people getting rid of their Leafs/EVs/PHEVs and going back to ICEVs

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kolmstead said:
The Leaf will not have enough range to do my commute as soon as winter hits. I didn't understand when I bought it that it was a disposable car and would be essentially worthless after five years. I bought a a Prius when it became obvious that the Leaf's battery was degrading rapidly, so I'll switch to it this fall and give the Leaf to charity or sell it cheaply. I'll be retiring soon and refuse to buy anything that I can't count on for at least ten years of usefulness.
I figured I'd add pointers to your other posts on this, including where you finally got rid of it.

http://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=454921#p454921
http://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=8802&p=475234#p475234
 
I had a 2011 for 3 years (lease) and it has come time for my 2013 to go back after it's lease.

I'm glad it's going back. I still would not buy one here in Phoenix. While the pack was definitely better than the 2011, the past month or 2 have had noticeable range loss. I suspect I'll be losing my second bar soon. I used to get home with 40 miles left. Now it's closer to 20.

I would be open to leasing another for 3 years, but my "long distance" car (2001 Grand Cherokee) was getting unreliable so I had to replace it. Unfortunately, I can't afford two car payments (I'm single).

Honestly the thing I'll miss the most about the leaf is the HOV lane privileges. I will most likely buy a early 2000 CNG civic as a commuter beater just so I can get the HOV lane access. You can find them on craigslist for a few grand. There's a CNG station down the block from my house. I think it will work out good.
 
turbo2ltr said:
I had a 2011 for 3 years (lease) and it has come time for my 2013 to go back after it's lease.

I'm glad it's going back. I still would not buy one here in Phoenix. While the pack was definitely better than the 2011, the past month or 2 have had noticeable range loss. I suspect I'll be losing my second bar soon. I used to get home with 40 miles left. Now it's closer to 20.

I would be open to leasing another for 3 years, but my "long distance" car (2001 Grand Cherokee) was getting unreliable so I had to replace it. Unfortunately, I can't afford two car payments (I'm single).

Honestly the thing I'll miss the most about the leaf is the HOV lane privileges. I will most likely buy a early 2000 CNG civic as a commuter beater just so I can get the HOV lane access. You can find them on craigslist for a few grand. There's a CNG station down the block from my house. I think it will work out good.

well that sucks. super cheap leases on 2016's with 30 kwh packs. I got mine for zero down, $245.99 a month and I also have a junker gasser and glad I don't use it much since I really don't think it could handle much. But with the LEAF, I am only using it 3,000 miles a year. This year, it will hit 5,000 miles but only because I ran out of lease miles on the LEAF... :cry:
 
turbo2ltr said:
I will most likely buy a early 2000 CNG civic as a commuter beater just so I can get the HOV lane access. You can find them on craigslist for a few grand.

Are they cheap because the CNG tanks are expired and due for replacement? I believe it is 15 years on those.
 
turbo2ltr said:
I would be open to leasing another for 3 years, but my "long distance" car (2001 Grand Cherokee) was getting unreliable so I had to replace it. Unfortunately, I can't afford two car payments (I'm single).

Honestly the thing I'll miss the most about the leaf is the HOV lane privileges. I will most likely buy a early 2000 CNG civic as a commuter beater just so I can get the HOV lane access. You can find them on craigslist for a few grand. There's a CNG station down the block from my house. I think it will work out good.
Dang! Sorry to hear this! Have you already replaced the Cherokee? What did you go with?
 
turbo2ltr said:
I will most likely buy a early 2000 CNG civic as a commuter beater just so I can get the HOV lane access. You can find them on craigslist for a few grand. There's a CNG station down the block from my house. I think it will work out good.
Be careful. Per http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?t=8119#p179304
Devin said:
Also, the CNG cylinder is only certified for 15 years so after 15 years by law it MUST be replaced.
If it hasn't been replaced...
 
jhm614 said:
Dang! Sorry to hear this! Have you already replaced the Cherokee? What did you go with?

A 2016 Ford Police Interceptor Utility. :D
It's missing some creature comforts, but it also has a lot of room for my ham radios, and I got (what I think) is a smoking deal. $24,500. Regular explorers start at $32k. I like it a lot better than the Jeep.. lets see if it lasts to 170k like the jeep does.


Be careful. Per viewtopic.php?t=8119#p179304
Thanks for the info! The tank expiration is something I did find out along the way (luckily before I bought anything) so it will be something I look for when I'm ready to purchase.. I'll have to check out pricing on replacing them.
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
I got mine for zero down, $245.99 a month

Dang, thats pretty low. I think I'm paying $360 on this one. Well when I bring it back in the next couple weeks, we'll see how just how willing they are to get me in a new one... Maybe I won't give it up just yet.
 
turbo2ltr said:
I can't afford two car payments (I'm single).

ha ha ha ha.. sorry I read that I almost spat my drink out on the laptop... if you think you've not no money now, do not get married, its not a money multiplier, I can assure you of that (unless you count fractions).
 
DuncanCunningham said:
turbo2ltr said:
I can't afford two car payments (I'm single).

ha ha ha ha.. sorry I read that I almost spat my drink out on the laptop... if you think you've not no money now, do not get married, its not a money multiplier, I can assure you of that (unless you count fractions).

Bahaha, I see the err in my thinking: Two income family != more money. Good point. lol.
 
DuncanCunningham said:
turbo2ltr said:
I can't afford two car payments (I'm single).

ha ha ha ha.. sorry I read that I almost spat my drink out on the laptop... if you think you've not no money now, do not get married, its not a money multiplier, I can assure you of that (unless you count fractions).
LOL! The father of a friend of a friend of mine has a license plate frame that says
"driver carries no money
he's married".

When that friend of a friend got married, my friend also got him such a license plate frame. :)

I'm single and can afford two car payments. No problem. But, I paid cash... errr, check in full for both the ones I have now.
 
cwerdna said:
cwerdna said:
There's another guy @ work in that group who has a Volt. Long ago, I found he isn't driving it anymore and prefers the luxury of his (or his wife's) Lexus RX SUV. He then loaned the Volt to his mother-in-law. Sounds like she'll have it for probably the rest of the lease. He just doesn't care about the Volt or PHEVs. When the '16 Volt details came out, I asked him if he knew about it/cared. Nope. It sounds like he has no plans to get one either.
I bumped into the above guy in the restroom a few weeks ago. I asked him if his MIL still had the Volt. Nope. Long gone.

He said he *hated* his Volt. He summed it up to the "electronics" not working well. From the brief conversation I had, it his statement seemed to center around Bluetooth in his Volt not working well. Unclear what the issues were. He's probably the first person I've ever personally heard of who used the words hate about their Volt.

Sure, over time, I learned of a few folks on EV/PHEV groups or forums I'm on who had the (seemingly pretty rare) lemon Volt or problem Volt but it seemed like most everyone else liked or loved their Volt.
I talked to this guy briefly today asking if he's back to any EVs or PHEVs.

Nope. He now drives a 4Runner. He says he still has the Lexus RX (which is apparently a hybrid). He also mentioned they have a Prius v wagon.
cwerdna said:
cwerdna said:
I forgot about another guy at work who I don't see much anymore. He had a '11 or '12 Leaf because of his girlfriend's work or something (company car?). I think she left that job or she had to turn that car in, for whatever reason. So, no more Leaf for him. I believe this is over a year ago. When I do see him, sometimes ask if he's going to get another Leaf or EV. He doesn't seem interested at all or (IIRC) gives some excuse of "no time".
I spoke to the above guy the other day. He still has no EV and still doesn't seem to care. He also driver a 4Runner now. The girlfriend is now his wife.

I said to him that he's not an EV enthusiast, to which he claimed he is. I countered, "well, you don't have one now and you don't seem to care to get one." He then mentioned how gas prices are cheap now, mentioned BMWs as being "cool" or something like that and mentioned I think the M3 and 635i. He seems to want a 6-series.

He mentions if they need to go on a long-road trip, they'd take his wife's PiP, for which she didn't bother get to green HOV stickers. CA has hit the issuance limit and it's not looking likely the cap will be raised again.

Can you imagine the general apathy outside of strong EV/PHEV regions? I'm in California, in Silicon Valley!

At last check, we had over 190 plug-in vehicles on our internal list at work and PLENTY of charging stations at work. Not all of them show up every day and some are mystery cars. And, I know some are missing from the list as well.
I spoke to this guy recently asking if he's going to get back to having an EV. His answer was "too lazy".

We now have over 300 plug-in vehicles on our internal list at work.
 
I guess they have to "go back" to a 1999 ALL manual Corolla like I did. I have no doubt they would be looking for another EV then... Like Me


FYI; The day of my accident; Costco Gas $2.559

Gas Yesterday when filling up (again!) $2.819
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
I guess they have to "go back" to a 1999 ALL manual Corolla like I did. I have no doubt they would be looking for another EV then... Like Me


FYI; The day of my accident; Costco Gas $2.559

Gas Yesterday when filling up (again!) $2.819
At $2.819 I could consider driving our PHEV more than the Leaf (maybe not, but it would be more reasonable), really gas around here is at least $3.05 a gallon, although it is very hard to find it that low, a more normal price is about $3.50 a gallon and some stations are as high as $3.79 a gallon.

Seriously, driving our PHEV as our primary car was costing us around $150/month in gas, that has now dropped to about $20 total between gas and charging our Leaf.....really can't beat that. And a prime example is in the Leaf, we can take a road trip from Long Beach to San Diego and worst case scenario is about $6 round trip if the free quick chargers aren't available in each direction, normally we can do it for absolutely nothing, so no, I don't plan on giving up my Leaf to go to an ICE vehicle. To be honest, when the time comes, I want to get a long range BEV to replace our PHEV. You can't beat the price of free to power the vehicle, of course I will admit to being lucky enough to live near quite a few free chargers, we actually don't even have a way to plugin at home, even with the trickle charger, but really the city, as well as some vehicle manufactures, EVSE manufacturers and dealerships are willing to pay for the electricity to charge my car, why wouldn't I do that?
 
Regarding the electronics on the Leaf/ Bluetooth. My 2017 would not link up to my old clam-shell phone. It will link fine to a newer (dumb) phone. Perhaps that was his complaint.
My (wrecked) 2011 Leaf did fine with the clam-shell.
Driving to work today, I passed a gas-station with $2.09
 
I kinda did, going to a Gen 2 Volt... I would have kept the 2011 Leaf since it had a new battery but Nissan wanted a ludicrous 12k+ to buy out the lease. I tracked it and saw that it finally sold a year later for $4,900 from a dealer...
 
In my case my situation has changed. I now need to drive over 140 miles in one trip as much as 4 times per week (but usually only twice) with only one area with L2 charging stations in the middle of the trip. I did make the Leaf do the trip all last summer which was ok except having to drive at 35mph with the heat or AC off for nearly 70 miles. But then winter set in and one day at -15°F I had to call a tow truck because I only made it 30 miles!
 
I wrecked my car and it took two months for repair. The first month I had a Hertz rental Versa Note that got 31MPG according the dash gauge, The second month I had a Dealer C300 loaner. According to the web site it got 24MPG. There were no books in the car. I put in a total of $70 for gas and my electric bill for 2 months went down $100.

Really, I hated the noisy Versa so it was worth paying more for mt B250E.

I imagine a decent ICE would be cheaper to run at today's prices.
 
GlennD said:
I imagine a decent ICE would be cheaper to run at today's prices.

I don't know what you pay for electricity but I pay way less than that. My electric bill is about $15 to $20 higher driving the electric car. That's at about 10 cents per kWh (I think it's closer to 8 cents during the night). But I do charge off of free charging whenever I get a chance including at work, so my results may be different than anyone else's. But that's a whole lot less than the $40 I'm paying weekly to drive a borrowed 2014 Chevy Sonic that says it gets 39.7mpg.

My total operating costs in my Leaf would amount to less than $400 per month, perhaps as low as $300 per month, if I were to kept it for years to come. (Including depreciation, interest, insurance, tires, brake fluid flushes, 12V battery replacements, and traction battery replacements.)

Calculating the cheapest ICEV I can come up with is at least $500 per month average for the life of the vehicle, all things considered, with the exception of buying $500 or less cars that barely run and driving them a few months until they blow up and then buying another.

The only, and I repeat ONLY thing holding me back from keeping the Leaf is the range and lack of charging infrastructure.
 
GlennD said:
I wrecked my car and it took two months for repair. The first month I had a Hertz rental Versa Note that got 31MPG according the dash gauge, The second month I had a Dealer C300 loaner. According to the web site it got 24MPG. There were no books in the car. I put in a total of $70 for gas and my electric bill for 2 months went down $100.

Really, I hated the noisy Versa so it was worth paying more for mt B250E.

I imagine a decent ICE would be cheaper to run at today's prices.

I know California has high electric rates with usage tiers (at some utilities) so an electric car could be more expensive to drive if it raised monthly kWh to the next tier, but electric driving is much cheaper than gas for me in Arizona. I am on a time of use plan with extra charge for 1-hour maximum peak demand so it would be expensive to charge on peak, but I charge only off peak at home for between $30 and $40 to drive about 1,500 miles per month. I will always drive electric for my around town driving and keep my other vehicles for longer trips.
 
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