A day of firsts... stranded on the freeway

[surfingslovak]

trojanm50 didn't say how far out he was at LBW, but given freeway speed and VLBW at 12 miles away, I'll guess 20 miles. 20 miles after LBW is easy if you slow down enough. And 20 miles at 30 mph only takes 40 minutes. Looking for an L2 and stopping there for 30 minutes will also take 40 minutes of your time, with little if any progress toward your destination. Besides, 30 minutes of L2 on trojanm50's 2011 would only give him about 5 or 6 miles farther on the freeway. You can't (or at least most of us can't) make 15 miles on the freeway after LBW.

Ray, I learned in a private conversation, that he ran out about 4 miles from home. The 30 minutes on L2 might have been the ticket, but it's difficult to say. Below is what I offered up as advice couple of days ago:

I would get careful when cell voltages start hitting 3.20V. It's also known that the lowest possible SOC is about 2% before the contactor drops and disconnects the battery pack.

The tires play an important role, and most of the tires owners select are not quite as efficient as the stock Ecopias. The tires on my ActiveE are approximately 5% less efficient then the Ecopias were, I measured the same routes and speeds. This translates to about 5% range loss. Also, as the thread wears, rolling resistance decreases. I know this does not help you much, I'm just saying.

Can you find an outlet to plug into during the day?

Once the battery contactor has been disconnected after turtle mode, the battery will need to clear VLB (~7%) before it can be put into drive again. It would be better to stop in turtle mode, if there is a spot to pull over, instead of running out completely. Easier said than done, I know. I have been in turtle mode about 30 times with the LEAF, and ran out on the Bay Bridge in pouring rain last December in the ActiveE. I can empathize. Glad you made it home, it's all uphill from here. Inflating the tires to a safe higher pressure is a good idea. It could buy 1% or 2%.

 

[trojanm50]

Yes, as soon as you noticed that you weren't "going to make it" you should have pulled off the highway and taken city roads, driving at 25mph. You likely would have saved a lot of time and made it home.

Even better would be to look for an L2 charging station and stop there for 30 minutes before trying to make it home.

For once I don't think I agree with you, Stoaty. I've been below LBW more than 100 times, and never yet hit turtle, except the one time I did it intentionally. My response is what stjohnh said, except that I usually figure I can make it at 35-40 mph.

trojanm50 didn't say how far out he was at LBW, but given freeway speed and VLBW at 12 miles away, I'll guess 20 miles. 20 miles after LBW is easy if you slow down enough. And 20 miles at 30 mph only takes 40 minutes. Looking for an L2 and stopping there for 30 minutes will also take 40 minutes of your time, with little if any progress toward your destination. Besides, 30 minutes of L2 on trojanm50's 2011 would only give him about 5 or 6 miles farther on the freeway. You can't (or at least most of us can't) make 15 miles on the freeway after LBW.

Ray

Ray, I hit VLBW (3 horizontal lines) around 11.6 miles away from home. City streets was not an easy option where I was driving. I suppose after another 6 miles I could have taken city streets. In addition, city streets would have increased the distance. I was trying to make it to a charger that was on my usual exit. The main reason i did not take an earlier exit was cos I was wary of driving around in circles trying to find a charger that I havent visited before. This has happened many times, The GPS will take me to a certain location, like an office building or something and I have to drive around to find the exact location.

I also did slow down after I hit VLBW, down to almost 40mph. The kicker was that I hit turtle about 50 feet after the last exit. At that point I went over to the shoulder and slowed down to 20mph.

The key here is that I could have avoided the situation entirely but I am just so disappointed that I got stranded after just 62 miles while Nissan still continues to promise 80% after 5 years.

I was stranded about 3.5 miles from home so, I guess those extra 30 minutes on L2 would have helped. I sincerely hope the increased PSI takes care of this. Given that I do not have a charger at work, another 30 minutes to my commute is no fun.

 

[Goodtohave]

My biggest advise is just get off the highway when you think you may be in trouble.

You can easily triple your range by doing 30mph on a sideroad.

 

[apvbguy]

the take away from incidents like this is to stick with the OEM tires

If only OEM tires were useable for anything but dry paved road. As much as I don't like the performance hit Leaf with OEM tires is completely useless in Iowa in winter. It was also only marginally better on wet pavement.

OEM tires are compromise chosen based on some assumption. In case of Leaf I'm afraid it's rolling resistance above all.

that is a plausible reason, fortunately my LEAF will more than likely never be driven in snow, so that is a non issue.

 

[apvbguy]

Please elaborate on your assertion that the Ecopias were designed for the Leaf. ;-) Our Prius has them as well, and it's a very different car. The Ecopias seem to have been designed to offer low rolling resistance at a low price for OEM use. Not much else more than that.

maybe my claim was a bit over ambitious, however these guys did some testing
http://www.caranddriver.com/features/the-nearly-10-g-nissan-leaf-getting-an-ev-to-grip-like-a-911-feature" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[trojanm50]

Do we have any documented cases where people who changed from ecopia to ecopia, experienced lesser range loss. I understand the new tires will cause some range loss on account of increased tread.

 

[harryjpowell]

I'm about to replace my orig Ecopia's tires at about 28,500 miles.. I haven't had any prob with the originals so I'm debating getting new Ecopia's or replacing just 2 to the Mich.. for about 2k miles then the other two.. This might help lessen the abrupt range loss... Not sure which would be better.

 

[Stanton]

I'm about to replace my orig Ecopia's tires at about 28,500 miles.. I haven't had any prob with the originals so I'm debating getting new Ecopia's or replacing just 2 to the Mich.. for about 2k miles then the other two.. This might help lessen the abrupt range loss... Not sure which would be better.

There's a couple of very good (old) threads on this with lots of arguments on both sides. For myself, I couldn't justify buying a new set of tires every 2 years regardless of the impact on range. Having said that, the initial m/kWh hit I took going to Michelin Defenders has settled over time to ~5%. However, the handling/wear improvement has been dramatic.

 

[alcalira]

I too ran out of of juice--not such a bad experience! I was really pushing it, trying to do Vacaville - Berkeley - Vacaville on a single charge (about 85 miles, mostly freeway). Hit turtle about 5 miles before Vacaville, and then she quit three miles later. Fortunately, there was an offramp right there, so I coasted off and called Nissan Roadside Assistance.

Within 20 minutes a spiffy flatbed tow truck arrived, loaded me up, and took me the final two miles to the Vacaville quick charge station. Charged up while doing my grocery shopping at the nearby Winco Foods.

Coulda been much worse! Thank you to Nissan for including the roadside assistance.

 

[alcalira]

BTW there are other tire discussion threads. I've had great luck with Kumho Ecowing tires. Improved ride and handling and range over the Bridgestones. Highly recommended. Available at America's Tire/Discount Tire.

 

[trojanm50]

BTW there are other tire discussion threads. I've had great luck with Kumho Ecowing tires. Improved ride and handling and range over the Bridgestones. Highly recommended. Available at America's Tire/Discount Tire.

Thank you, I will check out the Kumho tires. Im looking for something that has tread warranty.

BTW- Here is an update on my situation. I increased the PSI to above 40. Drove the car yesterday on the same route. Suffice to say I made it back with VLBW.

* On the old Ecopias, I would have gone 76 miles before turtle.
* Pirelli P7 - At 32 PSI, out of charge at 61.9 miles
* Pirelli P7 at 44 psi, I could have driven another 7 miles to a total of 70 miles.

The pirelli p7 when inflated above 40psi, causes atleast 10% range loss in my experience. Significantly more, if they are at 32PSI.

I plan to check out Kumho. Can Nissan void a warranty because we did not stick with stock tires?

 

[bowthom]

Climate control, fan etc was turned off and the temp was set to the lowest. If there is another way to save energy on the climate control other than Phils mod, please tell me how.

MY 2011 Leaf, if I turn off the system then just push the mode button, I can then set the mode to "foot & defrost" with no fan indicated or heater energy being used. Helps keep the windshield clear. If I adjust the fan speed or temp the system turns back on and uses heater energy.

 

[TomT]

Nope.

Can Nissan void a warranty because we did not stick with stock tires?

 

[DaveEV]

The pirelli p7 when inflated above 40psi, causes atleast 10% range loss in my experience. Significantly more, if they are at 32PSI.

What were your old tires inflated to? You may want to give the new ones a thousand miles to break in - it can take that long or longer before the new tires "loosen up".

 

[donald]

36psi is the Nissan recommended pressure, F&R, isn't it? Should the TPMS have flagged a warning?