Winter is hard on range!

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Winter is underway in Minneapolis. Since Thursday morning we have around or below zero (F). This morning it was -7F. Observations -

1. Pre-warming the car even with it plugged in cost me 2%. I think the climate control is taking more than the charger can deliver? I should be able to avoid this lost by proper use of the timer.

2. Any trip, no matter how short, will have a big impact on range. I didn't bring a lunch to work today so I ran out for a bite. The 4 mile trip took almost 10%...most of which went to keeping the windows clear and warming the cabin. It had warmed to about 2F at lunchtime.

3. The Leaf handles very well with snow and icy roads. Traction control kicks in at the appropriate time and works as it should. This was with the original tires.

4. Heated seats and steering wheel really help, but I'm not a huge fan of the cycling they go through. They also seem slow to warm in extreme cold like this morning.

5. Based on one data point from yesterday, the range dropped about 40% from my summer range. This was with the climate control set at 60F (the lowest setting...wish we could set it lower). This was with slow driving as traffic was backed up yesterday...lot's of time spent at 10mph or slower. In this case this probably cost me range as I was running the heater and defrost for a good portion of the time.

6. Looks like we will be in a cold to very cold pattern for a couple of weeks....good chance to learn more and to figure out how to optimize cold weather range. Outside of a couple of days where it is suppose to sneak into double digits it looks like we will be just oscillating between single digits above and below zero.

7. At lot of you guys do not know what 'cold' means :)
 
Pipcecil said:
I do have 3 bars of capacity loss, that's why is so low now. I am on my way to loose my fourth.
Maybe by the time that 4th bar goes away, Nissan will have the new hot battery in production.

Do you own the car or lease the car ? How many miles are on the car ?
 
I get 60Km with 0 % to spare at -30c (-22F) that using no heat in the car, just the steering wheel and seat heater with a blanket for the rest of me, pluss my winter coat/skie mask/gloves and thats the warm weather here! when the liquid nitrogen starts pooling about it gets annoying as your boots freeze up! all so about the same time most us canadians consider closing the windows at night!
 
XeonPony said:
I get 60Km with 0 % to spare at -30c (-22F) that using no heat in the car
That's a simply ferocious temperature to force any batteries to operate at. Is the reduced range down to a heavily reduced operating range allowed for the battery, in an attempt to avoid degrading battery life, I wonder?

The advantages of EVs would, I think, begin to be very questionable if a significant fraction of your year was spent at these temperatures. Certainly the 'frontier spirit' though!?
 
My Leaf does great on cold weater ;) . At 35000 miles I drove 12 miles in 20F temperature and only lost one bar and grew one tree.

Now some more info: car was preheated and for the drive the heat was disabled, I had 50 mph gust from behind and drove 40-45mph. The return trip 12 hours later started at 11 bars and ended at 6 bars, against the same wind, heat at full blast and doing 60-70 mph.
 
KJD said:
Pipcecil said:
I do have 3 bars of capacity loss, that's why is so low now. I am on my way to loose my fourth.
Maybe by the time that 4th bar goes away, Nissan will have the new hot battery in production.

Do you own the car or lease the car ? How many miles are on the car ?

I hope so, a heat resistant battery would be wonderful. I own the car and did not lease (unfortunately - had I known what I do now I would have leased or waited). I currently have 49k on the car.
 
XeonPony said:
I get 60Km with 0 % to spare at -30c (-22F) that using no heat in the car, just the steering wheel and seat heater with a blanket for the rest of me, pluss my winter coat/skie mask/gloves and thats the warm weather here! when the liquid nitrogen starts pooling about it gets annoying as your boots freeze up! all so about the same time most us canadians consider closing the windows at night!

Thanks for this data point. -22F is about as cold as it will get here, so it is good to know what to expect before running climate control.

We've had about a week now where it has been between -10 and 5F....I've gotten in some good learning. Mostly I wish I could set the climate control lower than 60F.
 
yesterday was the least efficient day I have ever seen. I only got 3.1 miles per kilowatt hour. I only drove about 20 miles as my charge went from 85 percent to 45 percent. It was one of those days when the temperature was right at freezing and the humidity was high. I had to run the heater. It was just too cold. And that was all at speeds less than 30 mph!
 
This evening I got my second LBW ever. I started with less charge than I thought I had, went to two cities in my area, then about 5 miles from home got the warning. I got back about one mile's range on a down hill, then ran an errand in town and arrived home with 16% SOC. The heater really lowers range when in constant use - even the heat pump. I was never worried about not making it, or about getting Turtle Mode, though.
 
The lowest charge I ever got to was 3 percent. This weekend. The percent charge turned into dashed lines it was so low. I had some pretty white knuckles for that last mile! The miles to go went to dashes about 5 miles before that. I only knew it was 3 because I was hooked up to a level 3 charger that showed the charge level.
 
I've been riding two-wheel EVs for so long that I go into Conserve Charge Mode early enough to avoid that. I have a real aversion to running super-low on power, having once found myself riding at 10MPH on the shoulder of the highway, on a cold, dark night, not knowing if I'd make it home...
 
It's been a bit colder than normal here in San Diego (35°F at night, yes I know that's still not "cold" compared to other cities) so I did notice whenever we turned the heater on, we would see a significant loss in charge. Last night I drove about 23 miles at night starting at 55% and ended up at home with 20% while the heater was on through half of that time.

We just purchased our Nissan Leaf 2013 last weekend, but after reading a few posts on this forum, it makes me concerned about the battery degradation throughout time. I've been driving the car for less than a week and all is great so far.
I usually start with 100% charge. (I've read a lot about 80% charge; is it better to be on 80% charge than 100%?).
Are there certain specific things a new owner should make sure to do to try to preserve the battery as much as possible? Or is it an inevitable degradation?

My work commute is 52 miles every weekday (26 each way, 10 mi city / 16 mi freeway). Although I can easily make it now, I've read some people's battery degradation has unallowed them to make their regular work commutes they were once able to do with their Leaf. Will I eventually not be able to make this commute?

Thanks in advance!
 
I have been getting 2.1 m/kwh while the temperature in Denver was between -7 and 4f. This is stop and go traffic, running the heater at 75F and seats on low.
 
LeafinThePark said:
Winter is underway in Minneapolis. Since Thursday morning we have around or below zero (F). This morning it was -7F. Observations -

1. Pre-warming the car even with it plugged in cost me 2%. I think the climate control is taking more than the charger can deliver? I should be able to avoid this lost by proper use of the timer.

2. Any trip, no matter how short, will have a big impact on range. I didn't bring a lunch to work today so I ran out for a bite. The 4 mile trip took almost 10%...most of which went to keeping the windows clear and warming the cabin. It had warmed to about 2F at lunchtime.

3. The Leaf handles very well with snow and icy roads. Traction control kicks in at the appropriate time and works as it should. This was with the original tires.

4. Heated seats and steering wheel really help, but I'm not a huge fan of the cycling they go through. They also seem slow to warm in extreme cold like this morning.

5. Based on one data point from yesterday, the range dropped about 40% from my summer range. This was with the climate control set at 60F (the lowest setting...wish we could set it lower). This was with slow driving as traffic was backed up yesterday...lot's of time spent at 10mph or slower. In this case this probably cost me range as I was running the heater and defrost for a good portion of the time.

6. Looks like we will be in a cold to very cold pattern for a couple of weeks....good chance to learn more and to figure out how to optimize cold weather range. Outside of a couple of days where it is suppose to sneak into double digits it looks like we will be just oscillating between single digits above and below zero.

7. At lot of you guys do not know what 'cold' means :)



27 mile round trip cost me 70% in Denver last week. Temps around 0f.
 
ottok62 said:
LeafinThePark said:
Winter is underway in Minneapolis. Since Thursday morning we have around or below zero (F). This morning it was -7F. Observations -

1. Pre-warming the car even with it plugged in cost me 2%. I think the climate control is taking more than the charger can deliver? I should be able to avoid this lost by proper use of the timer.

2. Any trip, no matter how short, will have a big impact on range. I didn't bring a lunch to work today so I ran out for a bite. The 4 mile trip took almost 10%...most of which went to keeping the windows clear and warming the cabin. It had warmed to about 2F at lunchtime.

3. The Leaf handles very well with snow and icy roads. Traction control kicks in at the appropriate time and works as it should. This was with the original tires.

4. Heated seats and steering wheel really help, but I'm not a huge fan of the cycling they go through. They also seem slow to warm in extreme cold like this morning.

5. Based on one data point from yesterday, the range dropped about 40% from my summer range. This was with the climate control set at 60F (the lowest setting...wish we could set it lower). This was with slow driving as traffic was backed up yesterday...lot's of time spent at 10mph or slower. In this case this probably cost me range as I was running the heater and defrost for a good portion of the time.

6. Looks like we will be in a cold to very cold pattern for a couple of weeks....good chance to learn more and to figure out how to optimize cold weather range. Outside of a couple of days where it is suppose to sneak into double digits it looks like we will be just oscillating between single digits above and below zero.

7. At lot of you guys do not know what 'cold' means :)



27 mile round trip cost me 70% in Denver last week. Temps around 0f.

70% of battery for a 27 mile seems extreme to me. I go daily 50 miles highway speeds without heat and still have 25-35% left in battery.
 
Yes, winter is hard on range! -9 F this morning. I charged to 80%+ this morning (226 Gids), pre-heated to 70 degrees, drove to work with the CC set to 60--happy that Nissan was smart enough not to program the the A/C to undo my pre-heat---I worked for 6 hours, drove to lunch at 0 degrees F and drove home 4 hours later. All cold soak times for the car. 2 TB each trip. Pulled into the driveway below VLBW (24 Gids) and only 29.0 total miles on the ODO. Funny thing is that the peak heater load was only 4.5 kW. My old '12 Leaf with resistance heat would peg out at 6 kW. Hard to believe that the HP was operating at all, but I could hear it running when I got out to grab the mail.
 
Rauv said:
Yes, winter is hard on range! -9 F this morning. I charged to 80%+ this morning (226 Gids), pre-heated to 70 degrees, drove to work with the CC set to 60--happy that Nissan was smart enough not to program the the A/C to undo my pre-heat---I worked for 6 hours, drove to lunch at 0 degrees F and drove home 4 hours later. All cold soak times for the car. 2 TB each trip. Pulled into the driveway below VLBW (24 Gids) and only 29.0 total miles on the ODO. Funny thing is that the peak heater load was only 4.5 kW. My old '12 Leaf with resistance heat would peg out at 6 kW. Hard to believe that the HP was operating at all, but I could hear it running when I got out to grab the mail.
Why not use the end timer to finish charging to 100% just before you leave for work ?

It will not hurt the battery that way. Just do not leave it at 100% SOC for long periods of time.
 
0 to -10F wish we had some of that blazing hot weather here, at -27.4f (-33c) using no heat, driving about 75Km an hour with a tail wind I can just make 64Km with 20% soc remaining, trip home I am lucky if I am over 85% after 9h charging at L1, when I get home under same circumstances I have 5 to 7% remaining soc

makes me really apreciate the seat heater and steering weel heater, today I had to shut off the seat heater and crack a window! as I only managed 80% charge
 
if you are in a cold climate charge to 100% for your commute ! use the timer and preheat, charging to 80% and then hitting VLBW is worse for the pack than charging to 100% having a comfortable drive and getting home at 10 to 15%!!!!!!!!!

I just dont see alll the reason to baby a pack and kill your day if you are leasing anyway

I charge to 100% every day and topp when needed during the workday with trickle
34,500 miles and have all 12 cap bars

its winter! its cold ! charge all you can
 
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