Electric car, Leaf

Mylargo

Hi
I was considering buying the Nissan Leaf but only if the range of a fully powered battery would be sufficient for my daily commute to work and home. According to the leaflet it will travel 199km when fully powered but I am assuming this is only in ideal conditions. My commute is a 146km round trip. Approximately 25 per cent of the journey is urban while the rest is rural. The home leg is also done at night time so I will need lights. Would anyone have a better idea of the range under these conditions. I know I could always charge up but with time constraints this may not always be possible.
Thank you.

bazz26

Paging Mad Lad:

September1

Mylargo wrote: »

Hi
I was considering buying the Nissan Leaf but only if the range of a fully powered battery would be sufficient for my daily commute to work and home. According to the leaflet it will travel 199km when fully powered but I am assuming this is only in ideal conditions. My commute is a 146km round trip. Approximately 25 per cent of the journey is urban while the rest is rural. The home leg is also done at night time so I will need lights. Would anyone have a better idea of the range under these conditions. I know I could always charge up but with time constraints this may not always be possible.
Thank you.

New one - maybe, but one would have to try
Old one - without heating and with some effort

If you can charge at destination then you are OK

If you can't charge at your destination not a chance for a daily driver. Are there any public quick chargers on the route?

thecomedian

I would say no.

If you pay 23k on a car you would want to be able to lights and heating. You don't want to be cutting it fine everytime.

The leaf isn't suited to long commutes, it's perfect for short trips, especially around town.

NIMAN

Does anyone know how much use that little solar spoiler is on the top of the Leaf?

Is it there to reassure the owner or can it actually make a significant difference to the battery (I know that it would depend on sun intensity of course).

Scottie99

As a Leaf driver I'd say your pushing it. I do 115km a day and have 2/3 (24/36km)bars left at the end of trip. Where are you traveling from?

Stinicker

Google the Opel Ampera or get a Toyota Prius and convert it to LPG.

Mylargo

Thank you all
Scottie99
I'm travelling from the north end of Meath to Dublin about a 150km round trip so it looks unlikely without a top up.

reboot

NIMAN wrote: »

Does anyone know how much use that little solar spoiler is on the top of the Leaf?

Is it there to reassure the owner or can it actually make a significant difference to the battery (I know that it would depend on sun intensity of course).

I would think if it produced anything more than a very few watts,it would only charge the 12volt battery,not the big 400v LI-on main battery.
I have been driving a renault Zoe for about 7 months.Much cheaper car with a free home charger.
My advice ,forget solar panels when dealing with a 24KW hour battery.

Scottie99

reboot wrote: »

I would think if it produced anything more than a very few watts,it would only charge the 12volt battery,not the big 400v LI-on main battery.
I have been driving a renault Zoe for about 7 months.Much cheaper car with a free home charger.
My advice ,forget solar panels when dealing with a 24KW hour battery.

Agreed, makes no real difference.

paulclan

http://www.torquenews.com/1080/new-data-canada-shows-cold-weather-range-loss-nissan-leaf-and-chevrolet-volt
Do read this!

12 watt solar panel is just a trickle charger for the little battery not the main Li-ion. It'll charge a few mobile phones on a very sunny day that's about it.
Car's too heavy for batteries, knock-on effect is it needs heavy batteries and so it continues.
Batteries deteriorate over their cycle life, so add in running cost of replacing them every 5-10 years-ish.

Scottie99

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

Batteries deteriorate over their cycle life, so add in running cost of replacing them every 5-10 years-ish.

Maybe in hot climates. In ireland they're saying 15/20 years...

Depends on a lot of things like how you use, maintain and charge them, fast charging will make them deteriorate faster.
I heard they were putting speakers in the doors to simulate combustion engine noise because people often didn't realise they were speeding.

Scottie99

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

fast charging will make them deteriorate faster.

It's been accepted by Nissan now that fast charge doesn't deteriorate the battery. Cars that have only FC'd, it's been noted that they have no deterioration in the battery compared to other Leafs.

air

reboot wrote: »

I have been driving a renault Zoe for about 7 months.Much cheaper car with a free home charger.

Are you driving the Zoe in Ireland?
How is the range and general ownership experience?

I've been looking around to substantiate my claims, most of what I know about batteries is based on lead acid chemistry tbh. The fundamental problem with fast charging any battery is the heat it generates denatures the battery, with a vented liquid electrolyte this can be managed but there is still some premature capacity loss.
The dry cell Leaf Li-ion batteries have metallic lithium plates which will go a long way for heat distribution and preventing shedding of active material but still I see estimates of a 10% loss over the lifetime if fast charging is the primary charge method. Of course this is not realistic for most as a fast charger is industry levels of power and not possible for domestic outlets.
Li-ion's prefer being being stored at 40% charge, not the 100% the user might assume.
Like a lot of rechargeables; partial discharges will make the battery give more in the long term and last longer than complete discharges.

The thing I've noticed about batteries, chargers and the like is that manufacturers can claim all sorts of hogwash and very few people will notice otherwise as degenerative effects are slow and hard to prove unless you have a very good monitoring system and test them at intervals. The the nature of a discharge curve is pretty similar to the last and few remember the first.
How many people out there think an alternator fully charges a battery? 'fraid not.

I found an excellent suggestion that if the roads contained inductive loops you could charge while you drive.

SleeperService

Wait til the pylon-phobes hear about inductive charging roads... Radiation joe!

I'd imagine there is a very specific controller with very well modelled algorithms involved in monitoring the charge/discharge of these batteries. A more advanced version of the intelligent battery sensors already in use in lead acid with start/stop tech kinda thing. This is not some cheapo fleabay charger and battery combo.

Yeah most likely, admittedly my predictions of 5-10 years is probably fairly premature. As a rule of thumb with batteries if you can afford the time the slower you charge them the better they perform. It'd make you think twice about buying a second hand one, which I find disheartening, I'm not a fan of disposable vehicles and scrappage schemes. I think usually the ecological solution is fix the old one.
I'm holding out for cold fusion myself hey look no gearbox!!

I doubt induction loops will threaten Ireland's shores for a very long time, given that the CC still haven't mastered the art of fixing pot-holes.

September1

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

Yeah most likely, admittedly my predictions of 5-10 years is probably fairly premature. As a rule of thumb with batteries if you can afford the time the slower you charge them the better they perform. It'd make you think twice about buying a second hand one, which I find disheartening, I'm not a fan of disposable vehicles and scrappage schemes. I think usually the ecological solution is fix the old one.
I'm holding out for cold fusion myself hey look no gearbox!!

I doubt induction loops will threaten Ireland's shores for a very long time, given that the CC still haven't mastered the art of fixing pot-holes.

When they are no longer useful for car they are still worth quite a lot of money.

Sir Liamalot

Sir Liamalot wrote: »

Depends on a lot of things like how you use, maintain and charge them, fast charging will make them deteriorate faster.
I heard they were putting speakers in the doors to simulate combustion engine noise because people often didn't realise they were speeding.

No not true, Nissan already have a sound generator you can turn off.

maybe make a law that people take earphones out and stop texting while walking on public streets.

EV's are too quiet ? Complete BOll***S.

I've never had issues in the Prius but if someone is being stupid I give a very gently blip of the horn, no problems. I don't get all aggressive about it, I'm aware it's silent but I'm also aware people should take responsibility for themselves and come back to planet earth while out on public.

Some people have nothing better to do than sit around thinking of what new laws to make next.

Limalot.

Yes fast charging a battery not meant to be that gets hot isn't good, Regarding the Leaf, though no one can say if fast charging daily is bad or not because we don't actually have the manufacturers data for the cells which is crucial rather than making assumptions.

Some Lithoum batteries can be charged at very high current without any ill effect.

Lithium prefer to be stored around 60%.

Yes slower charging is always better, but batteries are getting so good now that you can charge a 5 ah battery at 450 amps (or 90 C) with barely any heat.

I doubt a 5-10 min daily top up on a fast charger will do the Leaf battery much harm at all, For use as Nissan intended 7,000 miles a year then the Leaf can easily see 20 years use until the battery reached the end of life of 70%.

A high mileage driver in Seattle doing 130 miles a day has lost 20% capacity and has not to fast charge on way to and from work, which is bad as your battery that was 66 ah new now becomes 52.8 ah so you'r charging the battery and cycling it more and more at that stage you're going to most likely see rapid deterioration if fast charging daily at that stage.

I do believe that for high mileage users they should have the option to replace tha battery for a brand new one at 80% capacity not 70 not in a 70-80 mile range car.

Of course as batteries get larger then this won't be an issue as in regard the Tesla Model S, with it's 250 mile range you'll only rarely bring it to empty and so cycling becomes much less of an issue and even at end of life ( 70% ) it will still have 170 mile range.

One thing we must not forget that even if the Leaf battery deteriorated to 80% after 100,000 miles in Seattle, doesn't mean it will here and it has absolutely 0 meaning with the I3, E-Golf etc etc as they'll all have different chemistries.

Of course for new buyers that buy new every 3 years or those on PCP they won't have to worry about it anyway.

air

air wrote: »

Are you driving the Zoe in Ireland?
How is the range and general ownership experience?

You can't get a Zoe here ?

beazee

Deleted User wrote: »

You can't get a Zoe here ?

You can, up the North

beazee

beazee wrote: »

You can, up the North

Ah yeah, forgot about the North.

Are you leasing the battery then ? I can only assume Renault decided very quietly not to sell it here because of the battery leasing, so much for giving the choice.

Zoe makes the best use of the available charging infrastructure. 20 kw from most if not all non fast chargers. Charges in 1 hr form all those chargers from 0.

beazee

Unfortunately, NI dealers do not offer battery leasing to customers with address in the South.

beazee

beazee wrote: »

Unfortunately, NI dealers do not offer battery leasing to customers with address in the South.

No unfortunate at all, unless you intend to keep it long term or do very high mileage I see absolutely 0 point in leasing the battery.

You'd have paid for the battery anyway.

So how much does it cost with the battery ?

Did you get stung in VAT ?