petewc and knightmb,
It's obvious from the discussion in this thread that the unpredictable, random behaviour of the e-pedal mode is not present in all Leafs. In some Leafs, this system works reliably every time. In others, it is unreliable and downright dangerous.
petewc, the engineer who looked into this issue in my Leaf acknowledged that there IS an issue and that he was aware of this behaviour in Leafs of all production years since Nissan began employing the e-pedal technique in power regen. So, some Leaf owners have never experienced this issue. I also thought that the engineer's explanation was BS at first, but the more he got into the details of what the on-board computer does in order to decide how to engage e-pedal operation, the more I realized how hit-and-miss this design must be. And he did say, too, that the design engineers of this system and the software governing it need to re-think, re-design, and/or re-program this whole complex system before we, consumers, have no issues with the e-pedal mode. All of us who experience e-pedal issues have to continue to "bug" Nissan -- let them know we're not happy.
knightmb, supposedly, according to Nissan marketing, letting go the accelerator automatically engages maximum regen. When this system works as intended, it's beautiful, it gives the driver a feeling of satisfaction, and it can help extend the range of the Leaf. Everyone who has driven their Leaf with e-pedal on has had a learning curve (an un-learning curve?) in judging the distance needed for the car to come to e complete stop in various road conditions since this is vastly different from how friction brakes bring a car to a complete stop. (It took me the better part of a year to figure this out driving in snow, ice, rain, heat, flat road, inclines, bumpy roads, with ECO mode on and off, etc.). It was quite upsetting to me when I first realized that e-pedal was "misbehaving", as I'm sure it was for every other Leaf owner who has had this trouble. You may need to spend a considerable amount of time driving your (wife's) Leaf in order to know how e-pedal mode works and if it works as it should.