people getting rid of their Leafs/EVs/PHEVs and going back to ICEVs

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I just bought a used 2012 Leaf SL. All I need is a commuter to work and home that gets 9 miles to the charge. My leaf has 9 bars to battery health, and gets about 14 miles or so per charge (even though the GoM says 63). Even with these less than optimum results, I fully plan to get another leaf or ev in the next 5 years. I love not having the $$$ annual maintenance of a gas engine. My wife commutes with her ice and spends $170 in gas a month with $70 oil changes every 3 months. It’s crazy.
 
Your Leaf really only gets 14 miles per charge? I find that shockingly low, especially with that many bars left. Have you driven it to turtle?

I hope you didn't pay much for that car. But if it serves your needs, that's great!
 
rmay635703 said:
SageBrush said:
alozzy said:
Sounds like there's at least one bad cell

yep

If he lived in a carb state he could actually claim the battery defect warranty
I'm in California. There is no mandated additional/better warranty on HV batteries on BEVs in CA or CARB states.

I've seen multiple people on various forums circulate misinformation over and over on this. It's very tiring. They've conflated AT-PZEV and enhanced AT-PZEV hybrid and PHEV HV CA battery warranty mandates with that of BEVs. Nope. Some if it is due to bad information from an "article" by someone who is misinformed.

(And yes, I had an AT-PZEV hybrid with 10 year/150K mile HV battery warranty.)
 
AutobotLeaf said:
I just bought a used 2012 Leaf SL. All I need is a commuter to work and home that gets 9 miles to the charge. My leaf has 9 bars to battery health, and gets about 14 miles or so per charge (even though the GoM says 63). Even with these less than optimum results, I fully plan to get another leaf or ev in the next 5 years. I love not having the $$$ annual maintenance of a gas engine. My wife commutes with her ice and spends $170 in gas a month with $70 oil changes every 3 months. It’s crazy.

LeafSpy would help here a lot.
You might be able to pay a reasonable amount for someone to swap a bad cell or three and extend the life of the pack 5x.
 
As an aside, when Elon Musk recently made reference to making batteries stress members of frames to reduce the weight of EVs, my first thought was "what happens if there's a bad cell". I would think the cost to repair structural battery cells would be outrageous. Guess time will tell...
 
alozzy said:
As an aside, when Elon Musk recently made reference to making batteries stress members of frames to reduce the weight of EVs, my first thought was "what happens if there's a bad cell". I would think the cost to repair structural battery cells would be outrageous. Guess time will tell...
I thought about it also. The answer would seem to be: end of car.
Tesla has to have remarkable confidence in their cells
 
I have to think he meant the mechanical case of the batter pack, not each individual cell. Since there are so many cells in a pack, making each one strong enough to carry mechanical loads would vastly increase the weight of the vehicle. Using the case as a structural member could make sense but I don't see how this works using individual cells. If a cell went bad, the case would be removed and the cell replaced. The only additional complication would be keeping the frame correctly spaced and supported while the case was out. Easy peasy.
 
^exactly. I was just riding my friend's mid-80's Honda 100cc motorbike this last weekend and that is how it was made. The frame mounts to the front of the engine case and then starts again at the rear. The engine/trans is part of the frame load bearing assembly and removing it leaves two frame stubs that have very little rigidity.
 
I completely reset my Leaf to factory, rebooted, and now it gets 35-40 miles on a full charge. Don’t know what setting was triggered, as most things were off, but it works pretty good now. I’m very satisfied.
 
I had a 2012 Leaf I kept for 18 months on lease, then returned it for a gas car. At the time I liked it except for its range was terrible (particularly in the winter), but I knew if it went up 50-100% I'd do it again. I bought a hybrid avalon a few years later. Last year we got back into EV again with a 2020 leaf SV, and then earlier this year I got a PHEV volvo. Although its range is only 15-20 miles on gas we're getting a bit over 800 miles/tank (~14 gallon fill). It's not very efficient (1.5-2.4 miles/kWh depending on temperature), but it's fast, lets me do most of its miles on electric, and I'm very happy with it so far. Its battery will cycle so many times and the cars are so complex I'd never dream of owning one out of warranty.
 
https://www.chevybolt.org/threads/relative-returns-nissan-leaf-after-7days.40005/ is another Leaf abandonment story. Unfortunately, you'll need to have an account there to see it. The driver didn't do their homework. They had no ability to charge at home and I guess not at work, either.

Now, due to a recent '20 Bolt fire (no '20+ Bolts have been recalled for battery fires, yet), possibly battery related, a bunch of Bolt drivers are jumping ship to ICEV...
 
cwerdna said:
rmay635703 said:
If he lived in a carb state he could actually claim the battery defect warranty
I'm in California. There is no mandated additional/better warranty on HV batteries on BEVs in CA or CARB states.

I've seen multiple people on various forums circulate misinformation over and over on this. It's very tiring. They've conflated AT-PZEV and enhanced AT-PZEV hybrid and PHEV HV CA battery warranty mandates with that of BEVs. Nope. Some if it is due to bad information from an "article" by someone who is misinformed.

(And yes, I had an AT-PZEV hybrid with 10 year/150K mile HV battery warranty.)
To resurface this, here are refutations to the garbage "article" that I allude to.

https://www.chevybolt.org/threads/bolt-battery-warranty-to-repair-or-replacement-16-250-battery-replacement-cost.30777/page-5#post-526376
https://www.chevybolt.org/threads/bolt-battery-warranty-to-repair-or-replacement-16-250-battery-replacement-cost.30777/page-5#post-758599
 
cwerdna said:
cwerdna said:
cwerdna said:
I forgot about another guy at work who I don't see much anymore. He had a '11 or '12 Leaf because of his girlfriend's work or something (company car?). I think she left that job or she had to turn that car in, for whatever reason. So, no more Leaf for him. I believe this is over a year ago. When I do see him, sometimes ask if he's going to get another Leaf or EV. He doesn't seem interested at all or (IIRC) gives some excuse of "no time".
I spoke to the above guy the other day. He still has no EV and still doesn't seem to care. He also driver a 4Runner now. The girlfriend is now his wife.

I said to him that he's not an EV enthusiast, to which he claimed he is. I countered, "well, you don't have one now and you don't seem to care to get one." He then mentioned how gas prices are cheap now, mentioned BMWs as being "cool" or something like that and mentioned I think the M3 and 635i. He seems to want a 6-series.

He mentions if they need to go on a long-road trip, they'd take his wife's PiP, for which she didn't bother get to green HOV stickers. CA has hit the issuance limit and it's not looking likely the cap will be raised again.

Can you imagine the general apathy outside of strong EV/PHEV regions? I'm in California, in Silicon Valley!

At last check, we had over 190 plug-in vehicles on our internal list at work and PLENTY of charging stations at work. Not all of them show up every day and some are mystery cars. And, I know some are missing from the list as well.
I spoke to this guy recently asking if he's going to get back to having an EV. His answer was "too lazy".

We now have over 300 plug-in vehicles on our internal list at work.
So, I finally saw the above guy today at an event. Ever since COVID, he just works from home. I asked him, does he have an EV now?

Nope.

Remember, I'm in Silicon Valley w/plenty of free charging at work. The previous post about him was at https://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=518784#p518784 from 2018. Earlier posts about him were from 2016:
https://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=462252#p462252
https://mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=455693#p455693
 
cwerdna said:
cwerdna said:
Two guys at my work sold their Model 3's. One of them is down to a BRoD (GM, IIRC extended-length) SUV as he said he didn't need his 3 as he moved to be much closer to work.
I checked in with one of the guys. He still has the BRoD GM SUV and an ICE RV now (which I guess could be a battering van of death). Still no return to EVs in his household.

We're all working from home now anyway. I wonder if this will change some point after we start working in the office again, presumably when most of us get vaccinated. We do have free L2 charging at work and that guy now lives kinda far from work.
The above guy with the BRoD GM SUV and an ICE RV recently left the company and also moved back to CA from FL. He got a replacement ICE RV and he mentions he still has an SUV (presumably the same BRoD GM SUV). I asked about whether he still has no EV. Answer is nope.

During the pandemic, he got a house near Lake Tahoe and became permanent remote. Then he moved to Florida and planned to do some sort of split time thingy (some months of the year working from CA and some from FL). He sold his FL house and it seems like he will be just working remotely from the house near Tahoe for a Bay Area company.
 
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