I haven't been updating this blog as much, but I think I should update it more often. I received the car back from the dealer about 3 weeks ago. The service advisor at Cerritos Nissan basically told me they were unable the source of the problem with my vehicle but did admit there was a problem with the vehicle. They told me a head engineer from Nissan HQ came to take some diagnostic data and will be sending that data back to Japan. They told me I should receive some word from them real soon about the results.
When I picked up my car from the dealer, I noticed that there is one bar missing from my battery capacity. That means I have 11 out of 12 bars. I spoke with the advisor and he told me that's normal. My car has 23k miles and I always charge it with a L2 at my home. With only 11 bars, with a full charge, my car gets about 80 miles range in the morning whereas I had about 90 miles range when I had 12 bars. So I decided to wait and see what Nissan says about my car. So it's been 3 weeks and no word from Nissan.
On September 23, 2012, when I first turned on the car in the morning I noticed it only showed a 70 mile range. Like every time I drove the car, I would reset the efficiency bar and the driving distance so I can see how many miles this car can go and on what efficiency. I typically drive around 4.2-4.5 miles/kwh.
Anyways, so Sunday morning I ran some errands locally totalling at most 6-8 miles. I had lost one bar on the capacity meter from that. My wife and I decided to go to South Coast plaza which is typically a 20 mile commute each way. I figured I easily had enough to get there and back even without charging. Was I wrong! On the drive there, my car dropped 6 bars with an efficiency of 4.0miles/kwh. By the time I got to South Coast, I had 5 bars left with only 33 miles capacity. So I figured that sounds about right and should have plenty to get back.
My wife and I did some shopping and decided to head home. At about 12 miles back, the car went from 5 bars all the way down to 2 bars already showing about 12 mile range left. How did I lose over 20 miles on a 12 mile commute? I decided to go off the freeway and go to a charger. By the time I got to a charger which was only 3 miles away, the car was down to only 6 miles and one bar! I wouldn't have enough to even get home!
This commute I was going around 60-65 mph, not even that excessive. It was however a hot day around 88 degrees.
Usually I can easily go to South Coast and back but it seems like something is really deteriorating with the Leaf. I am absolutely regretting purchasing this car and the lies Nissan was telling their customers about getting up to 100 miles range. I've never seen 100 miles and at best around 85-90 miles. Now with this battery issue after 23k miles, I am getting at most 60 miles range on the car.. even less on a hot day it seems!
Nissan, if you're reading this, you really need to do something!
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