Nissan Leaf

peposhi

By the look of it - it’s a Leafs day out there. I saw no less than 7 Leafs of all gens in just a a 25km stretch this eve...

Good weather gets them all out

slave1

So we are now into our 4th year of EV ownership.

I picked up our Leaf30 Acenta at a week over 6months old and 2,575kms on her.
Zero VRT and cost £13,250, the Nissan dealer I bought it off had no clue what they had, it arrived (transporter) mint with plastic seat wrap on back seats and unopened charge cable. At the time there was a flood of Leafs in the UK so I took advantage when negotiating.
I had never driven one before and it took me a good 20minutes to figure out how to drive it off the road and into the driveway!
I had to do daily trips up and down the motorway with fast charges to get it over the 6,000kms at VRT, some days we had three sessions to get the ODO up.

The car is now up to 68,953kms, battery is at 92.22% SOH (BMS software update done).
We have replaced just two tyres, next two due to be replaced very soon.
Annual services have cost between €77-€79 from main Nissan dealer.
Availed of considerable free charging over the years, from free eCars network to that one year unlimited electricity deal from whomever it was and still getting the odd free fast charge in to help battery health.
Insurance is cheap, €357 fully comp currently.

Zero issues, the car has never let us down in any form or manner. Fast charges go straight to 43kWh and no rapid gating at any time of the year.
It's a lovely comfy drive, those seats are very good.

Based on our typical journeys I'd put Winter range at about 125kms and Summer at around 160kms so it's absolutely perfect for us as a second car.

I've saved thousands between cheaper tax, insurance and upkeep, not to mention the free charging.
Given the good sunny weather the last few weeks this car has been fully self charged from our PV array, true zero emmissions.

It's got some bumps and scratches now, these are impossible to avoid in small towns and public parking.

Here's to the next 4 years!!!

slave1

slave1 wrote: »

I had to do daily trips up and down the motorway with fast charges to get it over the 6,000kms at VRT, some days we had three sessions to get the ODO up.

McG

I picked up a leaf recently and today got an eo mini pro 2 installed.

The leaf keeps stopping charging after a few mins and won't start again unless I turn the isolator switch off/on. Any ideas on what I'm doing wrong here?

Charge showing at 83% so not full. First time charging it myself so no past experiences to compare to.

KCross

McG wrote: »

I picked up a leaf recently and today got an eo mini pro 2 installed.

The leaf keeps stopping charging after a few mins and won't start again unless I turn the isolator switch off/on. Any ideas on what I'm doing wrong here?

Charge showing at 83% so not full. First time charging it myself so no past experiences to compare to.

What are the 3 blue lights inside the windscreen doing when you plug it in and start the charge?

Any timers set in the car? If yes, have you tried pressing the override button to the right of the steering wheel?

McG

KCross wrote: »

What are the 3 blue lights inside the windscreen doing when you plug it in and start the charge?

Any timers set in the car? If yes, have you tried pressing the override button to the right of the steering wheel?

No timers, I'd tried the override button in case there somehow was one I wasn't aware of.
At first I get 2 solid blue lights and the 3rd blinking. Stays that way for a bit then stops unless I turn the charger off/on

optimal

McG wrote: »

No timers, I'd tried the override button in case there somehow was one I wasn't aware of.
At first I get 2 solid blue lights and the 3rd blinking. Stays that way for a bit then stops unless I turn the charger off/on

It looks more like a charger issue as the lights are behaving normally. I'm not familiar with that charger at all.

McG

Should I be able to get to 100% or does max charge percentage drop as battery ages? Ours is a second hand with 11 bars which has me wondering whether maybe 85% is full?

the_amazing_raisin

McG wrote: »

Should I be able to get to 100% or does max charge percentage drop as battery ages? Ours is a second hand with 11 bars which has me wondering whether maybe 85% is full?

No it'll still go to 100%, it's just that 100% means less energy as the battery degrades

Simplest way to diagnose whether it's the car or charger is to plug into a public ac point and let it charge for about 30 mins

If it fails to charge, it's the car. If it succeeds then the charger is at fault

Assuming it's the charger (seems more likely) call the electrician back to check it over and if they can't figure it out then get in touch with EO

KCross

McG wrote: »

No timers, I'd tried the override button in case there somehow was one I wasn't aware of.
At first I get 2 solid blue lights and the 3rd blinking. Stays that way for a bit then stops unless I turn the charger off/on

Another possibility is that “long life mode” is turned on. Do you see that option in the menus?

After that I’d be thinking the cable or charge point. Maybe try a public charge point and see what happens on that.

McG

looks like it may have been a problem with ALM config. Should be sorted now, wife is out with car so will test later.

randomstuff

Put a deposit on this earlier in the week and having it delivered tomorrow

https://www.donedeal.ie/cars-for-sale/nissan-leaf/27389328

Its got 12 bars, 6kw charger, 2 keys, type 1 to type 2 cable, no granny cable. New tyres, new nct & tax.

It was an Isle of Man car - exported from UK 2017 and was in Isle of Man until January this year. Is there any point in me doing a paid reg check on it in UK? (the UK reg was WM64DBU and the Isle of man reg was MMN943Y - The Isle of Man reg doesn't come up in any searches, that normal?)

On delivery, I'm planning to push every electric button to confirm everything works. General body inspection and test drive. Is there anything I should look out for?

Very excited

kennethsmyth

randomstuff wrote: »

Put a deposit on this earlier in the week and having it delivered tomorrow

https://www.donedeal.ie/cars-for-sale/nissan-leaf/27389328

Its got 12 bars, 6kw charger, 2 keys, type 1 to type 2 cable, no granny cable. New tyres, new nct & tax.

It was an Isle of Man car - exported from UK 2017 and was in Isle of Man until January this year. Is there any point in me doing a paid reg check on it in UK? (the UK reg was WM64DBU and the Isle of man reg was MMN943Y - The Isle of Man reg doesn't come up in any searches, that normal?)

On delivery, I'm planning to push every electric button to confirm everything works. General body inspection and test drive. Is there anything I should look out for?

Very excited

Check the tops of the front suspension struts for rust as water can catch in there - under bonnet clip off two plastic covers at the windscreen.

12 bars for 2015 is possible but it could also be due to a reset of the system by dealer - not likely but I wouldn’t be upset with 11 bars either - check with LeafSpy if you gave available, otherwise forget about it and just enjoy the drive. The grey is nice in the older style leafs.

randomstuff

Just got call from dealer, they couldn't get it NCT'ed today - will be with me early next week. Bummer - was looking forward to having a go on it over weekend...

cannco253

Hi All

Has anyone experienced a total failure of the brakes on their Leaf? Brake is completely unresponsive today, car only stops when the foot brake (handbrake) is applied. Upon startup the car makes a type of clicking noise for about 10 seconds and then stops.
I had a new 12v battery put in about 2 weeks ago, but hadn't any problems prior to that.

Dashboard shows yellow ABS light, yellow BRAKE system warning light, red BRAKE warning light and yellow ESP light.

whatawaster

Quick question for anyone with a 40KWH Leaf from the UK - is it correct that the Speedometer is in mph and cannot be changed to km?

the_amazing_raisin

cannco253 wrote: »

Hi All

Has anyone experienced a total failure of the brakes on their Leaf? Brake is completely unresponsive today, car only stops when the foot brake (handbrake) is applied. Upon startup the car makes a type of clicking noise for about 10 seconds and then stops.
I had a new 12v battery put in about 2 weeks ago, but hadn't any problems prior to that.

Dashboard shows yellow ABS light, yellow BRAKE system warning light, red BRAKE warning light and yellow ESP light.

Thankfully no, and hopefully it never happens

Sounds like some major failure of the hydraulics for the braking system. Maybe check for a puddle of brake fluid under the car

Definitely a job for the garage, no working around that problem

I presume auto hope in park is dead as well? That probably depends on the brakes instead of the motor to hold the car in place

At least with regen you can still slow down a bit, albeit in an uncontrolled manner

Please keep us posted on how the repairs go, whether this is a known issue or something

cannco253

tbh no idea what's happened, but will hopefully get it sorted out fairly quickly.

One thing I'm surprised at with the Leaf is that although the dashboard lights were indicating a problem, no text or audible messages appeared on the main screen or on the smaller screen behind the steering wheel. I would have thought that this would be common enough nowadays but seems not with our Leaf anyway. The car speaks and tells you when the battery charge is low, so surely would be easy enough for it to let you know of any potential system failures. I wonder if other EVs are similar or have a better system for advising the driver of problems?

I can't figure out if there's any way of reading the fault code messages through the main screen on the car to try to see the issues, or if you are forced to use Leafspy or get a diagnostic in the garage?

the_amazing_raisin

cannco253 wrote: »

tbh no idea what's happened, but will hopefully get it sorted out fairly quickly.

One thing I'm surprised at with the Leaf is that although the dashboard lights were indicating a problem, no text or audible messages appeared on the main screen or on the smaller screen behind the steering wheel. I would have thought that this would be common enough nowadays but seems not with our Leaf anyway. The car speaks and tells you when the battery charge is low, so surely would be easy enough for it to let you know of any potential system failures. I wonder if other EVs are similar or have a better system for advising the driver of problems?

I can't figure out if there's any way of reading the fault code messages through the main screen on the car to try to see the issues, or if you are forced to use Leafspy or get a diagnostic in the garage?

If you have an OBD dongle for LeafSpy then you should be able to read the diagnostic codes using a generic OBD app

I think Torque was one that got good reviews but I've never really used it myself

randomstuff

First public charge at local tesco while shopping - I must say it took me about half dozen re-plugs to get the car connected.

Am i suppose to connect the cable at charging station first, then swipe in the esb app, and then plug at car or is there some other way? Can I not just plug it in, and swipe and it connects?

Orebro

cannco253 wrote: »

Hi All

Has anyone experienced a total failure of the brakes on their Leaf? Brake is completely unresponsive today, car only stops when the foot brake (handbrake) is applied. Upon startup the car makes a type of clicking noise for about 10 seconds and then stops.
I had a new 12v battery put in about 2 weeks ago, but hadn't any problems prior to that.

Dashboard shows yellow ABS light, yellow BRAKE system warning light, red BRAKE warning light and yellow ESP light.

Did you get this sorted in the end? Would be interested to know what the issue was - total brake failure not a good thing!!

the_amazing_raisin

randomstuff wrote: »

First public charge at local tesco while shopping - I must say it took me about half dozen re-plugs to get the car connected.

Am i suppose to connect the cable at charging station first, then swipe in the esb app, and then plug at car or is there some other way? Can I not just plug it in, and swipe and it connects?

Yeah they can be finnicky, and it can vary from car to car. I haven't used public AC in a while, but as I recall I had to swipe the card, plug into the charger, then plug in the Leaf


Those were the older chargers where the door doesn't open until you swipe the card however. Newer ones might be different

cannco253

Not yet, the car is due to be collected and brought back to the dealer sometime this week so we'll have to wait and see what they find.

The Leaf supposedly keeps some sort of log of the events that have taken place, so that should help identify what happened.

I've read about a brake control unit recall/reprogram but don't think it effects Leafs built in the UK. This link describes brake problems but I don't know yet if it's related to the problem I've had

https://flipthefleet.org/2018/leaf-brakes-failures/

Has anyone on boards had the Leaf brakes reprogrammed due to this issue?

Can't drive the car at the moment, so looking forward to getting this sorted.

obi604

randomstuff wrote: »

First public charge at local tesco while shopping - I must say it took me about half dozen re-plugs to get the car connected.

Am i suppose to connect the cable at charging station first, then swipe in the esb app, and then plug at car or is there some other way? Can I not just plug it in, and swipe and it connects?

Well wear. Congrats on purchase. Always nice to get a new car.

They can be really finicky. I had to give up at stages. For me - Some Only work with the app on the phone only, the physical card did not work at all.

Then sometimes did not work with either.

Jofspring

Have many had the issue with squeaky wing mirrors? One of mine keeps squeaking, tried wd40 but has made no difference.

_dof_

Jofspring wrote: »

Have many had the issue with squeaky wing mirrors? One of mine keeps squeaking, tried wd40 but has made no difference.

Yeah, I did in my Leaf 40kwh and I know other people with it too. I only happens during cold weather. Is it the drivers side one??

I reported it when my car was in for service and they tried to lubricate it, but it didn't help, so they replaced the mirror under warranty.

Same thing started happening to the new one before long and when I said it to them they offered to put in a warranty request again, but said it would probably be the same again unless Nissan redesigned it.

So I didn't bother, it stops happening when the weather warms up.

kennethsmyth

Jofspring wrote: »

Have many had the issue with squeaky wing mirrors? One of mine keeps squeaking, tried wd40 but has made no difference.

Unless you pop out the mirror and then pop off the painted mirror cover you cannot get to the mechanism that needs to be lubricated. Careful with the painted cover or you’ll snap a clip.

Also use white spray grease or something with ptfe as the squeak is plastic against plastic in the mechanism. It’s an easy enough job, my squeak hasn’t returned in 2 years.

Jofspring

Cheers lads, I'll keep an eye on it and probably give popping it off a go.

It's the passenger mirror that's squeaking on mine. It's a 2017 so the older model.

kennethsmyth

Jofspring wrote: »

Cheers lads, I'll keep an eye on it and probably give popping it off a go.

It's the passenger mirror that's squeaking on mine. It's a 2017 so the older model.

Pretty much same mechanism, you want to spray down into pivot point once cover removed.

rodneytrotter15

So I changed the battery in the Leaf Key, no longer getting the low battery warning and it will start the car and lock when I've the key in my hand and press the lock button on the door handle but none of the buttons on the key will actually work. Has anyone come across this before ?