Leaf owners: Your thoughts on the battery pack?

DaveinOly owns a LEAF in this forum, I think our total is two or three. A LEAF forum would get more responses I imagine.

However, I think you are wrong about the LEAF battery warranty. IIRC it is warranted based on capacity. It makes no sense to warrant range since driving habits and terrain are so variable.

Complaining about being 'jerked around' by Nissan in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami is at best sour grapes, and smells of puerile egotism I thought beneath you Daniel. Anyway, let it go since you will have your Tesla toy shortly.

 

My understanding is that Leaf DOES have active cooling by air with the fan. It is not have liquid cooling but air cooling is active.

Prius PHV prototype is also actively cooled by fans.

 

I have a LEAF. I'm not concerned with the engineering decisions, they're Nissan's to make. I have no clue if it needs active cooling or not. All I want is a nice car I can drive and the LEAF definitely delivers on that. As for capacity, while it's true the battery isn't warranted against gradual capacity loss, it IS warranted for 10yr/100,000mi against FAILURE (including sudden capacity loss).

I'm sure you're aware that ALL rechargeable batteries loose capacity over time. How quickly usually depends on how many full charge/discharge cycles. Nissan can't say what capacity your battery will have after a given time because they don't know how you're going to drive. If you only drive 10 miles a day, your battery will last much longer than someone who drives 200 miles a day since they'll be doing a full charge/discharge twice a day, versus you doing it every 10 days. I believe 60% capacity is a typical number at which point a battery would be considered in need of replacement and it would be nice if they told us that so we could do the math ourselves. Temperature also plays a key factor, so drive times and charge times come into play too. There's far more variability here than with a gas engine. But even those lose horsepower and mpg over time - does your car manufacturer guarantee those numbers? Don't think so...

 

(Not a Leaf owner...)

I thought it was 8 years/100K miles as I'd always heard and is listed at Nissan LEAF Warranty Information | Nissan USA.

I was at the Tesla showroom in Seattle last year and heard a car with its coolant circulating the whole time as it was sitting there and got the explanation about the car maintaining battery temp.

That said, from the above, in the back of my mind, I've always had some concerns that Nissan might've under-engineered battery cooling/thermal management because they'd originally planned (or at least kept publicly talking about) leasing the batteries, prior to any announcement of battery warranty length. For all we know, they might've gone to the point of no return and had to ship and just slap on a warranty, while being unable to lease the batteries.

Time will time how they hold up. I personally wouldn't be surprised if we see large capacity losses or failures from people who live in very hot areas w/no shaded parking where the cars bake outside w/a full or pretty fully battery. How to Prolong Lithium-based Batteries – Battery University claims that high temps in combination w/full charge are very bad for whatever chemistry of li-ion battery they tested.

For those leasing and not intending to buy at the end of the lease, I suppose those folks don't need to care much. I haven't run the lease vs. buy numbers (since leasing terminology is all Greek to me), but it sure seems a lot less risky to lease.

 

This battery warranty issue is tricky. Hard driving and deep recurrent DODs are going to take their toll on the battery, no doubt. I'm fine with letting the driver pay for aggressive driving habits and can understand Nissan not wanting to warrant every LEAF for driving extremes. The flip side though is that uncertainty is present how 25-75 percentile use batteries will perform, or finding that Nissan denies coverage to a median use battery that is still within 99th percentile degradation.

One possibility is using Nissan's demand that the battery be checked every 12 months or so to trend the battery. If degradation accelerates it could imply defect.

 

I don't have a Leaf but in my life I've owned one electric vehicle (S-10 EV) and I've leased one (GM EV-1).

The EV-1 Gen II was a great experience. My battery seemed to have no degradation over the entire two year period. I always got great range, better than 85-90 miles. I was sad when the lease ended.

The S-10 was a bad experience. I bought it used at a govt auction and really never got much use out of it. The range was around 30 miles.

My hope is that the Leaf batteries hold up like the EV-1. I'm waiting to see how owners are doing after the first couple years before I consider that route.

 

No cooling? I am confused where you are getting your data from.

The battery temperature is regulated by a fluid coolant loop, a sort of radiator and a fan. You can usually only hear this engage during charging. I suspect a quick charge, however, generates a massive amount of heat, and this is probably where the system is really necessary.

 

The Leaf has exceeded my expectations in every way, especially range and recharge time. I recharge at home with the provided portable 120v J-1772 EVSE and find that the estimated and published recharge time is about 1/4 less in reality. They recommend to charge at 80% to extend battery life. That gives me 90 miles in economy mode.

 

Not according to all of the articles I have read about it. They all have stated that the Leaf battery has no active thermal regulation. Do you have a source saying otherwise?

Obviously if you start with 25% charge left in the battery, it is only going to take about 75% as long to charge.

How does 80% of the stated 100 mile max range equal 90 miles?

 

Leaf was amazing at ReFuel 2011 and it's battery nor the inverter did not have heat related issue. Tesla Roadster and other conversions had heat issues.

My Nissan Leaf Forum • View topic - ReFuel 2011 at Laguna Seca in the Leaf (w/pics & video)

 

Same way people get 1000 miles out of the 500 'mile max range' Prius.

 

Hi Daniel,
Lot's of folks were torqued out about delivery delays and fairness perception. Personally, we really really really had to work hard, to remain at the front of the line, and still we got bumped around. We've never run multi national automotive corporations, nor their logistics, so it's hard to say how much better things could go, theoretically, if at all ... especially with a brand new product. I figured it might not be until 2012 before we got our delivery, only we'd purposed to be patient, regardless. Now that it's July, there have been more Leafs manufactured/sold than all other brands ever sold (unless you count leased/crushed EV's). If some other company could do it better, they already would have. But no one has. That speaks volumes as how complex things likely are. And all this production has been in spite of the devastating 8.9 earth quake - tidal wave - 18,000+ dead - electric power out - supply chain chaos, etc.

In any even let me opine to your other points.

- As for the Leaf's traction pack warranty (at least in California, which requires certain environmental standards), ours is for 100,000 miles, just like RAV4-EV's had ... or for 8 years from date of purchase ... which is 3 years longer than the RAV4-EV pack warranty. I read through our warranty and it wasn't 4 pages long - as it pertained to the traction pack. Maybe WA is different from CA. ... I don't know.
- Active cooling: As others point out, your concern seems to "Focus" (point intended) on liquid cooling ... as Ford's EV will have. Note; no price yet stated on the focus ev. Liquid cooling is more complex, and in part, that's why the Transit (Ford's mini van EV) costs OVER $57,000. Part of the huge cost is because it's EV guts are made by another company, and it's not a high volume item. Even if you knock off $7,000 for that ... the Focus MAY cost a whole lot more than the Leaf ... making it like the Volt ... not affordable for most. Even so - liquid cooling is NOT a silver bullet. Ford's EV battery chemistries MAY be crappier quality compared to the Leaf ... and thus REQUIRE liquid cooling, just to make due. it's too early to tell. Nissan was the only manufacturer back in the 1990's to make an EV with Lithium (in it's altra). It was a disaster, and they pulled them back from the Lessees faster than most other manufacturers. Still, that experience (failure) likely gave them a great foundational knowledge base.
- No explanation about why no liquid cooling? Do they need to explain? Those why say liquid is de facto best are the folks using or planning to use it ... but might that simply mean those folks HAVE to use it? ... ie, a battery chemistry more prone to be less robust? Yes. But even so, Nissan does explain their traction pack choise. When asked, Nissan has stated the Leaf pack doesn't need liquid cooling. The proof is in the pudding my friend. Many Leafs are now traveling the Arizona summers (109 - 113 degree Fahrenheit) daily with no issues - apparently just like Nissan expected. AZ residents (reporting on mynissanleaf dotcom) say their temp gauges show only a couple extra bars ... well below the red line. We've had a few mid 90 degree days here in So Cal this summer already, and I have yet to see the temp gauge hit any thing higher than the half way mark (only one bar - above the usual place) - and one time, that was pulling a grade, to 4,100 feet in the heat.
- Lastly - "refuse to guarantee how long their battery would last"
Here's my warranty:

See, here's the trick. EPA rates the battery (average) for about 100 miles. EPA requires the battery warranty to extend to 100,000. The Leaf's 100,000 battery life/warranty is inextricably linked to EPA emissions standard. So - should the charge drop down to 80% ... 50% ... 25% ... or less ... and you bought the Leaf 10 months ago ... 8,500 mile ago ... you ARE good for a remedy ... just like a traction pack in a prius that dumps 25% or 50% of its "EPA RATED" capacity prior to warranty expiration. Does Nissan want to advertise that to a world full of abusive drivers? Well ... if you read between the lines ... put the pieces together - you can understand that all the elements are there to make a claim, should the Leaf traction pack come up short.

Hope that helps - fwiw

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"See, here's the trick. EPA rates the battery (average) for about 100 miles. EPA requires the battery warranty to extend to 100,000. The Leaf's 100,000 battery life/warranty is inextricably linked to EPA emissions standard. So - should the charge drop down to 80% ... 50% ... 25% ... or less ... and you bought the Leaf 10 months ago ... 8,500 mile ago ... you ARE good for a remedy ... just like a traction pack in a prius that dumps 25% or 50% of its "EPA RATED" capacity prior to warranty expiration. Does Nissan want to advertise that to a world full of abusive drivers? Well ... if you read between the lines ... put the pieces together - you can understand that all the elements are there to make a claim, should the Leaf traction pack come up short."

I am not following you here Hill. Are you saying that you think a valid battery claim warranty will be present if it degrades faster than 1%/1000 miles or ~ 1%/month ?

 

I'm saying that everything you hear from your dealer is not necessarily the way it is. Take your maintenance schedule for example. The dealer TELLS you that you need to come in for maintenance or replace items at 3,000 or 4,000 or 12,000 miles for "warranty items" when in fact many items don't need replacement for MUCH longer. See here, for example:
http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-ii-...70-what-services-you-need-what-you-don-t.html
Ergo - NOT 1%/1,000 miles. No, the EPA requires a stated life expectancy, and they state Leaf's traction pack range is (appx) 100 miles for a duration of 100,000 miles or 8 years. Violate any of the proscribed "no-no's" (in post #16 ) above though, and all bets are off. That's as straight forward as it can get.

How many time have you read a warranty that's disclaiming everything and anything (incidentals, consequentials, implied warranties of merchantability, fit for the particular purpose, etc)? Only some states say otherwise, contrary to a manufacturer's disclaimer. So, why do manufacturers try to write up warranty disclaimers if they're invalid? simple. Some people won't bother to put in a valid claim.

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^^ Unless the customer plans to document a battery defect by demonstrating less than 100 miles by standardized testing on a LF4 (is that the correct name?) cycle, I am not convinced. Hopefully Nissan will be reasonable, although that is certainly in the eye of the beholder, and customers will show up with unreasonable demands and threats of negative PR if their demands are not met.

As I said before -- tricky.

 

Honda's Civic hybrid is going through (what might be called) a Nissan Leaf deja vu. See thread #46 here:
http://priuschat.com/forums/honda-h...rid-dont-buy-one-heres-why-5.html#post1351935

I'm not necessarily a fan of the EPA on all counts, but some times they do serve their purpose.

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