Advice please: Battery Warranty & LeafSpy New Buyer Questions

[Murf]

I am about to buy a pre certified 2013 Leaf S with 21k miles for $10k - This seems to be a good deal based on autotrader and other guides.

My two concerns are:
1. Battery Life: I ordered a ELM327 Bluetooth reader to hook up LeafSpy to the car (I hope the garage is okay with this) but most of the LeafSpy guides online are for owners, can someone give me guidance on what numbers to look for when checking the life of a used 2013 Leaf S. I know it has 12 bars but I want to know is that 98% health or 86%.

2.Battery Warranty: The Pre certified warranty covers the battery and other components for 100,000 miles or 7 years but my understanding is that they only guarantee to get the battery back to 9 out of 12 battery health. What percent drop in health and range is 9 out of 12? Do they ever get you back to 12 out of 12? This will have a big impact on my ability to resell the car in a few years.


I appreciate any advice or direction before I buy the car

 

[Firetruck41]

1. You want to look for the SOH number, which is essentially % capacity, also Ahr is helpful.

2. Battery/powertrain warranty is 7(?)yr/100k mi for things like bad cells or manufacturing defects, but that does not cover capacity. The battery capacity warranty is 5yr/60k mi. The practice has been to replace the battery with a new one, for battery capacity claims, so far, though they are technically going beyond what they have to do.

 

[Murf]

1. You want to look for the SOH number, which is essentially % capacity, also Ahr is helpful.

2. Battery/powertrain warranty is 7(?)yr/100k mi for things like bad cells or manufacturing defects, but that does not cover capacity. The battery capacity warranty is 5yr/60k mi. The practice has been to replace the battery with a new one, for battery capacity claims, so far, though they are technically going beyond what they have to do.

Thanks for the help, one question:
To get the SOH number (that tells me if the batteries capacity is diminished) does the Leaf need to be at 100% charge?
For example if the dashboard display says it has 52% battery charge and the SOH says it is 48% does that tell me anything or does it need to be 100% charged and then check leafspy to see what the SOH number is?

 

[LeftieBiker]

The SOH does not depend on SOC. It will vary, especially according to time of year, but you can read it at any SOC. It's *possible* that doing a full charge/equalize on the pack first may raise it a little.

 

[Valdemar]

I would also look at the GID count after a full charge if possible. This number more or less precisely tracks the amount of energy stored in the battery in real time. New pack reads about 280-290 GIDs on a full battery, as battery ages this number will decrease. It also decreases with battery discharge as you drive the car, that's why the only meaningful reading for battery health evaluation purposes is at the highest SOC possible. The SOH% is affected by BMS reset I think, and if the dishonest dealer did reset the computer recently it would read high.

 

[dhanson865]

1. You want to look for the SOH number, which is essentially % capacity, also Ahr is helpful.

2. Battery/powertrain warranty is 7(?)yr/100k mi for things like bad cells or manufacturing defects, but that does not cover capacity. The battery capacity warranty is 5yr/60k mi. The practice has been to replace the battery with a new one, for battery capacity claims, so far, though they are technically going beyond what they have to do.

Thanks for the help, one question:
To get the SOH number (that tells me if the batteries capacity is diminished) does the Leaf need to be at 100% charge?
For example if the dashboard display says it has 52% battery charge and the SOH says it is 48% does that tell me anything or does it need to be 100% charged and then check leafspy to see what the SOH number is?

If SOC is anywhere between 20% and 100% the numbers will be fine. At the bottom end they can get less reliable but I wouldn't worry about SOC%. It's unlikely for a dealer to let a car sit around with a totally discharged pack.

AHr starts out in the 60s, leafspy assumes 66.25 AHr for a new pack. The table below is just collected guesswork from all the threads on this forum about people losing bars. Don't consider it accurate, just something to compare to.

Loss of bar 12 - between 53.75 AHr and 56 AHr
Loss of bar 11 - between 49.75 AHr and 52 AHr
Loss of bar 10 - between 45.75 AHr and 48 AHr
Loss of bar 9 - between 41.75 AHr and 44 AHr

So long as the AHr and SOH% agree I use the SOH% as my easy math number. If you take that first reading on a used car you want to be sure that it hasn't had a BMS reset (showing 12 bars when it's really a 8 bar car). AHr is the one that will stick out as odd if they pulled any sort of fast one on resetting the bars.

So if your AHr is over 50 and your SOH% is in the 80s or 90s then all jives and you can reasonably trust the numbers. If your AHr is in the low 40s and the SOH% is high someone reset it.

A reset car isn't giving you all truthful numbers but that isn't a straight up walk away situation. If the miles and months are inside warranty you can sometimes get a good deal with a worn out battery and get Nissan to replace it later. Just keep in mind that is more work and more risk. If you are willing to do it that can be a smart play. If you don't want the hassle look for a car where the AHr is high enough to match the SOH%.

 

[cwerdna]

1. You want to look for the SOH number, which is essentially % capacity, also Ahr is helpful.

2. Battery/powertrain warranty is 7(?)yr/100k mi for things like bad cells or manufacturing defects, but that does not cover capacity.

Battery defects warranty is 8 years/100K miles. Powertrain/EV system is 5 years/60K miles. Basic warranty is 3 years/36K miles.

Warranty booklet can be downloaded from https://owners.nissanusa.com/nowners/navigation/manualsGuide.

 

[cwerdna]

The SOH does not depend on SOC. It will vary, especially according to time of year, but you can read it at any SOC. It's *possible* that doing a full charge/equalize on the pack first may raise it a little.

I would look at Hx, SOH, AHr and less importantly, # of gids at full charge.

 

[Murf]

Thank you all for the tips

Can you give me some advice. I went and looked at three 2013 Leaf S cars today, I am struggling on what to pick, any advice is welcome.

Car 1: 22k miles, AHr 60.55 SOH 92% Hx 92.92% SOC 89.3% QC 9 L1/L2 1125 GIDs 238 - has Quick charge and reverse camera
Car 2: 19k miles, AHr 61.45 SOH 93% Hx 94.70% SOC 65.9% QC 0 L1/L2 755 GIDs didn't get. No QC or reverse camera
Car 3: 34k miles, AHr 62.80 SOH 96% Hx 96.57% SOC 64.4% QC 16 L1/L2 1237 GIDs didn't get. Has Quick charge and reverse camera.

All cars are around the same price of $10k-10.5k and all were in Seattle area for their entire life according to Carfax.

Initially I was leaning towards Car 1 but the fact that car 3 has 50% more on the odometer but the batteries SOH and AHr is higher has me conflicted between Car 1 and Car 3. Any guidance from the experts on this forum is welcome.

Thank you

 

[cwerdna]

Don't worry about the L1/L2 cycle count. There are bugs where it can increment at least 1 extra "cycle" if using the charging timer.

Also, IIRC, if you even just plug in a CHAdeMO connector w/o starting a session, the the QC count will +1.

For all we know, they weren't intended to be cycle counts for each of these. Or, Nissan knows about these bugs and doesn't care about fixing them. Or, there's some other more accurate count that Turbo3 doesn't know about/isn't printing the value of.

 

[Evoforce]

For me, based on the SOH, AHr numbers/camera/QC I'd pick 3.

 

[bigbearballs]

I'm confused, do I need to do a full charge to compare numbers? If not, what's the scale to look at?

 

[dhanson865]

I'm confused, do I need to do a full charge to compare numbers? If not, what's the scale to look at?

You don't need a full charge to look at AHr, SOH%, or Hx

You only need a full charge to compare max GIDs and really you can ignore GIDs if you have leafspy.

 

[bigbearballs]

I'm confused, do I need to do a full charge to compare numbers? If not, what's the scale to look at?

You don't need a full charge to look at AHr, SOH%, or Hx

You only need a full charge to compare max GIDs and really you can ignore GIDs if you have leafspy.

I'm about to lose a bar huh? This is a 2014 that's been in Texas it's whole life. That's probably the problem.

 

[dhanson865]

I'm about to lose a bar huh?

If you still have the 12th bar it's about to drop, yes. Probably in the next month considering how warm your pack is and that you are in TX.

 

[bigbearballs]

I'm about to lose a bar huh?

If you still have the 12th bar it's about to drop, yes. Probably in the next month considering how warm your pack is and that you are in TX.

Damn, I wish I would have leafspyed it before buying, waa waaaaaa. Now, what are my chances of getting it to under 9 bars by 2019?

 

[Valdemar]

I'm about to lose a bar huh?

If you still have the 12th bar it's about to drop, yes. Probably in the next month considering how warm your pack is and that you are in TX.

Damn, I wish I would have leafspyed it before buying, waa waaaaaa. Now, what are my chances of getting it to under 9 bars by 2019?

Chances are pretty good, especially with appropriate battery "care"

 

[bigbearballs]

If you still have the 12th bar it's about to drop, yes. Probably in the next month considering how warm your pack is and that you are in TX.

Damn, I wish I would have leafspyed it before buying, waa waaaaaa. Now, what are my chances of getting it to under 9 bars by 2019?

Chances are pretty good, especially with appropriate battery "care"

Which would be lots of qc charges, charging to 100% in the sun and letting it sit, anything else?

 

[Valdemar]

Damn, I wish I would have leafspyed it before buying, waa waaaaaa. Now, what are my chances of getting it to under 9 bars by 2019?

Chances are pretty good, especially with appropriate battery "care"

Which would be lots of qc charges, charging to 100% in the sun and letting it sit, anything else?

Have fun driving it fast, if range allows.

 

[Murf]

Thank you all for the tips

Can you give me some advice. I went and looked at three 2013 Leaf S cars today, I am struggling on what to pick, any advice is welcome.

Car 1: 22k miles, AHr 60.55 SOH 92% Hx 92.92% SOC 89.3% QC 9 L1/L2 1125 GIDs 238 - has Quick charge and reverse camera
Car 2: 19k miles, AHr 61.45 SOH 93% Hx 94.70% SOC 65.9% QC 0 L1/L2 755 GIDs didn't get. No QC or reverse camera
Car 3: 34k miles, AHr 62.80 SOH 96% Hx 96.57% SOC 64.4% QC 16 L1/L2 1237 GIDs didn't get. Has Quick charge and reverse camera.

All cars are around the same price of $10k-10.5k and all were in Seattle area for their entire life according to Carfax.

Initially I was leaning towards Car 1 but the fact that car 3 has 50% more on the odometer but the batteries SOH and AHr is higher has me conflicted between Car 1 and Car 3. Any guidance from the experts on this forum is welcome.

Thank you

So I got one recommendation is to go with car 3. Should I choose better leafspy battery numbers over 10k lower mileage?
Is $10k a good deal for a pre certified version?