Battery swap with evsenhanced's tool

I have successfully performed a pack swap on my 2011 Leaf. Local Nissan dealership refused to swap the packs.

I have two 2011 Leafs:
SL with minor rust, quarter panel damage, and cloth seats.
SV in pristine shape, leather seats, but a bad battery.

I'm transplanting the backup camera, solar spoiler, and battery to the SV. I don't need the QC Port (only 3 stations nearby and they're usually broken anyway).

My mechanic did the actual pack swap ( I had neither the lift nor the dollies to move the batteries around, so it was way easier to just pay him). I activated the battery using evsenhanced's HV pairing tool. It worked like a charm.

If anyone is interested in doing a pack swap in the US, feel free to message me. I would be more than happy to talk about my (very positive) experience with the tool. At this time, it only does same capacity swaps--no upgrades.

I spent the rest of the weekend learning how to remove trim panels and swapping the backup camera. Someone posted it took them an hour. It took me 8... And then I found that my car doesn't have the right driver's side floor harness, so I have more work to do. :sigh:. But the empowerment of working on your own car is amazing.

The best part is my range has nearly tripled and I have regenerative brakes. It's like a totally different car. The range indicator is far more accurate and we took the car on an outing the other evening that we couldn't have made with the old battery. Got home with tons of miles to spare.

On a side note, if anyone's looking for a mechanically sound 7 bar 2011 in the KC area, I'll have one for sale soon.

I have two 2011 Leafs:
SL with minor rust, quarter panel damage, and cloth seats.
SV in pristine shape, leather seats, but a bad battery.

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AFAIK there has never been an SV with leather seats. Someone probably swapped them from an SL, or they may be aftermarket or recovered...

Katzkin aftermarket by first owner. Leather wasn't an option in 2011.

It's done really well... The doors and center console are all done up... Not just the seats. If you didn't know better you'd think it was stock.

I actually had a Nissan dealership tell me my car was an SL because of it.

Well done, and thanks for sharing.
I'm glad to hear that the tool worked. How much did it cost ?

Could you have put in any 24 kWh pack ? I imagine the 'good' 2011 battery also has a fair amount of aging.

SageBrush said:

Well done, and thanks for sharing.
I'm glad to hear that the tool worked. How much did it cost ?

Could you have put in any 24 kWh pack ? I imagine the 'good' 2011 battery also has a fair amount of aging.

Click to expand...

I rented the tool from someone in Kentucky (if you need contact info, PM me). I've encouraged him to post to this forum. Renting the tool wasn't very expensive. Compared to the cost of a brand new battery from Nissan, this whole project was a steal.

I believe any 24 kWh pack would work, but am not sure. I did a like MY transfer to be sure. The "good" 2011 battery is at 87% SOH (the car I recently bought from seanhanley on MNL. More than double the range of my 57% SOH "bad" pack, as there appears to be less internal resistance and the increased regen braking makes a huge difference.

One big thing is the old 24 kWh packs have different rear brackets and rear covers than the new packs. If you bought just the battery, you would also need the rear covers and rear brackets. Since I had a complete car, this was a non-issue--the mechanic swapped all brackets and covers necessary.

2019-10-24 Note: Edited to fix location of tool rental

Lothsahn said:

SageBrush said:

Well done, and thanks for sharing.
I'm glad to hear that the tool worked. How much did it cost ?

Could you have put in any 24 kWh pack ? I imagine the 'good' 2011 battery also has a fair amount of aging.

Click to expand...

I rented the tool from someone in Arkansas (if you need contact info, PM me). I've encouraged him to post to this forum. Renting the tool wasn't very expensive. Compared to the cost of a brand new battery from Nissan, this whole project was a steal.

I believe any 24 kWh pack would work, but am not sure. I did a like MY transfer to be sure. The "good" 2011 battery is at 87% SOH (the car I recently bought from seanhanley on MNL. More than double the range of my 57% SOH "bad" pack, as there appears to be less internal resistance and the increased regen braking makes a huge difference.

One big thing is the old 24 kWh packs have different rear brackets and rear covers than the new packs. If you bought just the battery, you would also need the rear covers and rear brackets. Since I had a complete car, this was a non-issue--the mechanic swapped all brackets and covers necessary.

Click to expand...

Really good info -- thanks!

I forgot that you bought SeanHanley's car. That explains a lot. It also means (I think) that the tool worked to install a 2016 battery into a 2011 model. Sean's car had a warranty replacement battery. How was the different brackets and covers resolved ?

This is great news..... It is the beginning of a whole generation of cars that can be kept for decades, like the original VW Beetle...

SageBrush said:

Really good info -- thanks!

I forgot that you bought SeanHanley's car. That explains a lot. It also means (I think) that the tool worked to install a 2016 battery into a 2011 model. Sean's car had a warranty replacement battery. How was the different brackets and covers resolved ?

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Nissan uses compatible LBC's and paneling when doing a warranty or paid battery replacement. I believe, but am not sure that the paneling just follows the battery model year (e.g. a 2011 battery uses one type of paneling while a 2016+ battery uses a different set of paneling), but there may be compatibility issues with the car model year as well. I honestly don't know. But it definitely all works if Nissan mounted it to a car and you're using the same MY.

The mechanic simply swapped all of the brackets along with the battery. Since the battery was designed for a 2011, no issues!

How can iget the pairing tool

Now I would recommend buying a CAN-bridge, which wasn't really available back when this guy was renting the "pairing tool" (which can't do a battery pack capacity upgrade). There are many threads about "battery swaps/upgrades" to read, and a guy named Dala has a lot of good videos you should watch (and sells the CAN-bridge) if you are going to DIY.

You don't need a special tool any more, thanks to Dala, when doing like battery swaps. You can do it just with LeafSpy:

https://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=44&p=612770#p612758

alozzy said:

You don't need a special tool any more, thanks to Dala, when doing like battery swaps. You can do it just with LeafSpy:

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Yes 100% correct
I swapped a battery over last week and used "Leaf Spy Pro" and worked well

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.Turbo3.Leaf_Spy_Pro&hl=en_NZ&gl=US

The only hard part was the leaf spy menu system
Had to work out how to turn on the error codes
And know what one to clear