What are my option to upgrade 24kwh battery on Leaf 2015

[ybiyani]

Currently, I can do 60 miles on the B-mode but in winters it will probably go down to 40 miles and in a few years the battery will degrade to.

What are my options?

[Calaveras]

I am in the same situation as you. I have a 50 mile round trip commute.
I wish there were good answers out there, but there are not at this time.

There are a bunch of talk about 3rd party replacement, but they are unicorns. I wish they were real, but until they are doing 5 a month in 5 cities, it is just not ready for prime time.

I expect to use the car until the day I am in Turtle to get home in the summer. I home to get 3-4 more years? . At that point I sell it to someone with a 10 mile commute who can use it for 3 more years. At that point it is 10 years old with 100k miles.

[powersurge]

My 2015 still has 12 bars, so I am not looking for a new battery at this time. However, I will still strongly consider spending the full amount for the Nissan battery replacement when I do need a new battery. I have done the math many times and I still get the same result...

Scenario 1) When you need a new battery, the car will be worth little... (maybe $4-5K, or less). If you put in an $8,000 battery, you will have an electric car that will last another 80-100K miles... It is your dependable, well known vehicle that you will continue to live with with minor complications. (Total car value=$12,000, which ). ***If for some reason you need to junk the car, you can still sell the "almost new" battery, and recoup some of the the price of the battery. No matter what happens, you gamble that you will try to enjoy the total lifespan of the car, and you have that satisfaction.

Scenario 2) If you sell the old Leaf, and bought another used Leaf, say for $8-10K, you will get an unknown car, need to make unexpected repairs, and be back in the position of needing a new battery relatively soon. At that point you are into the car for the price of the car (e.g., $9,000) PLUS needing an $8,000 battery ($17,000) NO GOOD.

Scenario 3) If you buy a New Leaf, you will not be satisfied with a standard 40 KWH Leaf, but the nice, top of the line E+ SL (for $45,000). Then, you will have a nice $300+ per month finance charge for 6 years, higher insurance costs with collision, and a rapidly depreciating asset (again, like your old leaf). NO GOOD. PS - I refuse to pay $45k for a Econobox size car...

SO, for me, Spending $8,000 on a new replacement battery, is like paying off my car loan (at $300 per month) for only 2 extra years. Then you are broken even, have experienced NO DEPRECIATION, and gotten to keep you old faithful Leaf....

[Tortoisehead77]

Scenario 3) If you buy a New Leaf, you will not be satisfied with a standard 40 KWH Leaf, but the nice, top of the line E+ SL (for $45,000). Then, you will have a nice $300+ per month finance charge for 6 years, higher insurance costs with collision, and a rapidly depreciating asset (again, like your old leaf). NO GOOD. PS - I refuse to pay $45k for a Econobox size car...

Nobody is paying $45k for a new Leaf.

[Lothsahn]

I would not worry about the future. Let the future worry about itself.

There are 4 teams working on battery upgrades that I know of: Dala, Véhicules Électrique Simon André in Quebec, CA, Fenix Power, and evsenhanced in NZ. Progress is steadily beig made, and stuff is getting better. Current solutions sometimes result in unexpected turtle and other conditions, and are limited on which model years are supported.

What options you have today may be totally different when you want to replace your battery. When that time comes, make your decision.

Unless you're in an extremely hot area, have some weird failure, or your range needs are nearly the limit of your 2015, your 2015 battery should last for a long, long time (8-15 years), which makes your decision a 2023 problem at earliest. That's 4 years away, and I fully expect the battery landscape to be totally different at that time.

That said, if your range is starting to be a problem now, you may need to make a faster decision. Your options are a different car or talking to the place in Quebec. I think they've only one one swap so far, and it's unclear what bugs, if any, exist in that swap. It's an aftermarket option, so some experience and testing would be really welcome before doing that, unless you're an early adopter and OK with risk.

[Oilpan4]

I was just going to put in a used 40kwh battery for a lot cheaper than new.

[Dooglas]

SO, for me, Spending $8,000 on a new replacement battery, is like paying off my car loan (at $300 per month) for only 2 extra years. Then you are broken even, have experienced NO DEPRECIATION, and gotten to keep you old faithful Leaf....

I'm with you. When the time comes that I would actually need a new battery and my Leaf is still in excellent condition, I'd just bite the bullet and replace the battery. Now, with luck there will be other options including Nissan (or someone else) implementing a rehabbed battery option in the US. If so, that may be an even better choice.

[alozzy]

I'll be surprised if Nissan still has any inventory of 24kWh packs for this purpose. So, I'm hoping that by the time I would need a battery replacement that a 30 or a 40 kWh pack would be installed by Nissan. Failing that, I'd consider third party options but only at a lower price point.

[Oilpan4]

Third party installers are already putting used 30kwh and 40kwh packs in 24kwh cars and having the range read correctly.
As far as I know no one has put a 62kwh pack in a lesser car. But that's only a matter of time.

40kwh cells can be stuffed into a 24kwh case.
Giving your car more range but it will confuse your car, it also renders the gom a little more useless.
30kwh is pretty close to 24kwh so there isn't a huge difference in range or gom perpetual error.

To me a drop in 40kwh battery plug and play adaptor really isn't worth much more than a 1,000 dollars. Since I can repack my old 24kwh pack with 40kwh modules and learn to deal with the way off gom and the car trying to understand why the SOH is always maxed out at 103.75%.

[powersurge]

SO, for me, Spending $8,000 on a new replacement battery, is like paying off my car loan (at $300 per month) for only 2 extra years. Then you are broken even, have experienced NO DEPRECIATION, and gotten to keep you old faithful Leaf....

I'm with you. When the time comes that I would actually need a new battery and my Leaf is still in excellent condition, I'd just bite the bullet and replace the battery. Now, with luck there will be other options including Nissan (or someone else) implementing a rehabbed battery option in the US. If so, that may be an even better choice.

Yes, if you think that your good car (at the time) will be ready to serve you for another 8-10 years (with no gasoline costs) for that price. That is a good deal in my book. If God forbid, you need to junk the car, you will be easily able to sell the battery first.