My car is a 2020 model. Nissan has started a recall for a battery defect that, they say, might affect 1% of 2020 LEAFs but can result in a fire during fast DC charging. Nice! Nissan says they're working on a solution. Of course they are. My battery is still covered by their warranty. If they can't fix it they have to replace it for free. Meanwhile, they don’t want me to fast charge. Regular charging is fine. Minor inconvenience for me. I mostly charge at home anyway. I was annoyed until I saw a similar battery recall for certain EV Jeep models. Stellantis, the parent company, says to park the Jeep away from buildings or flammable materials and don't drive it AT ALL until the issue is corrected. Yikes!
Well, you need to send this information to the Trump campaign. He could then update his silly shark versus electric boat dilemma and make it more factual. For example, does he burn up in his EV Jeep or have to walk and be eaten by lions.
Eww. Lions with intestinal problems? They need to be more careful about what they eat...toxins, you know.
Alas, the recall notice arrived. Mine is one of the cars subject to the recall. The notice looks pretty serious. It has a photo of the normal AC Level 2 charge socket with a green "okay to use" note and another photo of the CHAdeMO DC fast charge socket with a stern warning in bright red saying "Do not use" and a big red "X" on the photo. Well, it's just a reminder that EV technology is still young. As I say, being limited to Level 2 AC charging is not a problem for me. Hm. Ten years ago, the stripped down basic LEAF didn't even necessarily have a DC fast charging connector. It was an extra cost option.
I ran into a speculation that that Nissan might offer to "cash out" LEAF owners if the only fix would be to replace the battery pack. The idea is, Nissan would give me a chunk of cash in return for their dealer removing the CHAdeMO socket and circuitry. I might go for that if it would pay off a significant part of the loan. I don't owe very much anyway, the car cost me about $16k, but I DC fast charge it so rarely that I don't think I'd miss it. Besides, CHAdeMO is headed for obsolescence anyway. Nissan isn't saying these things yet.
I've found that the LEAF's state of charge indicator goes crazy about 50 miles into a freeway speed trip. The available charge and mileage drop off very quickly and the car begins sounding all its "charge now!" warnings but if you pull over for twenty minutes or so, the car decides you still have 50% charge available. I've made a few experiments and determined that the non-hysterical state of charge readings are correct and yield the car's rated distance range. If you avoid high speed driving for more than twenty minutes or so, the state of charge decreases as you drive all the way to nearly nothing exactly as it should. I suspect a defective battery cell overheats if the car draws high amps for more than about about 20 minutes. That's consistent with the recall notice.
