How to set the start charge time on a 2013 S model?

aftabu said:

2013 Leaf S has this limitation. You can only set when to finish charging. This is painful because you don't want to be up until midnight to take advantage of off-peak rate. I am going to work around it by using this

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0035GF8NA/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Just costs $8

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That would work (I was skeptical but the specs do say 15A) but of course it's for 120 volt charging only. If you put a lot of miles on your Leaf everyday, there may not be enough hours during the entire off-peak time period to charge the car to even 80%.

EDIT: I looked at the specs again and although it does say 125v, 15A, it also says 1250 W. IIRC voltage times amperage is wattage. So if a Leaf can be expected to draw 12A at 120V, that's 1440W which exceeds this timer's rating.

Some 240 volt EVSEs like the Schneider EVLink (currently recalled by the manufacturer) and Siemens VersiCharge do have start timers that are independent of the Leaf's own timers. Plus you're far more likely to get at least 80% charging during off-peak hours even if you arrive home on VLBW.

aftabu said:

2013 Leaf S has this limitation. You can only set when to finish charging. This is painful because you don't want to be up until midnight to take advantage of off-peak rate. I am going to work around it by using this

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0035GF8NA/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Click to expand...

Ummm ... That timer is 120v only. If you are charging at 120v you are probably going to need to need to start charging before off-peak and/or finish charging after off-peak. Basically, you will be charging whenever you can plug in.

If you are charging at 240v it's not "painful" to take advantage of off-peak. What can be painful is starting at the beginning of off-peak and discovering in the morning that you don't have enough juice for the day. Why should you have to worry about that? Let the car worry for you. Tell it you need to be charged by 7 AM, and it will be. If your off-peak ends at 4 AM, tell it to be charged by 4 AM. Simple! If the car needs longer to charge than the off-peak time it will start a bit early. With your scheme, if it needs longer it will end a bit late. What's the difference? You have the same amount of higher cost charging time either way.

OK, I'll admit that the car's calculations are usually conservative. With an SV or SL you could get a message when the charging ends. With the S you may have to go out and check a couple of mornings when you first wake up. If it has already ended, move the end time a bit later. Or, if you're lucky, you may have a smart meter which can tell you (via utility website) when the power dropped off.

Ray

Wow, I'm very grateful for this thread. I think I finally understand how to use the charging timer. I was very confused as to why it didn't work as I expected!

I do have one more question. The manual is very insistent that of the two clocks (dash and radio/nav), it is the nav-clock that is used for the charging timer. For us S owners, that means the radio clocks, presumably. But the radio clock seems to be 12 hour only... I can't find a way to set or check whether the clock is set to AM or PM. Am I missing something? This seems like it should matter for the purpose of the charging timer...

vanagon said:

I do have one more question. The manual is very insistent that of the two clocks (dash and radio/nav), it is the nav-clock that is used for the charging timer. For us S owners, that means the radio clocks, presumably. But the radio clock seems to be 12 hour only... I can't find a way to set or check whether the clock is set to AM or PM. Am I missing something? This seems like it should matter for the purpose of the charging timer...

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For the SV and SL models the timers are implemented as routines in the computer that drives the navigation unit. For the S model the timers are implemented as routines in the computer that drives the dashboard. Regardless of what the manual may say, does that give you a hint as to the answer?

Actually, the only place I see that "insistent" statement is in the Charging Troubleshooting Guide. And there it is a verbatim copy from the 2011 and 2012 manuals, and was correct for those years, but if you want to be picky is no longer correct for any 2013 model. For the 2013 SV and SL models the two clocks are synchronized, so the problem of "which clock" no longer exists.

Ray

Per customer support.

Charger timer on Leaf model S:

When you set the to time on to 5am, the timer figures out when it has to start in order to get a full or 80% charge.

Climate control:

Set the timer to 7am. The heater or AC will start in time to warm up or cool the car to 76F in time for 7am.

Not intuitive at all.

Planet4ever: Thank you so much for making the charging timer so simple and easy to understand. I too was not getting it, and now my car is happily waiting to charge according to it's end time. Yes!

Do you have off peak rates where you live? If So, I imagine the easiest way to do it is to set the end time when the off peak rates end (5 am?). This way, you know for sure no matter how dead the battery gets, it will only charge off peak. I also have an 2013 S, and the timer works just fine for me too, and I had a heck of a time with the manual. I ended up searching the web for the answer... that's how I found this forum! By the way, I read the manual so much the pages are starting to fall out! grrr!

johnrhansen said:

I had a heck of a time with the manual. I ended up searching the web for the answer... that's how I found this forum! By the way, I read the manual so much the pages are starting to fall out! grrr!

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Gee, my manual is sitting in the glove compartment but it has hardly ever been opened. I downloaded this:

http://www.nissan-techinfo.com/refgh0v/og/Leaf/2013-Nissan-LEAF.pdf

It's gotten lots of use, but so far none of the bits seem to have fallen out.

Ray

I will apologize in advance but I still don't understand how to make my Leaf S charger start charging for me at midnight when my low rates kick in. I don't really care about the end charge time as my Leaf will be charged in about 4 hours and well before peak kicks in. I also don't want to get up to plug it in at Midnight. Nissan has made this very complicated for the S Model.

kgv2828 said:

I will apologize in advance but I still don't understand how to make my Leaf S charger start charging for me at midnight when my low rates kick in. I don't really care about the end charge time as my Leaf will be charged in about 4 hours and well before peak kicks in. I also don't want to get up to plug it in at Midnight. Nissan has made this very complicated for the S Model.

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The simple answer is that you can't do that using the LEAF timer, but why would you want to?

If, say, your lowest rate is from midnight to 6 AM, what is the difference to you whether the car charges between midnight and 4AM or between 2AM and 6AM? Now, admittedly, if you sometimes have to leave for work before 6AM then it will make a difference to you. But ignoring that (or compensating by setting the end time earlier than 6AM) here is the score card for end-only as I see it:

Difference to you personally: None
Difference to the car: Less time waiting at a high battery charge, so (slightly) longer battery life.
Difference to your utility: None now, but in a future with many EVs, avoids a midnight surge.

The other answer, if you really REALLY want the feature, is to get an EVSE which has a built-in timer.

Ray

planet4ever said:

kgv2828 said:

I will apologize in advance but I still don't understand how to make my Leaf S charger start charging for me at midnight when my low rates kick in. I don't really care about the end charge time as my Leaf will be charged in about 4 hours and well before peak kicks in. I also don't want to get up to plug it in at Midnight. Nissan has made this very complicated for the S Model.

Click to expand...

The simple answer is that you can't do that using the LEAF timer, but why would you want to?

If, say, your lowest rate is from midnight to 6 AM, what is the difference to you whether the car charges between midnight and 4AM or between 2AM and 6AM? Now, admittedly, if you sometimes have to leave for work before 6AM then it will make a difference to you. But ignoring that (or compensating by setting the end time earlier than 6AM) here is the score card for end-only as I see it:

Difference to you personally: None
Difference to the car: Less time waiting at a high battery charge, so (slightly) longer battery life.
Difference to your utility: None now, but in a future with many EVs, avoids a midnight surge.

The other answer, if you really REALLY want the feature, is to get an EVSE which has a built-in timer.

Ray

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I have an S and my wife has an SV. I agree with everything Ray said.

So the bottom line is that there is no capability to set a start time for charge. My use case was very simple:
- Come home from work at say 6PM
- Set the timer to start charging at off peak and that is anytime after midnight (assume 3AM)
- Plug the charger into the leaf at 6PM and leave and forget (charging will not start)
- At 3AM, it automatically starts charging so I get a full/almost full charge by 7AM
- Get ready to go to work, unplug the charger and off I go
- Repeat for the next 5 days

But if it is not possible, I understand and can look at other ways to accomplish above.

I used to plug my car in as soon as I got home, but stopped because sometimes a trip in the evening would come up and I'd end up unplugging it. I think the easiest thing to do is to turn the charge timer off. Plug the car in and start the charge at the last possible minute before you go to sleep. So you charge up an hour or 2 at the higher rate.. Just how much is that going to cost? That way your car's charge is as high as it can be in case you get some surprise trip you need to take when you get home from work. If you save yourself from having to drive the ice car just once, it makes up the difference in the peak and off peak rate.

kgv2828 said:

So the bottom line is that there is no capability to set a start time for charge. My use case was very simple:
- Come home from work at say 6PM
- Set the timer to start charging at off peak and that is anytime after midnight (assume 3AM)
- Plug the charger into the leaf at 6PM and leave and forget (charging will not start)
- At 3AM, it automatically starts charging so I get a full/almost full charge by 7AM
- Get ready to go to work, unplug the charger and off I go
- Repeat for the next 5 days

But if it is not possible, I understand and can look at other ways to accomplish above.

Click to expand...

So why not just set the end time to 7AM and accomplish exactly the same thing?

Got it but it took a while.

So all I have to do is to set the end time and the Leaf SW calculates a start time. If 4 hours is what it takes to complete the charge and I had set the end time as 7AM, it knows to start charging at 3AM automatically if I have the charger plugged into the leaf. At the end of the day, at achieves the same result as having a start time.

It was not as intuitive for me initially and the manual was not at all clear. Thank you everyone on the forum for clarifying this. I will try it to see if theory matches reality tonight.

I'm at the dealership right now for another issue and asked them to check on this. The tech arrived at same conclusion as the rest of us - that without the navigation system there isn't an obvious way to set the charger START time. He's going to call Nissan and see if there's a way to do so. If I get good news I'll repost.

I'm not sure why I'd ever want to set an END time, while it seems close to essential to be able to set a START time in order to take advantage of lower power rates at night. Seems like Nissan would like us all to buy the model with the Navigation. What's up Nissan?
-Jeff

Jeffissenberg said:

I'm not sure why I'd ever want to set an END time, while it seems close to essential to be able to set a START time in order to take advantage of lower power rates at night. Seems like Nissan would like us all to buy the model with the Navigation. What's up Nissan?
-Jeff

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Hmm... look through the rest of this thread.
Mostly setting end time is better because:

1) What you really care about is the charge being DONE when you are ready to leave for work. You don't really care about when it starts.
2) You want the car to sit fully charged for as few hours as possible (better for long term health of the battery), IE you don't want it sitting fully charged from 3AM to 7AM when you actually leave for work. Better is finish charging at 7AM and drive at 7AM.
3) The grid already has problems with EV owners all starting charging at 12MN (or whenever the local low rate starts). Better for the grid to have people start charging at varying times, depending on how many hours are needed for full charge.

I have an S and my wife has SV, I much prefer the simplicity and usefulness of the S system. I do understand that the complexity of the SV system is useful for some people, but I think the S system works just fine for the majority.

Jeffissenberg said:

I'm at the dealership right now for another issue and asked them to check on this. The tech arrived at same conclusion as the rest of us - that without the navigation system there isn't an obvious way to set the charger START time. He's going to call Nissan and see if there's a way to do so. If I get good news I'll repost.

I'm not sure why I'd ever want to set an END time, while it seems close to essential to be able to set a START time in order to take advantage of lower power rates at night. Seems like Nissan would like us all to buy the model with the Navigation. What's up Nissan?
-Jeff

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AFAIK there is no way to set a START timer on the Leaf S. And unless you have a very narrow window of opportunity to use an off-peak rate, and/or are only on 120 volt charging, it's very unlikely that an end-only timer will cause you to start charging during the more expensive rate.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, there are also EVSEs that let you set a start delay if that is important to you.

Jeffissenberg said:

I'm not sure why I'd ever want to set an END time, while it seems close to essential to be able to set a START time in order to take advantage of lower power rates at night.

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As stjohnh said, this has all been covered earlier in this thread. Rather than saying that the S model has no start time, just think of it as having an automatic start time -- the latest possible to meet the end time. I believe that is what made the light bulb come on for kgv2828. If the lower rates cover a six hour period and you need to charge for four hours on a given night, having a start time would mean it would charge for the first four hours of the six. Having an end time means it will charge for the last four hours of the six. Either way it takes advantage of the lower rates. In the extreme case of a lowest rate period that is shorter than the charging time, using a start time would mean charging slops over to the following higher rate period. Using an end time means charging starts in the higher rate period, but only shortly before the lower rate kicks in.

Ray

I'm so glad I found this thread!!! It seems like we S trim model owners/leasers are just an afterthought of the writers/editors of the 2013 manual. I couldn't make heads or tails of the very brief, poorly explained section on setting the charging timer on my 2013 S model LEAF. When I got to the screen that had "TO:" and the time setting I couldn't figure out what "TO" meant. Why doesn't it say "End" or "Stop"? Then when I decided it must mean the end time I didn't know if the time entry was the number of hours from the current time I wanted it to turn off or if it was the actual time of day/night that I wanted it to turn off.

Thanks to all that made what was clear as mud into something that finally made sense! I hope Nissan improves their manual for us cheapskates that opt for the lowest cost model in the future.