Battery degradation?

lightspeed

Hi all, im looking into best option for an electric car and warming towards a bmw I3 with range extender.

A topic that i dont see discussed much is battery degradation. For example, Ive seen some BMW i3 models from 2014 and 2015 with range extender at around 60,000 miles. What would worry me is what would the battery range be like at that age and mileage?

do the battery degrade much and are some electric car batteries worse than others for this?

Also, somewhat different topic but for anyone who has a BMW I3, can you advise how expensive are they to service? would it be similar costs to standard petrol or diesel car?

One plus of going electric is that i understand they are cheaper to maintain but i do like the petrol range extender option on the I3.

Below link to an article where a driver in the US discusses 20% drop after 30,000 miles. He does mention he is based in Phoenix so care probably under much hotter temperatures than here in ireland.

http://www.mybmwi3.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5305

If could wait a few more months and save up some more funds, I may stretch to get the 94 ah with range extender model.

ewj1978

I'm probably going the i3 route the next EV i get. From what i've read in our climate the i3 battery degradation is quite low. A lot lower than other EV's.
I'd not take much notice of the guy above,as its 40c+ in arizona for most of the year and that definitely is not good for the health of a battery.

dashoonage

This is something ive always wondered. Where as my ICE engine with proper TLC will last me a long time. How long will batteries in EV's last me ? then what ? worthless asset?

ELM327

dashoonage wrote: »

This is something ive always wondered. Where as my ICE engine with proper TLC will last me a long time. How long will batteries in EV's last me ? then what ? worthless asset?

The batteries will never be worthless, they will always have an inherent value even at 30% of SOH as storage.


The more recent batteries in non Leaf cars don't show the same levels of degradation as the first gen leaf.

dashoonage

ELM327 wrote: »

The batteries will never be worthless, they will always have an inherent value even at 30% of SOH as storage.


The more recent batteries in non Leaf cars don't show the same levels of degradation as the first gen leaf.

Yes...i get that...but will you sell a car with 30% SOH ?

peposhi

dashoonage wrote: »

Yes...i get that...but will you sell a car with 30% SOH ?

Yup. And get the battery replaced.
Boom - next to a brand new car with only 20 moving parts!
Try that with with an ICE - replace the engine at what ... 250-300k km with new and you’d still have to deal with maintaining (most likely replacing) nearly 2000 moving parts in all the rest of the systems - fuel, gearbox, exhaust...

rolion

Hi,

Thanks for opening the thread...i was looking at the i3 Rex myself...

I understood that batteries degrade based on age and on level of maintenance.
They will go off even if you dont use them,as per age.

If you keep them charged at 80% ( aka long life) they should keep you longer... Ho wlong,depends by the drivign style,frequencey of charging and how long and not lastly,by the internal manufacturing processes (faults or not).
I remember one big manufacturing plant was making wafers for some components.They were all the same but with some inevitable internal faults...those that passed the tests were marked as higher specs while others marked as OK at a lower running performance benchmark.

Read somewhere that some manufacturing EV cars are "buying" back the used packs to be used as storage in PV plants.
Also,i expect that in the future,you will be able to buy / replace/swap current battery pack with at least same wattage even not better ones.

ELM327

dashoonage wrote: »

Yes...i get that...but will you sell a car with 30% SOH ?

Battery replacement in a leaf is mooted as €5k for the whole battery.
With that you get the equivalent of a new engine and gearbox in an ICE car as your capacity and range is back to 100%


Not sure of the cost for other cars, and most are still under warranty. All Tesla batteries came with an 8 year warranty, my Ioniq has a 5 year warranty, not sure for other cars but to be honest outside of the leaf there hasnt been much degradation. One youtuber I follow has a 2014 Zoe with 100k km and ~2% degradation. There are Tesla Model S out there with 400k km+ and <10% degradation. It's just not an issue.

ELM327

rolion wrote: »

Hi,

Thanks for opening the thread...i was looking at the i3 Rex myself...

I understood that batteries degrade based on age and on level of maintenance.
They will go off even if you dont use them,as per age.

If you keep them charged at 80% ( aka long life) they should keep you longer... Ho wlong,depends by the drivign style,frequencey of charging and how long and not lastly,by the internal manufacturing processes (faults or not).
I remember one big manufacturing plant was making wafers for some components.They were all the same but with some inevitable internal faults...those that passed the tests were marked as higher specs while others marked as OK at a lower running performance benchmark.

Read somewhere that some manufacturing EV cars are "buying" back the used packs to be used as storage in PV plants.
Also,i expect that in the future,you will be able to buy / replace/swap current battery pack with at least same wattage even not better ones.

Not needed, all ev will have a BMS that doesnt let you access the top or bottom levels of the battery. (Tesla are a notable exception to this rule, they allow access to pretty much 100% via a user selected menu option)

rolion

My Leaf has a user selectable menu from where i can select to set ON or OFF the 80% long life battery.

Usual,i give it a 99% fast charge once every week or two,if i have "space" at a public fast charge.
All other times,stays at 80% setting.

Correct me if im wrong but...does not the battery performance / degradation is based on how do you charge ... at what speeds and what voltages you push the electrons back in the position !?

ELM327

yes but "100%" in that is generally an actual SOC of 93-97%. Check it on leafspy.

rolion

ELM327 wrote: »

yes but "100%" in that is generally an actual SOC of 93-97%. Check it on leafspy.

Yes,or even lower if battery loses bars...
I heard about LeafSpy,i will give it a go later,thanks.

rolion

Just found out that the i3 will not be manufactured anymore with the Rex option...but only fully electric with a 42Kw battery...
more H E R E

Mike9832

rolion wrote: »

Just found out that the i3 will not be manufactured anymore with the Rex option...but only fully electric with a 42Kw battery...
more H E R E

The US will still get the Rex

BMW think we don't need it

unkel

ELM327 wrote: »

All Tesla batteries came with an 8 year warranty, my Ioniq has a 5 year warranty

The warranty on the battery in your Ioniq is 8 years. Same as most other electric cars for sale today

In the USA, Ioniq comes with a lifelong battery warranty. That says it all about how slowly modern batteries deteriorate. I'd say it is fair to expect a degradation of about 20-25% or so over 10 years

lightspeed

Can anyone advise have they notice much degradation in electric cars they have owned?

Does fast charging each night do much damage?

If i was to get an electric car id prefer to get a home charger than can charger it in a few hours than a a more standard home charger that would take much longer to charge. At the distance id be driving id want to be charging it each night.

Im quite fond of the BMW i3 and the 94 n 33kwh model with range extender i feel gives the best value for money. I also like that with range extender you should always be able to get to a garage or get yourself home withe ease to recharge.

ELM327

2017 Ioniq BEV - 0 noticed degradation. ~30k km done in 6 months of ownership. Fast charged 2/3 times a week for the first 15k km then practically no fast charging since I got my home charger installed. (last FCP was in october)

Previous EV:
2014 Leaf 24kWh. 60k km done in 13 months of ownership. Total odometer at time of sale 110k km. Battery State of Health 92% as per leafspy. Fast charged 4+ times a week, multiple trips with 8+ fast charges a day and temperature in the red.

8% degradation after 110k km.

rolion

lightspeed wrote: »

Can anyone advise have they notice much degradation in electric cars they have owned?

Does fast charging each night do much damage?

If i was to get an electric car id prefer to get a home charger than can charger it in a few hours than a a more standard home charger that would take much longer to charge. At the distance id be driving id want to be charging it each night.

Im quite fond of the BMW i3 and the 94 n 33kwh model with range extender i feel gives the best value for money. I also like that with range extender you should always be able to get to a garage or get yourself home withe ease to recharge.

A quick charge is based on the car's on-board built-in charger.
Typical charger is 3.3KW,giving different time of charging,based on the level of battery,from 10 to 90. From 90 to full 99 can take ... "hours",it does take longer,dunno why !

If you want a fast charge then make sure you get a 32A home charger and a EV car with 6Kw on-board charger.

My L24 3.3Kw takes one hour to get 30Km at around 3.5Kw injected power.

Ive loved that i3 with Rex but i read that some UK garages will not touch the motor as is all capsulated,just replaced, therefore a huge bill in case it fails.

Dand88

Anyone on here have any soh recorded for there nissan leaf 40kw's ?collecting one jan 19 and would love to hear any feedback on worst range to full charge and current soh compared to time owned and mileage? Thanks in advance : )

Mike9832

Dand88 wrote: »

Anyone on here have any soh recorded for there nissan leaf 40kw's ?collecting one jan 19 and would love to hear any feedback on worst range to full charge and current soh compared to time owned and mileage? Thanks in advance : )

https://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=25726

Orebro

Mike9832 wrote: »

https://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=25726

And Thierry try’s to torpedo a thread once again with nonsense.

To the OP, the 40Kw Leaf is a bit new to know for sure, but it’s likely to perform the same as other modern EVs as regards degradation. Regardless of this, it is Nissans problem and not yours since the battery has an 8 year warranty - but I doubt very much you’d ever need to call on it.

n97 mini

unkel wrote: »

In the USA, Ioniq comes with a lifelong battery warranty.

Is that transferable? A lot of "lifetime" warranties only apply to the first owner.

EDIT: answer here. First owner. 10 years/100k miles subsequent owner(s).

lightspeed

rolion wrote: »

Ive loved that i3 with Rex but i read that some UK garages will not touch the motor as is all capsulated,just replaced, therefore a huge bill in case it fails.

What you mean capsulated? Do you mean it difficult to get access to service the 0.6 petrol engine?

I assume bmw would service it but im guessing they will be charging more than local mechanic. One thing im not sure of is if you can get a mechanic other than bmw to service it does the warranty for battery still apply?

From reading other uk forums many seem to buy an extended warranty from bmw. Anybody know if it available here and dont suppose it could apply to a used car?


I spend an 1.5 hours on m50 crawling each morning and was keeping an eye out for a bmw i3 but saw none. I had the nct for current car yesterday and up rocks an i3 right beside me. I kind of like the look of them even though i know they not to everyone's tastes and needs.

Mike9832

Orebro wrote: »

And Thierry try’s to torpedo a thread once again with nonsense.

To the OP, the 40Kw Leaf is a bit new to know for sure, but it’s likely to perform the same as other modern EVs as regards degradation. Regardless of this, it is Nissans problem and not yours since the battery has an 8 year warranty - but I doubt very much you’d ever need to call on it.

Read it

You might learn something

Or not

According to the LeafSpy our L40 is at 96.1% State of Health after 10 months and 23k kms. In the past 4000 km the SOH has dropped from 96.22->96.10 while the health dropped by 2% from 8->19k so hopefully the initial stage of "maturing" is over now. The trend should be clearer this time next year.

When new the car had 99.51% SOH.

slave1

samih wrote: »

According to the LeafSpy our L40 is at 96.1% State of Health after 10 months and 23k kms. In the past 4000 km the SOH has dropped from 96.22->96.10 while the health dropped by 2% from 8->19k so hopefully the initial stage of "maturing" is over now. The trend should be clearer this time next year.

When new the car had 99.51% SOH.

Surely the car new should have been 100%+ from Leafspy (taking hidden reserve into account)?
I think a 4% drop in less than a year is not inspiring.
When I checked our L30 last at 26months old it was 102.6% SOH

slave1

slave1 wrote: »

Surely the car new should have been 100%+ from Leafspy (taking hidden reserve into account)?
I think a 4% drop in less than a year is not inspiring.
When I checked our L30 last at 26months old it was 102.6% SOH

I don't think the battery degradation is exact science. Looks like the algorithm for calculating the SOH works very differently between our previous L24 and this L40. In the old car rapid charging always improved the SOH temporarily but this doesn't happen at all on the L40.

Anyway I agree, the 4 percent apparent degradation in 10 months is not very good. It appears to be the norm on L40. That's why I said that it will be interesting to see how the stats look like after summer 2019.

rolion

Hi.,
Where did you buy the LeafSpy and dongle, any good recomandation,please !?
Thanks.

rolion

rolion wrote: »

Hi.,
Where did you buy the LeafSpy and dongle, any good recomandation,please !?
Thanks.

Mine is an old ELM327 v1.5 that I had since 2012 probably. Sorry can't help you there. I think recently some Konnwei model has been mentioned as a supported dongle.

slave1

rolion wrote: »

Hi.,
Where did you buy the LeafSpy and dongle, any good recomandation,please !?
Thanks.

Got it for just over a Euro on Aliexpress but it's no longer listed I'm afraid

Maybe one of these are still available:

electric vehicle wiki

ED E

unkel wrote: »

The warranty on the battery in your Ioniq is 8 years. Same as most other electric cars for sale today

In the USA, Ioniq comes with a lifelong battery warranty. That says it all about how slowly modern batteries deteriorate. I'd say it is fair to expect a degradation of about 20-25% or so over 10 years

Nah, on the shelf Li Ion packs are very inert and age well. Keeping within the BMS limits you're single digits per decade.




You can basically ignore the age of the cell and focus entirely on use patterns and cycle count as thats many levels of magnitude more impactful.


Tesla can ban a car from superchargers if they think the owner is excessively supercharging because they know its a surefire way to nuke the pack. Slow night charging + Irish climate + "eco" mode driving is a recipe for a very long pack life and come 12yrs time your new pack will cost a lot less.

KCross

ED E wrote: »

Nah, on the shelf Li Ion packs are very inert and age well. Keeping within the BMS limits you're single digits per decade.



You can basically ignore the age of the cell and focus entirely on use patterns and cycle count as thats many levels of magnitude more impactful.


Tesla can ban a car from superchargers if they think the owner is excessively supercharging because they know its a surefire way to nuke the pack. Slow night charging + Irish climate + "eco" mode driving is a recipe for a very long pack life and come 12yrs time your new pack will cost a lot less.

Where did that chart come from?
Its generally accepted, that as long as you dont abuse the pack, that age is the biggest factor by far for degradation.

Leaving it at very high or very low SoC for extended periods is also bad and obviously very high temp but the BMS stops that from happening.

Your chart suggests degradation levels that are nowhere near reality for the current EV's. My guess is its from a study on a single cell and its over a very short period of time and who knows what chemistry of cell they used.... it might have been a laptop battery as opposed to a Leaf battery, for example.

Basically, I dont believe the chart because it doesnt jive with the car I have outside the door!

ELM327

If you have to add battery cycle aging to the aging from time in the above chart, it implies a ridiculous amount of deg that is not seen in the real world.

I have an Ioniq that has done ~30k km in 6 months with no degradation. Leaf 24kWh had I think 8% deg after 105k km.
There are teslas that have 400k km + with less than 10% degradation.

BigAl81

ELM327 wrote: »

I have an Ioniq that has done ~30k km in 6 months with no degradation.

I think the Ioniq has an almost 31kWh gross battery pack, with 28kWh net usable. So if the battery degraded 10%, you'd still have 28kWh usable.

Maybe someone more knowledgeable than myself could confirm? It would be a big positive for the Ioniq if so, as I think the Leaf 40kWh, 40 is the full usable amount, so 10% degradation would see it drop to 36kWh?

ELM327

BigAl81 wrote: »

I think the Ioniq has an almost 31kWh gross battery pack, with 28kWh net usable. So if the battery degraded 10%, you'd still have 28kWh usable.

Maybe someone more knowledgeable than myself could confirm? It would be a big positive for the Ioniq if so, as I think the Leaf 40kWh, 40 is the full usable amount, so 10% degradation would see it drop to 36kWh?

That's not how it works. My 24kWh leaf had ~22kWh usable, with the degradation the usable SOC and the actual SOC both reduce.



And the leaf 40 is approx 37kWh usable.

BigAl81

That's kind of my point.

The Leaf "40" has 37kWh usable, so a 10% degradation means you now have a 33kWh battery!

If the Ionic actually has 31 gross battery size (I believe), and only 28kWh is actually usable, you are shielded from the first 10% of degradation. If the Ionic battery degrades 10% you'll still have a usable 28kWh.

That's a big difference in potential future range between the two cars. This is especially important to someone like me who needs the full range of the car in some scenarios.

ELM327

BigAl81 wrote: »

That's kind of my point.

The Leaf "40" has 37kWh usable, so a 10% degradation means you now have a 33kWh battery!

If the Ionic actually has 31 gross battery size (I believe), and only 28kWh is actually usable, you are shielded from the first 10% of degradation. If the Ionic battery degrades 10% you'll still have a usable 28kWh.

That's a big difference in potential future range between the two cars. This is especially important to someone like me who needs the full range of the car in some scenarios.

This is not true.


Leaf has a 40kWh battery with 37kWh usable.
10% degradation would leave you with 36kWh gross and approx 33.7kWh net.
Ioniq has a 31kWh battery with 28kWh usable
10% degradation (unseen so far) would leave you with 27.9kWh gross and 25.2kWh usable.


The battery degrades as an entity and the non usable levels are not shielded from it. The degradation is gross and not net.

KCross

BigAl81 wrote: »

That's kind of my point.

The Leaf "40" has 37kWh usable, so a 10% degradation means you now have a 33kWh battery!

If the Ionic actually has 31 gross battery size (I believe), and only 28kWh is actually usable, you are shielded from the first 10% of degradation. If the Ionic battery degrades 10% you'll still have a usable 28kWh.

That's a big difference in potential future range between the two cars. This is especially important to someone like me who needs the full range of the car in some scenarios.

I dont get your logic.
If the Ioniq degrades 10% the 28kWh will go down the same as you have shown for the Leaf.

BigAl81

Ah,

I misunderstood that in the Ionics case, the 10% loss would be the 28 to 31kWh range that you don't use anyway, and you'd still have the 28kWh left.

Seems that's not the case unfortunately, thanks for clarifying!

DrPhilG

When I bought my Leaf in 2015 the SOH I believe was around 94%. Sold it last month after 3.5 years and 85k km at 84.3%.

The i3 doesn't have a way of checking the SOH as far as I'm aware but mine is 2 years old with very low mileage (4500 when I got it) and the mileage I'm getting per charge is what I'd expect for the battery size and consistent with what others are getting. By that I mean mine is lower than most.

I drive it hard and live in a very hilly area so I never get great efficiency and that's why my mileage is low compared to what a city driver in England would get.

DrPhilG

DrPhilG wrote: »

When I bought my Leaf in 2015 the SOH I believe was around 94%. Sold it last month after 3.5 years and 85k km at 84.3%.

The i3 doesn't have a way of checking the SOH as far as I'm aware but mine is 2 years old with very low mileage (4500 when I got it) and the mileage I'm getting per charge is what I'd expect for the battery size and consistent with what others are getting. By that I mean mine is lower than most.

I drive it hard and live in a very hilly area so I never get great efficiency and that's why my mileage is low compared to what a city driver in England would get.

Yes you can check the battery capacity in the i3 easily.

https://bmwi3owner.com/2016/01/secrets/

My 2017 , March registered i3 94 AH Rex with 42,000 Kms has 100% battery capacity.

Lease is up in November 2020 and it's likely the ix1 will be released by then which has the potential to be a seriously good car but the price will be serious with a decent spec no doubt so I could wait another year or two, the i3 is a car I can easily live with and not get bored of it because it's so good to drive on the back roads. And it would be nice not to have to pay for a car for a while lol.

Now that BMW have announced the continuation of the i3 they could do with giving it a refresh, power upgrade and also higher charge rate on the fast charger.

Time will tell if this 94 AH battery proves to be as good as the specs show, 3500 cycles to 80% if incredible, I've yet to see any other cell with those specs.

3500 times say 160 kms = 560,000 kms to 80% capacity but you won't run the battery down every time so it won't see a full cycle much which will help but interesting to see how time and temp has an effect, being AC cooled heat won't be an issue.

i3 is big enough for my needs so if they upgrade it to charge faster, decent range and more power I would certainly think about it.

i3 94 AH has the potential to keep 20+ years as the Rex can make up for any capacity loss which is another + for the Rex over a BEV. Even the older battery Rex can be used with little impact to capacity loss apart from burning more petrol.

I do know that 42 Kwh with maybe 38 Kwh usable and a measly 50 Kw charging on DC is not enough to convince me to get a BEV only, this is a mistake and BMW should reconsider. Our charging network is shocking.

It's not just the loss of the rex , if the battery is cold you're talking maybe 30-35 Kw charging as I experienced leaving Galway, so I charged up to about 50% drove to Ballinasloe and then it was plenty warm for a 50 Kw charge or 45 Kw as our chargers are not 50 Kw.

See the issue there was that I was not plugged in to AC to preheat the battery but that only heats to 10 Deg C so BMW would have known that that was warm enough because by the time someone needs to fast charge it will be close to the 20 Degrees C to allow full charge rate, which is the case as I've seen before.

So the point of all that is that the range will need to improve a lot to convince me to ditch the Rex, recharge times also have to come down a lot.

Whether the limitation of cold charging will reduce as they change to higher voltage batteries depends on whether or not lower voltage higher current is the issue due to increased internal resistance when cold, the battery can't take any more current because there is more resistance, I would like to know if higher voltage and less current makes a difference.

Anyway, for me Rex must stay for some time.