Charging timers: RAGE MODE, ACTIVATE

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FalconFour

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 19, 2012
Messages
326
Location
San Jose, CA
Oh my god, I have simple needs. I have a damn simple charging plan that I cannot for the life of me relay to the LEAF.

Charge ANY TIME EXCEPT 10am-9pm Monday through Friday.

Let that sink in for a moment. Just how simple a schedule that is. It's just a block, weekdays, that I don't want the car to charge when it's plugged in at home! Sounds simple, right?

No, the car has to make this crap complicated. Oh, but how much I hesitate to post this on the MNL forums. Last time I posted about this timer crap, the behavior of the participants in that thread made me want to swear off this forum forever as a bunch of pissy, "oh, everything is so obvious, just look you stupid noob" jackasses. Let's see if we can have a thread, with a full understanding that I am not a moron and I do actually have a very low-level understanding of many of the systems in this car. And how a timer should operate. And how this one does not.

So let me explain my problem, and why the timers are just a huge screw-up. Your timers may be working for you. Someone might be able to come up with a 2-timer plan to meet my needs as well. That doesn't mean the timers aren't screwed-up and ass-backwards, it just means that someone else was better at working through the ass-backwardsery better than I could. There really shouldn't've been a need for someone else to help out a guy that understands as much as I do about this car. The fact that I've been left with a non-charged car at least 3 times now due to incompetent timers means there is a huge problem here.

"OFF".

OFF means OFF, as in, "no timers. Charge any time between 12am and 11:59:59pm of the day that "OFF" is selected for.

Oh, but that would make too much sense, right? So here's issue number one: timer "OFF" means "not charging at all today". What the sh*tf$ck kind of derpy-ass upside-down logic is this? Biggest stupid mistake I've ever seen in this car so far. No wonder I keep coming out to a dead car. Weekends, I want to charge any time of day, so I set them to "OFF". Intuitively, this makes sense - you'd have to be a hardcore Nissan apologist/butt-kisser to try to tell me there's some legitimate reason for that behavior - the reason simply does not exist.

"START TIME | END TIME"
No, stupid. It's "END TIME | START TIME". Let's break this down a little bit. If I have an electric vehicle, when I plug that vehicle in, I want it to charge. This is signified by the motion of attaching the plug to the socket. That says "here's power, now charge please". OK? That means go. Now. With a few exceptions: I want to avoid peak hours. Well, that flips the whole algorithm on its head. Should be simple to program, right? Well, now we're crossing day/night boundaries while defining our inverted charging-timer plan. Kinda like trying to draw a repeating pattern for a stencil or something - you've got to cross over some date/time shifts to comprehend where to set the start and end, and on what days. Instead of making it a simple "don't charge during these hours", it's now like "start on one day with a program assigned to one day, try to figure out how that interacts with the schedule of the next day". Can we be for freakin' real? I want it to charge whenever I don't tell it NOT to charge. Not "only charge when I DO tell it to charge". Done and done. The current behavior is absurd and plain backwards.

"Charging station? What's that?"
Timers are a convenience function at home. AT. HOME. So when people are out and about, they plug in, walk away. What's the car do as it stands today? "Oh, charging timers... beep! Beep beep! Haha, just kidding, not charging... walking away... sucker". Bad juju. I can't expect that you'd use GPS location to determine if charging timers should apply, but come on. Do something. The nav system already auto-stores new charging stations, so the infotainment/management console is already aware of charging events and locations. Why can't that be expanded to override timers on non-home locations automatically?

LEAF is quickly falling to a "meh"-rate car now that competitors have started bringing up production of real modern EVs - like the Fiat 500e, Chevy Spark, etc. - and they're pretty on top of their game. If Nissan keeps thinking that "meh, don't need to update older models with new software" while competitors choose to respect their customers and provide free updates... Nissan would be in a tough PR situation for sure.

If someone that can perform time-manipulation in their head better than I can could come up with a 2-timer solution for that criteria stated in the beginning of this post, I've give you a huge <3. But that's only half the problem, as you can see from this post. Charging timers suck and I shouldn't need two charging timers to perform something as simple as that - if it were designed properly, a "M-F 10am-9p blackout period" would be a single timer. If I wanted, I'd expand that to weekend partial peak times as well, but due to the unnecessary complexity of the timers, I'd probably need 3 timers to do that...

Attached: my failed attempts at trying to set timers. Weekends had been switched OFF completely, but... see earlier rage in this post regarding THAT selection.
 

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Your current timers do not cover the hours between 11:50 PM Sunday and 9:10 PM Monday. There is also an overlap on Saturday morning. I think if you back up the weekend timer to 10:00 AM start and end at 9:50 AM, you will cover the weekend and also the time between Sunday night and Monday morning.
 
I enjoyed your rage.
This is not the solution you want, but it's dead stupid, works every time, you don't need to explain it to the wife, and the Leaf, devoid of internal timers, will charge whenever it is plugged in while you are "out".

Intermatic EH40 Electronic Water Heater Timer
http://www.rewci.com/inehwaheti24.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It's not the only one available by any means, just representative of a 240VAC 30 amp set it and forget it external digital timer.

Plug in, walk away. :D

I confess, I wired one of these in when I ran my circuit, and I have;
1) NEVER woken up to an uncharged Leafy
2) NEVER had to think about anything when I plug in elsewhere
3) NEVER charged during ON peak, unless I push the over-ride button intentionally.

Not saying you can't solve your problem with what the Leaf provides, just saying...... see 1 - 3 above.

Good Luck

(oh, and they work just as well on hot water heaters :roll: )
 
Personally, I don't believe we need a RAGE mode. There's just too much of that already. You may want to change your title.
 
KennyLewis said:
Your current timers do not cover the hours between 11:50 PM Sunday and 9:10 PM Monday. There is also an overlap on Saturday morning. I think if you back up the weekend timer to 10:00 AM start and end at 9:50 AM, you will cover the weekend and also the time between Sunday night and Monday morning.
It actually borders on physical pain - that feeling I get in my head when I try to wrap my mind around how those overlaps work and how starting at 10am and ending at 9:50am makes sense... Back to the Future stuff going on here. ;) But that does sort-of make sense, since I had to use day-overlapping timers for weekdays. Ow, ow, ow, my head... I can manipulate binary in my head but I CAN'T DO TIME! :lol:

I actually entered that weekend timer in a fit of rage while pissed-off that it refused to charge during a weekend saying "OFF". Didn't make sense that a whole different timer schedule would overlap with another... or that I'd need to program a timer to say "charge any time today, seriously, why am I even programming a timer". :p

KillaWhat said:
I enjoyed your rage.
This is not the solution you want, but it's dead stupid, works every time, you don't need to explain it to the wife, and the Leaf, devoid of internal timers, will charge whenever it is plugged in while you are "out".

Intermatic EH40 Electronic Water Heater Timer
http://www.rewci.com/inehwaheti24.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
That could work in theory ;) But I've got the dryer-outlet + EVSE Upgrade solution, so I'd need something non-hard-wired so I don't have to start breaking out bare wires to run a timer. :/ It's dang pathetic that LEAF owners have had to use external solutions to compensate for the poorly-designed timers built into the car... just goes to prove my point. ;) I think we can get the problem solved using those built-in timers with just some hackery, but... this post is just a very good point!

LEAFfan said:
Personally, I don't believe we need a RAGE mode. There's just too much of that already. You may want to change your title.
Lol, changing the title? Not happening. Rather rude of you to say that, too. It's an appropriate title and there's nothing wrong with it. Someone needs to be smacked for designing the timers the way they did in the LEAF.
 
KillaWhat wrote:
I enjoyed your rage.
This is not the solution you want, but it's dead stupid, works every time, you don't need to explain it to the wife, and the Leaf, devoid of internal timers, will charge whenever it is plugged in while you are "out".

Intermatic EH40 Electronic Water Heater Timer
http://www.rewci.com/inehwaheti24.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

That could work in theory ;) But I've got the dryer-outlet + EVSE Upgrade solution, so I'd need something non-hard-wired so I don't have to start breaking out bare wires to run a timer. :/ It's dang pathetic that LEAF owners have had to use external solutions to compensate for the poorly-designed timers built into the car... just goes to prove my point. ;) I think we can get the problem solved using those built-in timers with just some hackery, but... this post is just a very good point!

I'm REALLY not fan of things plugged into outlets that should be hardwired.
But...... get a timer, get the appropriate size and type of wire and plug, and put a box and an outlet on the timer, mount it to the wall, and plug it in...and there you go.

Marine products stores sell a wide and weird variety of 240VAC products.
 
FalconFour said:
LEAFfan said:
Personally, I don't believe we need a RAGE mode. There's just too much of that already. You may want to change your title.
Lol, changing the title? Not happening. Rather rude of you to say that, too. It's an appropriate title and there's nothing wrong with it. Someone needs to be smacked for designing the timers the way they did in the LEAF.
If the poor design of the Leaf timers (which most would agree is substandard) leads to rage on your part, the timers are the least of your problems. Gotta agree with LEAFfan, we really don't need a RAGE mode.
 
You want the car to charge anytime in public, but not charge
from 10 AM to 9 PM at home, on weekdays?

Using the Timers that are there:
You set Sunday through Thursday to charge from 9 PM to 10 AM
(which is 10 AM the following day), and and then set
Friday and Saturday to charge from 9 PM to 9 PM.

Since the car does not vary operation by location (home or not),
you will have to push the Timer Override button to charge
weekdays between 10 AM to 9 PM (for your "public" use).

Or, you can just complain about how the timers do not
work the way that you think they should.
 
Stoaty said:
...If the poor design of the Leaf timers (which most would agree is substandard) leads to rage on your part, the timers are the least of your problems. Gotta agree with LEAFfan, we really don't need a RAGE mode.

One side of my family is Italian, and we're quite demonstrative. But I do have to occasionally remind myself that not everyone sees the joy, shared experience and humor in a good rant where a minor inconvenience is sufficient cause for the Injustices of the World and incompetence of its inhabitants to labored upon with gusto. :lol:

Nissan's human interface designers certainly do come from another planet. Don't get me started about the HVAC controls where I have to look at the panel 3 times and engage in over a dozen button-presses to get the same effect as flicking a knob without looking. If I ever get ahold of the stunad who designed this...! :lol:
 
garygid said:
Or, you can just complain about how the timers do not
work the way that you think they should.
You're a bigger man than I am. I knew the answer, too, but didn't want to deal with the rage. We all know the timers could have been done better, but they're what we've got. This is much easier if your EVSE has a timer like my Blink has. My Blink is set for 1AM to 5PM, so that if I plug in at home in the evening, it doesn't charge, but the car does charge if I plug in elsewhere. I did do this with the car's timers for a while, but it's better if you don't need to override the timers when using public charging as that overrides the 80% charging as well.
 
davewill said:
garygid said:
Or, you can just complain about how the timers do not
work the way that you think they should.
You're a bigger man than I am. I knew the answer, too, but didn't want to deal with the rage. We all know the timers could have been done better, but they're what we've got. This is much easier if your EVSE has a timer like my Blink has. My Blink is set for 1AM to 5PM, so that if I plug in at home in the evening, it doesn't charge, but the car does charge if I plug in elsewhere. I did do this with the car's timers for a while, but it's better if you don't need to override the timers when using public charging as that overrides the 80% charging as well.

I'd say there should be an 80% limit unless I press the 100% button, or select 100% in the timers. I agree, it is simple stupid to plug in away from home and hit the button that is really near the lid release, and look at the lights to see that I'm actually charging. But you are correct, you will charge to 100% once you bypass the timer, unless you are available to unplug the car. Back to the OP, I've not had any issues with the current charging timers, as least not to the point of raging about them. The climate control timer stinks, I would like to be able to have a real end time, so I can end it before our winter peak rate at 7am. The wife leaves at 7:20, but I want the climate control to turn off at 7am.
 
kentuckyleaf said:
I'd say there should be an 80% limit unless I press the 100% button, or select 100% in the timers. I agree, it is simple stupid to plug in away from home and hit the button that is really near the lid release, and look at the lights to see that I'm actually charging. But you are correct, you will charge to 100% once you bypass the timer, unless you are available to unplug the car. Back to the OP, I've not had any issues with the current charging timers, as least not to the point of raging about them. The climate control timer stinks, I would like to be able to have a real end time, so I can end it before our winter peak rate at 7am. The wife leaves at 7:20, but I want the climate control to turn off at 7am.
The 2013 models let you choose 80% charging separate from the timers, so that's an improvement. As far as shutting off the climate control at 7AM, that's how the climate control timer DOES work. In your case, you'd set it for 7AM, and it would come on before then so that the car is ready by 7AM: http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=12400" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
 
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