Range and heat activation Issues

[TimLee]

...
But as Ghosn said, 'it is not a car for the long journeys'. You and I might do a commute of almost the entire range of the battery, but for every one of us there are dozens who only drive 5 miles, and the car is targeted at them not us. The rather strange and curious dichotomy there, though, is that if you are not commuting 50 miles a day, then the extra purchase cost will never pay back on a 5 mile a day commute by ICE. Funny little gotcha that one, isn't it!?
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And the low miles per year LEAF driver also takes a more severe cost per mile penalty on battery capacity degradation because a significant portion is based on time.
Degrades whether you drive it or not.

Low miles per year drivers always have higher costs even in an ICE because valuation of vehicles decline with time.
But the LEAF driver also has the range declining with time too.

Total cost of ownership is more competitive with ICE if driven 12,000 to 15,000 miles per year. But for many that drive that many miles per year the range is problematic A small sweet spot.

[cwerdna]

Ok, how long before "actual" heat comes out of the vents (with the 2013)?

Between 10 seconds and about 90 seconds, depending on the outside temp and whether the car was used recently or not.

Yep. As I've posted at least a few times before, w/my '13 Leaf SV, by the time I've backed out of my garage to the driveway, I feel warm air coming out of the vents. This is with the car sitting in the garage overnight and me NOT preheating at all.

This sounds like a HUGE improvement over the crap resistance heater in the '11-'12 Leafs.

[donald]

Hmmm.. that might not actually be true. The thing is, when it is cold, everything else is cold too. You are radiating IR and nothing else is radiating IR back. This really counts as a Big Effect. It is not that the air is cold, but everything else around you is making you feel cold, and that stuff needs to get a bit warmer first before the air win!

Its very true. I lived it the entire Winter and it really sucks. The heat should just come on in 1-2 mins.

Well, you can do the experiment as I have done, if you like, and see what you think. Instead of warming the heating system up, use a fan heater to warm the car interior up. Then sit in it and start up the heater. I am convinced you will find it will appear to then 'warm up' on the same time-scale as you would have expected, at least apparently much quicker than had you not pre-heated the car with the fan heater.

The thing is, without the car's interior radiating IR back to you, the physical motion of the air may feel more 'cooling' than it is actually contributing heat. It is a known effect. It's why you have to set the heater to a higher level in winter in an ICE, because you are not benefitting from re-radiated IR.

Don't take anyone's word for it when you can test it yourself!!