I am losing more bars than usual

I reached 3000 miles yesterday exactly in 3 months. I had been driving it most of the times but the past 10 days my wife had been driving it and she drives a bit more aggressive than usual. I used to average 4.6mi/kwH and it dropped to 4.5 mi/kwH.

I started driving the Leaf again last week and what I am noticing is that my 3rd SOC bar seems to be going much sooner than usual. I used to drive 25 miles one way to work by using just 4 bars but now I am tending to go into my 5th bar. Not sure if any of the battery modules has gone defective or its just because of the change in driving habit between my wife and I.

Today I charged to 80% and my 1st bar (3rd) went in less than 3 miles. I will monitory again tomorrow ans for another week but wanted to check if anyone else with 3000 miles is noticing anything like this?

Do I take it to dealer to get it checked?

csriram45 said:

I reached 3000 miles yesterday exactly in 3 months. I had been driving it most of the times but the past 10 days my wife had been driving it and she drives a bit more aggressive than usual. I used to average 4.6mi/kwH and it dropped to 4.5 mi/kwH.

I started driving the Leaf again last week and what I am noticing is that my 3rd SOC bar seems to be going much sooner than usual. I used to drive 25 miles one way to work by using just 4 bars but now I am tending to go into my 5th bar. Not sure if any of the battery modules has gone defective or its just because of the change in driving habit between my wife and I.

Today I charged to 80% and my 1st bar (3rd) went in less than 3 miles. I will monitory again tomorrow ans for another week but wanted to check if anyone else with 3000 miles is noticing anything like this?

Do I take it to dealer to get it checked?

Click to expand...

I don't see anything that would make me too nervous here. Does the same driving drop the range far more than it used to? If you reset the economy gauge and take fresh readings, are they similar to what you used to get, or not? I have a car with 3,600 miles, and I haven't seen any change at all in economy, range, etc.

I think I normally see the top charge bar at 80% charge disappear after 2-3 miles. That's normal. Also, if you drive your car on the freeway, or loan it to a more aggressive driver, you'll see the projected range drop for the next 100 miles or so (of course the real range will not change). But if it's been a while since your wife drove it, you shouldn't see much difference even in projected range; of course it goes without saying, your wife couldn't actually reduce the battery's ability to hold charge, etc. ;-)

I definitely wouldn't take it into the dealer without something more concrete than you've mentioned in your posting so far.

- Bob

I am at 2500 and I gave up trying to determine why one day it takes me 2 bars to get to work and other days 3-4 bars. There are a lot of variables that come into play even for daily routes, sitting at lights, more/less stops or temperature outside. It's impossible to copy exact behavior for our daily commutes to be able to make some conclusion. Dealers can do battery check, so it's your best bet, but to me it sounds normal.

Yeah even I am trying not to read too much into it but figured I could just write and see. The reason I got concerned was that this is my daily commute and over 2 months it has been consistent 4 bars and only this week it's become 5. I think one of the other factors is that the weather has warmed up compared to previous months although I thought that should help the battery. It's not super hot but just warmer.

I will monitor and watch and update. Thx for the responses.

I have 4500 miles on my LEAF and charge twice a day to 100%. I've noticed that I get more miles per bar (6 to 7 miles) now on my first and second bar , but usually get about only 5 to 6 on my third bar. I also noticed that when I pre-cool in the afternoon, I get more miles off of my first and second bar (7-8 miles per bar, with 8 miles/bar happening quite a bit).

csriram45 said:

I reached 3000 miles yesterday exactly in 3 months. I had been driving it most of the times but the past 10 days my wife had been driving it and she drives a bit more aggressive than usual. I used to average 4.6mi/kwH and it dropped to 4.5 mi/kwH.

I started driving the Leaf again last week and what I am noticing is that my 3rd SOC bar seems to be going much sooner than usual. I used to drive 25 miles one way to work by using just 4 bars but now I am tending to go into my 5th bar. Not sure if any of the battery modules has gone defective or its just because of the change in driving habit between my wife and I.

Today I charged to 80% and my 1st bar (3rd) went in less than 3 miles. I will monitory again tomorrow and for another week but wanted to check if anyone else with 3000 miles is noticing anything like this?

Do I take it to dealer to get it checked?

Click to expand...

I am having the exact same thing and I am at about the same number of miles. I was out of town last week and my wife drove the Leaf all week while I was gone. I checked Carwings and my wife scored some really really low Kw/mile (~2-3). She assured me she kept it under 75mph (speed limit out here is 70mph on tollway and interstate). Suffice to say the first couple days this week when I drove I noticed the same thing. After a couple chage/discharge cycles and my normal slower driving things seem back to normal. I would love to know what happened though and why.

csriram45 said:

Yeah even I am trying not to read too much into it but figured I could just write and see. The reason I got concerned was that this is my daily commute and over 2 months it has been consistent 4 bars and only this week it's become 5. I think one of the other factors is that the weather has warmed up compared to previous months although I thought that should help the battery. It's not super hot but just warmer.

I will monitor and watch and update. Thx for the responses.

Click to expand...

Check your tire pressure. It sounds basic but it can make a difference.

It's definitely normal to only get 2-3 miles from your third bar at 80% charge. The SOC bars aren't linear.

LEAFfan said:

It's definitely normal to only get 2-3 miles from your third bar at 80% charge. The SOC bars aren't linear.

Click to expand...

At 80% charge, the third bar is not "full". You'd have to charge above 80% to max out the third bar.

Ok the 80% charge meaning the third bar is not full seems to make sense. Today I drove very conservatively (under 60 miles/hr) on freeway and was able to make it to work in 4 bars and came back also in 4 bars. My miles/kwH also went back up to 4.6 today.

Tire pressure is a good catch. I will also know better as tomorrow I will charge to 100% (fridays) and so would know much more I get out of the car.

It could also be wind. Same route, same temp, same driving speed is all fine and dandy. None of us see the wind. It could be just breeze in the wrong direction. I use cruise control so I don't know if the car has to work harder at any given time.

In fact, just yesterday: I normally arrive at work (41 miles) with anywhere between 42-45 miles left (5 bars). I charge to 65-70 at work and make it home with 5-7 remining (same distance). Yesterday I arrived with 52. Whoa! I charged to 70 and on the way back the bars started to disappear faster than usual. I was supposed to arrive home with 7 miles left, arrived with 3. Crazy! No idea why. So there...

So the friday drive and the drive yesterday seemed to be normal. so I guess it was just an adjustment issue and the driving style and habit. I probably was driving the LEAF a bit more like my usual ICE car compared to driving a bit more conservatively which I was doing before. . I still have the stupid Phone issue that I talked about in the other thread.

How often do you charge to 100%? If you have not gone to 100% in a while I would try that and see.

I charge to 100% all the time and I see something similar--after a weekend of running errands, the commute seems to take more bars. By the end of the week things approach normal. I have 3600 miles. I use 4 bars to go the 30.7 miles to work each morning, but some days it's 5. Overall I'm averaging 7 miles/bar but that fluctuates a lot. I haven't worried too much about it up to now but I'll definitely take it in at 7500 miles (or 6 months) and have them do a battery check. There may be a module that shows some erratic behavior, but who knows?

ILETRIC said:

It could also be wind.

Click to expand...

Ah, the wind! Why didn't I think of that. Yesterday I made an extremely long trip from Antioch to south of San Jose, and reported the very stressful results on another thread last night. I was getting five miles per bar when I thought I should be getting closer to seven. The problem mysteriously went away after the first thirty miles I traveled.

The Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers feed into Suisun Bay near Antioch, and that is the only break in the coastal range that shields the 450 mile long Central Valley. The wind roars up through Suisun Bay and the Delta most of the time, and I was fighting it. Thanks for helping solve a mystery.

Ray

so so it isnt just me that seems to wonder this and my car is also hitting about 3500 miles. The 4 - 5 bar is on and off and I think it also depends on how I drive... I would still want them to give it a check when I reach my 7500 mile check...

csriram45 said:

so so it isnt just me that seems to wonder this and my car is also hitting about 3500 miles. The 4 - 5 bar is on and off and I think it also depends on how I drive... I would still want them to give it a check when I reach my 7500 mile check...

Click to expand...

Come to the SF BayLEAFs meeting on August 13 and bring this up during the open Q&A session. Let's see if others in the area are experiencing the same. And, if you like, we can do the horn upgrade

Actually, I have finally figured out why I was losing bars. Wind may not be the factor after all. It's the cabin temp management. I used to set it between 63 and 60. And one night just hit me...

If the outside temp is 56 (Norcal) and I set AC at 63? I'm using the damn heat. That's what it is! Car is pulling in 56 degree air, it HAS to warm it up if it's set for 63, does it not?

So from now on it's 60 only no matter what, and on "off" if possible. I'd like to know from Nissan at which point the heater is NOT heating the air that comes in. If anyone knows, please post.

The problem I have is that the window fogs up quite readily, so I have to use AC (now at 60) to clean it up every few minutes, and the AC on-off goes on for a good half hour until it seems to settle down and window stops fogging up so much. My old car would go at least 15 minutes before I had to defog it, this one is every 3-5 minutes. I wonder if everyone has the same experience in cool weather, nighttime driving.

seems they need some options on climate control that allow auto but prevent/lockout heat if you desire

during winter damp weather I can see setting climate to 60 auto so that heat is run and maybe a/c dehumidifies (hit of both heat and a/c comp must be alot)

It happened again today and it was odd. I charged the Leaf to 80%. I drove about 0.9 miles and stopped to go to a store. Came back and I lost a bar!!!!! Typically at 80% I lose the first bar after 3.5 miles so losing at 0.9 miles is very odd.... any ideas? may be the car did not pack as much charge as it normally does?