Carwings vs Leaf Spy Pro (or both?)

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TheMagster

Member
Joined
Sep 1, 2018
Messages
23
Hi everyone! Excited new Leaf owners here, my wife and I just bought a Certified Pre-Owned 2015 Leaf SV with 25k miles and 12 bars for under $12k! Pretty good deal I think! For now we're charging primarily through Level 1 at home, and considering installing a Level 2.

When I went to activate Carwings, I was told that my Leaf didn't have a TCU, so that would be a $150 upgrade from a Nissan dealership. That's a flat cost, there's no monthly fees after that. I've also looked into Leaf Spy Pro with the Bluetooth ODDB dongle (wish I had known about that when shopping for the car!), that would cost about $30 total ($15 for the app, $15 for the dongle).

My question is, which is more useful? Or should I get both? I don't really mind the extra $180 of getting both, I just wanted to see if you think it is worth it or not.

A bit more about how we're using the car: I work from home, so I don't have a regular commute, which means that the car's built-in charging and climate control timers aren't very useful to me. My wife is a stay-at-home mom for our 1 year old daughter. We live in the country in Northwestern Oregon, USA (lots of hilly, curvy, 2 lane highways at 55 mph...not great for mileage). The primary use case for the Leaf will be trips to town and back for shopping, errands, seeing friends, etc. That's a 30 mile round trip, plus maybe 2-4 miles of in town driving. We'll do this something like 2-3 times per week (which is why Level 1 charging is generally fine for us). Once a month or so we'll take the Leaf on a longer road trip, and we'll make use of public Level 2 and Level 3 chargers for these trips.

While I'm brand new to it, I'm endeavoring to become a hypermiler, largely based on the advice I'm reading in the various hypermiling threads on these forums. My wife loves the challenge of planning our longer road trips such that we hit as many free charging stations as possible, and get the most out of every quick charge that we need (meaning that we would arrive at the quick charge station as close to an empty battery as possible). So we make a good team!

I'm interested in Carwings for the added functionality of checking the car's state of charge (SoC) remotely, and also for the option of turning on climate control 20 or 30 mins before we need to drive somewhere, to reduce the drain on the Lithium Ion (Li-ION) battery. I'm interested in Leaf Spy Pro for the extra nerdy goodness it provides about the car's battery....my understanding is that it provides more accurate data about the SoC and health of the battery and other car systems. However, the 30 ft range of Bluetooth isn't exactly remote, you have to be near the car for it to work. I'm also mildly concerned about the Bluetooth ODDB dongle draining the 12V battery since we aren't daily drivers (though the car will be plugged into Level 1 at home the vast majority of the time that it isn't in use, so this maintains the 12V battery as well as the Li-ION battery, correct?)

Alright, I think that's enough detail...so cast your votes...Carwings, Leaf Spy Pro, both, or neither?

Thank you!
 
There are problems associated with the TCU "upgrade" that I think make it not worth it. LeafSpy is definitely useful, but it's apples to oranges. Now, as for this:

I'm interested in Carwings for the added functionality of checking the car's state of charge (SoC) remotely, and also for the option of turning on climate control 20 or 30 mins before we need to drive somewhere, to reduce the drain on the Lithium Ion (Li-ION) battery.

The car always, always, always uses the battery to power the climate control. If you are charging with a higher amperage L-2 EVSE then the current supplied exceeds the drain and the pack stays charged. However, with L-1 charging you will always have a net loss of charge, albeit a fairly modest one. The best thing to do to conserve charge is to preheat 2-5 minutes before leaving (the climate control will likely turn off after 15 minutes of preheating anyway). This will leave you with about 97% charge if you had 100% to start.
 
TheMagster said:
my wife and I just bought a Certified Pre-Owned 2015 Leaf SV with 25k miles and 12 bars for under $12k! Pretty good deal I think! For now we're charging primarily through Level 1 at home, and considering installing a Level 2.

When I went to activate Carwings, I was told that my Leaf didn't have a TCU, so that would be a $150 upgrade from a Nissan dealership. That's a flat cost, there's no monthly fees after that.

My question is, which is more useful? Or should I get both? I don't really mind the extra $180 of getting both, I just wanted to see if you think it is worth it or not.
I'm fairly disinterested in the NissanConnect (the new name, I understand, for the former "CarWings") feature, but I understand that many owners who've paid for the equipment upgrade continue to have serious problems (like their 12V batteries being drained, or periodic firmware lockups that require the units to be power-cycled via fuse-pulling). I didn't feel CarWings was worthwhile even when it wasn't defective, so I certainly wouldn't advise paying for it now.
TheMagster said:
A bit more about how we're using the car: I work from home, so I don't have a regular commute, which means that the car's built-in charging and climate control timers aren't very useful to me. My wife is a stay-at-home mom for our 1 year old daughter. We live in the country in Northwestern Oregon, USA (lots of hilly, curvy, 2 lane highways at 55 mph...not great for mileage). The primary use case for the Leaf will be trips to town and back for shopping, errands, seeing friends, etc. That's a 30 mile round trip, plus maybe 2-4 miles of in town driving. We'll do this something like 2-3 times per week (which is why Level 1 charging is generally fine for us). Once a month or so we'll take the Leaf on a longer road trip, and we'll make use of public Level 2 and Level 3 chargers for these trips.
I'll suggest that the charging timers have more value than you think: they make it reasonably easy to avoid having the car charge to 100% all the time. Nobody knows with certainty what the best policy for battery longevity is, but many agree that in general, one should try to minimize the time-integral of the major stresses: high temperature and high state-of-charge. By setting both start and end times, you can arrange for the car to add a finite amount of energy during each night. When I was employed, my daily commute was very regular: about 20 miles. One hour's charging would replace a shade more energy than the commute used; the excess would get used on the weekend, or, if it built up too much, I'd just skip plugging in one night. And in that vein, I'd suggest you'd get way more value for the money that you were considering spending on the telematics upgrade if you put it toward L2 charging at your residence. That would mitigate the admitted downside of keeping your battery at a lower state of charge: unpreparedness for unanticipated longer trips. Also, using the charge timer this way can help ensure charging at the lowest possible utility rates (if your utility offers time-of-use rate incentives).
TheMagster said:
My wife loves the challenge of planning our longer road trips such that we hit as many free charging stations as possible, and get the most out of every quick charge that we need (meaning that we would arrive at the quick charge station as close to an empty battery as possible). So we make a good team!
If you can, hedge against the possibility of a station you've just barely made it to being out of service.
TheMagster said:
I'm interested in Carwings for the added functionality of checking the car's state of charge (SoC) remotely,
A bit obsessive, innit?
TheMagster said:
I'm also mildly concerned about the Bluetooth ODDB dongle draining the 12V battery
The dongles seem to be a bit of a grey-market commodity; even buying the same product number from someplace like Amazon won't guarantee that the unit will be the same. I bought about three of them before getting one that a) actually worked and b) had an ON/OFF switch that would let me leave it plugged in without worry about battery drain.
TheMagster said:
the car will be plugged into Level 1 at home the vast majority of the time that it isn't in use, so this maintains the 12V battery as well as the Li-ION battery, correct?) !
It's counter-intuitive, but that's not always a good idea. Check around to confirm this, but I think that if the car's plugged in, it will only recharge its 12V battery at times when it's actively charging the traction battery, too. If the car's left plugged in, the main traction battery will eventually charge fully, at which point it won't need recharging for months, whereas the 12V battery will drain away running various small monitoring electronics, and also suffer its own inherent discharge/sulphation/what-have-you. If you need to leave a LEAF for a week or more, leave it unplugged at 50-80% charge. And, as previously mentioned, I hold that one should avoid leaving a LEAF at 100% charge for extended periods, which is what your proposed policy will lead to. Set up one timer to replace the charge you use on a day's drive, and the other to target 100% comfortably before a typical long-trip departure time. When you plug in each evening, pick which timer should be active based on what you intend to do the next day.
 
Since the TCU upgrade was free for 2015 LEAFs, there should be no charge to you to make it function. Also, if it is a certified pre-owned car purchased from a Nissan dealer, they should have checked and updated the TCU before you bought it. I would not want to go without CarWings (now called EV Connect) because I like to use remote climate control and monitor charging. For me, pulling a fuse or disconnecting the 12-volt battery once in a while is acceptable in return for having the remote functions operational. I doubt that I have had to pull the fuse more than 5 or 6 times since getting the upgrade in December 2016.

I also never drive without Leaf Spy Pro because I like the information it displays and sometimes need to clear trouble codes after a failed quick charge.
 
I'm also mildly concerned about the Bluetooth ODDB dongle draining the 12V battery since we aren't daily drivers (though the car will be plugged into Level 1 at home the vast majority of the time that it isn't in use, so this maintains the 12V battery as well as the Li-ION battery, correct?)

I missed this. To elaborate on what Gerry wrote: the car regularly and frequently checks the status of the connection while plugged in, and once charging is over this starts to drain the 12 volt battery. So oddly enough, leaving the car plugged in while not charging is the quickest way to kill the 12 volt battery, not save it. Disconnect the car when not charging, and use a battery maintainer once a month to top it off. Happily for you, this isn't as much as issue on a 2015 as it is on, say, a 2013 Leaf.
 
Thanks everyone for your responses and helping to correct some of my misunderstandings!

The Leaf manual explains the process of starting climate control while the car is still charging to help extend range. So does this only apply if you are charging at L-2 (since the amperage is enough to both charge the battery and run the climate control)? I've heard that this function doesn't work at L-3. The manual also says that L-1 charging is for 'emergencies only', but I've learned from this forum that it is fine to use it long term. Still, I would like to have a dedicated circuit for charging EVs (possibly charging two at once a few years from now), and if I'm going through the bother of installing a new circuit, I figure it might as well be a 240V one. I would most likely buy one of the L-2 EVSEs that plug into the standard 240V outlet, as I like the flexibility (for example, I know that my sister's house as an unused but functional 240V outlet in the garage, so if I went to visit her I could bring the L-2 EVSE with me).

Definitely interesting to learn that the car should have come with the TCU. I just looked over the Certified Pre-Owned checklist that notes all the work the dealership did on the car, and it doesn't mention anything about the TCU. If my car already has it and it was overlooked somehow, then I would definitely want to use NissanConnect/CarWings. If not, then perhaps I won't pay the extra for it, as several of you have suggested.

Levenkay, thanks for the advice on using the charging timers! Do you know if there's a set amount of charge that comes through in an hour of charging at L-1 and L-2? I like the idea of Timer 1 being set to just replenish the amount drained by our normal run to town (~30-32 miles), and Timer 2 (or overriding the timers altogether) to provide a full charge in preparation for a longer roadtrip. Would I need Leaf Spy Pro to get an accurate enough measurement of that 30 mile trip's energy consumption, or would it be enough to just take note of the battery's depletion (i.e. if I left the house at 100% and returned at 60%, then I can program Timer 1 to charge 40%)?

I understand the 50%-80% sweet spot of Li-ION charging, and of course I do want to get the longest life out of my car's battery that I can, so I'm trying to figure out a good way to achieve this with my sporadic driving habits. My plan at this point is simple: if I return home with more than 80% charge, don't plug it in. My thought was that by using NissanConnect remotely I could check the SoC periodically and stop the charge when the SoC is between 80% and 90% (yes, this is a bit obsessive, but since my car doesn't have the 80% battery mode I'm not sure what else I could do). This would be especially useful if I were using a public charger somewhere and I wasn't actually near the vehicle, maybe I'm walking around town or in a cafe a few blocks away. Leaf Spy Pro wouldn't help in this scenario, since it is limited to Bluetooth's range of 30 ft, correct? Then again, if I'm using a public charger, maybe I want to charge it up to 100% to get the most out of it?

I'm also getting the sense that I should use the timers to have the car reach 100% charge shortly before driving it on longer trips. So say I want to leave at 10 AM tomorrow for a longer roadtrip in which I'll definitely have to use public charging stations, and the car is currently at 50% charge, should I set the timer so that it reaches 100% charge at 9:45 AM? If that's the case, then it seems like the NissanConnect/CarWings app would be quite useful, as I could fiddle with the timers from my phone instead of having to go out to the garage to use the car's screen.

My other motivation for checking the SoC remotely through NissanConnect would be to see if someone has unplugged me. Of course I can lock the EVSE to the car, but if I'm charging at L-1 in public then I can't lock the plug to the 120V outlet. The area I live in has a huge void of public chargers...most of the towns in this area have no L-3, and maybe one L-2 if you are lucky. So charging at L-1 in public is actually something I'll have to do from time to time, just to top me up enough to get to the next charger or to get home. If you use Plugshare, scroll the map over to the northern Oregon coast and you'll see what I mean...

Seems totally insane to me that a car this sophisticated wouldn't maintain the 12V battery properly...and I still need to use a battery maintainer? I doubt there will be many times when I'm not driving the car at least once or twice a week, so I don't think I'll need to manually maintain the 12V battery, I certainly don't on my various ICE cars that get driven far less regularly than that. Still, good info to know, so thanks for that! I'll start unplugging the car when I notice that it isn't charging anymore.

Thanks again everyone! I'm learning tons from these forums, and it is so helpful to have all of you to pepper with questions and bounce ideas around!
 
You may well not need to use a battery maintainer with a 2015, as they seem to have improved the charging algorithm in 2014 or 2015. I was suggesting topping off once a month more as a precaution than a necessity. You can check the rest voltage of the battery by leaving the hood unlatched, waiting 30 minutes, then using a multi-meter on the battery terminals. 12.5 volts or higher and you are ok. Lower and you need to use a maintainer at least occasionally.

Do you know if there's a set amount of charge that comes through in an hour of charging at L-1 and L-2? I like the idea of Timer 1 being set to just replenish the amount drained by our normal run to town (~30-32 miles), and Timer 2 (or overriding the timers altogether) to provide a full charge in preparation for a longer roadtrip. Would I need Leaf Spy Pro to get an accurate enough measurement of that 30 mile trip's energy consumption, or would it be enough to just take note of the battery's depletion (i.e. if I left the house at 100% and returned at 60%, then I can program Timer 1 to charge 40%)?

L-1 charging reliably adds about 5% charge per hour, which is roughly 4 miles' worth of charge for typical drivers. L-2 charging depends on the rated amperage of the charging station (and with earlier and S model Leafs, the onboard charger rating). You should get a good enough 'seat of the pants' idea of how far you can drive on how much charge with some experience, although it can't hurt to have LeafSpy and an appropriate dongle for it.
 
TheMagster said:
Levenkay, thanks for the advice on using the charging timers! Do you know if there's a set amount of charge that comes through in an hour of charging at L-1 and L-2? I like the idea of Timer 1 being set to just replenish the amount drained by our normal run to town (~30-32 miles), and Timer 2 (or overriding the timers altogether) to provide a full charge in preparation for a longer roadtrip. Would I need Leaf Spy Pro to get an accurate enough measurement of that 30 mile trip's energy consumption, or would it be enough to just take note of the battery's depletion (i.e. if I left the house at 100% and returned at 60%, then I can program Timer 1 to charge 40%)?
Sadly, the timers are only programmable as specific times-of-day, and then only in ten-minute intervals. This kind of thing isn't something that has to be gotten exactly right the first time; start out with a decent estimate, and refine when and if necessary. The 2011 LEAF, which was my first, had a blanket "stop charging at 80%" policy that one could select, so as long as I had that car, I just used an "end only" timer, set to finish at around 06:00 every day. Since my commute was short, I would only plug in every few days. That was pretty simple, but because the EPA (or whichever agency determines official ratings like that) decided that the advertised range had to reflect the worst-case combination of user settings, and that meant "with the stop-at-80% feature selected", it tended to make the already skimpy maximum range even shorter. Nissan promptly responded by removing the feature, so they could go back to touting the "from 100%" range. Lawyers; whaddaya gonna do? Anyway, i got into the habit of resetting the "average miles per kWh" display each morning, and watching that stat gave me a rough feeling of what my commute's needs were. For my combination of hills, surfaces, and traffic, the indicated economy tended to be around 4.5 in the summer, and maybe 3.8 in the winter. Ballparking that to 4mi/kWh, a 20 mile trip uses 5kWh. The 2016 LEAF no longer had the "80% charge" policy, so I estimated that its 6.6kW charger delivered "6kW effective" into the battery, which is 1kWh every ten minutes. My 5kWh commute therefore called for 50 minutes of charging; I set the timer for "start at 04:50, end at 05:40, everyday", and left it that way, unless (like during the winter) the average charge drifted enough to call for readjustment. OP note: an L1 charge will only deliver about 1.3kW, so you'd need about 46 minutes of L1 per kWh that you want to charge.
TheMagster said:
I understand the 50%-80% sweet spot of Li-ION charging, and of course I do want to get the longest life out of my car's battery that I can, so I'm trying to figure out a good way to achieve this with my sporadic driving habits. My plan at this point is simple: if I return home with more than 80% charge, don't plug it in. My thought was that by using NissanConnect remotely I could check the SoC periodically and stop the charge when the SoC is between 80% and 90% (yes, this is a bit obsessive, but since my car doesn't have the 80% battery mode I'm not sure what else I could do). This would be especially useful if I were using a public charger somewhere and I wasn't actually near the vehicle, maybe I'm walking around town or in a cafe a few blocks away. Leaf Spy Pro wouldn't help in this scenario, since it is limited to Bluetooth's range of 30 ft, correct? Then again, if I'm using a public charger, maybe I want to charge it up to 100% to get the most out of it?
Hopefully, you won't need to use public charging very often, so keep it simple and just let it go to 100% . That's what'll happen anyway if you punch the "override timer" button (which you'll have to do unless you want to bother with drilling through the klunky menus to turn the everyday timer OFF). By definition, you'll soon be burning off at least some of the charge anyway, even if the car makes it to 100% before you're finished getting your nails done (or whatever it is you're doing at the public charging site). But should you hang around killing time while a public L2 reaches 100%? Golly, I wouldn't think so. If the public charger has fees, you can be sure they're way higher than you'd pay at home, so from a cost standpoint, you'd want to minimize for-fee public charging. Even if there's no cost to you, there's the question of whether that last twenty cents' worth of juice is worth your time, and whether someone else might have a more pressing need.
TheMagster said:
I'm also getting the sense that I should use the timers to have the car reach 100% charge shortly before driving it on longer trips. So say I want to leave at 10 AM tomorrow for a longer roadtrip in which I'll definitely have to use public charging stations, and the car is currently at 50% charge, should I set the timer so that it reaches 100% charge at 9:45 AM? If that's the case, then it seems like the NissanConnect/CarWings app would be quite useful, as I could fiddle with the timers from my phone instead of having to go out to the garage to use the car's screen.
You had gotten the impression, perhaps, that NissanConnect was useful? Sorry; charge timers are not manipulable via that app. The workaround is to use an alarm clock app on your phone to wake you up at two or three in the morning (or whatever), so you can then use the NissanConnect app to initiate charging. Or just reflect that you don't need to do this very often, start charging when you go to bed, and take whatever insignificant hit there may be to the battery's life.
TheMagster said:
My other motivation for checking the SoC remotely through NissanConnect would be to see if someone has unplugged me. Of course I can lock the EVSE to the car, but if I'm charging at L-1 in public then I can't lock the plug to the 120V outlet. The area I live in has a huge void of public chargers...most of the towns in this area have no L-3, and maybe one L-2 if you are lucky. So charging at L-1 in public is actually something I'll have to do from time to time, just to top me up enough to get to the next charger or to get home. If you use Plugshare, scroll the map over to the northern Oregon coast and you'll see what I mean..
The L3 availability isn't TOO terrible; I've driven out from Portland to Astoria (which does have an L3) two or three times now on a weekend lark, just to get some Bowpicker's fish-n-chips!

TheMagster said:
Seems totally insane to me that a car this sophisticated wouldn't maintain the 12V battery properly...and I still need to use a battery maintainer? I doubt there will be many times when I'm not driving the car at least once or twice a week, so I don't think I'll need to manually maintain the 12V battery, I certainly don't on my various ICE cars that get driven far less regularly than that. Still, good info to know, so thanks for that! I'll start unplugging the car when I notice that it isn't charging anymore.
I concocted several theories for myself to try and explain Nissan's 12V charging system, but must admit to a lack of clues. I once thought that the cutsie little solar panel in the middle of an SL's rear spoiler explained why my 2011's battery never had a problem (the person I sold it to says it's now at 90K miles and 9 capacity bars, still on original battery), but the consensus is that the solar panel's irrelevant. Still, it's just as well if Nissan assigned all its competent designers to the motor drive and braking systems, and left the 12V subsystem to the rest.
 
I concocted several theories for myself to try and explain Nissan's 12V charging system, but must admit to a lack of clues. I once thought that the cutsie little Solar Panel in the middle of an SL's rear spoiler explained why my 2011's battery never had a problem (the person I sold it to says it's now at 90K miles and 9 capacity bars, still on original battery), but the consensus is that the solar panel's irrelevant. Still, it's just as well if Nissan assigned all its competent designers to the motor drive and braking systems, and left the 12V subsystem to the rest.

The solar panel likely helps in cases where the car is parked in full sun for many hours most days. The most likely explanation for the issue is that either:

A. The car was designed to have either a larger, deep cycle SLA or AGM battery or even a lithium battery. (Less likely.) Then the bean counters ordered a cheap little starting battery be used instead, late in the design cycle. The evidence for this is how much better the car behaves with a larger capacity 12 volt battery.

B. It never occurred to Nissan's engineers that the cars might be left plugged in but not charging for days on end. Car designers make mistakes like this all the time.
 
OK, so after going a few more rounds with the dealership and the NissanConnect support staff, I finally got it working! As GerryAZ said, the TCU came standard with my car, the SV model (though I was told it didn't come with the 2015 'S' model). As part of the Certified Pre-Owned inspection, the TCU was upgraded to the new 3G network it now uses (as the former Carwings/2G AT&T network is now defunct), so it was good to go. The only step I was missing is that you have to sign into the Nissan Owner's portal and accept the terms and conditions, that part you can't do through the app. The rep then read me the pin and password over the phone, I entered them into the car, and it all started working. The only oddity at this point is that the app's SoC doesn't match what the car says....at the moment the car says it has 89% battery left, and the app reports 92%. The range matches though, both say 84 miles. Seems odd, but the rep said that it may figure itself out over the next few days...hopefully that's true.

After all this trouble I may still find that the NissanConnect app isn't useful as several of you have said, and if that's the case then I'll just stop using it. I mentioned the issue with folks having to manually pull a fuse to the rep, she said I shouldn't ever have to do that...we'll see.

At least at a glance the app seems useful enough to me, here's a screenshot:
wseUSX9l.png


I can remotely start/stop charging and climate control, and add other widgets like the Eco tree gauge.

As for Leaf Spy Pro, for those of you who use it, do you use it while driving for feedback on your driving habits? Or only once in a while to check on various things?
 
TheLostPetrol said:
TheMagster said:
I can remotely start/stop charging and climate control, and add other widgets like the Eco tree gauge.
Just to be clear, you can start charging and you can start/stop climate control, but there is no remote stop for charging.

Ah, I see. I doubt I would ever really need to stop charging, but if I really wanted to I suppose I could create a custom timer that ended in the near future. That could be done from the app. Again, not much utility there.
 
TheMagster said:
Again, not much utility there.

Hmm. When wife who isn't feeling well walks out to warm car on wet cold windy night and the car is warm for her, the seat is warm... Happiness is a happy wife. I call that real utility.

I don't see much utility in remote stopping of climate control.

Used remote start charge once, went to a meeting, got a text from Chargepoint that my car wasn't charging, started the charge remotely. Saved me from having to excuse myself, walk to car and push the timer override button. Or wait an hour for my car to charge after meeting.
 
WetEV said:
TheMagster said:
Again, not much utility there.

Hmm. When wife who isn't feeling well walks out to warm car on wet cold windy night and the car is warm for her, the seat is warm... Happiness is a happy wife. I call that real utility.

I don't see much utility in remote stopping of climate control.

Used remote start charge once, went to a meeting, got a text from Chargepoint that my car wasn't charging, started the charge remotely. Saved me from having to excuse myself, walk to car and push the timer override button. Or wait an hour for my car to charge after meeting.

Oh I certainly see the utility in that! I was just referring to my little workaround of remotely stopping charge by setting charging timer from the app. I could also see remote stop of climate control if something comes up and you have to postpone your trip.

Edit: OK, scratch that, even my workaround won't work as the app doesn't actually let you schedule the charging timer, only a climate control timer. Guess I misread that. I also found that the car has to be either on or plugged in to communicate with the app, otherwise the app will show the last time it connected. So it seems like the TCU isn't active all the time, which seems like a good thing given the 12V battery drain issue.
 
The car does not need to be plugged in or turned on for the app to communicate with it. You can start climate control on battery power or check status anytime. You need to use refresh on the app if you want to update status of the car.
 
TheMagster said:
Hi everyone! Excited new Leaf owners here, my wife and I just bought a Certified Pre-Owned 2015 Leaf SV with 25k miles and 12 bars for under $12k! Pretty good deal I think! For now we're charging primarily through Level 1 at home, and considering installing a Level 2.

When I went to activate Carwings, I was told that my Leaf didn't have a TCU, so that would be a $150 upgrade from a Nissan dealership. That's a flat cost, there's no monthly fees after that. I've also looked into Leaf Spy Pro with the Bluetooth ODDB dongle (wish I had known about that when shopping for the car!), that would cost about $30 total ($15 for the app, $15 for the dongle).

My question is, which is more useful? Or should I get both? I don't really mind the extra $180 of getting both, I just wanted to see if you think it is worth it or not.

A bit more about how we're using the car: I work from home, so I don't have a regular commute, which means that the car's built-in charging and climate control timers aren't very useful to me. My wife is a stay-at-home mom for our 1 year old daughter. We live in the country in Northwestern Oregon, USA (lots of hilly, curvy, 2 lane highways at 55 mph...not great for mileage). The primary use case for the Leaf will be trips to town and back for shopping, errands, seeing friends, etc. That's a 30 mile round trip, plus maybe 2-4 miles of in town driving. We'll do this something like 2-3 times per week (which is why Level 1 charging is generally fine for us). Once a month or so we'll take the Leaf on a longer road trip, and we'll make use of public Level 2 and Level 3 chargers for these trips.

While I'm brand new to it, I'm endeavoring to become a hypermiler, largely based on the advice I'm reading in the various hypermiling threads on these forums. My wife loves the challenge of planning our longer road trips such that we hit as many free charging stations as possible, and get the most out of every quick charge that we need (meaning that we would arrive at the quick charge station as close to an empty battery as possible). So we make a good team!

I'm interested in Carwings for the added functionality of checking the car's state of charge (SoC) remotely, and also for the option of turning on climate control 20 or 30 mins before we need to drive somewhere, to reduce the drain on the Lithium Ion (Li-ION) battery. I'm interested in Leaf Spy Pro for the extra nerdy goodness it provides about the car's battery....my understanding is that it provides more accurate data about the SoC and health of the battery and other car systems. However, the 30 ft range of Bluetooth isn't exactly remote, you have to be near the car for it to work. I'm also mildly concerned about the Bluetooth ODDB dongle draining the 12V battery since we aren't daily drivers (though the car will be plugged into Level 1 at home the vast majority of the time that it isn't in use, so this maintains the 12V battery as well as the Li-ION battery, correct?)

Alright, I think that's enough detail...so cast your votes...Carwings, Leaf Spy Pro, both, or neither?

Thank you!

So you were told you had to pay for the 3G upgrade on a "2015?" Hmmm, interesting. My take; if that is the case, forget it. Its not really worth the money imho, especially for your apparent use case.

BUT that is not why I am posting. Your have 2 MAJOR conflicting statement here. First off, you want to hypermile and think your roads are not conducive to getting great results and you would be right BUT not for the reasons you think.

I have driven the roads in your area many many many times and have gotten the best performance from my LEAF. For one thing, hills are not the best for highly efficient driving but can be mitigated quite a bit. So experiment with different driving styles. Your biggest advantage is the 55 mph speed limit. Stick to that "average" and your efficiency will soar.

But efficiency does not start when you get behind the wheel. Relying on Level one will put you in a deep hole that will be difficult to overcome.

When you plug your car in, several things happen. NONE of them run on love. They ALL use electricity. This would be electricity diverted from the path that ends at your battery pack. This process happens only with AC charging. Now realize all charging we have losses due to heat, etc. Nothing much we can do for that. BUT the ideology that charging slower to generate less heat is wrong because of the all the support systems using their tiny slices of that incoming power.

In a nutshell; the overhead of the charging system only changes slightly from 120 volt 1.44 KW charging to 240 volt charging up to 6.6 KW. Due to this scenario, you want to charge rather quickly.

Effective charging efficiencies; FYI; I only list what I personally use on a regular enough basis to determine efficiency since measurements have to be taken over several days and averaged. 120 volt measurements were determined by Kill A watt meter. The 240 volt measurements were determined using a utility grade meter hooked in series before the dedicated charging outlet.

120 volts @ 12 amps; 1.44 KW = 75% to the battery
240 volts @ 12 amps; 2.88 KW = 85%
240 volts @ 20 amps; 4.8 KW = 88%
240 Volts @ 25 amps 6.0 KW = 90%

So advice #1 ; get an EVSE for the home. There are a MILLION different options out there nowadays. Even Costco sells them now. I have a Clipper Creek mostly because it comes with just about any plug you want. Mine is the plug into the wall kind since I rent and although I haven't moved since I got, I have moved twice before so portability is a big requirement for me. Before doing that, check with your PUD, etc. for possible incentives and rebates to cover part of that cost. I already had several EVSEs when I got my Clipper Creek but because of incentives that overlapped my Clipper Creek purchase gave me back all but $30 of my expense of the EVSE purchase and wiring the extra dryer plug in the garage (Permitting is a LOT cheaper that way)

Battery management rules

1) Always make sure you have enough charge every morning to cover both your driving needs AND your peace of mind. You will have to determine your comfort level as to how much of a charge you want at the ready in your LEAF.

2) Charge your LEAF every day. If your driving needs are very modest or you know in advance you will won't be going anywhere (On occasion, I know this but its rare for me as my life is not predictable and I tend to run off and "freewheel" on my days off, etc.) you might be able to skip a day but doing so on a regular basis means you are putting too much charge into the LEAF.

Advice #2; You say you don't need timers but if you have TOU billing, you want to do all your charging when rates are lowest but more important; You do not want to charge to full if you don't need that much range and it sounds like most of the time you won't. Now you can manage your charging manually. I do it but it and it works for me but I wouldn't recommend it to "anyone" else because its a bit of a pain.

So depending on which EVSE you end up with, you might need to set your car to charge 2 hours a day...or 3 or even one. You will need to adjust as you see fit. Better than me where I just kinda wing it to charge however long I think I need to get to around 70% SOC (don't use that as a guideline. I have 40 kwh LEAF so easy for me to do what I do)


So anyway, I know you asked specific questions and I haven't really answered any of them but let me say there have been a "few" issues with 12 volt battery management so if you decided CARWINGS is a required part of your future, then get a 12 volt jumper box or something in case you need it. I only had CARWINGS on my 2011 and yeah, during a two week period when I was forced to park on the street, there was twice it was cold enough to do the remote heating and yeah, it was cool I guess. But what I wanted my car to do about a HUNDRED times was to precool the car but unfortunately my approximate 7 minute walk to the parking lot from my desk was usually not enough time to get the car cooling. In fact, about half the time, it didn't even start at all. This pretty much ended my desire to have CARWINGS. Now realize that my 2011 was 2G and now we have blazingly 4G. (yours would only be 3G) but most accounts of 2018 users seems to be in agreement that the system is still quite slow.

On the flipside; your concern about LEAF Spy killing the battery? I haven't heard that and in reality, there is little hard evidence why 12 volt batteries die on LEAFs so suddenly. Yes, its true the 12 volt BMS is crap. The lead acid battery is essentially treated likes its a Lithium based battery which is the same as telling a vegan to eat around the meat on a pizza with mushrooms...


But its my feeling the CARWINGS is the primary reason 12 volt batteries die. As far as LEAF Spy. I always make sure I exit the program (in settings you can make sure BT shuts off on exit as well) and have never had a 12 volt battery issue.

In conclusion;

The two things I consider indispensable for all LEAFers is LEAF Spy and Plugshare. If you like data, you will LOVE LEAF Spy. I use a dedicated phone for my LEAF Spy device (too much junk on regular phone) in airplane mode and connect to home wi fi regularly to transfer files to my home computer.

On your pricing; LEAF Spy Pro is $20 (I would NEVER consider getting anything less) The current recommended dongle is $35. I would HIGHLY recommend you check with Jim (see thread here) or access LEAF Spy help menu for recommended dongles. There are a TON out there that do not work. FYI; You can go to Amazon and search OBD device for Nissan LEAF if that is easier for you.
 
GerryAZ said:
The car does not need to be plugged in or turned on for the app to communicate with it. You can start climate control on battery power or check status anytime. You need to use refresh on the app if you want to update status of the car.

Interesting, that doesn't seem to be how it is working for us....we'll keep playing with it.

DaveinOlyWA said:
So you were told you had to pay for the 3G upgrade on a "2015?" Hmmm, interesting. My take; if that is the case, forget it. Its not really worth the money imho, especially for your apparent use case.

Yes, but it seems it was a mistake on the NissanConnect rep's end. For some reason she thought my car didn't have a TCU already, but it did, and it already had the upgrade to 3G as part of the Certified Pre-Owned inspection. So I was good to go, and the service is free for me (no upgrade cost, and no $15 monthly fee like the 2018 Leaf owners have to pay). As long as it stays free and doesn't cause me other trouble (such as 12V battery drain), then I'll likely keep using it.

DaveinOlyWA said:
BUT that is not why I am posting. Your have 2 MAJOR conflicting statement here. First off, you want to hypermile and think your roads are not conducive to getting great results and you would be right BUT not for the reasons you think.

I have driven the roads in your area many many many times and have gotten the best performance from my LEAF. For one thing, hills are not the best for highly efficient driving but can be mitigated quite a bit. So experiment with different driving styles. Your biggest advantage is the 55 mph speed limit. Stick to that "average" and your efficiency will soar.

Good to know, thank you! When driving in these hilly, windy areas, do you recommend setting the cruise control at 55 mph, or just keeping your average at 55 (i.e. gaining speed by not using regen on downhills, then allowing the car to lose speed on uphills)?

DaveinOlyWA said:
But efficiency does not start when you get behind the wheel. Relying on Level one will put you in a deep hole that will be difficult to overcome.

When you plug your car in, several things happen. NONE of them run on love. They ALL use electricity. This would be electricity diverted from the path that ends at your battery pack. This process happens only with AC charging. Now realize all charging we have losses due to heat, etc. Nothing much we can do for that. BUT the ideology that charging slower to generate less heat is wrong because of the all the support systems using their tiny slices of that incoming power.

In a nutshell; the overhead of the charging system only changes slightly from 120 volt 1.44 KW charging to 240 volt charging up to 6.6 KW. Due to this scenario, you want to charge rather quickly.

Effective charging efficiencies; FYI; I only list what I personally use on a regular enough basis to determine efficiency since measurements have to be taken over several days and averaged. 120 volt measurements were determined by Kill A watt meter. The 240 volt measurements were determined using a utility grade meter hooked in series before the dedicated charging outlet.

120 volts @ 12 amps; 1.44 KW = 75% to the battery
240 volts @ 12 amps; 2.88 KW = 85%
240 volts @ 20 amps; 4.8 KW = 88%
240 Volts @ 25 amps 6.0 KW = 90%

Definitely good info, thanks for your research! I do plan on adding Level 2 at home, I'm just not sure I'll get to it immediately since we're a little cash poor after buying the car! I was planning to add a dedicated 240V circuit at 40A, which the goal of being able to charge two EVs simultaneously (since we plan to get another one in 5 years or so). I own my home, so I'm happy to do permanent installs.

DaveinOlyWA said:
So advice #1 ; get an EVSE
Compare EVSE equipment for the home. There are a MILLION different options out there nowadays. Even Costco sells them now. I have a Clipper Creek mostly because it comes with just about any plug you want. Mine is the plug into the wall kind since I rent and although I haven't moved since I got, I have moved twice before so portability is a big requirement for me. Before doing that, check with your PUD, etc. for possible incentives and rebates to cover part of that cost. I already had several EVSEs when I got my Clipper Creek but because of incentives that overlapped my Clipper Creek purchase gave me back all but $30 of my expense of the EVSE purchase and wiring the extra dryer plug in the garage (Permitting is a LOT cheaper that way)

That's what's holding me back...there's no incentives from my power company, so all of this is out of pocket. I'm confident in my abilities to run the 240V circuit myself, but I'm nervous about voiding my home insurance by not using a certified electrician. I'm looking into the option of doing the work myself but having an electrician inspect and certify it. I also prefer a portable EVSE, it just makes sense since I'm considering long distance travel in the Leaf. This is the one I'm looking at:

EVI Deluxe Dual Voltage EV Portable Smart Charger Plus

That's the most recent recommendation in the EVSE thread. It comes with all the adapters, allows custom amperage selection, and the price is right. Thoughts?

DaveinOlyWA said:
2) Charge your LEAF every day. If your driving needs are very modest or you know in advance you will won't be going anywhere (On occasion, I know this but its rare for me as my life is not predictable and I tend to run off and "freewheel" on my days off, etc.) you might be able to skip a day but doing so on a regular basis means you are putting too much charge into the LEAF.

Based on my driving habits, I was thinking of charging Tues, Thurs, Sat, Sun, and aiming to charge to 80% each time. If I ever take a longer roadtrip and need to charge to 100%, I should know that days in advance and be able to override the charging timer. I believe this will continually keep me in that 50% - 80% sweet spot, as my routine drive to town and back uses about 30% of the battery. What do you mean by 'you are putting too much charge into the LEAF'? Wouldn't charging less help keep the battery at a lower state of charge for a longer period of time?

DaveinOlyWA said:
Advice #2; You say you don't need timers but if you have TOU billing, you want to do all your charging when rates are lowest but more important; You do not want to charge to full if you don't need that much range and it sounds like most of the time you won't. Now you can manage your charging manually. I do it but it and it works for me but I wouldn't recommend it to "anyone" else because its a bit of a pain.
We don't use TOU billing, it is flat rate at 12 cents per kW/hr. We did the math and if we switched to TOU and were very careful, we might save $5 per year. And if we weren't careful it would end up costing us more. So flat rate is a much better option, I think. I'm still using the charge timer to only charge at night to help keep the battery at a cooler temp during charging, and to make sure there's nothing else running on the circuit (the current 120V circuit I'm using is shared by my workshop where I'll run shop tools, but I'm definitely not going to be running any shop tools between midnight and 8 am... again, that's just temporary until I get the dedicated 240V circuit installed).

DaveinOlyWA said:
So anyway, I know you asked specific questions and I haven't really answered any of them but let me say there have been a "few" issues with 12 volt battery management so if you decided CARWINGS is a required part of your future, then get a 12 volt jumper box or something in case you need it. I only had CARWINGS on my 2011 and yeah, during a two week period when I was forced to park on the street, there was twice it was cold enough to do the remote heating and yeah, it was cool I guess. But what I wanted my car to do about a HUNDRED times was to precool the car but unfortunately my approximate 7 minute walk to the parking lot from my desk was usually not enough time to get the car cooling. In fact, about half the time, it didn't even start at all. This pretty much ended my desire to have CARWINGS. Now realize that my 2011 was 2G and now we have blazingly 4G. (yours would only be 3G) but most accounts of 2018 users seems to be in agreement that the system is still quite slow.

I carry around this little Li-ION jump starter battery:
HyperPS 6800mah Multi-function Vehicle Car Jump Starter Mobile Power Bank Battery Charger Emergency Kit with LED Torch
Bought it from Amazon, but unfortunately they don't seem to carry it anymore. That's a shame, because it is a great little device! Supports quick charging on my phone through USB-C, and I've used it to successfully jump start a Prius before. Haven't tested it on the Leaf, but I'm confident it would work given the Leaf's smallish 12V battery.

I have heard about the slowness of the remote climate control start...I'm planning to kick it on about 20 mins before leaving, we'll see if that's enough. At home the car is parked in a garage, so the temp stays pretty stable anyway.

Also, even if I decided to stop using NissanConnect/Carwings, wouldn't the TCU still be operating and draining the 12V battery? The car is relaying telemetry data to Nissan servers regardless, right?

DaveinOlyWA said:
On the flipside; your concern about Leaf Spy killing the battery? I haven't heard that and in reality, there is little hard evidence why 12 volt batteries die on LEAFs so suddenly. Yes, its true the 12 volt BMS is crap. The lead acid battery is essentially treated likes its a Lithium based battery which is the same as telling a vegan to eat around the meat on a pizza with mushrooms...

But its my feeling the CARWINGS is the primary reason 12 volt batteries die. As far as Leaf Spy. I always make sure I exit the program (in settings you can make sure BT shuts off on exit as well) and have never had a 12 volt battery issue.

In conclusion;

The two things I consider indispensable for all LEAFers is Leaf Spy and Plugshare. If you like data, you will LOVE LEAF Spy. I use a dedicated phone for my LEAF Spy device (too much junk on regular phone) in airplane mode and connect to home wi fi regularly to transfer files to my home computer.

On your pricing; Leaf Spy Pro is $20 (I would NEVER consider getting anything less) The current recommended dongle is $35. I would HIGHLY recommend you check with Jim (see thread here) or access LEAF Spy help menu for recommended dongles. There are a TON out there that do not work. FYI; You can go to Amazon and search OBD device for Nissan LEAF if that is easier for you.

Thanks, I'm definitely happy to pay a bit more for a dongle that just works (and has an on/off switch). I expect that I would only really use LeafSpyPro while on long roadtrips, but I think I will enjoy the data on it as you do.

Thank you for such a detailed reply! Just yesterday I was reading your blog about your trip down the Oregon coast to test out the upgraded charging stations. Granted you have more range than I do, but it was still refreshing to see that EV roadtripping in this area is quite doable!
 
On the charging thing; Charging every other day means you charged to too high a level.

But on the flip side, 80% is worse than 70% but is it enough to really matter? Probably not. But what it does do is give you the extra range in case you need it.

TBH; your comments on preheating, etc. tells me your heat need is high which means you will likely need to charge to full during Winter to cover the range loss from climate control. Do you park outside?
 
We park in an uninsulated garage at home, and it definitely helps keep the car cool in the summer, but I don't think it will do much to help keep the car warm in the winter, so you are right we will likely rely on preheating in the winter quite a bit (or just try to use steering wheel and seat warmers...I've read that's more efficient). As you know we live in a very temperate climate, so we don't have big temp swings to deal with. The thermal mass of our house and garage's concrete slab foundation helps stabilize indoor temps as well.

OK, here's my charging plan, based on what you and others have advised:
Schedule: Tues, Thurs, Sat, Sun
Duration: 8 hrs at Level 1 (12 amps, adds 4 miles per hour or roughly 5% battery capacity per hour)
That should replenish 32 miles per charge, which is about right to cover our normal driving habits. We typically drive 2-4 times per week, and the same 32 mile round trip each time. I'm going to try to keep the car in the 40% - 80% battery capacity range at all times, except for longer roadtrips.
This should always leave me with at least a 40% 'reserve', which would allow me to take an impromptu trip to town even if the car hasn't had a chance to charge.

Given that we don't drive every day, I'm still not seeing a good reason why we should charge every day. Do you think charging for 3 or 4 hrs every day is better than charging for 8 hrs four days per week?

Once I have Leaf Spy Pro I should be able to get more detailed information about this. At the moment there's a lot of guess work around the battery capacity percentages, range, and so forth.
 
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