2023 60 kWH vs 2022 62 kWH?

[Flyct]

What’s the deal with the Plus battery rating in model year 2023? Previous years the Plus battery was a 62 kWH battery but for model year 2023 it’s rated at 60 kWH.

Is this a different battery or just the same battery with less rating?

 

[knightmb]

It's possible for both.

For example, my 2020 Leaf Plus had a battery "rating" of 62 kWh, but was advertised as "56 kWh" usable.

It's possible they are still using "lab rated" 62 kWh battery as a whole and will have it set for "60 kWh usable".

In one example, it's better than mine because it will allow more power usage, thus more range than what my "62 kWh" rated but only 56 kWh could use. On the other hand, it's possible they did reduce the cells capacity some to save cost or make the manufacturing easier in some way. It's also possible it's a typo by the marketing people. :lol:

 

[GerryAZ]

Maybe the reduced the maximum cell voltage slightly.

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

My bet is that they figured it how to pull 3kWh worth of battery out of the car to save $200/car trying to offset with aero changes to balance total range of the car. The epa went down by a few miles and the wltp went up by a couple miles/kms.

The European 2023 Leaf lists battery size at 59kWh not 60kWh, so guess they round up here and down in the EU.

 

[LeftieBiker]

If they reduced capacity then they must have used cheaper materials, resulting in cells the same size, but with lower capacity per cell.

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

Has anyone seen a Leafspy screenshots on a 23 Plus yet? (Both the gids and the cell screens)

 

[knightmb]

I'm curious as well. I looked at the press kits for my 2020 vs. the 2023 and the mileage did come down from 215 miles to 212, but I know the EPA has also changed how it does those mileage calculations, so I wonder if the numbers would be the same or not.

The non-plus Leaf still shows as 149 miles, exactly like my wife's 2018 showed when it was advertised for sale. Going from 215 to 212 wouldn't compute for the change if they really took off 2 kWh worth of capacity from the battery as a whole. The 40 kWh battery packs only reserve 1 kWH at the top for driving, so the owner can use nearly 39 kWh of capacity. Is that shortening the battery life, hard to say since my wife is over +50K miles on her 2018 and she drives it dead, a lot and also charges it to 100% and forgets about it, a lot. :| Somehow, her battery SoH is still above +90% :?

For the EPA mileage to come down, all things being equal, the +plus Leaf would have to be only charging to around the +56 kWh mark, just like mine, which would mean they are still leaving nearly +4 kWH at the top.

It's also possible that all of this math is moot because it's just the marketing people that are bad to presenting the facts. :x

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

Epa went down, but the wltp rating went up.

City/highway

Epa on the 2019 S+ was 118/97
Epa on the 2019 SV+ was 114/94
Epa on the 2023 SV+ is 121/98

The new Leaf is per epa more efficienct than the 2019 S+, which is good news.

The battery rating going from 62 to 60 is what shaved the epa range estimate...but the 23 should do better on paper.

 

[watchdoc]

several sites now quote Nissan engineers as saying there have been "chemsitry changes" to the cells to acheive minor but greater efficiency. I've searched around and haven't been able to find any information about these cell changes.

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

I saw that too. Maybe the Leaf aligned to the Chem in the Ariya.

 

[LeftieBiker]

Is that shortening the battery life, hard to say since my wife is over +50K miles on her 2018 and she drives it dead, a lot and also charges it to 100% and forgets about it, a lot. :| Somehow, her battery SoH is still above +90% :?

Maybe we should dub that pack the "Masochist Pack" - in honor of your wife's poor car.

 

[knightmb]

Is that shortening the battery life, hard to say since my wife is over +50K miles on her 2018 and she drives it dead, a lot and also charges it to 100% and forgets about it, a lot. :| Somehow, her battery SoH is still above +90% :?

Maybe we should dub that pack the "Masochist Pack" - in honor of your wife's poor car.

I just checked her Leaf today and she did finally break the 90% barrier, down to around 89% now, so I have to admire that the pack has even lasted this long. I think she is close to over +400 QC now. I don't understand how she is driving more miles than me per month as I'm averaging between 4k to 5k miles, somehow she tops that and stays ahead of me. I guess we are both in a race to break the 60k miles barrier before the end of the year. :lol:

Actually, I do know what it is. When she was driving her ICE (which was a very reliable wagon style vehicle), she had some *mental* limits due to fuel cost, maintenance (oil changes, the usually stuff that is frequent when you drive a lot of miles) in how often she would drive around. Once she got her Leaf and oil changes, belts, whatever, fuel cost goes out the window, now she drives the Leaf so much, she almost lives in it, seems like sometimes. :lol:

 

[xafalcon]

I have just got a late model "long range" battery pack in the workshop

It is a UK battery build. The label on the battery has a May 2022 assembly date with a stated capacity of 60kWh. Leafspy pro reports it as a 62kWh battery with 97.6% SoH 169 Ah

The car was sold new in November 2022

So it appears the "long range" battery capacity has been downgraded by Nissan, but not by leafspy. Perhaps check with Jim Pollock how leafspy pro determines the original battery capacity

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

My packs at 97 SoH were also exactly 169 AHr.

My belief is that Nissan started to list something closer to "usable" rather than total capacity. That's why in Europe the pack is sold as 59kWh. When my pack was new, it listed almost exactly 59 kWh on Leafspy.

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

What's odd is that the epa range went down, but the wltp range went up. Guessing low speeds did modestly better, and higher speeds worse efficiency wise.

 

[cwerdna]

While looking up something else, I found https://www.nissan.com.au/vehicles/browse-range/leaf/specs-and-pricing.html listing 39 kWh usable on non-Plus and 59 on Plus.

 

[knightmb]

My packs at 97 SoH were also exactly 169 AHr.

My belief is that Nissan started to list something closer to "usable" rather than total capacity. That's why in Europe the pack is sold as 59kWh. When my pack was new, it listed almost exactly 59 kWh on Leafspy.

That's interesting, so it's possible there is a "lab" difference between the old and new chemistry that helps the battery, but the usable capacity is still higher than my 2020 when it was new. I've never gotten more than 56.5 kWh of usable capacity with my 62 kWh pack. So if the new pack is only rated for 60 kWh but can deliver +59 kWh of power and the Leaf is more efficient than previous models, I wonder why the rated mileage went down? :shock:

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

It's a good question.

In the first 6 months with my Leaf Plus, I did notice it was 50/50 If my car would charge up.to the 59ish kWh or only 56ish. A re-plug to charge would generally bring it up to close to the 59, but I never understood it. I wonder if the bms software was a bit flaky and was letting me overcharge a bit. I did love having close to 800 gids on tap vs. the almost 700 I get now.

 

[DougWantsALeaf]

Is interesting that the Ariya window sticker says 87 "useable" kWh battery and the Leaf window sticker (2023) says just 60 kWh Lithium Ion battery

 

[DaveinOlyWA]

So after all this time we still don't have a LS shot of a new 60 kwh pack?