2016-2017 model year 30 kWh bar losers and capacity losses

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webeleafowners said:
SageBrush said:
30 kWh batteries were such a short lived story, I'm curious to see how Nissan handles warranty inventory and replacement.
Maybe they”ll use the new 40 kw battery. Is it physically possible?
Dimensions wise -- yes.
Technically -- I think so, with modification.

Likely ? Nissan has 5 year history* of telling Nissan owners to pound sound when it came to out of warranty battery replacement costs, and just recently they increased 24 kWh replacement costs by ~ 30%. Something extra-ordinary would have to change.

*excluding a 6 month period they relented on warranty replacement as part of a PR push before the 2018 LEAF
 
webeleafowners said:
SageBrush said:
30 kWh batteries were such a short lived story, I'm curious to see how Nissan handles warranty inventory and replacement.
Maybe they”ll use the new 40 kw battery. Is it physically possible?

Just about anything is possible if you are willing to spend the money and Nissan is simply not going to do it. They have contingency plans in place to build warranty packs for both 24 and 30 kwh replacements.

Realize that Nissan is not like Tesla. They build multiple models on the exact same line as the LEAF so they jump from battery packs to gas tanks in the blink of an eye. Tesla's issue is simply they are not a refined automobile manufacturer yet. So they currently only build with minimal options to gain experience and efficiency.

Its a tough challenge to maintain proficiency with a very high number of new employees. Getting the basics down would take less than a month. Gaining the ability to recognize and fix problems without a major disruption takes time and not all workers will gain this tool...
 
My wife's 2016 Leaf SV is showing one bar drop. Not sure when it occurred but I noticed it last week when I was testing Leafspy on it.

Leaf spy showed the following details

SOC 97.4%
kwh remaining 22.6
GIDs 291 79.7%

AHr 63.64
SOH 80.07%
Hx 74.95%


Car was leased in July 2016 and has 17600 miles


Area Northern Virginia
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
They have contingency plans in place to build warranty packs for both 24 and 30 kwh replacements.
Is this speculation on your part or do know specifics ?
 
Storksb said:
My wife's 2016 Leaf SV is showing one bar drop. Not sure when it occurred but I noticed it last week when I was testing Leafspy on it.

Leaf spy showed the following details

SOC 97.4%
kwh remaining 22.6
GIDs 291 79.7%

AHr 63.64
SOH 80.07%
Hx 74.95%


Car was leased in July 2016 and has 17600 miles


Area Northern Virginia
80% SOH seems to be the average so far, looks like there will be warranty replacement in your future.
Hope you can endure the range loss till then .
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
Just about anything is possible if you are willing to spend the money and Nissan is simply not going to do it. They have contingency plans in place to build warranty packs for both 24 and 30 kwh replacements.
Why would Nissan revert to a technology that will require more replacements within the warranty period if they could make use of modules that are physically the same which if derated could mean a once only replacement?
 
For all I know the modules they are about to install as replacements in our car are the same as what's used in 2018s and they just derate them somehow. I doubt it will matter either way as I expect the 2018 cells don't hold up either, maybe be worse yet.
 
LTLFTcomposite said:
For all I know the modules they are about to install as replacements in our car are the same as what's used in 2018s and they just derate them somehow. I doubt it will matter either way as I expect the 2018 cells don't hold up either, maybe be worse yet.

Would the use of a 40kwh pack also require a BMS swap as well? If so, wouldn't successive chademo charges tell you if that's the case?

If no BMS change is required, then wouldn't you end up with a higher capacity leaf (since there will be no lower voltage to software-limit the actual capacity)?

The thought of needing a new piece of firmware to artificially limit a bigger pack down to 30kwh makes me think this isn't likely. Would be nice if it was true though.
 
Oils4AsphaultOnly said:
LTLFTcomposite said:
For all I know the modules they are about to install as replacements in our car are the same as what's used in 2018s and they just derate them somehow. I doubt it will matter either way as I expect the 2018 cells don't hold up either, maybe be worse yet.

Would the use of a 40kwh pack also require a BMS swap as well? If so, wouldn't successive chademo charges tell you if that's the case?

If no BMS change is required, then wouldn't you end up with a higher capacity leaf (since there will be no lower voltage to software-limit the actual capacity)?

The thought of needing a new piece of firmware to artificially limit a bigger pack down to 30kwh makes me think this isn't likely. Would be nice if it was true though.
IDK the answers to your questions but assumed the capacity could be limited with a software update. Pure speculation on my part is testing that update is why it has taken 10 weeks to get a replacement battery. Honestly I'm unsure what we're going to be left with when all this is done, but feel fairly certain it won't be anything better than when the car was new.
 
A somewhat related story a family friend had what was apparently a fairly major repair needed to an older Volt that involved some or all of the pack being replaced. They had the car for nearly three months and he was driving an ice loaner. When he finally got the car back it now shows 53 miles range. I'm skeptical and I'm sure anyone reading this will be too, but he texted me a picture and has no reason to make up a story.
Edit: Followed up with him, after living with the fix for a while it seems he's just a fairly efficient volt driver who was hampered by some bad cells. He got the car used and never experienced the degradation, it had already happened.
 
Battery replacement scheduled for Friday, Estimated 2-4 hours to replace. I will post specs on new battery after installation.
 
If details of battery assembly date (inside battery serial number from Leaf Spy Read ECU) could be posted for these new packs it would be interesting. Voltage at full charge should confirm whether still 30kWh modules.
 
Storksb said:
My wife's 2016 Leaf SV is showing one bar drop. Not sure when it occurred but I noticed it last week when I was testing Leafspy on it.

Leaf spy showed the following details

SOC 97.4%
kwh remaining 22.6
GIDs 291 79.7%

AHr 63.64
SOH 80.07%
Hx 74.95%


Car was leased in July 2016 and has 17600 miles


Area Northern Virginia

Looks like its been gone a while.
 
There are indications in tests here in New Zealand that some 2016 cars are under reporting capacity as presented in SOH and lost bars. Unfortunately this low value may extend to earlier onset of LBW and VLBW so as far as the driver can tell their range is also significantly dropping and car less useful.

An overnight charge test by one owner managed to put in a reported 27.7kWh at 240V 16A. This 10 bar car is reporting 60.41AHr and 76.01% SOH. Based on Recharge Event Energy of 31.78kWh when new from the compliance doc https://iaspub.epa.gov/otaqpub/display_file.jsp?docid=36671&flag=1 this signals around 87% SoH, a massive 11% difference.

I appreciate that when 4 bars are lost Nissan will sort it out. However, there may be many cars out there where the reported range is reduced and less useful to the owners. Has anyone done these recharge tests and/or looked in more detail at GIDs and volts during discharge to various indications such as LBW and VLBW?
 
dwl said:
There are indications in tests here in New Zealand that some 2016 cars are under reporting capacity as presented in SOH and lost bars. Unfortunately this low value may extend to earlier onset of LBW and VLBW so as far as the driver can tell their range is also significantly dropping and car less useful.

An overnight charge test by one owner managed to put in a reported 27.7kWh at 240V 16A. This 10 bar car is reporting 60.41AHr and 76.01% SOH. Based on Recharge Event Energy of 31.78kWh when new from the compliance doc https://iaspub.epa.gov/otaqpub/display_file.jsp?docid=36671&flag=1 this signals around 87% SoH, a massive 11% difference.

I appreciate that when 4 bars are lost Nissan will sort it out. However, there may be many cars out there where the reported range is reduced and less useful to the owners. Has anyone done these recharge tests and/or looked in more detail at GIDs and volts during discharge to various indications such as LBW and VLBW?
As an owner of a 2016 4 bar loser, I can tell you that my experience is that the Leaf spy numbers matched the actual usable mileage fairly closely. For the last year I've been routinely driving the car to LBW or less fairly regularly. LBW is a fixed number of GID's (50) so I've watched the LBW creep up from 13% to 21% of power left when the nice lady announces LBW. Range has steadily dropped over time, My basic commute is 56 mi plus any errands and at this point if I have any errands, I need to charge in town before going home. My usable range (I.E. before I get to LBW) is 52 miles. Fortunately the last 3 miles to home are downhill. Also the nearest charger to my house is 15 miles away and it is only a level 2 charger. I do have the data for the various levels of charge and the voltages associated with them but I've found that the percent of charge screen is more than accurate enough for daily use.

By the way, the car is currently in the shop for battery replacement. Dropped it off Friday morning but it won't be ready until Monday.
 
There are indications in tests here in New Zealand that some 2016 cars are under reporting capacity as presented in SOH and lost bars.

All of the available evidence shows that the batteries are losing capacity rapidly, not under-reporting it. This is an important distinction, as it means a real physical deterioration of the packs, as opposed to a software glitch in the BMS.
 
LeftieBiker said:
There are indications in tests here in New Zealand that some 2016 cars are under reporting capacity as presented in SOH and lost bars.
All of the available evidence shows that the batteries are losing capacity rapidly, not under-reporting it. This is an important distinction, as it means a real physical deterioration of the packs, as opposed to a software glitch in the BMS.
The amount of charge accepted from flat by several cars seems to be significantly more than would be expected from the AHr/SoH and kWh reports from Leaf Spy (simply relaying car BMS). If drivers only go down to LBW or VLBW they may experience the reduced capacity as these indications seem to be triggering at higher than expected voltages on some cars.

If there is evidence that confirms the total holding capacity is reduced, not just capacity down to the warning levels, references would be appreciated. I accept there will be cars that have lost more capacity and there will be variability across the whole fleet.

If we use the value from Nissan of 31.78kWh from empty, would we expect to only be able to put in SoH * 31.78kWh at 240V and 15A ? There might be calibration errors in the EVSE kWh reporting but the example I gave was the car accepted a lot more than would be expected for the SoH (87% vs 76% reported SoH). Unfortunately only using down to LBW and VLBW can show reported loss of capacity which might not be actual.
 
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