This comparison was made with the leaf driving in b mode on the highway. While b mode enables more regen, it also creates more electric induced drag at highway speeds. You can get the same amount of regen driving in d mode by lightly applying the brakes. D mode allows much better coasting which would improve efficiency at highway speeds. Try this same comparison again driving the leaf in d mode, and see what happens!
LEAFSpy has always had an offset, even on the 1st gen LEAF since it takes into account the restricted usable capacity of the battery (i.e. the lithium cells are never fully charged or discharged). For example on my former 2014 LEAF, 100% SOC on the dashboard corresponded to 97% in LEAFSpy. Similarly, ~20% on the dashboard corresponded to about ~29% in LEAFSpy. From my experience, I think the low range is due to the battery temperature/high internal resistance. For overnight cold soaks below -5C, my range used to be ~50-60% of that when the outside temperature was above 5-10C. Compared with the Bolt EV that I now drive, the range loss due to similar cold temperatures (same driving conditions/route, no heater use) is much less (65-75% of warm temperature range) once the battery thermal management warms up the battery.
Great video as always. Since Nissan wants Leaf 2 to go more mainstream than previous one (as you can see by its design) and there will be more customers who isn't used to EV driving, Nissan might have taught leaf to underestimate SoC so that new customers won't stop in the middle of roads. It will be difficult but I'd like to know how long can EVs drive after SoC reach 0%, like driving around and around in a charging facility.
Nissan almost has a pseudo reserve tank coded to the Leaf's battery in that regard like a gasoline car. Some types of people would push a car until the warning light to actually search for a gas station. If that kind of mentality buys a Leaf they might do the same and charging stations (outside Norway) isn't remotely as common as gas stations. An ingenious solution to cater to the daring but for those wanting to stretch the range and battery, getting LeafSpy might be mandatory to learn the real SoC.
The primary cause of the leafs apparent high consumption will be the cold weather. Lion batteries have only 60-70% of their rated capacity at -20c. The ioniq heats the batteries to prevent lower battery capacity affecting range so much. And yes lion batteries do not behaviour linearly when it comes to their use. Anyone who has a smartphone will notice this as the capacity drops faster when the voltage is lower
I wonder if Nissan will update the Leaf with an active heater and cooler system for the battery in more extreme climates. In Norway we can get warm summers and very cold winters. 30 to minus 40. Driving this Leaf from Oslo to Bergen during winter would be interesting, considering you have to climb the mountains (unless you go through the longer coastal route via Kristiansand and Stavanger).
The percent of full charge capacity is an estimate made by the BMS. It works with battery voltage, real time current drain, and temperature in order to estimate the percentage of remaining capacity (generally the 100% capacity is the capacity at 4.2V/cell, sometimes derated to 4.1 or 4.0 for 100%). So as the parameters vary, the estimation process is challenged to stay consistent and not generate fluctuations in the indicated capacity.) Battery packs are typically manufactured with default values for internal resistance and capacity as a function of voltage and temperature. The pack has to be cycled in order for the BMU to customize the "model" for the estimation process. While this is going on, there can be jumps in the estimate as the pack learns. If a car is brand new the estimates may change in real time. The manual for my 2013 Leaf also says to expect the gauge to read higher when the battery is cold... due to the 100% capacity going down (unexpected behavior to me...) We probably should not use the available charge gauge for "science".
The battery percentage jumping around like that might be caused by the battery BMS not being calibrated correctly. My iPhone does that when the BMS is not calibrated correctly. But that's just my guess.
Great discussion as usual. DO get LeafSpy and a compatible BT OBD II port. The numbers are much more believable and detailed. It also (Pro version) gives you power consumption for Heat, AUX, A/C, and drivetrain broken out.
The Russian video was filmed in Eastern Russia, where it's common to drive Japanese-style cars (right-hand steering wheel) due to proximity to Japan. The car was imported to Russia from Japan for a customer.
Great Job Bjørn! It seems the BMS recalculates the available max capacity while driving depending on temperature. That might explain the weird SoC changes, because then it recalculates SoC depending on available capacity... In very low temperatures, the algorithm to calculate available capacity might be a little bit too sensitive to extreme temperature changes due to internal heat build up, so the effect on the displayed SoC might be too massive... It seems the weird jumping happened inside a tunnel, where the air temperature may have been much higher than on the outside. This may also be an indication that the BMS recalculates available capacity based on outside temperature, and then in turn the SoC jumps...
Your findings sound right. You can't trust the %-meter. The only thing you can go by is Wh in and Wh out. It has to do with low temperature and internal resistance of the battery. The %-meter is meant for end user to get a "feeling" of how much available energy there is. So it makes sense the car "fakes" %-meter which gives more meaningful state of charge for end user but you can't calculate by it. I'm quite sure they know about it and it's there for a purpose.
The main issue is that if the SoC is wrong and car behaves based on the SoC reported in instrument cluster then even you have 20% in real SoC; car would be in turtle mode, which is useless. Nissan should fix this issue if it is indeed a bug with instrument cluster, regardless lack of active battery-pack temperature regulator is rather odd. Original leaf didn't have it but original lead was the first mass market E.V. so it could afford to not have certain features; not the 2nd generation leaf though.
all of this makes sense. The leaf doesn't have active battery temperature control. Batteries in the cold lose efficiency phones in the winter outside die faster than in the summer. Cameras are the same. The leaf battery got cold because and the charge level dropped. Then the car was plugged in which heated up the battery and the charge lost due to cold reestablished it self. If you do this same trip in summer it will be very different. That is why the Leaf isn't there yet.
My experience with the Zoe is that the trip meter is very conservative. Best way to determine you're metrics is to take note of the km's and the consumed kwh's (i use CanZE) and use some old school notepad math. I must add that the 17" wheels are terrible for range and dropping to 15" wheels with low drag/friction profile tyres can add up to +15% of range. Maybe more in a car like the Leaf.
Going by the old leaf design, when the temp goes below -17C the battery heater comes on to protect it from freezing. This consumes (if I remember correctly) approximately 400Wh. So earlier on when the battery was cold, it may have been on to protect the battery from freezing. Would explain why on the way back the efficiency went up, since it was warmed from the driving and quick charges, that protection was turned off. The battery really doesn't like being colder than -10C and warmer than 30C (which for most climates is acceptable). It's optimal range is when it's between 18C - 25C.
Chivalryx this makes me wonder whether the battery heating system could be tricked into heating the battery at a higher temperature, to aid charging capacity
My 2012 Leaf drops relatively quickly to 20km range, but from 20km range it drops really slow. I mean, my guess is that it has at least 40km when it claims to have 20km range. My guess is this is a measure to get people to charge more often? I don’t know.
When you look at the design specifications for the gm bolt EV battery, you can see that it is properly liquid cooled and heated, to keep the battery at the optimum temperature throughout it's life, If either being run or connected to the mains, which will reduce degradation, down to a miniscule amount and equalise temperatures when rapid charging also, so the temperature is kept equally controlled whilst charging. The leaf 24, 30 and 40 are all not controlled within close temperature parameters and ambient heat loss is mostly how leaf batteries are cooled and hence that is why there is a much higher level of battery degradation with a leaf battery as the temperature often falls outside optimum temperature for good battery management, particularly when operated in hot conditions. Therefore it can be concluded that in this regard, the leaf is made in a much more inferior way than the bolt.
interesting comment on leafspy. I thought the new leaf will try to display more technically correct figure (true SOC) in linear manner. same problem with older leafs. not exactly a problem, but a behaviour is handy to know by owners, that leaf deliberately introduce anxiety much earlier.
So both the Ioniq and Leaf had non-linear SoC meters, with the Hyundai being optimistic while the Nissan being pessimistic. Not as big of an efficiency advantage the Ioniq has over the Leaf as the initial test seems. Great sleuthing Bjorn.
Regarding the tripmeter on the Leaf. On my leaf(24kWh) when i start going downhill the only consuption showed is what is used by heat. When i then get to flat road and start consuming, the tripmeter will not show any consuption until i have used what was regenerated going down the hill.
Maybe it also is same issue with manufacturers "trick numbers" when people experience for example that the Opel Ampera charges way slower than for example 2 years older Kia Soul EV?
I have the same jumping SOC on my 30kWh leaf when the battery is cold and you push the motor output power. Leaf spy does report more accurate SOH. It actually reports what is available and how much will the BMS let the battery to charge / discharge. This may require some calibration but the default has been very accurate for me (around 12 % left close to turtle and 96.7 % when charged to "full" ). GIDs % will report how much you can use. I got to as low as 18 GIDs left and still not get a turtle. I suggest you get leaf spy to work before you test the new leaf again, this will make your math a lot more accurate. LEAF spy also saved me once when i plugged the chademo port incorrectly and the car refused to charge on chademo and L1/L2. I cleared the DTC errors with leaf spy, restarted car and could charge again.
Yesterday I went down to about 4% battery on my new Leaf and LeafSpy showed I had just above 6kWh of energy left. I spoke to Jim the LeafSpy programmer and the fault is with the Leaf not the app.
If you can't rely on what the car tells you (and you shouldn't) you have to base consumption on how much energy the charging station says has been put into the battery. What counts when comparing cars is not the theoretical or claimed capacity of the battery but how much you can travel on a full charge (or partial charge if you prefer) and the speed of charging during a journey.
Please make a video when the car goes in turtle mode see how far you could actually drive before the car quits going I think everybody would be really interested in this!!!😎
In one of the comments to that Russian video James confirmed that the LeafSpy is not tuned or tested w/2018 model, so not to be used as a reference model either. Also, in 2013+ models 10% from the dashboard is in fact 20% (per LeafSpy). Quote: James Pollock 1 week ago LeafSpy developer here. Nice video. Don't speak Russian but I am guessing you were comparing LeafSpy's SOC which is directly from the BMS ECU with the modified version of SOC Nissan shows on the Dash. Looks like Turtle mode showed up at about 6.5% or about 2.6 kWh left in the battery for protection. I currently don't have access to a 2018 Leaf so there will probably be some improvements/fixes to LeafSpy once I get my hands on one
Excellent video and explains so much. I think Nissan who are targetting the New Leaf at mass-market have set the percentage display to be zero when there is a reserve of say 15% - 20% to protect the battery. Not as sophisticated as Tesla which has software limited the true capacity which can be "upgraded" over the air. However, maybe the Leaf will continue to show the same range for its 100% of charge over time as the buffer can be reduced without the owner seeing any range reduction something which would reassure someone switching from an ICE vehicle. Also, degradation of the battery would not be noticed as a range reduction throughout the life of the battery guarantee.
Does the new Leaf track what % of charge is used for battery conditioning while driving? I'm wondering if that is what is causing the trip computer discrepancy....the trip computer does not count kWh used for battery conditioning towards the efficiency calculations. The Bolt/Ampera-E will tell you what % of the battery is used for conditioning and HVAC.
love this sort of review. redo the comparison asap. starting to sound like Nissan made it look better and improved tech but failed to improve efficiency. maybe they think mainstream buyers don't care. personally I'd rather have looks and efficiency but it sounds like it's a generation away in the Ioniq. i had hoped Leaf would improve enough to be my next car but from this review sub 100 range is out of the question, 16% reserve or not.
Thanks Bjorn, I suspected that the Ioniq was a more economical car than the LEAF and the inconsistencies with all in car instrumentation. Interesting to see how at extreme temperatures those problems are compounded. I wonder how long it will be before we get Kw/h figures advertised equivalent to mpg or standard fuel consumption, it is relevant now to vehicle choice so thanks for testing, and would also be interesting to find out if we can trust our public SOC figures?
The main issue is just the cold battery I guess, so that's what a Tesla would show with a blue bar. The leaf do not heat the battery because of a design choice to get more range on many shorter trips I guess. So in the tunnel you might have some more energy output than before and a bit less cold air and the battery pack heated up a bit and the displayed state of charge rised. Maybe running this car in non-eco mode would enable the battery heater earlier or maybe this decision is hooked up to the navigation system, which could estimate if it's a good choice to start the heater to access some of the "lost" state of charge because of the voltage drop. Never the less it would be fairer to split your test in two parts: 1. Just the range of a vehicle at a given temperature, like -10°C until it's on 0 km or start dropping the power output heavily that you cannot keep up 100 kph or similar. 2. Just a "we load both cars full and drive 100 km at 100 kph in -10°C, start charging it with DC, leave the car, lock it and look at the numbers of the charging stations which the car needed to be full again." Full would be the maximum state of charge chargeable with DC or recommend daily use state of charge by the vendor - whichever applies best. :)
My thoughts exactly. In a Tesla we would have the snow flake on the battery symbol. If this is the case, it is very bad for the leaf, because charging it with that cold battery is not good for the battery health. (some cells are very cold, others are normal temperature) But also 8 years warranty on it? Would be worst case scenario, if the state of charge drops are a result of uneven battery temp. Because a software fix would not be enough to fix it.
Bjørn Nyland seems like others got similar behaviour in very cold weather. Driving high speed into cold area uphill, even got limp mode for a while. Reduced speed and got to a less cold area. Car back to normal range again. Sensors getting too cooled down and limit battery? Location of some battery sensors make them too cold tricking the electronics ? Could explain odd fast charging as they "unfreeze"
Bjørn Nyland yeah, but these cars have pouch cells, which have notoriously issues with uneven battery temperatures... Maybe the battery was just partly warm, but the convection inside the cells are bad. The jumping SoC is a clear indication that the voltage dropped and the SoC internally calculated is just based on a estimation without a voltage drop.
Friends with a Leaf 2 just visited and they charged at my house. I have a 16A 3.7kW charger for my Ioniq. According to the Leaf it was charging at a speed of 6kW?! The battery indicator of the Leaf is truly a Guess-O-meter. And today it was around 15 degrees in the Netherlands. I don't know what Nissan did, but it feels as if they made some mistakes with the 40kW battery and they really have to redo their homework and fix it with a software/firmware update. The Leaf itself is a nice car and well build. But Nissan should fix this, because it is a bit of letdown with an unreliable battery indicator and issues with rapid charging.
So if I understood well, the Russian did 162km with 6% of the battery left at a speed of 85 km/h at -30C actually I thinks it's a good results if you consider that the heat pump at that temperature does not work and that the Leaf has a battery warmer .
Actually he dropped to ~70km/h only shortly. Then he speeded up again. Also when it was -29C to -31C, he kept the speed up between 80 and 85km/h on the speedometer most of the time. That would be about 76-81km/h gps speed.
Watch from 03:25 to 04:00. At 06:18 local time, his trip meter was at 22.3 km At 07:06 local time, his trip meter was at 76.6 km He traveled 54.3 km in 48 min. That's an average of 68 km/h. I didn't bother checking other timestamps. But you get the idea. He was driving pretty slow.
Kelvyn Bettridge Maybe, old version show +10% on the speedometer all over the range. At least it's easy to compensate, just do double digits like 55, 77 and 99 to travel at 50, 70 and 90.
Many thanks Bjørn for the two comprehensive videos on the battery gage questions / issues. I am seriously considering purchasing one as my first electric vehicle and I am asking Nissan if they are aware of users feedback such as yours and if so what are their plans
Maybe the BMS still has to calibrate? With new phones the soc value is also inaccurate after a few charges it is much more accurate. Maybe something similar is happening to the leaf?
Bjorn there's a difference between the real percentage of the battery (shown with spy leaf) and the usable percentage (shown on the gauge). For example my PHEV Golf GTE since the car was new, when charged to maximum the battery does not pass 94% (checked with obd11) and when reaches 0km range I still have 24% in the battery (checked with obd11). That means VW uses a protection/buffer not to charge to real 100% nor to discharge it to real 0% increasing in my opinion the life of the Li-ion battery. Resuming: the car makers hide from the driver the real percentage, giving only information about the usable strip of the battery. If you use diagnostic tools like Spyleaf or OBD11 then you'll be able to have a more precise reading. Like your videos, thank you.
If the state of charge uses a temperature dependent safety factor or something, maybe the state of charge would rise if moving the car inside a heated parking garage?
I do 250ish Wh/mi with my 2nd gen 64 reg leaf because it's 3C°. When it's 10 outside and get stuck behind a truck (cause that's the way to do it) I do less than 200 Wh/mi. The new leaf is a shame if you can't beat my figures at least. I only got 4 month of experience...
Well leaf is heavier and the motor has more HP too. altho you get lower range on leaf if you base on the monitor.......it is actually batter for you battery to charge your battery before you drain it fully.....it's also safer, you don't wanna assume you range long than it'll be and stuck in the mid of the road....
The weight is not much of issue with EVs I mean it doesnt make big difference if the diiference is close. Plus the safety up and bottom battery buffer is already there and it is not displayed. Zero or 100perc SOC doesnt mean you have reached it.
mravecsk1 still 400 lbs difference not mich? I don't know...10%more heavier... Also 30 hp different not sure if it matter.. Logically thinking it should matter...anyway leaf does has more air resistance while driving at high speed probably because the car is higher, this might be matter by a lot also
Same here, and the KM scale is also not correct, when i drove in winter, as soon as my battery goes under 33% i need to take in coint that if there is standing 60km left, i only can do like 30-35 :( I do not like the ioniq scaling :(
I wonder if the same "issues" will translate to the new Nissan e-NV200 too. I am planning on test driving e-NV200 when the dealer gets it in May. It would be pointless for me to test it without knowing exactly how much range it actually has. It might be a dealbreaker for me, so I really hope they fix this. Give me a linear 0-100% scale of the available energy! Anything else just make it too hard to compare EVs.
In this Russian video you can see that the Leaf shows 35% in the dash, but the app on the phone shows 45%! And a bit later the difference is even bigger 16% vs 32% So the difference is not linear. ua-cam.com/video/zl4H4Z6-e08/v-deo.htmlm45s But in his newer video you can see that when it is warmer (only -10 instead of -30°C) the difference is generally less (max 10%) ua-cam.com/video/eekRT3R4e6w/v-deo.htmlm47s
Unfortunately the russian guy didn't drove it down to 0% in the second video. The biggest difference between dash and app in the first video was around 5-15% (on the dash). But in the second video he stopped at 36%. In the first video the difference at 35% was 9,9% and the difference in the second video at 36% was 7,8%. So it is almost the same difference.
I've had same issue with the SOC with 2gen 24kw leaf. It was always the same in the start (happend 3 times during 1 winter)... Drove to work (65km) and at 17% it dropped down to 6%, never went up. This desember it went from 53% down to 41% then back to 52% (this was between Berger E6 to DC charger at skedsmokorset) so all happend very quick. Ended with getting ioniq (that was allready ordered). Never trusted my leaf after this...
About 30% is close to the difference in drag coefficient. The leaf is 0.29cd which is awful considering its an 'eco' & range limited battery EV car. The fact it has software issues as well is just more confidence breaking.. I'm ordering an Ioniq.
If you think that you need a maths degree to run an electric car you might well be right, but don't worry too much!... that is unless you don't have an option to use a conventional fossil fuel car for more "Adventurous" trips. For myself, I sometimes swap with my kids who really like my British made Nissan. I have had my Leaf Accenta for 4 years now and absolutely love it. I know that my longest regular trip ranges are well covered ( I set my charging to 80% to preserve the life of my battery) I did a test run to my main airport with 40% to spare so no worries about picking up friends. Five seater comfort and a good boot is a bonus. Comfort and ride is important to me and I like the light beige interior option that Nissan offer. My previous car was an old Merc which I don't miss and together with solar panels it is "Driving for nothing!"
If I want to know the fuel consumption of my petrol car, I could look at the dash but I don't. Fill the car up with petrol. Trip the odometer. Drive the car until it is short of petrol. Fill the car up with petrol and get a receipt. The odometer has to be accurate on the car, due to legislation. The amount of petrol delivered by the pump and recorded on the receipt is also accurate and tested regularly by the authorities. Miles per Gallon is then easy to calculate and is based upon to bits of information, distance travelled and fuel used that are quite accurate. Isn't the same true of electric cars? Forget the computer on the dash. "Fill" the car up with electricity... Trip the trip. Drive a good distance... "Fill" the car again... Amount of energy required to fill the car.... must be accurate if you are paying for it.... If the car is saying its full, when it isn't... just keep on keeping records... Over time, discrepancies will be lost.
Bjørn Nyland Thats exactly how EPA measures consumption. KWh taken from the wall socket, not from the battery. So you can optimize the onboard charger and get better MPGe in US. Even the speed of charging may be a factor as the charger may be more efficient at higher speed. For example, in EU Smart ED gets advertized with two different efficiency rating depending on the method charged, dedicated Mennekes socket or Schuko charging brick.
How much kWh did you draw from the chargers to charge the Leaf and the Ionic back to full after the race? To compare the true energy consumption (as opposed to range) of the Leaf and the Ionic, I think you should compare how much kWh they draw out of the chargers, for an identical trip in identical circumstances. Then you don't have to care about errors in the car displays.
At my opinion, i think the leaf you drove had a defect battery or any other component. (?) We cant point the finger on the weather. And how cold it was. I respect and i know that cold weather is really effect battery’s but in this case here. We had really bad results.
it's probably that the ionic has heat scavenging which allows it to take heat from the battery and motor to heat the interior and that coupled with the higher motor power of the leafs motor is why the leaf ran out of power faster then the ionic
Ioniq doesn't have that. It has a very simple air cooled battery. But I guess that the battery type on Ioniq has less internal resistance and will work better at higher load/speed than the Leaf battery.
This is due to very cold weather. I had the same issue today when driving my 2013 Leaf in -18 on highway at 140km/h. I was driving in -15 and then reached highway and started driving fast. As soon as I reached the cold weather zone uphill the % suddenly droped from 65 to 31% and I even got turtle mode!!! for a minute. But as soon I slowed down, the GOM started to climb up and after around a minute it again showed 60%. Personally I suspect that this is casued by temperature sensors getting exremeley cold due to high wind and then electronics limit the power and capacity of the battery automatically.
Excellent hypothesis! I observed the same thing on my Leaf 30Kw in January. I left home one morning with 60% SoC with a -13°C battery (data from LeafSpy app) to get to work 9 km away. On my highway route, I climbed a 1km hill at 90 km/h. The engine used more than 40Kw of power during this climb. The SoC suddenly went down to 22%, then the turtle appeared. A message appeared on the screen saying that the low temperature of the battery limited the power of the engine. I came to work with 37% SoC. That was the first and the only one time I saw this. It therefore seems that the chemistry of the battery allows a limited discharge at low temperature. See this : drive.google.com/file/d/1x2NNdbY2f9hNf1vvPZdQSstxiM5j_A4I/view?usp=sharing
You should never compare discharge rate if the battery was not charged to 100%. The last 5% are most important as this is the balancing phase so all cells are at the same SoC. The same goes for smartphones, if disconnected from charger at 95% the charge will drop fast to 90% or 85% in couple minutes.
That is the problem for Li-ion. It was not really charged to 98% the last 10% of SoC are very inaccurate while battery is still charging. Try the same for phone, charge to 98% and disconnect you will see that it will drop rapidly to 90%/85%. Now charge to 100% and it will take way longer(because of equalizing charge) to charge but at the end will not lose capacity quickly. That is also how fast chargers work that it can quickly charge to 80% but last drops are added more slowly. The 98% was a fake reading.
The car was almost new. It charged very slow towards the end, gaining about 1 % every 10 minutes. I doubt it would be much better if I charged to 100 %.
It would. The last 1% would give similar charge like last 10%. Think about it why the last drops are so slow. If the balancing phase is disrupted then battery is not correctly calibrated and it will behave strange.
I " made " a mistake not " did ". From an englishman who has learnt Swedish. I have always told people to correct me so I improve. I am not criticsizing.
I agree that there seem to be strange things going on. However, some common sense arguments might go a long way to get an explanation. First, when it comes to estimating SOC, there is just no definite authoritative answer. Cells are at 0% when the BMS decides it is unsafe to extract any more charge, and similarly at the opposite end for 100%, but in between any number is a guess, more or less informed, but a guess. Trusting the indication on the dashboard blindly is only slightly more naive than trusting LeafSpy blindly; while the latter has access to somewhat more raw data, that data comes from voltage and temperature sensors and whatnot, and remains an interpretation. Second, very low temperatures make the absolute battery capacity go down, at least on the Leaf, so it is not clear the Leaf percentages were not taken from a nominal capacity that is actually smaller than that for the Ioniq, given the circumstances. The Leaf manual is quite clear about the existence of such a phenomenon, though not so much about details. My drivers manual (for a 2016 Leaf) says that the available charge indication is in proportion to the amount of charge the battery can hold _at the current temperature_, and goes on to detail that the indication could rise when the temperature drops, because that reference amount decreases. I find that highly unlikely and never witnessed it; it appears to assume capacity is lost at the "top" (cannot put in the last kWh's when it is cold) rather than at the bottom (cannot extract the last kWh's when it is cold) or during discharging (the energy stored cannot be fully retrieved due to internal resistance). But in any case it is clear that the usable energy of a %SOC is temperature dependent. Finally it is clear that the information given is not mathematically consistent, as you noted. Average energy consumption is never reported negative, even when it clearly should be. I think most information is somewhat smoothed out to prevent users being too shocked. Also for some reason, power consumption/regeneration is always a bit late in being taken into account in the average (for instance reset the average just _after_ descending a slope, and the first readouts will be ridiculously low for flat driving, as the regen is incorporated after the reset). So really there is not too much point to trying to explain everything; clearly there is some "artificial intelligence" inserted that is (probably) trying to protect the driver from bad surprises, but obscures a clear view of what precisely is going on. One thing that is definitely irrelevant is the supposed lack of active thermal management in the Leaf. Because it actually can and will heat up the battery when it gets very cold, at least I suppose for models produced for cold climates. What is missing is active _cooling_ of the battery, but I think at -20C this is the least of your worries. I'm still a bit disappointed by the performance of the new Leaf in extreme cold, but that said, I would personally never encounter such conditions. In fact, driving in extreme cold, at 120km/h, and with strong headwind is about as bad as you can make a test for the car (with 30 km/h headwind you would effectively by fighting air resistance as if you were doing 150 km/h).
All what you said is interesting, but finaly the "fabulous" NEW leaf lost the race. And leaf consume 30% more energy than "old" ioniq. I have to pay my electricity and 30% more for the same trip is 30% more money out of my pocket.
De Leaf bilene som skal komme til Norge skal ha batterivarmer. Hadde den du testet batterivarmer? Og ved hvilken temperaturer slår batterivarmeren inn? Takk for mange informative filmer.
Hei,Bjørn:) ser du bytter på å ha leaf’en i"D"og"B"-modus.. kan det ha en innvirkning på kjørelengde?.. også ser jeg at du kjører i ca.110-115kmt. i eco-mode. kan det være at det er mer effektivt å ikke kjøre i eco-mode på motorveien?. jeg vil tro at man bruker mer energi ved å kun ha 150 hester enn 215 i høye hastigheter..har en 62kwt og har tenkt litt på dette.
how lower the battery voltage how faster the battery discharge you need more amp by lower voltage for the same amount off watts, this explains why you get more range over the 100 to 50 % state of charge
Wheels only are max 2% responsible for loss off range, i have 18 inch mak wheel, ( there awesome ) and see no loss off range compaired tot other ioniq!
Hy Björn it seems that the Ioniq is a Class of it's owne. It will be very interresting gehen so compere the new Nissan Leaf with the E-Golf because these car's have more or less the ssme performance.
See this video from two days ago, where Leafspy is used to see the actual battery state when the indicator is showing 0% range left. You'll see there's actually 4 kWh (!) still left and usable. Clearly a software bug: ua-cam.com/video/u5DxpaQo7gI/v-deo.html
I live in Canada and am seriously thinking of buying the Leaf. We have more or less similar condition as in Norway. Which one do you recommend? Leaf or Ioniq?
Hej Björn! Jag ville titta på din video med låg volym för att inte störa omgivningen, men den automatiska texten är inställd på nederländska!? Det är inget jag som användare kan ändra, du måste göra den inställningen. productforums.google.com/d/msg/youtube/OlH1QCA-dCk/t8Dzrmw7BAAJ
This car is poor, sorry. No matter at wich battery size....Just manufactored to earn some money. Nissan/Renault dont survive the Change, in my opinion.
This comparison was made with the leaf driving in b mode on the highway. While b mode enables more regen, it also creates more electric induced drag at highway speeds. You can get the same amount of regen driving in d mode by lightly applying the brakes. D mode allows much better coasting which would improve efficiency at highway speeds. Try this same comparison again driving the leaf in d mode, and see what happens!
LEAFSpy has always had an offset, even on the 1st gen LEAF since it takes into account the restricted usable capacity of the battery (i.e. the lithium cells are never fully charged or discharged). For example on my former 2014 LEAF, 100% SOC on the dashboard corresponded to 97% in LEAFSpy. Similarly, ~20% on the dashboard corresponded to about ~29% in LEAFSpy.
From my experience, I think the low range is due to the battery temperature/high internal resistance. For overnight cold soaks below -5C, my range used to be ~50-60% of that when the outside temperature was above 5-10C. Compared with the Bolt EV that I now drive, the range loss due to similar cold temperatures (same driving conditions/route, no heater use) is much less (65-75% of warm temperature range) once the battery thermal management warms up the battery.
Great video as always. Since Nissan wants Leaf 2 to go more mainstream than previous one (as you can see by its design) and there will be more customers who isn't used to EV driving, Nissan might have taught leaf to underestimate SoC so that new customers won't stop in the middle of roads. It will be difficult but I'd like to know how long can EVs drive after SoC reach 0%, like driving around and around in a charging facility.
Nissan almost has a pseudo reserve tank coded to the Leaf's battery in that regard like a gasoline car. Some types of people would push a car until the warning light to actually search for a gas station. If that kind of mentality buys a Leaf they might do the same and charging stations (outside Norway) isn't remotely as common as gas stations.
An ingenious solution to cater to the daring but for those wanting to stretch the range and battery, getting LeafSpy might be mandatory to learn the real SoC.
The primary cause of the leafs apparent high consumption will be the cold weather. Lion batteries have only 60-70% of their rated capacity at -20c. The ioniq heats the batteries to prevent lower battery capacity affecting range so much. And yes lion batteries do not behaviour linearly when it comes to their use. Anyone who has a smartphone will notice this as the capacity drops faster when the voltage is lower
Great detective work Bjørn!
I wonder if Nissan will update the Leaf with an active heater and cooler system for the battery in more extreme climates. In Norway we can get warm summers and very cold winters. 30 to minus 40. Driving this Leaf from Oslo to Bergen during winter would be interesting, considering you have to climb the mountains (unless you go through the longer coastal route via Kristiansand and Stavanger).
The percent of full charge capacity is an estimate made by the BMS. It works with battery voltage, real time current drain, and temperature in order to estimate the percentage of remaining capacity (generally the 100% capacity is the capacity at 4.2V/cell, sometimes derated to 4.1 or 4.0 for 100%). So as the parameters vary, the estimation process is challenged to stay consistent and not generate fluctuations in the indicated capacity.) Battery packs are typically manufactured with default values for internal resistance and capacity as a function of voltage and temperature. The pack has to be cycled in order for the BMU to customize the "model" for the estimation process. While this is going on, there can be jumps in the estimate as the pack learns. If a car is brand new the estimates may change in real time. The manual for my 2013 Leaf also says to expect the gauge to read higher when the battery is cold... due to the 100% capacity going down (unexpected behavior to me...) We probably should not use the available charge gauge for "science".
The battery percentage jumping around like that might be caused by the battery BMS not being calibrated correctly. My iPhone does that when the BMS is not calibrated correctly. But that's just my guess.
Great discussion as usual. DO get LeafSpy and a compatible BT OBD II port. The numbers are much more believable and detailed. It also (Pro version) gives you power consumption for Heat, AUX, A/C, and drivetrain broken out.
LeafSpy calculates the SoC using the full battery capacity while the car meter calculates by the usable capacity.
The Russian video was filmed in Eastern Russia, where it's common to drive Japanese-style cars (right-hand steering wheel) due to proximity to Japan. The car was imported to Russia from Japan for a customer.
Björn, did you check tire pressure on both cars before the test?
Great video again and thanks for sharing the new findings. Much better than professional tv's.
Great Job Bjørn!
It seems the BMS recalculates the available max capacity while driving depending on temperature. That might explain the weird SoC changes, because then it recalculates SoC depending on available capacity... In very low temperatures, the algorithm to calculate available capacity might be a little bit too sensitive to extreme temperature changes due to internal heat build up, so the effect on the displayed SoC might be too massive...
It seems the weird jumping happened inside a tunnel, where the air temperature may have been much higher than on the outside. This may also be an indication that the BMS recalculates available capacity based on outside temperature, and then in turn the SoC jumps...
Your findings sound right. You can't trust the %-meter. The only thing you can go by is Wh in and Wh out. It has to do with low temperature and internal resistance of the battery. The %-meter is meant for end user to get a "feeling" of how much available energy there is. So it makes sense the car "fakes" %-meter which gives more meaningful state of charge for end user but you can't calculate by it. I'm quite sure they know about it and it's there for a purpose.
The main issue is that if the SoC is wrong and car behaves based on the SoC reported in instrument cluster then even you have 20% in real SoC; car would be in turtle mode, which is useless.
Nissan should fix this issue if it is indeed a bug with instrument cluster, regardless lack of active battery-pack temperature regulator is rather odd. Original leaf didn't have it but original lead was the first mass market E.V. so it could afford to not have certain features; not the 2nd generation leaf though.
Yes pretty much unforgivable lack of features.
New Nissan Leaf *has* arrived in the UK - I saw one in London just the other day!
Bjørn Nyland First UK New Nissan Leaf was delivered beginning of February
And yes - the Russian was driving a Japanese Leaf - the clue was the Japanese on the display :)
The Leaf is for sale in The Netherlands as well now. Minimum price equals 33K Euros :(
Wow very expensive
True. Cars are expensive in the Netherlands because we have to pay extra taxes. A Model X 75D costs exactly 100,000 euros here :O
The only way to get correct numbers is just like with ICE cars: consumption / total distance at the gas/charge station.
all of this makes sense. The leaf doesn't have active battery temperature control. Batteries in the cold lose efficiency phones in the winter outside die faster than in the summer. Cameras are the same.
The leaf battery got cold because and the charge level dropped. Then the car was plugged in which heated up the battery and the charge lost due to cold reestablished it self.
If you do this same trip in summer it will be very different.
That is why the Leaf isn't there yet.
My experience with the Zoe is that the trip meter is very conservative. Best way to determine you're metrics is to take note of the km's and the consumed kwh's (i use CanZE) and use some old school notepad math. I must add that the 17" wheels are terrible for range and dropping to 15" wheels with low drag/friction profile tyres can add up to +15% of range. Maybe more in a car like the Leaf.
This is one of the reasons, why I like BMW i3 infotainment. It is very precise.
Going by the old leaf design, when the temp goes below -17C the battery heater comes on to protect it from freezing. This consumes (if I remember correctly) approximately 400Wh. So earlier on when the battery was cold, it may have been on to protect the battery from freezing. Would explain why on the way back the efficiency went up, since it was warmed from the driving and quick charges, that protection was turned off. The battery really doesn't like being colder than -10C and warmer than 30C (which for most climates is acceptable). It's optimal range is when it's between 18C - 25C.
Chivalryx this makes me wonder whether the battery heating system could be tricked into heating the battery at a higher temperature, to aid charging capacity
The Leaf IS available in the UK drove one about three weeks ago.
Pl
My 2012 Leaf drops relatively quickly to 20km range, but from 20km range it drops really slow. I mean, my guess is that it has at least 40km when it claims to have 20km range. My guess is this is a measure to get people to charge more often? I don’t know.
When you look at the design specifications for the gm bolt EV battery, you can see that it is properly liquid cooled and heated, to keep the battery at the optimum temperature throughout it's life, If either being run or connected to the mains, which will reduce degradation, down to a miniscule amount and equalise temperatures when rapid charging also, so the temperature is kept equally controlled whilst charging. The leaf 24, 30 and 40 are all not controlled within close temperature parameters and ambient heat loss is mostly how leaf batteries are cooled and hence that is why there is a much higher level of battery degradation with a leaf battery as the temperature often falls outside optimum temperature for good battery management, particularly when operated in hot conditions. Therefore it can be concluded that in this regard, the leaf is made in a much more inferior way than the bolt.
interesting comment on leafspy. I thought the new leaf will try to display more technically correct figure (true SOC) in linear manner. same problem with older leafs. not exactly a problem, but a behaviour is handy to know by owners, that leaf deliberately introduce anxiety much earlier.
So both the Ioniq and Leaf had non-linear SoC meters, with the Hyundai being optimistic while the Nissan being pessimistic.
Not as big of an efficiency advantage the Ioniq has over the Leaf as the initial test seems. Great sleuthing Bjorn.
The Russian guy must be very happy. Got boosted from regular few thousands views to 130k :D
Regarding the tripmeter on the Leaf.
On my leaf(24kWh) when i start going downhill the only consuption showed is what is used by heat. When i then get to flat road and start consuming, the tripmeter will not show any consuption until i have used what was regenerated going down the hill.
Maybe it also is same issue with manufacturers "trick numbers" when people experience for example that the Opel Ampera charges way slower than for example 2 years older Kia Soul EV?
I have the same jumping SOC on my 30kWh leaf when the battery is cold and you push the motor output power. Leaf spy does report more accurate SOH. It actually reports what is available and how much will the BMS let the battery to charge / discharge. This may require some calibration but the default has been very accurate for me (around 12 % left close to turtle and 96.7 % when charged to "full" ). GIDs % will report how much you can use. I got to as low as 18 GIDs left and still not get a turtle. I suggest you get leaf spy to work before you test the new leaf again, this will make your math a lot more accurate. LEAF spy also saved me once when i plugged the chademo port incorrectly and the car refused to charge on chademo and L1/L2. I cleared the DTC errors with leaf spy, restarted car and could charge again.
Yesterday I went down to about 4% battery on my new Leaf and LeafSpy showed I had just above 6kWh of energy left. I spoke to Jim the LeafSpy programmer and the fault is with the Leaf not the app.
If you can't rely on what the car tells you (and you shouldn't) you have to base consumption on how much energy the charging station says has been put into the battery. What counts when comparing cars is not the theoretical or claimed capacity of the battery but how much you can travel on a full charge (or partial charge if you prefer) and the speed of charging during a journey.
Please make a video when the car goes in turtle mode see how far you could actually drive before the car quits going I think everybody would be really interested in this!!!😎
Thanks another great video, I am getting nearer to making my decision thanks to your detailed reviews and information.
You are talking about a NISSAN LEAF from the TESLA car :)
In one of the comments to that Russian video James confirmed that the LeafSpy is not tuned or tested w/2018 model, so not to be used as a reference model either. Also, in 2013+ models 10% from the dashboard is in fact 20% (per LeafSpy).
Quote: James Pollock 1 week ago
LeafSpy developer here. Nice video. Don't speak Russian but I am guessing you were comparing LeafSpy's SOC which is directly from the BMS ECU with the modified version of SOC Nissan shows on the Dash. Looks like Turtle mode showed up at about 6.5% or about 2.6 kWh left in the battery for protection. I currently don't have access to a 2018 Leaf so there will probably be some improvements/fixes to LeafSpy once I get my hands on one
Excellent video and explains so much. I think Nissan who are targetting the New Leaf at mass-market have set the percentage display to be zero when there is a reserve of say 15% - 20% to protect the battery. Not as sophisticated as Tesla which has software limited the true capacity which can be "upgraded" over the air. However, maybe the Leaf will continue to show the same range for its 100% of charge over time as the buffer can be reduced without the owner seeing any range reduction something which would reassure someone switching from an ICE vehicle. Also, degradation of the battery would not be noticed as a range reduction throughout the life of the battery guarantee.
There's already a 4 kWh bricking protection. Remember that 40 kWh is gross capacity and about 36 kWh is net.
Please Bjørn we don't want Car Guru to get into trouble, please only refer to his channel as Rich's Dirty Garage ;)
There's only one Car Guru and we all know it.
Great video Björn! More Leaf videos please! :D
Does the new Leaf track what % of charge is used for battery conditioning while driving? I'm wondering if that is what is causing the trip computer discrepancy....the trip computer does not count kWh used for battery conditioning towards the efficiency calculations. The Bolt/Ampera-E will tell you what % of the battery is used for conditioning and HVAC.
"I was driving the speed-limit 110 kmh..." Video of him going 123 kmh.
+RayZ fox Speedometer is 5-7 % off. You knew that, didn't you? Actual speed was 110-115 km/h.
love this sort of review. redo the comparison asap. starting to sound like Nissan made it look better and improved tech but failed to improve efficiency. maybe they think mainstream buyers don't care.
personally I'd rather have looks and efficiency but it sounds like it's a generation away in the Ioniq.
i had hoped Leaf would improve enough to be my next car but from this review sub 100 range is out of the question, 16% reserve or not.
Thanks Bjorn, I suspected that the Ioniq was a more economical car than the LEAF and the inconsistencies with all in car instrumentation. Interesting to see how at extreme temperatures those problems are compounded. I wonder how long it will be before we get Kw/h figures advertised equivalent to mpg or standard fuel consumption, it is relevant now to vehicle choice so thanks for testing, and would also be interesting to find out if we can trust our public SOC figures?
thx for that! it was kind of useful! im looking foward to see your next testing videos.
The main issue is just the cold battery I guess, so that's what a Tesla would show with a blue bar. The leaf do not heat the battery because of a design choice to get more range on many shorter trips I guess. So in the tunnel you might have some more energy output than before and a bit less cold air and the battery pack heated up a bit and the displayed state of charge rised.
Maybe running this car in non-eco mode would enable the battery heater earlier or maybe this decision is hooked up to the navigation system, which could estimate if it's a good choice to start the heater to access some of the "lost" state of charge because of the voltage drop.
Never the less it would be fairer to split your test in two parts:
1. Just the range of a vehicle at a given temperature, like -10°C until it's on 0 km or start dropping the power output heavily that you cannot keep up 100 kph or similar.
2. Just a "we load both cars full and drive 100 km at 100 kph in -10°C, start charging it with DC, leave the car, lock it and look at the numbers of the charging stations which the car needed to be full again." Full would be the maximum state of charge chargeable with DC or recommend daily use state of charge by the vendor - whichever applies best. :)
My thoughts exactly. In a Tesla we would have the snow flake on the battery symbol. If this is the case, it is very bad for the leaf, because charging it with that cold battery is not good for the battery health. (some cells are very cold, others are normal temperature) But also 8 years warranty on it?
Would be worst case scenario, if the state of charge drops are a result of uneven battery temp. Because a software fix would not be enough to fix it.
+Ruben Kelevra The battery might be cold from Oslo to Espa. But it was warm at Rena and back again.
Bjørn Nyland seems like others got similar behaviour in very cold weather. Driving high speed into cold area uphill, even got limp mode for a while. Reduced speed and got to a less cold area. Car back to normal range again. Sensors getting too cooled down and limit battery? Location of some battery sensors make them too cold tricking the electronics ? Could explain odd fast charging as they "unfreeze"
Bjørn Nyland yeah, but these cars have pouch cells, which have notoriously issues with uneven battery temperatures... Maybe the battery was just partly warm, but the convection inside the cells are bad.
The jumping SoC is a clear indication that the voltage dropped and the SoC internally calculated is just based on a estimation without a voltage drop.
Friends with a Leaf 2 just visited and they charged at my house. I have a 16A 3.7kW charger for my Ioniq. According to the Leaf it was charging at a speed of 6kW?! The battery indicator of the Leaf is truly a Guess-O-meter. And today it was around 15 degrees in the Netherlands. I don't know what Nissan did, but it feels as if they made some mistakes with the 40kW battery and they really have to redo their homework and fix it with a software/firmware update. The Leaf itself is a nice car and well build. But Nissan should fix this, because it is a bit of letdown with an unreliable battery indicator and issues with rapid charging.
So next time Bjørn needs a Leaf spy to relieve the pain of ‘18 Leafs misbehaving display/bms reading. ...Or els...?
So if I understood well, the Russian did 162km with 6% of the battery left at a speed of 85 km/h at -30C actually I thinks it's a good results if you consider that the heat pump at that temperature does not work and that the Leaf has a battery warmer .
Watch the video again. It wasn't -31°C all the time. When it was that cold, he dropped the speed to 70 km/h (speedometer is about 5-7% off).
Actually he dropped to ~70km/h only shortly. Then he speeded up again. Also when it was -29C to -31C, he kept the speed up between 80 and 85km/h on the speedometer most of the time. That would be about 76-81km/h gps speed.
Watch from 03:25 to 04:00.
At 06:18 local time, his trip meter was at 22.3 km
At 07:06 local time, his trip meter was at 76.6 km
He traveled 54.3 km in 48 min. That's an average of 68 km/h. I didn't bother checking other timestamps. But you get the idea. He was driving pretty slow.
I checked his whole trip and his average speed was 64 km/h.
As you would say: he was hypermiling.
Is Nissan trying to manage FORO? Fear Of Running Out
Kelvyn Bettridge Maybe, old version show +10% on the speedometer all over the range. At least it's easy to compensate, just do double digits like 55, 77 and 99 to travel at 50, 70 and 90.
Many thanks Bjørn for the two comprehensive videos on the battery gage questions / issues. I am seriously considering purchasing one as my first electric vehicle and I am asking Nissan if they are aware of users feedback such as yours and if so what are their plans
Maybe the BMS still has to calibrate? With new phones the soc value is also inaccurate after a few charges it is much more accurate. Maybe something similar is happening to the leaf?
Bjorn there's a difference between the real percentage of the battery (shown with spy leaf) and the usable percentage (shown on the gauge).
For example my PHEV Golf GTE since the car was new, when charged to maximum the battery does not pass 94% (checked with obd11) and when reaches 0km range I still have 24% in the battery (checked with obd11). That means VW uses a protection/buffer not to charge to real 100% nor to discharge it to real 0% increasing in my opinion the life of the Li-ion battery.
Resuming: the car makers hide from the driver the real percentage, giving only information about the usable strip of the battery. If you use diagnostic tools like Spyleaf or OBD11 then you'll be able to have a more precise reading.
Like your videos, thank you.
If the state of charge uses a temperature dependent safety factor or something, maybe the state of charge would rise if moving the car inside a heated parking garage?
I do 250ish Wh/mi with my 2nd gen 64 reg leaf because it's 3C°. When it's 10 outside and get stuck behind a truck (cause that's the way to do it) I do less than 200 Wh/mi. The new leaf is a shame if you can't beat my figures at least. I only got 4 month of experience...
Well leaf is heavier and the motor has more HP too. altho you get lower range on leaf if you base on the monitor.......it is actually batter for you battery to charge your battery before you drain it fully.....it's also safer, you don't wanna assume you range long than it'll be and stuck in the mid of the road....
The weight is not much of issue with EVs I mean it doesnt make big difference if the diiference is close. Plus the safety up and bottom battery buffer is already there and it is not displayed. Zero or 100perc SOC doesnt mean you have reached it.
mravecsk1 still 400 lbs difference not mich? I don't know...10%more heavier... Also 30 hp different not sure if it matter.. Logically thinking it should matter...anyway leaf does has more air resistance while driving at high speed probably because the car is higher, this might be matter by a lot also
Same here, and the KM scale is also not correct, when i drove in winter, as soon as my battery goes under 33% i need to take in coint that if there is standing 60km left, i only can do like 30-35 :( I do not like the ioniq scaling :(
More videos with Renault Zoe 40 please!
I wonder if the same "issues" will translate to the new Nissan e-NV200 too. I am planning on test driving e-NV200 when the dealer gets it in May. It would be pointless for me to test it without knowing exactly how much range it actually has. It might be a dealbreaker for me, so I really hope they fix this. Give me a linear 0-100% scale of the available energy! Anything else just make it too hard to compare EVs.
Looks like you have to drive both cars until turtle mode to be able to compare the real range. I doubt that Ioniq can do 161km in -30C at ~90km/h.
+Martin Deekay The Russian didn't drive at 90 km/h. The speed was between 70 and 80.
$ 20 bet one of of the Nissan developers putting in the old 30kwh in a variable in the code somewhere.
In this Russian video you can see that the Leaf shows 35% in the dash, but the app on the phone shows 45%! And a bit later the difference is even bigger 16% vs 32%
So the difference is not linear.
ua-cam.com/video/zl4H4Z6-e08/v-deo.htmlm45s
But in his newer video you can see that when it is warmer (only -10 instead of -30°C) the difference is generally less (max 10%) ua-cam.com/video/eekRT3R4e6w/v-deo.htmlm47s
Unfortunately the russian guy didn't drove it down to 0% in the second video. The biggest difference between dash and app in the first video was around 5-15% (on the dash). But in the second video he stopped at 36%. In the first video the difference at 35% was 9,9% and the difference in the second video at 36% was 7,8%. So it is almost the same difference.
I've had same issue with the SOC with 2gen 24kw leaf. It was always the same in the start (happend 3 times during 1 winter)... Drove to work (65km) and at 17% it dropped down to 6%, never went up.
This desember it went from 53% down to 41% then back to 52% (this was between Berger E6 to DC charger at skedsmokorset) so all happend very quick. Ended with getting ioniq (that was allready ordered). Never trusted my leaf after this...
How cold was it?
About 30% is close to the difference in drag coefficient. The leaf is 0.29cd which is awful considering its an 'eco' & range limited battery EV car.
The fact it has software issues as well is just more confidence breaking.. I'm ordering an Ioniq.
If you think that you need a maths degree to run an electric car you might well be right, but don't worry too much!... that is unless you don't have an option to use a conventional fossil fuel car for more "Adventurous" trips. For myself, I sometimes swap with my kids who really like my British made Nissan.
I have had my Leaf Accenta for 4 years now and absolutely love it. I know that my longest regular trip ranges are well covered ( I set my charging to 80% to preserve the life of my battery) I did a test run to my main airport with 40% to spare so no worries about picking up friends.
Five seater comfort and a good boot is a bonus. Comfort and ride is important to me and I like the light beige interior option that Nissan offer.
My previous car was an old Merc which I don't miss and together with solar panels it is "Driving for nothing!"
If I want to know the fuel consumption of my petrol car, I could look at the dash but I don't. Fill the car up with petrol. Trip the odometer. Drive the car until it is short of petrol. Fill the car up with petrol and get a receipt. The odometer has to be accurate on the car, due to legislation. The amount of petrol delivered by the pump and recorded on the receipt is also accurate and tested regularly by the authorities. Miles per Gallon is then easy to calculate and is based upon to bits of information, distance travelled and fuel used that are quite accurate.
Isn't the same true of electric cars? Forget the computer on the dash. "Fill" the car up with electricity... Trip the trip. Drive a good distance... "Fill" the car again... Amount of energy required to fill the car.... must be accurate if you are paying for it.... If the car is saying its full, when it isn't... just keep on keeping records... Over time, discrepancies will be lost.
That could work. But there's loss in the charging process.
Bjørn Nyland Thats exactly how EPA measures consumption. KWh taken from the wall socket, not from the battery. So you can optimize the onboard charger and get better MPGe in US. Even the speed of charging may be a factor as the charger may be more efficient at higher speed. For example, in EU Smart ED gets advertized with two different efficiency rating depending on the method charged, dedicated Mennekes socket or Schuko charging brick.
yes, my nissan qashai trip computer overestimates mpg, compared to measuring miles on odometer between filling the tank to the brim.
How much kWh did you draw from the chargers to charge the Leaf and the Ionic back to full after the race?
To compare the true energy consumption (as opposed to range) of the Leaf and the Ionic, I think you should compare how much kWh they draw out of the chargers, for an identical trip in identical circumstances. Then you don't have to care about errors in the car displays.
We forgot to check.
At my opinion, i think the leaf you drove had a defect battery or any other component. (?) We cant point the finger on the weather. And how cold it was. I respect and i know that cold weather is really effect battery’s but in this case here. We had really bad results.
Other Leaf 40 kWh owners experienced the exact same thing. Still a defect?
It would be great to test a BMW i3 94AH(33KWH) as well to the leaf and the ionic
Did you have the parking break on :-)😂
it's probably that the ionic has heat scavenging which allows it to take heat from the battery and motor to heat the interior and that coupled with the higher motor power of the leafs motor is why the leaf ran out of power faster then the ionic
Ioniq doesn't have that. It has a very simple air cooled battery. But I guess that the battery type on Ioniq has less internal resistance and will work better at higher load/speed than the Leaf battery.
This is due to very cold weather. I had the same issue today when driving my 2013 Leaf in -18 on highway at 140km/h. I was driving in -15 and then reached highway and started driving fast. As soon as I reached the cold weather zone uphill the % suddenly droped from 65 to 31% and I even got turtle mode!!! for a minute. But as soon I slowed down, the GOM started to climb up and after around a minute it again showed 60%. Personally I suspect that this is casued by temperature sensors getting exremeley cold due to high wind and then electronics limit the power and capacity of the battery automatically.
Sounds spot on
Interesting. Thanks for sharing.
Excellent hypothesis! I observed the same thing on my Leaf 30Kw in January. I left home one morning with 60% SoC with a -13°C battery (data from LeafSpy app) to get to work 9 km away. On my highway route, I climbed a 1km hill at 90 km/h. The engine used more than 40Kw of power during this climb. The SoC suddenly went down to 22%, then the turtle appeared. A message appeared on the screen saying that the low temperature of the battery limited the power of the engine. I came to work with 37% SoC. That was the first and the only one time I saw this. It therefore seems that the chemistry of the battery allows a limited discharge at low temperature. See this : drive.google.com/file/d/1x2NNdbY2f9hNf1vvPZdQSstxiM5j_A4I/view?usp=sharing
Hello
What range olny in City?
You should never compare discharge rate if the battery was not charged to 100%. The last 5% are most important as this is the balancing phase so all cells are at the same SoC. The same goes for smartphones, if disconnected from charger at 95% the charge will drop fast to 90% or 85% in couple minutes.
Battery was charged to 98 %.
That is the problem for Li-ion. It was not really charged to 98% the last 10% of SoC are very inaccurate while battery is still charging. Try the same for phone, charge to 98% and disconnect you will see that it will drop rapidly to 90%/85%. Now charge to 100% and it will take way longer(because of equalizing charge) to charge but at the end will not lose capacity quickly. That is also how fast chargers work that it can quickly charge to 80% but last drops are added more slowly. The 98% was a fake reading.
The car was almost new. It charged very slow towards the end, gaining about 1 % every 10 minutes. I doubt it would be much better if I charged to 100 %.
It would. The last 1% would give similar charge like last 10%. Think about it why the last drops are so slow. If the balancing phase is disrupted then battery is not correctly calibrated and it will behave strange.
I " made " a mistake not " did ". From an englishman who has learnt Swedish. I have always told people to correct me so I improve. I am not criticsizing.
Thank you for the correction. That is a 4 year old video. Long time since then, I have learned the difference.
@@bjornnyland You're welcome !
I agree that there seem to be strange things going on. However, some common sense arguments might go a long way to get an explanation.
First, when it comes to estimating SOC, there is just no definite authoritative answer. Cells are at 0% when the BMS decides it is unsafe to extract any more charge, and similarly at the opposite end for 100%, but in between any number is a guess, more or less informed, but a guess. Trusting the indication on the dashboard blindly is only slightly more naive than trusting LeafSpy blindly; while the latter has access to somewhat more raw data, that data comes from voltage and temperature sensors and whatnot, and remains an interpretation.
Second, very low temperatures make the absolute battery capacity go down, at least on the Leaf, so it is not clear the Leaf percentages were not taken from a nominal capacity that is actually smaller than that for the Ioniq, given the circumstances. The Leaf manual is quite clear about the existence of such a phenomenon, though not so much about details. My drivers manual (for a 2016 Leaf) says that the available charge indication is in proportion to the amount of charge the battery can hold _at the current temperature_, and goes on to detail that the indication could rise when the temperature drops, because that reference amount decreases. I find that highly unlikely and never witnessed it; it appears to assume capacity is lost at the "top" (cannot put in the last kWh's when it is cold) rather than at the bottom (cannot extract the last kWh's when it is cold) or during discharging (the energy stored cannot be fully retrieved due to internal resistance). But in any case it is clear that the usable energy of a %SOC is temperature dependent.
Finally it is clear that the information given is not mathematically consistent, as you noted. Average energy consumption is never reported negative, even when it clearly should be. I think most information is somewhat smoothed out to prevent users being too shocked. Also for some reason, power consumption/regeneration is always a bit late in being taken into account in the average (for instance reset the average just _after_ descending a slope, and the first readouts will be ridiculously low for flat driving, as the regen is incorporated after the reset). So really there is not too much point to trying to explain everything; clearly there is some "artificial intelligence" inserted that is (probably) trying to protect the driver from bad surprises, but obscures a clear view of what precisely is going on.
One thing that is definitely irrelevant is the supposed lack of active thermal management in the Leaf. Because it actually can and will heat up the battery when it gets very cold, at least I suppose for models produced for cold climates. What is missing is active _cooling_ of the battery, but I think at -20C this is the least of your worries.
I'm still a bit disappointed by the performance of the new Leaf in extreme cold, but that said, I would personally never encounter such conditions. In fact, driving in extreme cold, at 120km/h, and with strong headwind is about as bad as you can make a test for the car (with 30 km/h headwind you would effectively by fighting air resistance as if you were doing 150 km/h).
Is it possible to over think all this?
my 2013 leaf shows a different number with leaf spy then the dash display I tend to believe the leaf spy
All what you said is interesting, but finaly the "fabulous" NEW leaf lost the race.
And leaf consume 30% more energy than "old" ioniq.
I have to pay my electricity and 30% more for the same trip is 30% more money out of my pocket.
De Leaf bilene som skal komme til Norge skal ha batterivarmer. Hadde den du testet batterivarmer?
Og ved hvilken temperaturer slår batterivarmeren inn?
Takk for mange informative filmer.
Yes, this one has it.
Hei,Bjørn:) ser du bytter på å ha leaf’en i"D"og"B"-modus.. kan det ha en innvirkning på kjørelengde?.. også ser jeg at du kjører i ca.110-115kmt. i eco-mode. kan det være at det er mer effektivt å ikke kjøre i eco-mode på motorveien?. jeg vil tro at man bruker mer energi ved å kun ha 150 hester enn 215 i høye hastigheter..har en 62kwt og har tenkt litt på dette.
No
how lower the battery voltage how faster the battery discharge you need more amp by lower voltage for the same amount off watts, this explains why you get more range over the 100 to 50 % state of charge
Yes, parts of it is true. But Leaf seems to not like cold weather.
Maybe BMS needs more driving to calibrate ? Try to drive one to turtle mode and theeeeen recharge to 100%
I have to get one then. Hard to reach nowadays because lots of people want to test it.
should i buy a Nissan Leaf 2018?
and then there is still the fast charge issue. 3rd charge get's decreased.
Wheels only are max 2% responsible for loss off range, i have 18 inch mak wheel, ( there awesome ) and see no loss off range compaired tot other ioniq!
Hy Björn it seems that the Ioniq is a Class of it's owne. It will be very interresting gehen so compere the new Nissan Leaf with the E-Golf because these car's have more or less the ssme performance.
Only the range reading should vary, not the battery percentage. Pls Nissan.
so which one is better? Ioniq or Leaf?
+Jack Liu Depends
See this video from two days ago, where Leafspy is used to see the actual battery state when the indicator is showing 0% range left. You'll see there's actually 4 kWh (!) still left and usable. Clearly a software bug: ua-cam.com/video/u5DxpaQo7gI/v-deo.html
*kWh
Corrected, thx
Why are the subtitles in Dutch - or do I need to take some more medication?
Where is the link to the Russian video/test?
+Jonas Enebrand AB Sorry, I forgot. It's there now.
If you really want to dig into real ECU/BMS diagnostics, i can point you in 'a' direction, which will give you what you want.
Sorry I don't understand why you say you drove at 110kmh but on the display it shows you were driving at 122kmh.
+K Phun Speedometer is 5-6 % off. And I was not always able to cruise at that speed.
I live in Canada and am seriously thinking of buying the Leaf. We have more or less similar condition as in Norway. Which one do you recommend? Leaf or Ioniq?
Hej Björn! Jag ville titta på din video med låg volym för att inte störa omgivningen, men den automatiska texten är inställd på nederländska!? Det är inget jag som användare kan ändra, du måste göra den inställningen. productforums.google.com/d/msg/youtube/OlH1QCA-dCk/t8Dzrmw7BAAJ
Why are you driving in B, and not in D ?
B has more regen.
I’m the first!!! Love watching Bjorn
Tim Ryan gratz
Hi Bjørn
Have you received any comments from Nissan?
Norsk elbilforening har offentliggjort denne vintertest.
elbil.no/stor-test-vinterens-vakreste-elbileventyr-til-fjells/
This car is poor, sorry. No matter at wich battery size....Just manufactored to earn some money. Nissan/Renault dont survive the Change, in my opinion.