My thoughts on a weekend with a 2015 Nissan Leaf 24Kw Acenta
Discussion
SCEtoAUX said:
Ref above. There's a button in the group of four, lower right on the dashboard that toggles display modes. One of those modes is battery charge.
That's the mode my car is always in.
Yup. Top left button with a graphic of two squares on it. That's the mode my car is always in.
I display average distance per Kw, but only because if I display battery %, I watch it and get paranoid.
I'm so very tempted.
I have a couple in mind....and i feel like i'm almost ready to go for it.
But....should i?
My concern is - (because this will have to be a longish term thing).....will i get bored??!?! Will, after a few days / weeks whatever...i suddenly see it as an appliance and derive no pleasure from it?
I dont know....i guess nobody can answer that for me as everyone is different....and it's good to read all of the positive reviews from people.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I have a couple in mind....and i feel like i'm almost ready to go for it.
But....should i?
My concern is - (because this will have to be a longish term thing).....will i get bored??!?! Will, after a few days / weeks whatever...i suddenly see it as an appliance and derive no pleasure from it?
I dont know....i guess nobody can answer that for me as everyone is different....and it's good to read all of the positive reviews from people.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Oh no, i dont think it's an exciting car at all....and i'm not looking for an exciting car...i know this is the answer for that.
I just meant...do you turn cold to them....do you not appreciate or like them any more....kinda thing.
But i DO think it's an INTERESTING car in terms of what it does and how it goes about it - (this is coming from never having a EV before and being like....'totes amaze' (urgh!) by the one i used for a weekend/3 days.
I just meant...do you turn cold to them....do you not appreciate or like them any more....kinda thing.
But i DO think it's an INTERESTING car in terms of what it does and how it goes about it - (this is coming from never having a EV before and being like....'totes amaze' (urgh!) by the one i used for a weekend/3 days.
Here's a question to all - bit of a EV NOOB question.
Most of the ones im looking at are a fair trek away and would almost certainly need 1 or more stops on the way back for charging.
Are there any particular types of charger where i can just plug in and pay/not pay for it without having to be registered/member / have the app etc?
I would just be looking to 'get home' kinda thing, even if it was a slower standard charge where i had to wait around a while.
I know thats a very vague question as there are many different types in different places...but i'd be most likely coming off a motorway at a service station for a quick (or slow) splash and dash.
Most of the ones im looking at are a fair trek away and would almost certainly need 1 or more stops on the way back for charging.
Are there any particular types of charger where i can just plug in and pay/not pay for it without having to be registered/member / have the app etc?
I would just be looking to 'get home' kinda thing, even if it was a slower standard charge where i had to wait around a while.
I know thats a very vague question as there are many different types in different places...but i'd be most likely coming off a motorway at a service station for a quick (or slow) splash and dash.
sjg said:
There's two ex-taxi 24kw Leafs for sale on one of the facebook groups, both done over 170k miles, both still have 10 of 12 battery bars left - so probably around 20-25% of range lost.
.
Do you have a link for these at all, my searching is bringing up nothing. Tempted to take a punt on a high mileage Leaf for a local trips only car..
Martin.
I need to update this thread - i got one a couple of weeks ago!
A 'Gen 2' 2013 63 with 85k miles, for £5800. 11 of 12 bars showing.
Think i got it for a decent price looking at other adverts and ebay listings etc. Thats good to know in case i have a change of heart and want to sell, i shouldn't loose much/any money at the moment.
However, i want to persevere.
One think i perhaps should have done is get the app and OBD11 reader first! As mine is only on 80.3%, so it's not too far from it's second bar going...
So, thats not great, especially when i read ScotlandTims post, 90,000 and still 96%? Thats amazing! What kind of charging methods have you been using to keep things going that well?
I will be using the granny cable and keeping fast charging to a minimum as i hear that helps a bit, also keeping to 80% charge as again i gather that helps.
It's looking at about 65-72 miles realistic at the moment, although it can do more in the right conditions, it seems to LOVE like...under 30mph town stuff..the range barely moves in that. However, my commute is a mix so i wont be able to get more miles than i currently do.
It's OK though as my general weekday miles are usually under 20, sometimes up to 30.
Mine has the optional 6.6Kw charge mode and the optional beige interior?! Not the best and wouldn't be my choice but it's bright and airy i suppose!
Still early days but im really liking how it drives, its refinement, comfort, space for the kids, big boot etc, it's just the right size for us. I like the spec too, still haven't set up the carwings etc. Or the heating timer etc.
Although i am strangely getting phone notifications to tell me the car has finished charging....when it isn't even charging or plugged in. Not sure if i'm somehow linked to someone elses car? Hehe.
It's just like....you drive around in it.....and you get this feeling of....."why doesn't everyone drive one of these?" It's just so smooth and nice! And quite quick too, if you want it to be.
A 'Gen 2' 2013 63 with 85k miles, for £5800. 11 of 12 bars showing.
Think i got it for a decent price looking at other adverts and ebay listings etc. Thats good to know in case i have a change of heart and want to sell, i shouldn't loose much/any money at the moment.
However, i want to persevere.
One think i perhaps should have done is get the app and OBD11 reader first! As mine is only on 80.3%, so it's not too far from it's second bar going...
So, thats not great, especially when i read ScotlandTims post, 90,000 and still 96%? Thats amazing! What kind of charging methods have you been using to keep things going that well?
I will be using the granny cable and keeping fast charging to a minimum as i hear that helps a bit, also keeping to 80% charge as again i gather that helps.
It's looking at about 65-72 miles realistic at the moment, although it can do more in the right conditions, it seems to LOVE like...under 30mph town stuff..the range barely moves in that. However, my commute is a mix so i wont be able to get more miles than i currently do.
It's OK though as my general weekday miles are usually under 20, sometimes up to 30.
Mine has the optional 6.6Kw charge mode and the optional beige interior?! Not the best and wouldn't be my choice but it's bright and airy i suppose!
Still early days but im really liking how it drives, its refinement, comfort, space for the kids, big boot etc, it's just the right size for us. I like the spec too, still haven't set up the carwings etc. Or the heating timer etc.
Although i am strangely getting phone notifications to tell me the car has finished charging....when it isn't even charging or plugged in. Not sure if i'm somehow linked to someone elses car? Hehe.
It's just like....you drive around in it.....and you get this feeling of....."why doesn't everyone drive one of these?" It's just so smooth and nice! And quite quick too, if you want it to be.
Well done on taking the plunge, M1C. I went through your exact thought process 2 years ago, and bought a 2015 24kwh Gen 2 Leaf. I've done 20k miles in it now, and I love it death. I'm still on 12 battery bars and the car is on 28k miles. I expect to keep the car for many years now. Your opening post of this thread was 100% spot on in my experience. We have our old ICE car now sat on the drive doing nowt most of the time, but it's there for long journeys to visit relatives, go on holiday etc. I'm looking forward to the day I can afford a BEV with enough range to make the ICE obsolete entirely.
You say you've got a beige interior, I thought those were phased out and not available on Gen 2? Do you have the electric parking brake or the foot operated mechanical one?
You say you've got a beige interior, I thought those were phased out and not available on Gen 2? Do you have the electric parking brake or the foot operated mechanical one?
ElectricSoup, thank you.
Mr E - yes, its definitely a Gen 2, foot operated ratchet brake etc. Upon reading up etc, i realised i definitely needed to go for one of those over the Gen 1. It's a September 2013 63 plate.
I know the Gen 1s all had the beige interior as standard, and the Gen 2s had the (much nicer IMO) dark interior as standard, but the beige became an option, which for some reason the previous owner chose! It's alright i suppose, just will need to keep on top of the cleaning etc to keep it looking nice.
The reason i went for it is that, when i did my man maths, the cost of the loan for the car + my electic cost per month was working out less than the amount i spent on diesel per month (in a decently economical 50mpg car) - so the tipping point had been reached.
it is faviourable as i'm on a very cheap electric tariff at home. I can also occasionally charge at work, if really needed, the option is there.
It's a battery owned model, a battery lease model would have thrown the sums out of the window.
I've used both an Ecotricity rapid charger and a Instavolt (ChargePoint) charger where you use your card and both worked nicely. However i'll mainly be granny charging overnight.
Does anyone here know how to set up the carwings thing? I've set up a Nissan+You account but can't seem to log in to the app on my phone. Somebody on the EV forum said i need to ring Nissan and set it up with them?
Mr E - yes, its definitely a Gen 2, foot operated ratchet brake etc. Upon reading up etc, i realised i definitely needed to go for one of those over the Gen 1. It's a September 2013 63 plate.
I know the Gen 1s all had the beige interior as standard, and the Gen 2s had the (much nicer IMO) dark interior as standard, but the beige became an option, which for some reason the previous owner chose! It's alright i suppose, just will need to keep on top of the cleaning etc to keep it looking nice.
The reason i went for it is that, when i did my man maths, the cost of the loan for the car + my electic cost per month was working out less than the amount i spent on diesel per month (in a decently economical 50mpg car) - so the tipping point had been reached.
it is faviourable as i'm on a very cheap electric tariff at home. I can also occasionally charge at work, if really needed, the option is there.
It's a battery owned model, a battery lease model would have thrown the sums out of the window.
I've used both an Ecotricity rapid charger and a Instavolt (ChargePoint) charger where you use your card and both worked nicely. However i'll mainly be granny charging overnight.
Does anyone here know how to set up the carwings thing? I've set up a Nissan+You account but can't seem to log in to the app on my phone. Somebody on the EV forum said i need to ring Nissan and set it up with them?
Now I'm sad. I prefer the beige interior but have the black one. :-(
Like you I charged at home to start with, then after a few months twigged that I could get away with mostly charging at work for free - and I've been doing that for 18 months now. Hardly ever plug in at home. I pay £150 a month on a PCP for the car, I used to spend almost £300 a month on diesel on an old 40mpg car which I owned outright. This is a big win to have a newer, 100% reliable car with no servicing or maintenance costs - the old car was costing thousands in repairs every year (big old Merc E class). See if you can wangle charging at work every day too, it'll save you even more money.
I gave up on carwings. Yes, you have to call Nissan. I tried a couple of times but was on hold so long I gave up. I have no use for the app really. The car's in a garage overnight so doesn't need pre heating or anything like that even in winter. Superfluous to my requirements.
I love the car so much I changed my user name on here - mine is the awful bright red colour, like tomato soup, hence the user name. I got over caring about the colour of my car years ago.
Like you I charged at home to start with, then after a few months twigged that I could get away with mostly charging at work for free - and I've been doing that for 18 months now. Hardly ever plug in at home. I pay £150 a month on a PCP for the car, I used to spend almost £300 a month on diesel on an old 40mpg car which I owned outright. This is a big win to have a newer, 100% reliable car with no servicing or maintenance costs - the old car was costing thousands in repairs every year (big old Merc E class). See if you can wangle charging at work every day too, it'll save you even more money.
I gave up on carwings. Yes, you have to call Nissan. I tried a couple of times but was on hold so long I gave up. I have no use for the app really. The car's in a garage overnight so doesn't need pre heating or anything like that even in winter. Superfluous to my requirements.
I love the car so much I changed my user name on here - mine is the awful bright red colour, like tomato soup, hence the user name. I got over caring about the colour of my car years ago.
Sounds good Soup!
I quite like the red!
Mine is white, looks just like Tims.
Sounds like you have got a decent setup there with regards to charging etc.
What is your normal routine? Do you granny charge or fast charge and do you always go to 100% or limit to 80%
I'm gonna try the 80% thing, it should be doiable with the miles i do (most, if not all days)
According to Leaf Spy my car has had 105 Quick Charges and 7586 L1/L2 charges. Alghough i read somewhere that you need to halve that number as it usually counts one charge as two?
I still have much to learn!
Shame about the Carwings thing. I've read it's a bit ropey to say the least. I would like to see if i can control the various things from my phone.
I quite like the red!
Mine is white, looks just like Tims.
Sounds like you have got a decent setup there with regards to charging etc.
What is your normal routine? Do you granny charge or fast charge and do you always go to 100% or limit to 80%
I'm gonna try the 80% thing, it should be doiable with the miles i do (most, if not all days)
According to Leaf Spy my car has had 105 Quick Charges and 7586 L1/L2 charges. Alghough i read somewhere that you need to halve that number as it usually counts one charge as two?
I still have much to learn!
Shame about the Carwings thing. I've read it's a bit ropey to say the least. I would like to see if i can control the various things from my phone.
Now I'm even more sad, I want a white one! :-)
I charge to 100% at work every week day. I then don't charge at home overnight, and when I get back the next day I usually have 50-60% left still, sometimes 30-40% if I've been running children about somewhere in the evening. Sometimes I get away without charging at all at weekends, but when I do I charge back to only 80% at home, and that's because I'm tight, not because I'm worried about battery condition. I'm given to believe that my age of Leaf has a far lower risk of degradation than older ones, so I crossed that off my worry list and just get on with life. The charger at work is a "fast" charger, and I have a PodPoint home "fast" charger which got installed for free when I bought the car from a Nissan dealer.
My PCP is up next September, and my GFV is about £4k. I'd probably have to be mad not to buy it for that as it'll probably actually be worth £8k, so I expect I will. But I do fancy a 30 or even 40kwh model and see if I can use our diesel car even less. And I am sometimes quite mad. And man maths etc etc.
:-)
I charge to 100% at work every week day. I then don't charge at home overnight, and when I get back the next day I usually have 50-60% left still, sometimes 30-40% if I've been running children about somewhere in the evening. Sometimes I get away without charging at all at weekends, but when I do I charge back to only 80% at home, and that's because I'm tight, not because I'm worried about battery condition. I'm given to believe that my age of Leaf has a far lower risk of degradation than older ones, so I crossed that off my worry list and just get on with life. The charger at work is a "fast" charger, and I have a PodPoint home "fast" charger which got installed for free when I bought the car from a Nissan dealer.
My PCP is up next September, and my GFV is about £4k. I'd probably have to be mad not to buy it for that as it'll probably actually be worth £8k, so I expect I will. But I do fancy a 30 or even 40kwh model and see if I can use our diesel car even less. And I am sometimes quite mad. And man maths etc etc.
:-)
Mr E said:
SCEtoAUX said:
Ref above. There's a button in the group of four, lower right on the dashboard that toggles display modes. One of those modes is battery charge.
That's the mode my car is always in.
Yup. Top left button with a graphic of two squares on it. That's the mode my car is always in.
I display average distance per Kw, but only because if I display battery %, I watch it and get paranoid.
I think it was introduced in 2013. All three of "mine" are 2011, so have to rely on the Guess o Meter.
ElectricSoup said:
But I do fancy a 30 or even 40kwh model and see if I can use our diesel car even less.
With all the rain, and now temp starting to approach single digits surely the temptation to go for a 30/40 kWh version is there?I did 49 miles yesterday in our EV without even thinking about the battery charge status. In my old 24kWh Leaf I would have been in hypermilling mode with the aircon off and trying to demist the windscreen with a good old fashioned sponge!
I cannot emphasis how much difference even a slightly bigger battery EV makes to the ownership experience. The difference a 300 mile range EV versus a 150 mile range one is tiny in real life (unless your doing 300 miles driving every day), versus going from a 75 mile range EV to a 150 mile one.
Edited by gangzoom on Wednesday 2nd October 06:54
Carwings is a waste of time. Haven't used in in almost my entire five years of ownership.
Just had mine serviced and MOT'd at my local indy. The bigger of the two services. Total cost £142.00 (yep, all in).
Zero VED, peanuts to service, very cheap to insure and fuel costs about 20% (at most) of an ICE. Anyone who does a regular 50 mile round trip for five days of the week would be an idiot not to have a Leaf as a second car.
Buy it for £8k, pay £100/month on the loan, save £120/month on fuel. That's a free car.
Just had mine serviced and MOT'd at my local indy. The bigger of the two services. Total cost £142.00 (yep, all in).
Zero VED, peanuts to service, very cheap to insure and fuel costs about 20% (at most) of an ICE. Anyone who does a regular 50 mile round trip for five days of the week would be an idiot not to have a Leaf as a second car.
Buy it for £8k, pay £100/month on the loan, save £120/month on fuel. That's a free car.
M1C said:
Does anyone here know how to set up the carwings thing? I've set up a Nissan+You account but can't seem to log in to the app on my phone. Somebody on the EV forum said i need to ring Nissan and set it up with them?
It'll probably be registered to the old owner's account still. I've just set it up today on our 'new' 2014 Tekna, and I filled in the contact form on the Nissan+you site, they emailed back asking for the VIN, i sent them a photo of the V5 and then I was able to register it in my account.Be aware that the new 'white site' Nissan+you account isn't the login for the carwings app. You click the connect button from the new site and it takes you back to the old style carwings site where you can register for an old account. This is the one you log into the app and the car with.
It's a bit of a faff but worth it for the remote climate control.
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