Couldn't make it

[kolmstead]

Maybe. I've seen 4.5 to 5 kW, but that's in the high desert, with OAT around 16-18 F. I believe that the heater is a 6kW Denso. The energy consumption screen isn't on during timed preheat, so who knows what it does. TED isn't going to tell the peak power pulled, since it will only indicate how much the Leaf's on-board charger drew from the 240V service.

Tonight may be a challenge. I turned off heater about half way to work, and definitely won't be running it on the way home. GOM dropped like a rock during this morning's commute.

-karl

 

[kolmstead]

Leaving heater off got me home cold but safely; 67 Gids remaining. I downloaded The Energy Detective data and it looks like I can improve things in two ways.

I leave for work at 6 AM. For charging, I use only an end timer, set to 6 AM. For cabin preheat, the timer is set to 6:10 AM leaving time.

With battery run down to LBW yesterday, it only took four hours to recharge, and charging ended three hours before the end time I had set. So I bumped the end time up to 7:00 for tomorrow. That should result in a warmer battery when I leave; it will stop charging around 4 AM.

The cabin preheat came on at 5:30, and looks like it was just starting to taper off on power draw a couple of minutes before I stopped it at 6:01 this morning. High-power draw lasted about 29 minutes, with charger only making up 3.7 kW of whatever was consumed from the battery. About 18 Gids, or 1.4 kWh of depletion. I set the preheat leaving time to 5:40 AM for tomorrow, so the heater should come on 30 minutes earlier than today. That may not allow for complete recharge of the battery, but it should make up at least half of the loss. A measurable change, so I can continue adjusting the timer.

Temps are supposed to moderate now, so with warmer weather and timer adjustments, maybe I'll recover some range! Thanks for all the suggestions, my friends!

-Karl

 

[IraqiInvaderGnr]

Leaving heater off got me home cold but safely; 67 Gids remaining. I downloaded The Energy Detective data and it looks like I can improve things in two ways.

I leave for work at 6 AM. For charging, I use only an end timer, set to 6 AM. For cabin preheat, the timer is set to 6:10 AM leaving time.

With battery run down to LBW yesterday, it only took four hours to recharge, and charging ended three hours before the end time I had set. So I bumped the end time up to 7:00 for tomorrow. That should result in a warmer battery when I leave; it will stop charging around 4 AM.

The cabin preheat came on at 5:30, and looks like it was just starting to taper off on power draw a couple of minutes before I stopped it at 6:01 this morning. High-power draw lasted about 29 minutes, with charger only making up 3.7 kW of whatever was consumed from the battery. About 18 Gids, or 1.4 kWh of depletion. I set the preheat leaving time to 5:40 AM for tomorrow, so the heater should come on 30 minutes earlier than today. That may not allow for complete recharge of the battery, but it should make up at least half of the loss. A measurable change, so I can continue adjusting the timer.

Temps are supposed to moderate now, so with warmer weather and timer adjustments, maybe I'll recover some range! Thanks for all the suggestions, my friends!

-Karl

What's energy detective? Is it a app (android).

 

[DirtyNate]

I decided to go for it today, disregarding my intuition to take my wife's suv. I have 52 miles round trip and it was -4F this morning when I left. By the time I got to work I had less than half of the battery capacity remaing. (5 bars). I'm nervous about my drive home considering I used no heat on the way in. Should be interesting to say the least.

 

[kolmstead]

http://www.theenergydetective.com/

A system that lets you monitor and record the electrical consumption (or production) of your house or business. Current transformers and a central computer that records what the transformers are reporting. It lets you see in real time how much power various circuits are drawing, and it lets you download data broken down by seconds, minutes, hours, days or monthly totals. I used the minute-by-minute report to see when the Leaf charged its battery and when the preheat came on. Only way I know to get that kind of info.

Speaking of which, last night's adjustments were not particularly successful. The Leaf either didn't preheat, or it preheated and quit long before I got in. Which doesn't make sense. I only extended preheat cycle by 30 minutes, and it's supposed to be able to run up to two hours. Heater immediately began drawing 1.5 kW and continued all the way to work. Battery was at 196 Gids, only a little better than yesterday. So if a preheat did occur, it stopped early and the battery failed to recharge. Won't know exactly what happened until I review TED data tonight.

-Karl

 

[kolmstead]

DirtyNate: It all depends on your battery condition. Hope you make it. You're better off having LeafSpy, LeafDD, or one of the other aftermarket products available if you're going to explore the car's limits. The stock Leaf instrumentation DOES NOT provide enough info.

-Karl

 

[Nubo]

I decided to go for it today, disregarding my intuition to take my wife's suv. I have 52 miles round trip and it was -4F this morning when I left. By the time I got to work I had less than half of the battery capacity remaing. (5 bars). I'm nervous about my drive home considering I used no heat on the way in. Should be interesting to say the least.

The capacity bars are not equal. 5 bars is not 5/12 of the capacity as one might expect, more like 1/2 or even a bit above, depending on how far into the 5th bar you've gone.

 

[planet4ever]

I decided to go for it today, disregarding my intuition to take my wife's suv. I have 52 miles round trip and it was -4F this morning when I left. By the time I got to work I had less than half of the battery capacity remaing. (5 bars).

The capacity bars are not equal. 5 bars is not 5/12 of the capacity as one might expect, more like 1/2 or even a bit above, depending on how far into the 5th bar you've gone.

Actually, that depends on whether he has a 2012 or a 2013. With a delivery date of 24 Feb I can only guess. For a 2011 (except the first few built, if still as delivered) and a 2012, Nubo is correct, and there are about 1½ "hidden bars" below the last one shown. For a 2013, 6 bars is about half the capacity, with much less left after the last one disappears. Back in 2011 we used to refer to "old bars" and "new bars". For 2013 Nissan has returned to something close to "old bars", so I call them "classic bars".

But if DirtyNate has a 2013 he should watch the State of Charge gauge (a new Trip Computer frame). It's not perfect, but it's a lot better than the available charge bars.

Ray

 

[DirtyNate]

I ended up making it home. I slowed my speed a bit on the freeway. I use as little freeway as possible as it is (about 6 miles each way). Thanks for the advice. I don't have any aftermarket toys. I have been meaning to get something because I know the cars instrumentation is only mildly useful.

 

[bowthom]

Hello,
I initiated a preheat with my LeafDD plugged in. I watched the battery amps. At first it jumped to -8.4 amps but it soon was dancing between +/- 2 amps with an overall negative affect on GID's (-1 GID/10 minutes). Unfortunately I could not sit there and wait for the GID's to start back up.
Outside temp was 38*F

Don T

 

[kolmstead]

I'm finally beginning to figure out the preheat/charge tricks. Today I was able to drive a nice, warm Leaf to work, starting with 205 Gids, very close to the battery's current 208 Gid, 100% maximum.

The secret was to start the preheat and charge manually. One hour heating using the preconditioning timer did not work; the car preheated and then shut off as soon as it was warm. Result was a cold car, charged to about 190 Gids. If I started the charger remotely, I could get it back up to about 195 Gids. Still not satisfactory.

Today I started preheat 50 minutes before I planned to leave, using the cell phone app. I checked a few minutes later and it showed preheating but no charging, so I started charging remotely also. That did the trick.

Of course, there's another issue arising; my CarWings subscription expires in a month. I wasn't planning on renewing it... up until this week, I have been using CarWings once or twice a year. Not worth paying for a subscription.

-Karl

 

[planet4ever]

Of course, there's another issue arising; my CarWings subscription expires in a month. I wasn't planning on renewing it... up until this week, I have been using CarWings once or twice a year. Not worth paying for a subscription.

Careful. You're likely to bring out all the conspiracy folks claiming that Nissan just slipped in a change to climate control for the 2011 cars so you can't preheat without paying for CarWings. :lol:

Ray