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jyecook

Member
Joined
Jan 12, 2025
Messages
5
Location
Sydney
Hello all,

I have recently bought a Nissan leaf 2016 - 60,000km from the auctions. The car hasn't been used in over a year. As a result the HV battery is flat and not charging.

I have replaced the 12 V battery.

When I plug it into the charger (slow charger) I get a single beep. No blue lights come on when the charging is switched on. I also towed the car to a fast charger and it still did not charge.

I have scanned the car with OBD 2 and received various codes including 7 codes for P337A, P337B, etc. for cell over-discharged module

I also had C1A62 - Control Module Power Supply, C1A6E - EV/HEV System, C1A70 - Brake Control System, P3178 - ECU Action Error, P3180- High Volatage battery system, P3182 - High Volatage battery system, C1B5B VCM circuit and C118C EV/HEV system.

I have checked all fuses. The 12V battery is also being drained, however, I suspect it is because I left the charger in the car without it charging.

Could anyone please suggest the next steps to take?

Thanks heaps
 
Put the 12V on external charger and keep it fully charged. A good strong battery will be necessary to get thru the troubleshooting.

Are you using leafspy app with the OBD2? Can you get any cell or pack voltage readings with your scan tool? Post up the data if possible.

With a fully charged 12V battery do you hear any relay or contactor noises in the pack when trying to start to READY, or when plugging in to charge?
 
Put the 12V on external charger and keep it fully charged. A good strong battery will be necessary to get thru the troubleshooting.

Are you using leafspy app with the OBD2? Can you get any cell or pack voltage readings with your scan tool? Post up the data if possible.

With a fully charged 12V battery do you hear any relay or contactor noises in the pack when trying to start to READY, or when plugging in to charge?
Thanks for the reply. I have ordered the Leaf Spy OBD2 Bluetooth connector, which should arrive next week.

I have some data.

HV battery level (%) 0.7
HV Batt volt 258.50
Max cell voltage 2920
Min cell voltage 1164 (there are a hand full of cells below 2000)

Yes, when I attempt to start the car I can hear relays clicking.
 
It will never turn on with cells that low. I don't know the procedure to charge when that low. I'd try clearing the codes, making sure all timers are off, and see if it will L1 or L2 charge, If not I suspect a new battery or removing and opening the pack and manually charging to a high enough point the car will charge normally.
 
It will never turn on with cells that low. I don't know the procedure to charge when that low. I'd try clearing the codes, making sure all timers are off, and see if it will L1 or L2 charge, If not I suspect a new battery or removing and opening the pack and manually charging to a high enough point the car will charge normally.
Thanks for the information. The dash is showing that there is 10 bars left.
 

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Have you tried clearing all the DTC's?
Problem may be at that low SOC the cells may be too out of balance to charge correctly or at all.
I read when the Army was playing around with Leafs powering inverters, they ran one so low, Nissan had to change the battery to get it "alive".
You might have a chance, manually charging the modules one at a time with the pack out of the car and opened up.
 
To avoid having to remove the HV battery you can false feed a charge to the HV battery via the HV connections at the front of the battery.

But you would need a good knowledge of working with HV DC & the necessary safety protection.

If you have 240v AC available, when rectified this gives you 336v peak which will slowly re-charge the battery ideally via an isolating transformer.
This should give the HV battery enough charge to bring all cells up to an operable voltage, then re-connect the HV cables & charge in the normal way.

You would also have to frig ( false feed 12v ) to the HV battery contactors via the low voltage connector to the HV battery box.

But try clearing the codes first as Cornbinder advises, it might just charge.
Make sure the 12v is good ideally charging it externally while testing.
 
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Since the main and pre-charge contactors are inside the battery case, that will not work. The HV connector is "dead" until a signal from the car turns them on.
I suppose you could make a remote device to turn on the contactors when the battery is completely disconnected electrically from the car, but you would have to "fool" all the proximity circuits that everything is still plugged in, then send the correct signals to close the contactors.
By the time you have done all that, you might as well remove and open the pack so if it doesn't take a charge or some haven't, you can address that.
 
When I read this, I'm concerned that some of these suggestions are dangerous when performed without the proper tools and safety precautions. Not saying the OP isn't capable...but I'm concerned that he bought the car without any sort of LeafSpy "testing" (knowing that it was "dead"). Any LiOn battery (cells) with readings that low (<2.5v) is likely beyond redemption.
Just don't want anyone to electrocute themselves. :sick:
 
When I read this, I'm concerned that some of these suggestions are dangerous when performed without the proper tools and safety precautions. Not saying the OP isn't capable...but I'm concerned that he bought the car without any sort of LeafSpy "testing" (knowing that it was "dead"). Any LiOn battery (cells) with readings that low (<2.5v) is likely beyond redemption.
Just don't want anyone to electrocute themselves. :sick:
Agreed, if you are going to deal with HV DC then you must equip yourself with the tools and PPE.
I see little point in keeping the battery in place and trying to defeat all the safety system to try and charge as one big battery.
Removing the service disconnect, splits the battery roughly in two, 1/2 the risk.
If I were going to try and revive this dead pack, ideally you want to charge in the smallest configuration as practical. That would be at the module level, however that would be a slow process. Reality would likely to charge at the stack level or somewhere around 24 volts worth of cells.
 
Since the main and pre-charge contactors are inside the battery case, that will not work. The HV connector is "dead" until a signal from the car turns them on.
As I stated in my post, there is a low voltage connector on the HV battery box.

From this connector you can access the main 12v contactor coils inside the HV battery box to activate them.
Would take you just a few minutes.

It's a simple way to TRY to charge the HV battery that I believe has been successful for others, at a minimal cost in time & materials.

A guy on Youtube does a similar thing with a hybrid because the HV battery voltage has become too low to operate the car.
He does access the HV battery to tap into the HV wires which isn't necessary on the Leaf. ( wouldn't want him tapping into my HV wires after seeing the job he does LOL ) ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yccAsXbuw9M
 
I will admit, I haven't looked that close into what would be required, but 1st you were talking about the peak 240 voltage, but are saying you wouldn't bypass all the HV wiring, so just how do you plan to get this 240 volts into the battery?
Are you planning on backfeed into the PDM or are you planning to dis connect the PDM feed and only feed the contactors? Either way I think the cars controls will register a fault and not allow the charger to start.
I don't think it is as simple as you think.
Disconnecting the low voltage multi pin connector, and making a new HV cable with the needed proximity circuit along with another multi pin cable with the needed supply to close the contactors would work, provided you have a constant current charger that can supply high enough voltage, but I am not aware of any.
There are many "handshake" requirement that the car must pass before the charger is turned on a connected to the battery
To be clear, it isn't that the car isn't able to pull in the contactors, and start the charger, it is the protection circuits are preventing it. Closing the contactors by back-feeding or by disconnecting the car connection and providing another supply to close the contacts will not satisfy the rest of the protection circuits and allow charging via the OBC. it also introduces yet another "fault" to the system, contactors and/or contactor supply when the the system is preventing those items
 
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The way I would do it is to disconnect the HV wires from the battery & use that connection for my external DC charger.
That would avoid any " handshake " requirements required to charge via the OBC.

The charger would simply be a 1:1 or ratio that will give approx 250V RMS ( 339V Peak ) on the secondary, isolation transformer of suitable rating, 500VA as I already have one of those.
Connect it via a low rated fuse to a bridge rectifier, then take the pos & neg straight to the HV connections on the HV battery.
Operate the HV contactors via the low voltage multi connector.

Being that the output voltage of the external charger is fairly low compared to the HV battery the current would be low & may take some time to bring the pack voltage up, but i'm sure it would get it to 325V or there abouts eventually.
 
That might work, at least to bring up the cells enough to so the OBC could take over.
However, it would require HV cabling and plug, to complete the proximity function in the battery pack.
so two special connectors some wiring and an isolation transformer, a supply to the contactors.
you can't just un plug and stuff wires into the HV port on the battery, the internal contactor protection will prevent the contactors from closing. It would also be extremely dangerous.
None of this will help address the extreme Delta V on the cells 2920-1164 .
I suspect that for there to be any chance of success of restoring the packs usefulness will require external charging to bring the low cells up to where the pack has a low delta v and the OBC could take over from there. Charging all in series, will not balance the cells at all.
when all is said and done, I don't see forcing things while in the car, productive.
 
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