimes epedal slows the car, sometimes it doesn't. Usually happens at slower speeds in the city, but this is precisely when I want to use it.
Doesn't matter if I'm in B or D mode, eco or not, or the state of charge (100%, 50%, 20%, etc).
There have been times where I'm coming to a stop sign or approaching a car in front of me and with epedal on, I will lift off the accelerator and the car will just coast as if epedal is not engaged. Several times I've had to slam on my brakes to stop the car. I never had to this with my 2018.
I've been having the same problem with e-pedal since I purchased my Leaf SL in Sep. 2018. I have been to the dealer several times since then without any improvement in this dangerous issue. I have just opened a case file with Nissan Canada and have asked an engineer from Nissan to look into this. As others have posted, this is a random, intermittent problem, affecting all model years using e-pedal, which the service techs have never been able to duplicate as the car does not give any error codes, that is, it "thinks" everything is OK. The Service Manager suspects a software/engineering problem that can only be rectified at the factory. Thus, the involvement of the Nissan engineer.
I urge all who are experiencing this issue to contact Nissan Canada and open a case file. Only then can Nissan do something about fixing it. Here's the phone number: 1-800-387-0122. And here's the email:
[email protected].
We might even open a case file with Nissan Canada as a group -- all of us who have had the e-pedal in our Leafs not operating as touted.
We've paid good money for our Leafs and for the convenience of one-pedal driving. We need to get that.
Just for reference, and hoping it may help others, I'm also posting the list of observations I have made using my Leaf. I have attached this list to my case file with Nissan Canada. Here it is:
1. Erratic, random regen braking – has NEVER worked as intended since car was purchased:
a. At every mode (A, B, e-pedal), at every speed, when SOC is below 80% and regen becomes
active and robust
b. Imperceptible in A Mode
c. B Mode:
i. Sometime starts as normal regen, then reduces
ii. Sometimes is almost non-existent, like A Mode, just coasting
iii. Sometimes it kicks in after a 2-3-second delay to expected strength
d. e-pedal:
i. Sometimes never activates
ii. Sometimes starts normal, then reduces like being in B Mode or less
iii. Sometimes starts normal, then “gives out” and coasts – very dangerous, scary,
unreliable approaching stopped vehicles or stop lights or counting on it to
decelerate the car enough to negotiate turns
2. Engaging e-pedal reduces acceleration power by almost 50%
i. Disengaging e-pedal Mode while driving results in a sudden jump in power
ii. It’s as if ECO Mode is engaged – Nowhere in the owner’s manual is this mentioned
iii. ECO Mode and e-pedal Mode reduce power the same way
3. Applying the friction brakes, the blue regen bars on instrument panel erroneously indicate that regen
increases – how can that be? Brakes do not feed power back to the battery!
_______________________________________________________________________________________
Update:
I have just had my concerns with my Leaf looked into by a Nissan Canada engineer. I was quite pleased with how he went about this. He spent about 30 minutes consulting with me discussing my concerns with me prior to running tests and road-testing my car. He spent another 30 minutes with me sharing his findings after his tests. These are the things he explained to me:
1. E-pedal operation is neither linear as it is with (traditional, mechanical) friction brakes nor has it been designed to function as a substitute for them.
2. All modern cars, EVs and ICEs, employ smart software which learns a driver's driving style and habits in order to enhance the driving experience by making the car "drive" the way the driver wants it to behave. If more drivers than one use the car, this system "learns an average of all the different styles and habits" it learns. The Leaf (all model years with e-pedal) employ such software.
3. The computer in the Leaf collects a myriad of pieces of information (SOC, weather and road conditions, etc.), including the info from that smart software, and it uses all these inputs to decide how to employ the e-pedal operation. So, the action of the e-pedal may be more erratic and random the more drivers of varying styles use the car because the on-board computer amalgamates all these styles and parameters to operate the e-pedal as it "thinks" is best suited to this amalgam. Thus, the weird behaviour of the e-pedal we've been complaining about!
4. He could not do anything to rectify this -- it is at the design engineering level.
5. I insisted that, in real-world use of the e-pedal, this behaviour is dangerous, not the one-pedal driving that Nissan touts it to be, and that there should be a fix for it. To this, he replied with #1 and added that Nissan is aware of this issue, that Nissan takes customer dissatisfaction very seriously, and so there may be a patch/fix in the future or in the upcoming Ariya. In other words, the more of us open a complaint case with Nissan Canada Customer Service, the better the chances will be for a fix.
6. To "why do the blue regen bars in the instrument panel increase in number when I apply the friction brakes although they do not regenerate power?" he replied: Along with a standard push-rod for friction brakes, there is an actuator attached to the brake pedal which engages the regen system in the Leaf when I depress the brake pedal. This increases the regen power of the motor, so the blue bars in the instrument panel track this sudden increase by increasing in number rapidly -- they tell the truth. The car's computer engages the friction brakes only at the very end to bring the car to a complete stop.
Even though the engineer explained a lot of my concerns, I am still upset that something I paid for, one-pedal driving convenience, is anything but that. I will not be satisfied until Nissan corrects the dangerous, unreliable e-pedal operation in my and everybody else's Leaf.
Until then, I am still going to avoid e-pedal. And I am going to approach Nissan Canada to revise its Leaf's Owner's Manual to include a lot of the above information.
