Range issue with 2012 Leaf SL

Hi,

I own a 2012 Leaf SL. According to my local Nissan dealer, it's one of the last Leaf's produced in Japan before manufacturing moved stateside. My car currently has 42k miles on it with 2 battery capacity bars missing.

I live in Southern California, and yesterday I drove from Palos Verdes to a place a few minutes north of Downtown LA. The total trip was 36.5 miles, and I was driving in Eco mode with no Air conditioning on with no traffic. I thought I would make it without a problem. I did have my lights on.

I barely made it with 1 bar remaining. It was a very anxiety inducing experience...

Is this normal? I thought I'd get much more range out of my Leaf. I had a similar problem a year ago, but my Nissan dealer inspected everything and told me the battery was fine. I'm posting on this forum in hopes of getting a second opinion.

Thanks.

malevich said:

My car currently has 42k miles on it with 2 battery capacity bars missing.

I live in Southern California, and yesterday I drove from Palos Verdes to a place a few minutes north of Downtown LA. The total trip was 36.5 miles, and I was driving in Eco mode with no Air conditioning on with no traffic. I thought I would make it without a problem. I did have my lights on.

I barely made it with 1 bar remaining. It was a very anxiety inducing experience...

Click to expand...

Lights don't matter. AC isn't much. Eco mode isn't much different.

Not enough information on this key point: How fast were you driving? If you were driving fast enough, it would explain it. Light traffic seems to imply fast driving.

You had about 10 miles (16 km) left at 70 MPH (113 kmh) at Low Battery Warning, and this doesn't change as the battery ages. And 20 miles (32 km) at 40 MPH (64kmh). If you are close, this should reduce the anxiety.

"battery was fine" means, it's not broken and they are not every going to refer to the capacity.

Did you see the Miles per KWh reading? most of us get 4. If your journey needed more, thus making the number lower, then that would be the issue. It's not miles you are getting it's KWhs from it.

You'd have to reset the KWh reading by pressing the button that looks like it has a dot on it and your KWh average will reset and read from what you are doing there on. I have a habit of doing it every day so I keep up the best Hyper miling skills current.

Totally insufficient info.

Please answer the questions at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=275421#p275421 here.

If you have nothing to read battery gids, then you should get Leaf Spy and a compatible OBD2 dongle instead of depending on the crap instrumentation in the '11 and '12 Leafs.

cwerdna said:

you should get Leaf Spy and a compatible OBD2 dongle instead of depending on the crap instrumentation in the '11 and '12 Leafs.

Click to expand...

Seems to me that LeafSpy gets its data from that very same "crap instrumentation"; it only provides better/different display formatting.

Levenkay said:

cwerdna said:

you should get Leaf Spy and a compatible OBD2 dongle instead of depending on the crap instrumentation in the '11 and '12 Leafs.

Click to expand...

Seems to me that LeafSpy gets its data from that very same "crap instrumentation"; it only provides better/different display formatting.

Click to expand...

Well, the GOM is crap and the '11 and '12 Leaf have no % state of charge display. You can't tell if you're at the beginning, middle or top of a bar. The LBW and VLBW warnings + rapidly dropping and varying GOM can cause unnecessary range anxiety, esp. when the GOM goes to - - -.

You can't tell the GOM, if I want to make it x miles, how many miles/kWh do I need to achieve in order to make it? At least you can w/Leaf Spy. And, the gid numbers gives you FAR more granularity than the 12 fuel bars.

Also, some people look at the imbalance amount to determine how close to dead they are. IIRC, Turbo3 (when I spoke to him in person) said that when you're near dead, the imbalances grow into the hundreds of mV. '11 and '12 instrumentation don't help w/that at all.

And w/the Leaf's displays/instrumentation visible to the user, you have no idea how close you are to losing another capacity bar and have little idea about the battery's temp due to the huge overlapping ranges and black box adjustments it makes: http://www.electricvehiclewiki.com/Battery#Battery_Temperature_Gauge.

malevich said:

Hi,

I own a 2012 Leaf SL. According to my local Nissan dealer, it's one of the last Leaf's produced in Japan before manufacturing moved stateside. My car currently has 42k miles on it with 2 battery capacity bars missing.

I live in Southern California, and yesterday I drove from Palos Verdes to a place a few minutes north of Downtown LA. The total trip was 36.5 miles, and I was driving in Eco mode with no Air conditioning on with no traffic. I thought I would make it without a problem. I did have my lights on.

I barely made it with 1 bar remaining. It was a very anxiety inducing experience...

Is this normal? I thought I'd get much more range out of my Leaf. I had a similar problem a year ago, but my Nissan dealer inspected everything and told me the battery was fine. I'm posting on this forum in hopes of getting a second opinion.

Thanks.

Click to expand...

As others have said, we need more information. I have a '12 SL missing 2 bars and I can regularly get 60+ miles on a full charge(92%) driving mostly freeway(65-70mph on the flat, somewhat in the draft of a semi if possible). Now if your regularly going over 70(or say driving 60 against a 20 mph wind which is almost like driving 80) that would also help explain things. I've found a strong headwind makes a big difference in range, again basically add your headwind to your travel speed to get your effective mph. Large hills or a mountain also makes a difference but I'm sure if you had such conditions you would have mentioned it.
I'd also suggest getting something like Leafspy, without it or something similar your simply guessing, which I really didn't like before I got it. I really like the SOC% display, if I get 1/2 way on my trip and I've used less than 50% of the charge I started with I'm happy, going off the bars or GOM is difficult if not useless IMO.

jjeff said:

t getting something like Leafspy, without it or something similar your simply guessing, which I really didn't like before I got it. I really like the SOC% display, if I get 1/2 way on my trip and I've used less than 50% of the charge I started with I'm happy, going off the bars or GOM is difficult if not useless IMO.

Click to expand...

Bars is far better than GOM.

SOC% is far better still.

If you get the LBW, set the trip meter. You have the same amount of charge below LBW regardless of battery capacity.

16 km at 110 km h, 32 km at 60 km h.

10 miles at 70 MPH, 20 miles at 40 MPH. Less if uphill, etc.

malevich said:

I was driving in Eco mode with no Air conditioning on with no traffic. I thought I would make it without a problem. I did have my lights on.

Click to expand...

As others have said, ECO mode makes no difference when you are traveling at highway speeds, except to limit power to the A/C, which you weren't using, and the headlights make no measurable difference. Your speed and headwinds make the biggest difference.
How long ago did you lose your second bar? If you are close to losing your 3rd bar, that would mean you have lost 27% of your battery capacity, which should still get you at least 50 miles. Do you know any other Leaf owners who might have LeafSpy to test your actual capacity?
The dealer battery checkup doesn't test capacity, it just examines your driving and charging habits, and could possibly point out the failure of individual cells. But, in 99% of the cases the battery degradation is fairly uniform across all cells, so it is not covered under the factory warranty. Unless you lose 4 bars by 5 years/60,000 miles, Nissan is going to insist that your battery is just fine. Do you know your in-service date, when the 5 year countdown started?