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I bought the cheapest EV, a used Nissan Leaf

jeffgeerling.com

211–220 of 683 posts

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

#211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 gro…

I had a leaf on demonstration for 24 hours. I was impressed with it. I drove the 50 miles to work and back, and put it on slow charge knowing I had 16 hours until I needed it. No problem. When I came to drive it in the morning it hadn't charged. It was actually a problem with the plug in the garage, it must have gone off a few minutes after I plugged it in. Now what? Wait 16 more hours? A couple of weeks later I went…

> It was actually a problem with the plug in the garage, it must have gone off a few minutes after I plugged it in. Now what? Wait 16 more hours?

So what, that's something you find out once that your electric installation is shoddy enough to most likely be a fire risk (because the charger plug has a thermal protection built in!), fix it and then you won't have that problem again. And as the Leaf should have 150 miles worth of range, you still should have way more than enough range on the battery to do two days worth of commute even if you suddenly find out the trickle charge didn't work.

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

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 gro…

>> When in reality you plug in at home and have a full battery every morning Right, but I should buy a house with a garage first. >> charge when you're getting groceries as the shop has multiple 100kW Unless you do groceries in unusual time, those chargers are occupied. Will you wait in line then?

You just need an outlet that is close to the car, but it’s mostly an American issue.

We get 230V/16A from a bog standard outlet, three phase is triple that.

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

#213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

I thought about this too - own a small electric vehicle for 90% of the family needs and rent a bigger SUV when the need arises. Until you do the math and realize that the 3-4 annual trips of multiple days would end up costing thousands of dollars in rental fees per year. Plus the usual inconveniences around renting. Suddenly the math does not look so appealing.

No idea what numbers you are crunching. I am doing this for 10 years now and able to afford luxurious cars for holidays because of it.

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

#214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 on…

I have a 2nd gen 2019 Leaf in Europe and it came with Type 2 and another one I've never ever used which looks like J1772, both next to each other in the front of the car. No CCS2 here, indeed.

I was under the impression Type 2 was the only European standard.

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

#216

[flagged]

Were they ever the rage? Seems to me they started off with a small fringe of hardcore fans, and they're gradually gaining adoption. That means they're picking up users that aren't enthusiasts and just want to get on with it.

It seems like you have some kind of issue, but I'm not sure what it is.

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

#217

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…

Always check if that suspiciously cheap second hand EV you're buying had active battery cooling.

A lot of the crap like the early Nissan Leafs didn't. And between that and the first gen EV battery pack design being shit in general, the battery pack just cooks itself. Its capacity falls off a cliff over time. This is where a lot of those early concerns about EV battery packs being hideously expensive consumables was coming from.

If the battery pack is actively cooled, then, as a rule, it ages gracefully. If not? Oh boy.

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

#219
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.

$17k minus an extra $2k added to my Camry's trade-in value, and it's eligible for the $4k used vehicle EV tax rebate at the end of the year. So out the door $15k with 36k miles and 94% doh battery, I was satisfied with the deal. At the end of the tax year I'll have paid $11k for the car, effectively. I tacked on the price of the CHAdeMO adapter mentally to the price I offered, since I knew I'd want it for the one or…

The deals on used electric vehicles are pretty shocking.

Used Chevy Volts are actually more expensive now than they were a few years back, at least on the CarMax website. Maybe a higher price because they were discontinued but I used to love my Volt. Averaged 150mpg over 3 years.

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

#220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$17k minus an extra $2k added to my Camry's trade-in value, and it's eligible for the $4k used vehicle EV tax rebate at the end of the year. So out the door $15k with 36k miles and 94% doh battery, I was satisfied with the deal. At the end of the tax year I'll have paid $11k for the car, effectively. I tacked on the price of the CHAdeMO adapter mentally to the price I offered, since I knew I'd want it for the one or…

BMW i3 are going for about the same.

and they're an absolute -nightmare- to maintain.... even with that being the case i still want one because russ hannaman had a point- everyone loves a car with doors that open like this \[]/ not like this =[]=
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