Seven year report, 2011 LEAF.

racerkit said:

June, 2011 car here.
Currently at 71,500 miles
Cost of Maintenance: $365 - set of tire at 64K miles and a set of wipers
8 bar reached at about year 6th (~70mos), 62K miles in March, 2017
Begged/Negotiated with Nissan, and paid $2400 for a new 2017 battery pack.

--- there was speculation that 2017 battery pack is maybe a 2016+ model battery pack with 30kWH at 107 miles range, and not the original Lizard pack. My experiences so far is proven more truth than not . I am now getting 105, 107 on full charge, even on the new less efficient tires (non OEM Ecopia). I am not sure if it's true 30kwh pack, but definitely more than the original 24kwh capacity.

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AVTA test results showed 2013 LEAF packs (and presumably, all "24 kWh" packs manufactured since) did have greater capacity than the defective 2011 and 2012 LEAF packs, but I doubt any of the "24 kWh" replacement packs were close to 30 kWh.

edatoakrun said:

Posting ~on my LEAF's build date anniversary, rather than delivery, since I have some free time...

I'm expecting to reach about 60 k miles by mid-May, and expect to see about 600 Wh in additional available capacity loss over the last year, the same as the last few years, once temps increase to the point I will regain most of the Winter seasonal capacity loss...

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Any other seven-year 2011 owners want to post to bring this thread back on-topic?

I am going to agree with Ed on this. Back before I got my 2011, there was talk of how these batteries could be used for PV storage after their useful life in a car was over. A used battery would work well with my pv system. Many of us thought this to be a useful option before we purchased our Leafs. I guess we were thinking that Nissan would "take care of us" for being silly enough to jump into this new technology.
They could have given us replacements at cost as a show of goodwill. But they chose not to.

On the logistical side, getting the core back would be a difficult endeavor. Needing a truck to haul pack back to residence and some way to get it out of truck would be a chore. But, this should be up to the customer, not Nissan.

OrientExpress said:

This is an interesting comparison to show how the LEAF's technology has, and is continuing to improve.

My 2014 now almost has 52000 miles on it, has all its bars and still goes 78-85 miles on a charge.

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Wow how did you manage that?? I am in Cupertino with a 2014 car with 35K miles. We bought it brand new and lost a bar at 31K miles a few months ago.

My 2011 has about 28,000 miles on it and still suits 96% of my driving needs. I use my wife's Acura for the other 4%. It still has 10 capacity bars. I've switched from 80% charging nightly to 100%. I don't know what the maximum range is because I don't want (or need) to test its limits. Anything over 45 miles R/T or so, I just take the other car. I won't take it to SF Intl., for example (~55 miles) to pick up my daughter and her husband when they visit (3 people, luggage, freeway speeds, climate control) but I will to San Jose (30 mi.) It's been super reliable, fun and easy to drive and park in small places. I've recently bought new tires, and once had some minor body work done below the passenger door when I was careless pulling into a spot next to a high curb, but other than that I've had no repairs and only the mandated free 1-year inspection and software upgrade. Oh yes, new wiper blades, too.

I am beginning to consider giving it up, though. That 96% of my needs used to be 99% so it's slowly losing its value to me. Also some of the other things I liked are gone, while the things I didn't like haven't gotten better. When the 2G(?) connection was lost I didn't upgrade because I don't have a smart phone. Now I can't start the heater remotely (or even by getting in the car) on cold mornings and I can't transmit destinations to the car with Google Maps. The short sun visor and sub-par sound system bother me, too. The pedestrian warning no longer sounds and the horn and heater have always been inadequate. These things didn't matter much when the Leaf was really the only practical electric vehicle out there, but now there are plenty of alternatives. Still, it's difficult to justify the expense of a new car when my wife and I both love driving the Leaf and it meets our needs as well as it does.

Take a look at a 2017 Hyundai IONIQ, if I could afford a new EV that's what I would buy.

For some reason, sales haven't exactly been stellar, so you can probably get a great deal from a Hyundai dealer that's had the car sitting on their lot for months.

Every review I've seen or read on the IONIQ has been favorable, in particular the Regen system gets rave reviews and the drag coefficient is super low, meaning great range at highway speeds.

You mean the Ioniq EV? That's still only sold in California, although a dealer special order might be possible in some places now.

LeftieBiker said:

You mean the Ioniq EV? That's still only sold in California, although a dealer special order might be possible in some places now.

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Gen II was going to be nationwide

Gen I is a compliancecar

The 2018 Ioniq is sold only in California.

edatoakrun said:

The only real surprise since my six-year post was Nissan's new screw you policy RE pack replacement, instituted last Fall.

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Hmm, did I miss the news? What changed? Or is this in reference to them ending the "goodwill" program?

maini said:

OrientExpress said:

This is an interesting comparison to show how the LEAF's technology has, and is continuing to improve.

My 2014 now almost has 52000 miles on it, has all its bars and still goes 78-85 miles on a charge.

Click to expand...

Wow how did you manage that?? I am in Cupertino with a 2014 car with 35K miles. We bought it brand new and lost a bar at 31K miles a few months ago.

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It was my wife commuter car and all she did was charge it to 100% each night and for the last six or so months DCQC it every afternoon at the free DRIVEtheARC station three blocks from the house.

alozzy said:

Take a look at a 2017 Hyundai IONIQ, if I could afford a new EV that's what I would buy.

For some reason, sales haven't exactly been stellar, so you can probably get a great deal from a Hyundai dealer that's had the car sitting on their lot for months.

Every review I've seen or read on the IONIQ has been favorable, in particular the Regen system gets rave reviews and the drag coefficient is super low, meaning great range at highway speeds.

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The Ioniq has battery cooling design flaws for hotter climates. While it has a stellar battery warranty, it is not transferable.

My anniversary of delivery. I have 78k miles and it's going strong. i got lucky and slipped into the replacement battery just before Nissan decided to mess with other early adaptors and had an 80/20 cost share.

Given my luck with the battery replacement (and the seat extenders I bought shortly after taking delivery) I've been very happy with this car. I still have 12 bars on the new battery, nothing other the the 12V battery has failed (new tires from Costco and new wiper blades). It's been a low cost car to operate and I still use it for 95% of my driving.

I was pleased that Nissan did the right thing by me and others given the battery degradation, but also feel the let a lot of people down. Until they add an active thermal management system, I can't see me buying another LEAF.

Got Home from a ~761 (corrected) mile trip to San Francisco and lake Tahoe Saturday, driving my ~60k mile, ~7 year old (see post #1) LEAF.

I've been waiting to drive my LEAF on this trip since delivery day, and:

...The good news is that finally having a few fairly reliable charge sites both locally and on routes south, I can make most extended trips far more quickly and easily now with a seven-year-old pack, than I could when my LEAF was new...

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A replacement for my factory pack would have been very handy for the first and last ~200 miles, but once I was on the 1-80 and I-50 corridors (where there is now probably about one DC charger installed per each 1,000 gas pumps!) my LEAF's ~20% range reduction from delivery doesn't matter too much.

Disappointingly, entering the eighth nearly-as-hot-as-hell North Valley Summer, my LEAF still hasn't lost its ninth capacity bar, displaying (erroneously) 42.09 AH (63.53%) when I left, and 42.80 AH (64.60%) on return.

RE thermal management on this trip, my main problem was keeping the pack temperature high enough to maximize capacity...

I assume the DC chargers you used along your 860+ mile trip were not "free charging" right?
How much charging $$ did you spend total? Just trying to figure out if the Leaf is economical on trips where multiple changing sessions are needed along the way.

I haven't charged DC in a while until last week due to an emergency. I used an eVgo station and it costs $4 for a 20 min quick charge. Ouch!

edatoakrun said:

Got Home from a 860+ mile trip to San Francisco and lake Tahoe Saturday, driving my ~60k mile, ~7 year old (see post #1) LEAF.

I've been waiting to drive my LEAF on this trip since delivery day, and:

...The good news is that finally having a few fairly reliable charge sites both locally and on routes south, I can make most extended trips far more quickly and easily now with a seven-year-old pack, than I could when my LEAF was new...

Click to expand...

A replacement for my factory pack would have been very handy for the first and last ~200 miles, but once I was on the 1-80 and I-50 corridors (where there is now probably about one DC charger installed per each 1,000 gas pumps!) my LEAF's ~20% range reduction from delivery doesn't matter too much.

Disappointingly, entering the eighth nearly-as-hot-as-hell North Valley Summer, my LEAF still hasn't lost its ninth capacity bar, displaying (erroneously) 42.09 AH (63.53%) when I left, and 42.80 AH (64.60%) on return.

RE thermal management on this trip, my main problem was keeping the pack temperature high enough to maximize capacity...

Click to expand...

mxp said:

I haven't charged DC in a while until last week due to an emergency. I used an eVgo station and it costs $4 for a 20 min quick charge. Ouch!

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That's a LOT better than EVgo's previous pricing. Prior to the recent price decrease (amazing!), for CHAdeMO charging without paying a monthly fee that requires a 1 year commitment, it was $4.95 to START a session + 20 cents/minute, so that 20 minute session would've been $8.95.

This coupled w/Blink's crazy pricing is why I didn't want to pay $1K to $1.5K extra for a used Leaf w/CHAdeMO when I was in the market for a used '13 SV. I've written about this numerous times on MNL and elsewhere.

Coincidence: I just last evening parked at the nearest EVGo station for my first-ever (and free!) QC session. My delight was short-lived, however, as the station informed me that "Your card is blocked." When I emailed their support about it, I got this response:

"My guess is that when you enrolled and requested a card, you didn’t register the card that was given to you. So you have no active card on your account. If you log in to your account you can activate the card you have."

Nope.

mxp said:

I used an eVgo station and it costs $4 for a 20 min quick charge. Ouch!

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Not necessarily ouch. How many miles did that $4 add? If it was north of about 40, then your cost per mile is roughly equal to or less than an econo car on gas give California gas prices. I'm guessing 20 min on a quick charge would be about 40 miles, but it's been a while since I did one of those so I may be a bit off.

mxp said:

I assume the DC chargers you used along your 860+ mile trip were not "free charging" right?
How much charging $$ did you spend total? ...

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Sorry, the trip was was 761 miles, by odometer, which is very close to correct.

Drive the Arc app is still free for CHAdeMO, and I used it six times for ~five to ~twelve kWh charges, on I-80 to SF, then Sacramento, I-50 to South lake tahoe, Hwys 89 and 40 over Donner pass, then hwy 20 back to the Valley. Two more DC charges appeared to be free, due to a charger malfunction.

https://drivethearc.com/

I spent ~ $18 for DC for three charges over during the first and last days of driving, and also used L2 EVSEs for about three hours total.

Could have skipped all of the L2 time if my pack wasn't so old...

I salute your dedication in undertaking such a long trip with a Leaf. You have more patience than I do.

Cinnabar said:

My anniversary of delivery. I have 78k miles and it's going strong. i got lucky and slipped into the replacement battery just before Nissan decided to mess with other early adaptors and had an 80/20 cost share.

Given my luck with the battery replacement (and the seat extenders I bought shortly after taking delivery) I've been very happy with this car. I still have 12 bars on the new battery, nothing other the the 12V battery has failed (new tires from Costco and new wiper blades). It's been a low cost car to operate and I still use it for 95% of my driving.

I was pleased that Nissan did the right thing by me and others given the battery degradation, but also feel the let a lot of people down. Until they add an active thermal management system, I can't see me buying another LEAF.

Click to expand...

Glad to see fellow original owners that still have their 2011s. i'm in the same situation as you w/ 78K mi. and using the Lizard replacement. Also still happy with the car's reliability and around-town utility. Despite all the dissapointment surrounding the lame battery longevity, I credit the LEAF with getting me excited about the technology and leading me to buy the Model 3 for my long distance road trips.