Leaf is Totally Dead - No warning. Resolved see page 3

[thankyouOB]

I got ready to leave for work and the car was totally dead. Couldn't get anything to work, even the dash was dark. Couldn't open the front charging port. Car is 6 weeks old with 1200 miles. VERY FRUSTRATING.

Called dealer, he said to call Nissan Roadside assistance. Waiting for flatbed, about an hour wait.

The car was fine last night, had about a 45% charge when I returned home, GOM showed about 40 miles of range, as I recall. Car drove fine last night. Didn't charge overnight, didn't see the need to.

Reliability is key to me - this isn't a warm and fuzzy feeling today.

Any ideas?

it is reliable. i had that happen (car dead) once in two years. i left the flashers on. 12v discharged.
jumped it myself and all was fine. that was 6 months ago.
i try to pay a little more attention to the silent car when i shut it down. familiarity breeds distraction.

 

[lencap]

Picked up car from dealer. The 12v battery was replaced under warranty (0 CCA reading - that's really dead!). I asked what caused it and he had no answers. "When the battery fully discharged all codes were erased. When we put in the new battery the system reset itself." I accepted the explanation, but that seems like poor design if diagnostic codes are lost.

In any event, they recharged the traction battery to 75% charge, confirming that it is working well. When they installed the new battery the traction readings were essentially unchanged from last night - about 41 mile of range, about 46% state of charge. They said to just drive it and let them know if anything seems to be working incorrectly.

I did not get a traction battery readout from the service writer (no Gid readings), but I'll talk with the tech tomorrow to see if he has those readings.

12V battery test report: "Battery needs to be replaced and system test needs to be performed before returning to customer." I am hopeful that the tech retained that info. New battery shows 582 CCA measured, 12.8 volts; rated 100% state of health on their diagnostic reading.

At this point I can't confirm if I indeed left the car in ACC mode, but if I did there wasn't anything obvious to alert me. The dash was dark and the center display was dark as well. I did turn off the car and exit pretty fast, so if I did double hit the on/off switch it is possible that I did put it in ACC mode by mistake. On the other hand the failed battery reads 0 CCA - that's pretty extreme for an overnight depletion rate. Old battery also showed 7.5 amp hours capacity. That leads me to believe that maybe the issue is related to charging problems between the 12V and main batteries. The service writer confirmed that the 12V battery only charges if the car is in motion.

I'll let everyone know if I have further problems, but for now I'm chalking it up to a learning curve, and I'll assume that I put the car in ACC mode without knowing it. Still, it's not a lot of comfort to know that I can be stranded so easily. Seems like Nissan can address this in future software updates.

 

[hieuous]

Picked up car from dealer. The 12v battery was replaced under warranty (0 CCA reading - that's really dead!). I asked what caused it and he had no answers. "When the battery fully discharged all codes were erased. When we put in the new battery the system reset itself." I accepted the explanation, but that seems like poor design if diagnostic codes are lost.

In any event, they recharged the traction battery to 75% charge, confirming that it is working well. When they installed the new battery the traction readings were essentially unchanged from last night - about 41 mile of range, about 46% state of charge. They said to just drive it and let them know if anything seems to be working incorrectly.

I did not get a traction battery readout from the service writer (no Gid readings), but I'll talk with the tech tomorrow to see if he has those readings.

12V battery test report: "Battery needs to be replaced and system test needs to be performed before returning to customer." I am hopeful that the tech retained that info. New battery shows 582 CCA measured, 12.8 volts; rated 100% state of health on their diagnostic reading.

At this point I can't confirm if I indeed left the car in ACC mode, but if I did there wasn't anything obvious to alert me. The dash was dark and the center display was dark as well. I did turn off the car and exit pretty fast, so if I did double hit the on/off switch it is possible that I did put it in ACC mode by mistake. On the other hand the failed battery reads 0 CCA - that's pretty extreme for an overnight depletion rate. Old battery also showed 7.5 amp hours capacity. That leads me to believe that maybe the issue is related to charging problems between the 12V and main batteries. The service writer confirmed that the 12V battery only charges if the car is in motion.

I'll let everyone know if I have further problems, but for now I'm chalking it up to a learning curve, and I'll assume that I put the car in ACC mode without knowing it. Still, it's not a lot of comfort to know that I can be stranded so easily. Seems like Nissan can address this in future software updates.

sounds to me like theres something else wrong. maybe a short to ground or a bad battery.

you're right, the battery should at least read something; not 0.

 

[LEAFfan]

Picked up car from dealer. The 12v battery was replaced under warranty (0 CCA reading - that's really dead!). I asked what caused it and he had no answers. "When the battery fully discharged all codes were erased. When we put in the new battery the system reset itself." I accepted the explanation, but that seems like poor design if diagnostic codes are lost.

In any event, they recharged the traction battery to 75% charge, confirming that it is working well. When they installed the new battery the traction readings were essentially unchanged from last night - about 41 mile of range, about 46% state of charge. They said to just drive it and let them know if anything seems to be working incorrectly.

I did not get a traction battery readout from the service writer (no Gid readings), but I'll talk with the tech tomorrow to see if he has those readings.

12V battery test report: "Battery needs to be replaced and system test needs to be performed before returning to customer." I am hopeful that the tech retained that info. New battery shows 582 CCA measured, 12.8 volts; rated 100% state of health on their diagnostic reading.

At this point I can't confirm if I indeed left the car in ACC mode, but if I did there wasn't anything obvious to alert me. The dash was dark and the center display was dark as well. I did turn off the car and exit pretty fast, so if I did double hit the on/off switch it is possible that I did put it in ACC mode by mistake. On the other hand the failed battery reads 0 CCA - that's pretty extreme for an overnight depletion rate. Old battery also showed 7.5 amp hours capacity. That leads me to believe that maybe the issue is related to charging problems between the 12V and main batteries. The service writer confirmed that the 12V battery only charges if the car is in motion.

I'll let everyone know if I have further problems, but for now I'm chalking it up to a learning curve, and I'll assume that I put the car in ACC mode without knowing it. Still, it's not a lot of comfort to know that I can be stranded so easily. Seems like Nissan can address this in future software updates.

Your service writer is incorrect. The 12V charges when you put the car in 'Ready' (PB push with foot on brake).

 

[RegGuheert]

thanks to OP for the detailed report!

Your service writer is incorrect. The 12V charges when you put the car in 'Ready' (PB push with foot on brake).

Correct. Plus it also charges when you charge the traction battery. Unfortunately, it does not seem to spend enough time actually charging (14.4V) and instead spends too much time in float (13.1V), which does not charge the battery unless the SOC is very low. Float certainly will not fully charge the battery.

 

[Ingineer]

I too accidentally double-bumped my power button when I first got my LEAF. The center display takes a few seconds before it comes back on, so it's easy to miss!

I installed a brighter LED in the power switch right away and since then I've never done this.

That aside, there does seem to be a lot of 12v battery failures in the US-built LEAF. They must be using a crappy supplier.

-Phil

 

[TomT]

I did this in my first week of ownership and came out from work to only three bars of charge (and those were the old bars - no reserve)... It was fun finding an EVSE in those days so I could get enough charge to make it home! That was the first and last time I did that!

I too accidentally double-bumped my power button when I first got my LEAF. The center display takes a few seconds before it comes back on, so it's easy to miss!

 

[Ingineer]

Yeah, if you have your foot on the brake, you'll end up losing bars, without the brake you'll have a dead 12V.

-Phil

 

[MikeD]

My understanding (and experience) is that after 1 hour of of being left in Accessory mode, the 2011 Leaf automatically turns Off. I could not find the reference to this in the Owner's Manual (I recall reading it somewhere), so I'm not sure if it is documented for later MY Leafs.

Edit Update: The auto-off reference is on page 3-10 or 3-11 of the Owner's Manual. Here is the entire text for 2011:

12-VOLT BATTERY SAVER SYSTEM
When all the following conditions are met for 60 minutes, the battery saver system will cut off the power supply to prevent 12-volt battery discharge.
. The power switch is in the ACC position,
. All doors are closed, and
. The vehicle is in the P (Park) position.

For later years thru 2013, the time is not specified, just "When all the following conditions are met for a period of time...".

 

[lencap]

Got a call from the tech who worked on the car. He didn't test the main battery health, but said he did check the 12V charging system and it was working as intended. He didn't anticipate any other problems.

So I'll just move ahead with the new 12V battery and see if anything else pops up.

 

[LEAFfan]

My understanding (and experience) is that after 1 hour of of being left in Accessory mode, the 2011 Leaf automatically turns Off. I could not find the reference to this in the Owner's Manual (I recall reading it somewhere), so I'm not sure if it is documented for later MY Leafs.

Edit Update: The auto-off reference is on page 3-10 or 3-11 of the Owner's Manual. Here is the entire text for 2011:

12-VOLT BATTERY SAVER SYSTEM
When all the following conditions are met for 60 minutes, the battery saver system will cut off the power supply to prevent 12-volt battery discharge.
. The power switch is in the ACC position,
. All doors are closed, and
. The vehicle is in the P (Park) position.

For later years thru 2013, the time is not specified, just "When all the following conditions are met for a period of time...".

Yep, same for 2013. I found out by listening to the radio while waiting in the car, and after one hour it turned off.

 

[Deleted member 9549]

Should mention in general that this type of problem has also been reported on the Volt and even Tesla. Similar situation where some system accidentally or as a result of a bug continues draining the 12v battery until its dead. Car acts totally unresponsive. A simple jump, even from a little booster battery is usually enough to bring the car to life.

As a EE, I'm amazed that these cars really can't find a better solution than to lug around a lead weight, low energy density battery just for running some electronics when that have enormous capacity lithium ion batteries at the ready. They could even dedicate a small lithium ion battery, or lower voltage than 12v to initiate power up. It just seems strange that you can strand a EV with a giant battery because some little lawn mower lead acid battery discharges. There must be a better way. I guess it will just take some time to sort out.

 

[nosuchthing]

It's all about cutting cost. The old led/acid tech is much cheaper than a small Li Ion unit. Wait for Elon Musk to come up with an elegant 12-volt fix in his future Teslas.

 

[espo35]

If you double-bump the on switch, you can drain the 12v battery to 0 cca. In 35 years in the industry, I've never seen a bad battery read 0....only a drained battery. My guess is that the dealership warrantied the battery so that they would be paid to fix your car, the tow and the rental bill. Much easier than trying to get $$ from the customer who left his ignition on. BTW.... they can scan the Leaf with a CONSULT 3 + and that will tell them what mode the ignition was when the low voltage code hit the ECM.

 

[LeftieBiker]

I don't have the manual in front of me, but I'm pretty sure that for the 2013 you have to press the Power button three times rapidly, not two. I could be wrong though - that manual is too long and not well organized.

 

[gbarry42]

What you're describing is the procedure to intentionally shut the car off in an emergency. What they are talking about is the "procedure" to accidentally have the car come back on after a normal shut down.

 

[LeftieBiker]

What you're describing is the procedure to intentionally shut the car off in an emergency. What they are talking about is the "procedure" to accidentally have the car come back on after a normal shut down.

Oops! You're right. For some reason my brain as conflating "ACCessory" with "ACCident."

 

[MikeD]

BTW there was an important change made involving 12v battery charging starting with 2013: In "On Mode" the 12v battery will be charged (presumably if it drops below a certain threshold voltage, it will charge from the main battery until it reaches some other threshold voltage -- I don't have a 2013 to check this presumption) in the common situation described below. For previous model years this did NOT happen.

Page EV-5 of "2013 LEAF Owner's Manual":

"CHARGING THE 12-VOLT BATTERY
The 12-volt battery is charged automatically using electricity stored in the Li-ion battery.

When the 12-volt battery is being charged, the charge status indicator light [the rightmost light of the 3 charging indicator lights] on the instrument panel flashes. (except when charging the Li-ion battery or the power switch is in the READY to drive position.) See Charge status indicator light in the Charge section [page CH-35].

While vehicle is driven

The Li-ion battery charges the 12-volt battery as necessary when the power switch is in the READY to drive position or ON position. The 12-volt battery is not charged in the following conditions.
• When the power switch is in ACC position.
• When the power switch is in ON position and shift position is in the N (Neutal) position.

While the vehicle is not in use

When the EV (Electric Vehicle) system is off for an extended time, the 12-volt battery may be automatically charged for a short period of time on a regular basis."

 

[gbarry42]

Have they added an extra "position" to the switch? ACC...ON...READY ?

 

[RegGuheert]

I too accidentally double-bumped my power button when I first got my LEAF. The center display takes a few seconds before it comes back on, so it's easy to miss!

I accidentally double-pressed the switch the other day upon arrival at my destination, so I sat and waited for the center console to light up, but it never did! I was sure I had double-pressed it since it made the sound twice. I was a bit surprised that the car really DID seem OFF. I decided to cycle the car back to ACC, ON and then OFF to be SURE it was really OFF. Strange...

BTW there was an important change made involving 12v battery charging starting with 2013: In "On Mode" the 12v battery will be charged (presumably if it drops below a certain threshold voltage, it will charge from the main battery until it reaches some other threshold voltage -- I don't have a 2013 to check this presumption) in the common situation described below. For previous model years this did NOT happen.

According to TimLee, this is not a change for 2013, but rather it was an undocumented feature in the 2011/2012s:

For the 2011 LEAF, the HVAC fan will run and the 12V battery will charge in the two button push, no foot on the brake, ON mode. You may be correct that the AC compressor will not run in the ON position, but the HVAC fan does run.
Have done this for many hours. Periodically as the 12V battery voltage drops, the blue light starts flashing, and it does charge from the HV battery DC to DC converter.

OTOH, TimLee had to have his 12V battery replaced before two years were up.

Have they added an extra "position" to the switch? ACC...ON...READY ?

No, those have always been there, along with OFF.