Nissan Leaf Gen1 - Performance Chip Tuning

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Piro

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 19, 2017
Messages
47
Location
Kraków, Poland
I have finished a new software mod for Nissan Leaf Gen1 (24, 30kWh). It delivers One Pedal Drive in mode D, astonishing 40+kW regen till full stop, 90kW (122 hp) power and 300 Nm (+30Nm more torque).
Feel like owning a new Nissan Leaf Gen2, with improved regen even in cold winter, till the full stop.
Former 0-100 (0-60mph) is changed from 10.9 sec to 9.0.
In D-mode you can press the brake and acceleration pedal together. Now, while the brake released, the launch control mode is activated, delivering 300Nm of torque from standing still.
V-max is increased and set to 165km/h.
B - mode works exactly as before. If car has no B-mode - then it always runs in D mode, or ECO button can be used as a switch.

Now installed into our two Leafs Gen1, quite funny to drive with accelerator pedal only.

Soon Gen2 will be ready with some power boost and even better regen.
 
Question, how did you achieve more motor output? I have a hard time seeing how this could be done, since the inverter firmware is clamping down on any NM demand that goes over the maximum that the inverter is capable of.

For example, see this screenshot.
ULRYJxj.png


This is a AZE0 24kWh that maxes out at 250NM. Even when requesting more than 250NM (with CAN-bridge), the inverter will not output more power. So you claim to be able to do this? EVs Enhanced, Muxsan, me, all have failed at getting more power out of the inverter. More regen is easy, but power?

This is what I got from an engineer over at EVs Enhanced:
Regarding the inverter stuff, I've already tried what you are talking about. The only difference is I did it through remapping the VCM rather than intercepting and modifying the CAN messages. Unfortunately despite requesting more torque, the inverter did not give it. Just to rule everything else out, I wanted to test the theory that the inverter was clamping the torque so we bought one of the aftermarket Thunderstruck inverter controllers. We made up a separate loom so we could unplug the stock Leaf wiring to the inverter and run the stand-alone controller. We then ran the car up on the dyno while gradually asking for more and more torque. It turns out that no matter what we did we could not get any more torque or power anyway over stock. The best torque curve was identical to stock. We could easily ask for less torque which would work fine. Asking for more torque than stock did not make the inverter shut down - it just would clamp the torque to the maximum allowed for that motor speed.
 
Piro said:
I have finished a new software mod for Nissan Leaf Gen1 (24, 30kWh). It delivers One Pedal Drive in mode D, astonishing 40+kW regen till full stop, 90kW (122 hp) power and 300 Nm (+30Nm more torque).
Feel like owning a new Nissan Leaf Gen2, with improved regen even in cold winter, till the full stop.
Former 0-100 (0-60mph) is changed from 10.9 sec to 9.0.
In D-mode you can press the brake and acceleration pedal together. Now, while the brake released, the launch control mode is activated, delivering 300Nm of torque from standing still.
V-max is increased and set to 165km/h.
B - mode works exactly as before. If car has no B-mode - then it always runs in D mode, or ECO button can be used as a switch.

Now installed into our two Leafs Gen1, quite funny to drive with accelerator pedal only.

Soon Gen2 will be ready with some power boost and even better regen.
Call me interested! Not so much for the power, the stock power is more than enough for me but I am interested in the greater regen, especially in the cold and does it still work when the battery is degraded, to say 8 bars? Currently my '12 8 bar Leaf has very very little regen, basically at any SOC, maybe 2 bubbles max and in the cold it has 0 regen available :( My 11 bar '13 is quite a bit better, gaining regen when down to say 95% SOC and by 90% is almost all bubbles but it still suffers in the cold where I'm only able to get 2 maybe 3 bubbles max.
I'm also a little worried what all this extra regen might do to the battery, I assume Nissan limited regen for a reason? I guess especially on the '12 I'm not so worried about shortening the life of the battery as it's so degraded now but I wouldn't want anything to blow-up by getting too hot, is all this regen safe?
I should also say, while my '12SL has a QC due to the battery being degraded? when temps are in single digits I'm lucky to get 10kw/h even when using the QC, hardly faster than my '13 on L2 where I get about 6kw/h.
Again I'm interested, is this a DIY, if so where would I order it and how much :)
 
jjeff said:
I'm also a little worried what all this extra regen might do to the battery, I assume Nissan limited regen for a reason? I guess especially on the '12 I'm not so worried about shortening the life of the battery as it's so degraded now but I wouldn't want anything to blow-up by getting too hot, is all this regen safe?
Yeah, I noticed that regen was limited to the max that DC fast charge would do at the same SOC, that can't be a coincidence right? :?
 
Actually, I believe regen is limited to 25 kW or thereabouts. Given the fact that the LEAF will DC fast charge at a sustained rate of 40 kW for much of the charging curve in mild temperatures, it seems like pushing regen to 40 kW shouldn't cause any damage.
 
alozzy said:
Actually, I believe regen is limited to 25 kW or thereabouts. Given the fact that the LEAF will DC fast charge at a sustained rate of 40 kW for much of the charging curve in mild temperatures, it seems like pushing regen to 40 kW shouldn't cause any damage.

On my 2013, provided the battery was warm enough, I've seen 30 kW in LeafSpy. It would be great to bump it up to 40 kW, but I still think it will depend on the temperature of the battery, so in the winter, I wouldn't expect to see the 40 kW boost unless the battery was warmed up without being in a high SOC.
 
Don't know how accurate the energy screen is on my 2012 - it pegs out at 30 kW regen even with 100% charge (or at least a few miles on it) with purposeful braking pressure. This is with 5-6 temp bars and my ~ 50 amp-hour "Lizard" battery.
 
Piro said:
I have finished a new software mod for Nissan Leaf Gen1 (24, 30kWh). It delivers One Pedal Drive in mode D, astonishing 40+kW regen till full stop, 90kW (122 hp) power and 300 Nm (+30Nm more torque).
Feel like owning a new Nissan Leaf Gen2, with improved regen even in cold winter, till the full stop.
Former 0-100 (0-60mph) is changed from 10.9 sec to 9.0.
In D-mode you can press the brake and acceleration pedal together. Now, while the brake released, the launch control mode is activated, delivering 300Nm of torque from standing still.
V-max is increased and set to 165km/h.
B - mode works exactly as before. If car has no B-mode - then it always runs in D mode, or ECO button can be used as a switch.

Now installed into our two Leafs Gen1, quite funny to drive with accelerator pedal only.

Soon Gen2 will be ready with some power boost and even better regen.
Care to respond to the many posts made in response to your OP?
 
Hi,

A brand newbie here. I have a 62kw/h leaf. I'd be very interested in an ECU tune if one were available.
I'd be very happy with extra regen power, but increase torque and top speed appeal to me too. It seems nissan did not do a lot to try to get the most out of the 62kwh power train.
When you accelerate from stand still you see that the power is held back until you reach 50mph or so and only then do you get the full 160kw.
This is really frustrating, as it definitely has more go available, it's just nissan decided to limit the power rather than sort out the traction with better tyres, suspension or other mods. I see that nismo do a limited slip differential for it, but that's an expensive, car completely apart, warranty busting option I dont want to explore yet. But an ecu tuning mod, I would love to explore that.
Do you have any more updates about this? anyone??
 
Part of the problem is that this is the exact same motor that puts out 108HP in the 2013 Leaf. It's being pushed hard enough now that full power is limited to 90 seconds, IIRC. In order to get a full-on performance version of the 62kwh Leaf, they'd have to use a bigger motor...
 
So some of you know that the next big thing I want to get going for the LEAF is a performance upgrade. Extracting more kW from the EM57 motor. This is going to be a big thing, lots of scammers have promised/sell VCM re-tunes, but these don't work. Trust me, I've tried :)

The only easy way forward with this is to replace the inverter that sits on top of the motor. Installing one from a 2018-2021 40kWh LEAF will get you up to 110kW of power, which is a hefty +30kW increase from the stock 80kW.

This is where I need help. You can't simply change the inverter, it is paired to the motor. The motor has a resolver offset that is stored in the inverter memory. If you replace the motor or inverter, you need a Consult3+ tool to enter in the new resolver offset that is stamped on the motor.

XQ1Gl02.png


In order to proceed with this upgrade, I will need someone that has access to the Consult3+ tool, and that can try this procedure on their LEAF while recording what is sent to the OBD2 port. This command will look very similar to the battery pairing that we got documented and put into Leafspy a few months back.

So, I already have one ongoing helper, but I am calling out to you all if you happen to have access to a Consult3+ tool. We need to check that the procedure is the same for a different range of vehicles (24 and 30kWh). So, if you have an AZE0 2013-2017 LEAF, AND Consult3+, give me a reach-out!
 
Dala said:
In order to proceed with this upgrade, I will need someone that has access to the Consult3+ tool, and that can try this procedure on their LEAF while recording what is sent to the OBD2 port. This command will look very similar to the battery pairing that we got documented and put into Leafspy a few months back.

So, I already have one ongoing helper, but I am calling out to you all if you happen to have access to a Consult3+ tool. We need to check that the procedure is the same for a different range of vehicles (24 and 30kWh). So, if you have an AZE0 2013-2017 LEAF, AND Consult3+, give me a reach-out!

Surprising that no cloning of the Nissan Consult3+ tool has been discussed. Yes, cloning since the days of WinXP based automotive diagnostic
tools has become more complex than just obtaining an image of a HD/SSD and loading it on another WinXP PC. The Chinese seem to have
no problem these days cloning Porsche, M/B, & BMW diagnostic software that will run on a WinOS machine. Here's a present example of
a Nissan Consult3+ on Ebay from Ukraine now;

https://www.ebay.com/itm/264636643940?hash=item3d9d92ba64:g:m7QAAOSwZ4VhARvJ

or just the SSD; https://www.ebay.com/itm/254637712110?hash=item3b499722ee:g:36EAAOSw2ide7j22

Here's the OBDII interface module; https://www.ebay.com/itm/184754284767?_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D20160811114145%26meid%3D9174bae18e5648988e97fab9a691d5b4%26pid%3D100667%26rk%3D2%26rkt%3D8%26sd%3D264636643940%26itm%3D184754284767%26pmt%3D0%26noa%3D1%26pg%3D2334524%26brand%3DNissan&_trksid=p2334524.c100667.m2042

Nissan sold Consult3+ software; https://www.nissan-techinfo.com/dept.aspx?dept_id=25

Surely buying these to use in reverse engineering the motor controller interface firmware, or any any aspect of the Leaf's electronic systems,
would be an absolute necessity.
 
An opportunity to visit a place that had a Consult3+ popped up, drove 200km to test it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of2vCYgblY4

I've emailed this info to the creator of Leafspy, so hopefully we can get it integrated there also like we did with the battery pairing :D
 
Very cool that you got a cooperative shop/dealership. Or at least one that didn't notice the logger. ;) Glad to see the leaf is getting more and more "open" this way.

Another cool one to log would be the yearly battery test (is this still a thing? Been years since I've owned a leaf). I believe there is a file that the consult spits out that is suppose to be sent to Nissan; I think it was a CSV or excel doc with various temperature measurements from when the the battery was charged and operated at.
 
DougWantsALeaf said:
Dala,
Not that I want this, but do you think the Plus Leaf is throttled/limited at low speed and could be opened up?

If you can get a trend from EV-CAN, showing the NM-demand messages, we can draw some conclusions. This is what the early LEAFs do;

kPk9wAX.png


Note that they taper off after getting to ~50km/h
 
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