Earlier leafs don't always do such a good job of keeping the 12 volt battery charged, but the 2015 does. Don't rely on charging the car to top it off - only driving it, leaving the solar panel in direct sun for days, or externally charging it will do a good job.
Leaf won't start - a story
- Thread starter nmleaf650
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Nubo
Well-known member
LeftieBiker said:
Yep, I got 9 years out of the OEM Panasonic battery in my '91 Miata. Those batteries were too good so Mazda stopped using them.
Nubo
Well-known member
jdcbomb said:
CCA has no meaning for LEAF. 65% health sounds a bit doddering to me, and at 6 years this battery doesn't owe you anything. IMHO replacement is preferable to waiting for the next inconvenience, but everyone's situation is different.
Climate is a big contributing factor to 12-volt battery life or failure. I grew up on a farm near the Canadian border (in eastern Washington) and learned to drive in a Ford pickup my Dad bought new in the fall of 1965. The OEM battery was still reliably starting it when he traded it in on a new truck in the summer of 1977. I bought a new Ford pickup after moving to Phoenix in 1982 and was surprised when the OEM battery failed after 18 months. I later had a top-of-the-line flooded-cell replacement battery fail after only 9 months and the warranty replacement fail 6 months after that before I started using AGM batteries in all of my vehicles.
CCA does not tell much about the condition of a 12-volt battery in the Leaf. A deep cycle battery is more appropriate for a Leaf so reserve capacity is a better measure of battery status. Unfortunately, that is harder to quantify without a sustained discharge test. I recommend replacing an OEM Leaf 12-volt battery with a deep cycle AGM at the first sign of weakness. I put an Optima Yellow Top in the 2011 when the original failed and did the same for the 2015.
CCA does not tell much about the condition of a 12-volt battery in the Leaf. A deep cycle battery is more appropriate for a Leaf so reserve capacity is a better measure of battery status. Unfortunately, that is harder to quantify without a sustained discharge test. I recommend replacing an OEM Leaf 12-volt battery with a deep cycle AGM at the first sign of weakness. I put an Optima Yellow Top in the 2011 when the original failed and did the same for the 2015.
Also, if you want to keep the 12 volt battery working well for as long as possible, add distilled water to the cells every year or two. People are so used to sealed batteries now that no one thinks to check the electrolyte levels anymore.
LeftieBiker said:
Very true! The flooded-cell batteries I noted were checked and topped-off every couple of months. We used tap water (from a well) on the farm so I topped-off a motorcycle battery with tap water while in college without thinking about it. The battery was completely dead a couple days later probably due to chlorine and/or fluoride in the tap water. Therefore, use only distilled water (not bottled drinking water which may have minerals in it).
Charging batteries at excessively high voltage will cause them to gas more and evaporate water out of the electrolyte solution at a higher rate. The charging algorithm of the DC-DC converter in the Leaf charges at a higher voltage (about 14.5 volts) until the current absorbed by the battery drops below a threshold. The charging voltage then drops to float voltage of about 13 volts. This greatly reduces the need to add distilled water so I only had to top-off the OEM battery in the 2011 once shortly after purchasing the car (battery was probably not properly filled at the factory). I never had to add water to the OEM battery in the 2015. Also, I have never connected an external charger to the 12-volt battery in either Leaf because the DC-DC converter charging algorithm charges the battery fully without overcharging during my normal driving and charging of the car. The OEM batteries in both Leafs lasted longer than normal for OEM batteries in my climate (probably because the temperatures under the hood of the Leaf are much lower than other cars).
gncndad
Well-known member
LeftieBiker said:
As a single data point: my OEM 2015 battery lasted 4 years, in DFW heat, driving short distances.
