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I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

jeffgeerling.com

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Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#61

Post by sevenseacat »

Xenoamorphous wrote: post #4

* Limiting the number of QCs (Quick Charges / DC Fast Charge), as this heats up the uncooled Leaf battery, degrading it slightly each time, especially on hotter days * Keeping the charge between 50-80% when manageable * Charging up to 100% at least once a month, and letting it 'top off' to rebalance the pack for at least a few hours afterwards * Not driving like a maniac, despite having more torque in this car than I…

I just checked my phone (an iPhone 11) and it says 72%. There is absolutely no way the capacity is anywhere near 72% anymore lol

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#62

Post by VBprogrammer »

bzzzt wrote: post #45
sgt101 wrote: post #3

EV's look like EV's because they don't have the same constraints on space that ICEV's do. There is no engine in the front/back, no water pump, no oil pump, no water cooled radiator, no starter motor... so on so on. There's also a great big battery under the floor pan and no gas tank. They are also heavier, so need different set ups in order to handle decently. But, that's why they look so different.

That wouldn't explain the unorthodox color schemes lots of smaller EVs like the i3 have. It really seems they are made uglier 'on purpose'. Also, a Tesla model S or 3 looks like a normal car so it's not other brands can't do that.

I think the Tesla looking like a normal car is because their design language hasn't changed in forever.

I've found myself taking a second look at a bunch of ICE cars recently as they've all started trying to copy elements from electric car design...

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#63

Post by rsynnott »

lucideer wrote: post #36
masklinn wrote: post #25

> Lack of standards: For 'L3' DC Fast Charging, the Leaf has a CHAdeMO port. Teslas and many newer EVs have NACS. Then there's CCS1 and CCS2. And charging stations are run by multiple vendors with multiple apps and payment methods. It's not like gas stations, like with Shell, BP, Buckee's, etc. where you just drive up, stick the gas nozzle in your tank, and squeeze. Afaik in Europe, CCS2 is the standard (and mandator…

Anyone who follows Jeff will know he's US-based, but I still really felt he could've highlighted that fact more in that charging port standards section. The fact that both J1772 & CCS2 are 100% universal in Europe is huge. So much so even Tesla switched to CCS2. This doesn't help Jeff but certainly one less problem for many readers of his article.

> The fact that both J1772 & CCS2 are 100% universal in Europe is huge.

Funnily enough, not for the Leaf! Though it will be on the third generation that's coming out this year. The second-gen Leaf (a ten year old design, at this point) that the author of the article bought doesn't have it. The EU only mandates CCS2 in _charging points_; manufacturers can still sell cars without it, though I think Nissan may be the only remaining one who _does_.

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#64

Post by rsynnott »

Xenoamorphous wrote: post #4

* Limiting the number of QCs (Quick Charges / DC Fast Charge), as this heats up the uncooled Leaf battery, degrading it slightly each time, especially on hotter days * Keeping the charge between 50-80% when manageable * Charging up to 100% at least once a month, and letting it 'top off' to rebalance the pack for at least a few hours afterwards * Not driving like a maniac, despite having more torque in this car than I…

A lot of this is either over-caution, or related to the Leaf's specific quirks (though it's not uncooled, it's passively cooled by airflow).

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#65

Post by anotheryou »

usui wrote: post #54

How can you write "I bought the cheapest EV" in the blog title, and have a section called "Why buy Leaf?" followed by a one-liner zinger aphorism "Price." without writing... the price you bought your used Nissan Leaf for? Someone might want to reference how much it cost back in 2025 a few years down the road.

I skimmed for way to long to realize it's just not in there...

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#66

Post by sillyfluke »

jillesvangurp wrote: post #21

Electric Vehicle Man on Youtube did a review of a 2000 pound second hand Renault Zoe that he picked up a few weeks ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEvwtxGeVpQ The second hand market for EVs is getting pretty interesting. There are lots of EV owners that are replacing their EVs every few years and because of all the growth over the last 10 years, there are now quite a few fairly nice EVs on the second hand market…

Don't really follow the secondhand EV market, but it seems to me firsthand buyers are still taking on considerable risk due to the range situation. People who have bought them abroad are sometimes advised to keep the battery between 20%-80-90% full. Following this advice, one person I know told me if they drive like they did their old car they have to recharge after roughly 170 miles, which is super annoying for them if they're driving over 500 miles on a trip. They regret buying the car they bought. When and if there is a sudden jump in range innovation that reaches the entire market and not just flagship brands, I don't see how these cars driven now won't be dead weight or dirt cheap. It seems super risky to keep one of these cars more than a couple of years.

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#67

Post by rsynnott »

nicce wrote: post #31
carstenhag wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is, as the title mentions, the cheapest EV. It's really old. It did not have tech that pretty much all EVs have nowadays. Nowadays you don't have to do this. You can. Just like with your phone or laptop.

> It's really old. Funny, how 2 years old car is really old. For combustion engines, old is like 15+? EVs will have the same problems as mobile phones. Maybe manufactures want that. But software will define the age of your car and I don’t like it. What if the car requires internet connection and the company dies?

For practical purposes it is a 15 year old design; it had a minor update 8 years ago, but was not brought up to date with the norms of the time (in particular, the passively cooled battery).

This was the very first mass-market electric car, with only minor tweaks. It's not surprising that it's a bit rough around the edges. That's part of why they're cheap second-hand (along with the fact that the 3rd gen, which actually is a proper redesign, is coming out this year).

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#68

Post by ZeroGravitas »

masklinn wrote: post #25

> Lack of standards: For 'L3' DC Fast Charging, the Leaf has a CHAdeMO port. Teslas and many newer EVs have NACS. Then there's CCS1 and CCS2. And charging stations are run by multiple vendors with multiple apps and payment methods. It's not like gas stations, like with Shell, BP, Buckee's, etc. where you just drive up, stick the gas nozzle in your tank, and squeeze. Afaik in Europe, CCS2 is the standard (and mandator…

It's not a lack of standards, it was an early proliferation of standards.

Chademo is still standard in Japan.

Also, given his comparison to the ease of the old way, in Europe at least it's fairly standard to know someone who has filled their hire car with diesel (or not diesel) by mistake. They have warning stickers on the filler flap because it happens so often.

Meanwhile knowing someone who uses the inexplicably more expensive premium fuel option also offered is maybe rarer.

Maybe EV-owning car reviewers should counter the FUD by pretending to be confused by these, always using the most expensive one in price comparisons and then breaking the car completely by using the wrong one during their test drive, like the many propaganda pieces put out about EVs.

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#69

Post by blitzar »

actionfromafar wrote: post #35
jillesvangurp wrote: post #21

Electric Vehicle Man on Youtube did a review of a 2000 pound second hand Renault Zoe that he picked up a few weeks ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEvwtxGeVpQ The second hand market for EVs is getting pretty interesting. There are lots of EV owners that are replacing their EVs every few years and because of all the growth over the last 10 years, there are now quite a few fairly nice EVs on the second hand market…

Big Asterisk on the maintenance though.

For £2,000 the maintenance plan is sending it to the scrap yard.

Gordon Gekko would buy it, break it into its constituent parts and sell them off for £5,000.

Re: I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

#70

Post by theshrike79 »

mschuster91 wrote: post #19
Xenoamorphous wrote: post #4

* Limiting the number of QCs (Quick Charges / DC Fast Charge), as this heats up the uncooled Leaf battery, degrading it slightly each time, especially on hotter days * Keeping the charge between 50-80% when manageable * Charging up to 100% at least once a month, and letting it 'top off' to rebalance the pack for at least a few hours afterwards * Not driving like a maniac, despite having more torque in this car than I…

Limiting QC events is easy enough. A daily commuter vehicle can easily trickle charge over night, and even the measly 40 kWh old used Leaf can get you 200km a charge - assuming an average commute of 20 km for Germany, that's a whole work week worth of battery life. The only time you as an average person actually "need" QC is for the yearly vacation road trip, but as the author writes, renting an ICE or chungus electr…

This is the thing that ICE people need to internalise.

You THINK you're driving long distances every day and you THINK charging is a massive hassle where you have to drive to a Charging Site and wait for the car to charge for HOURS.

When in reality you plug in at home and have a full battery every morning.

And when the infrastructure is properly built (yay Finland), you can get a week's charge when you're getting groceries as the shop has multiple 100kW chargers along with a fleet of Level 2 (22kW) chargers.

The only times I need to actively think about charging are over 200-250km day trips (my old Ioniq EV has a WLTP of 300km on a warm summer day). And even then the kids an dogs need a bathroom break anyway and I need to walk around a bit to freshen up. 20-30 minutes gets us 100-150km of charge (old car, slow charging) and we're off again.

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