I saw this on Google News, "We Drive A 2020 Nissan LEAF SL Plus At A Constant 70 MPH To Test Its Range

https://insideevs.com/reviews/420126/nissan-leaf-plus-highway-range-test-video/

I do appreciate these tests.

Car was run with tires at 36psi, but conditions were pretty favorable. AC was on, so you could maybe chalk up 6-8 or so miles over the 2 1/2 hours of driving. Also, he didn't drive into the reserve, so you could add another 15 miles of potential range if it was driven to turtle. Guessing he hit low, but not very low battery in the test.

I also like that it was only a 11 minute video, so he handled the content in a nice condensed format.

DougWantsALeaf said:

I do appreciate these tests.

Car was run with tires at 36psi, but conditions were pretty favorable. AC was on, so you could maybe chalk up 6-8 or so miles over the 2 1/2 hours of driving. Also, he didn't drive into the reserve, so you could add another 15 miles of potential range if it was driven to turtle. Guessing he hit low, but not very low battery in the test.

I also like that it was only a 11 minute video, so he handled the content in a nice condensed format.

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People actually run their tires at 36 psi though?

"We noticed that they did heat up to 38 psi while we were driving".

I inflate my car's tires to whatever their door sticker recommends.

Bouldergramp said:

"We noticed that they did heat up to 38 psi while we were driving".

I inflate my car's tires to whatever their door sticker recommends.

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Regardless. What they heat up to while driving is irrelevant. Tires are inflated cold.

Toyota has a long history of suggesting too low inflation pressures in order to give their cars a softer ride. They aren't alone. I don't know what Nissan suggests for other models, but 36psi is both too low for best range and handling, and too low to leave a safety margin for those who don't regularly check tire pressures - which is most people.

My continued opinion is that as the Leaf Plus and M3 SR+ both use the same tire model, they should be at the same PSI for the test.

The 3.4 miles per kilowatt hour felt a little low for his test, so going to run my own in a couple days and compare. Admittedly, between tires, minimal pro-pilot, minimal climate, and nearly full use of reserve those might get up up .3-.4, which is where I expect to get.

What tire pressure do you guys think provides the best combination of efficiency, ride comfort, tire performance, tire life and handling...for the 17" wheel?

I'm running 37 psi cold right now.

42 Cold ... 46 Hot

Learjet said:

What tire pressure do you guys think provides the best combination of efficiency, ride comfort, tire performance, tire life and handling...for the 17" wheel?

I'm running 37 psi cold right now.

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I run my tires at max PSI or a pound below. My current Ecopias are 44PSI max and that's about what I run them at, measured cold. The fronts especially wear better at max, below and the inside/outsides tend to wear quite quickly.

40-42psi is a very good compromise between efficiency, wear, and ride. 38psi works fine if ride is the #1 consideration.

Not comfortable running any tire at max. Nor too low.

We run the stock Michelin Energy Savers at 40 psi cold.

We will upgrade to tires with a higher max pressure rating before going higher.

What tires are rated to higher max pressure?

Why are we locked into talking about tire pressure??

The issue is the range test video... My reaction is that the test was impressive, even though it was flawed.

I drive at 70mph when I forget to unplug my car and mistakenly charge to 100%. Then I drive up and down my local highway at 70mph to quickly drain down my battery to 75-80%.

While driving at 70mph, I use almost double the energy that I use at 55mph.

SO - I think this man's test could have easily reached over 220 miles of range.

I do like the 70 MPH trials, as that's a normal driving speed for cross country trips, so it is important to understand the range at that speed.

My comment about tires, is that if we are comparing against Tesla or the Bolt, the tire pressure should be consistent.

Running a tire pressure lower than 40 psi runs the risk of excessive wear on the outside edges of the tire and poor cornering due to excessive rolling of the tire. Nissan used 36 psi to soften the ride at the expense of tire wear. 40-42 psi seems to be the sweet spot.

johnlocke said:

Running a tire pressure lower than 40 psi runs the risk of excessive wear on the outside edges of the tire and poor cornering due to excessive rolling of the tire. Nissan used 36 psi to soften the ride at the expense of tire wear. 40-42 psi seems to be the sweet spot.

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I don't strongly disagree, but I ran my 2018 with 38psi for the first Summer, with no issues. At the first tire swap I raised it to 42, letting it drop to 40. I didn't do much hard cornering, though.

I was running worn out ecopias at 42 to 44 and didn't really notice losing any range going to energy savers at 38 psi.
The energy savers are wearing good at that pressure.

Learjet said:

What tire pressure do you guys think provides the best combination of efficiency, ride comfort, tire performance, tire life and handling...for the 17" wheel?

I'm running 37 psi cold right now.

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I keep mine at 39.5 cold. I used to keep all my cars around 41-42 but the mileage/wear tradeoff wasn't worth the ride stiffness & long term impact on the overall suspension degradation. I also don't take corners aggressively that much anymore & see very uniform wear with 5k tore rotations.

Still riding on stock 17" Michelin Energy Savers

DougWantsALeaf said:

What tires are rated to higher max pressure?

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Some brands use a if memory serves me a different sidewall composition & those tires have a 51psi max inflation pressure.

My recollection isn't that the higher sidewall pressure is better just rather the sidewall is thicker or stronger so that allows for a higher pressure but that same sidewall also has lower compliance so the ride is less comfortable especially at max pressure.