Nissan Leaf 2013-2017 | Good USED buy?? | in-depth review...

plugging our cars into the mains electricity Supply when we get home at night might currently seem about as natural as shoveling coal into them before setting off in the morning but all the signs are that's going to change hybrid cars were a first step in the direction of increased use of electricity to drive our vehicles and fully electric models look like being the next only a car that will never go near a filling station 4 Chord except to use the jet wash or inflate its tires might take some getting used to but Nissan is confident that thanks to reduced pricing and increased range and quicker charging time it's much improved Leaf can make the transition a painless one it's as much about Nissan's leadership in the field of full electric vehicles that at a time when nice manufacturers are finalizing prototypes with this technology this forward-thinking Japanese brand is already fully revised its game-changing offering in this sector this model the leaf the name is an acronym for leading environmentally friendly affordable family car which is exactly what this was when first we saw it launched in 2011 as the first purpose-designed pure electric vehicle on the market back then the only other offering in this segment was a hastily converted City car design sold under different badges by Mitsubishi Peugeot and Citroen in comparison the Prospectors spending similar money on a larger more advanced Nissan Leaf seemed like a no-brainer decision for anyone seriously considering a car of this sort the problem for Nissan in the UK at least was that hardly anyone was considering buying a fully electric family vehicle and certainly not one costing close to 30 000 pounds a leaf might be better than anything else on offer but it was still beset by the usual EV issues of low operating range and patchy public charging infrastructure it was in short a car ahead of its time has that time now come perhaps after all today the cost of the technology has come down and the number of public charging points has dramatically increased plus the whole idea of owning a pure electric car is now more widely accepted it's a change in mindset Nissan has aimed to capitalize on by relaunching this leap model with a more affordable pricing structure a smarter more practical interior and a longer operating range and the results could very well be the best car of its kind we've yet seen let's check it out [Music] let's start with the headlines this car can travel nearly 20 percent further than it could before on a single charge and if you spec it right you can finish that charge in half the time if that's enough to get your interest then let's get behind the wheel and see what it's like to drive [Music] get yourself settled and if you've tried a leaf before you'll find that things aren't very different with this improved model if you haven't then the whole experience will be as futuristic as it always was now initially it feels just like the focus sized family hatchback it is but release the now foot operated parking brake and push the starter and the electric experience begins virtual instrument Graphics spring up in front of you accompanied by a cherry chime before a few seconds later you're ready to pull this mouse-shaped Auto gear selector into drive electric cars are always of course automatic and set off but before you do a quick check is needed of the all-important range indicator designated by this bar graph and the mileage figure displayed beneath it now it's the display you're going to get very used to staring at since it'll determine exactly how and when you can use this car Brands like Tesla have shown that a range of 250 miles or more is possible with very expensive electric vehicles affordable EVS though can't get anywhere close to that but amongst these this Nissan is probably now able to assume the mantle of best of the rest thanks to an increase in claimed operating range from 110 to 129 miles that's been achieved by this revised model thanks to a 30 kilogram weight reduction and the installation on Mid and top range variants of a clever heat pump that uses three times less energy than would normally be required to heat the car how well by uh drawing that energy from the air outside a technology approach that's uh well established in domestic use in the real world of course you won't regularly achieve the kind of total range that Nissan is talking about unless you habitually drive like a nun but the difference the most recent changes make is to allow a three-figure operating range to be less of a pipe dream and more of an achievable reality especially if you make good use of the helpful B mode that's been added to the gearbox select it rather than the usual drive setting by putting the lever back and you'll increase the energy that can be harvested from regenerative braking and therefore extend the distance that you can travel in this test I've been more commonly getting around 80 miles out of a single charge but that'll still be sufficient to satisfy the 80 of drivers whose daily mileage is less than that of course range is less of an issue if charging is quick and easy when one day the 50 kilowatt rapid charges that can replenish a depleted battery to around 80 percent of its capacity in just 30 minutes a common place on our major routes no one will think twice about taking an EV vehicle on a longer trip today though such a journey takes a little more forward planning though a couple of things do make that process easier first if you do get to the perspiration point when seven to eight miles from empty you find a voice prompting you to find a recharging Point as a low charged Turtle graphic appears on the dash well then there's always the car Wings telematics system that most models offer to help you out now this always knows where the nearest public charging point is and can direct you straight to it helping to avoid that scenario is the availability of an optional 6.6 kilowatt on-board charging system which can halve your charging time to as little as four hours providing you can find a seven pin socket to plug it into as you might expect over exercising of your right foot depletes the batteries very quickly and means plugging in much more often in fact it's actually more tempting than you'd think to drive this car quicker than you intend to or at least it is powering off from rest let me show you come to a leaf with electrical expectations based around milk floats and golf carts and the way that 100 of the torque is available right off the bat never fails to feel shocking from rest to 30 miles an hour this Nissan accelerates faster than a petrol V6 but progress slows as the revs rise culminating in a 11 and a half second not to 62 mile an hour time that's no better but certainly no worse than a conventionally powered rival diesel model Now power comes courtesy of a 360 volt electric motor putting out the equivalent of 109 PS and a pokey 280 newton meters of torque as this unit revs rather promisingly to over 10 000 RPM it'll only do 90 miles an hour flat out but of course at right speed isn't the point of this car no its natural habitat is an urban one that'll see you trundling along in Eerie silence actually it's not quite silent while designers are conventional cars bust a gut to get noise levels down Nissan has had to actually add sound to this one to counter public fears that quiet electric vehicles might as they approach unpleasantly surprise unwary pedestrians and the visually impaired hence the speaker fitted in the engine bay that produces a low wine at under 15 miles an hour to warm the pavement bound of your impending arrival those Leaf owners of a nastier disposition can actually switch it off in town it'll make most sense to drive this car in its Eco setting which you activate via this steering wheel button a setting which on the original version of this car combined a slower throttle response with extra regenerative braking to increase operating range by about 10 percent now the problem with that was that on the open road where you don't want a slow throttle response owners couldn't get the benefit of extra regenerative braking which is why on this car the two systems Now operate independently get beyond the city limits and you can disable the lethargic throttle response via the same steering wheel Eco button but at the same time Snick the gear lever from D to B to still harvest the extra braking energy and handling on faster twisty roads well on the original version of this car this ought to have been quite good thanks to a center of gravity the same as that in Nissan 370Z sports car and near perfect weight distribution the trouble was with that car that the steering was so ridiculously light and devoid of feel that at the wheel you felt absolutely no inclination at all to drive it with any kind of Verve with this revised model the engineers have improved things with revised damper settings that improve high-speed stability and ensure the car no longer floats rather weirdly when it encounters mid Corner bumps there's a bit more weight in the steering too it's still not what you'd call responsive but you do at least get a little more feel for what the wheels are doing beneath you turning is actually quite sharp and there's plenty of grip though also still plenty of body roll most importantly though for potential buyers the ride is very good foreign was the first mass production electric vehicle to be designed from the ground up for purely battery power early EVS like some of those still on the market were merely conversions of cars originally created with petrol engines now even if you didn't know this you could perhaps guess the fact from a glance at this dramatic looking Nissan for example since as an all-electric car there was no need to fit a bulky engine in the front it has a stubby and sharply angled nose that produces a smart wedge profile and AIDS the strong aerodynamic performance with this revised model now British built in Sunderland that nose now has to also accommodate the bulky charge or an inverter which used to take up space in the boot but the designers have managed to do that without affecting the Bonnet line so as before the so-called smart fluidity looks remain a little unorthodox subtle Grill changes are the only visual update over the original version the and the addition of an LED light under the charger lid which makes it a bit easier to connect up at night otherwise nothing's really very different and the futuristic styling remains unaltered but then many will feel that to be wholly appropriate for such a groundbreaking car the quirkiest detail is probably the raised profile of these blue LED headlamps positioned to channel air away from the wing mirrors and reduce road noise things get a little more bulbous around a rear end dominated by this kicked up roof line and these gently curved vertical tail lights and of course notable for the total absence of an exhaust pipe there is of course a battery instead as before a 48 module lithium-ion power pack that isn't housed in the boot but under the vehicle's floor helping create the low center of gravity that helps so much with the handling but perhaps the most important thing here is the overall size at around four and a half meters long this was the first pure electric car big enough for proper family use no more than around 200 kilograms heavier than a similarly shaped conventional model and offering cabin space and overall dimensions very comparable to that of a conventional Ford Focus style family hatchback even today no other EV on the market can offer you more rear seat space thanks to redesigned front seats that free up another 53 millimeters of leg room for rearward folk the bench back here can comfortably accommodate three adults on short Journeys two or longer ones and a trio of kids all day long the important practical news with this revised Leaf though lies further back I mentioned earlier that the charger unit and the inverter that the battery pack needs have been moved forward from the boot to the Bonnet well that's made a big difference to the cargo area luggage space is now 330 liters that's a 40 liter increase about the size of a piece of Airline carry-on baggage though top models lose 15 liters of that thanks to the need to house the subwoofer of The Punchy Bose stereo more importantly when you push the 60 40 split folding rear bench forward something you can't do in a rival Renault fluent Ze you now get a much flatter loading floor true the total cargo room on offer still isn't very big the 1100 liter total potential seats folded luggage area that you'd expect when traveling too up in a conventional family hatch is reduced here to just 680 liters but I can't see that unduly bothering too many potential buyers the reason the boot isn't bigger is that the lithium-ion battery pack is mounted beneath the floor of the vehicle a more pleasing consequence of which is the slightly raised driving position that you get behind the wheel on this improved model there's also the bonus that you can further adjust your seat for height should you want to unfortunately the more pressing change needed in this cabin the adoption of a reach adjustable steering wheel is still on Nissan's to-do list still you can move the thing up and down and with a bit of jiggling about it's possible to achieve a pretty comfortable driving position in a cabin that seems very different from that of the original Until you realize that apart from the adoption of a foot operated handbrake the only major change is the adoption of a darker palette of plastics the original light colored trim looked very modern but proved pretty impractical for the cold muddy climates of Northern Europe and Scandinavia so as before there's an appropriately futuristically styled split level Dash with blue tinted Graphics that look pretty conventional until you appear closer and find that they're primarily geared towards advising you just how much further you can go before a charging Top-Up is needed a mobile phone style percentage reading is now also included the graphics advise you of your success in regenerating electricity and there's an Eco indicator to display the status of electricity consumption with little tamaguchi-like trees growing on the display depending upon how frugally you're driving further range information is provided by various functions that you'll find on the large telematics screen residing in the middle of the center console powered by a system Nissan calls car wings mid and top spec models get it and a price to include a five-year subscription to the system here updated to be even more useful as well as the usual stereo Sat Nav and uh Bluetooth phone functions that you get with a conventional infotainment setup this one knows where every public charging point is and is always ready to direct you to one you can also access car Wings remotely via your PC or smartphone planning a trip in advance or setting a timer to cool down the car before a journey so that you don't have to use valuable battery power doing so once on the move the heating and windscreen demister aren't as off limits in this respect as they were in the old Leaf model though thanks to a heating system that emit and top range models is 70 percent less power hungry there are now two ways of buying this car as with the original version you can purchase the whole product complete with battery but at pricing now around 5000 pounds more affordable than the original 2011 model year figure after subtraction of the government's generous 5 000 pound plug-in car grant for electric vehicles that means a span in the 21 to 26 000 pound bracket the other way of getting yourself a leaf is to buy one without the battery at a five thousand pounds model for model saving then lease said battery from Unison dealer at a monthly cost that'll depend on your predicted annual mileage and ownership duration those two criteria will determine which approach will be more cost effective for you there are five leasing deals based on annual mileages between seven and a half and fifteen thousand miles and for 12 24 or 36 months the cheapest way which we'll see you paying around 70 pounds a month is to commit to the lowest mileage and the longest term other deals though could see that price increasing by up to 80 percent so choose carefully I'd summarize this by simply suggesting that if you're planning to keep your leaf for a long period and use it quite a lot then it's probably better to choose the battery inclusive package if on the other hand it'll be a second or third car you'll use occasionally and chop in for a replacement after three years you might save a couple of thousand over that period by opting for a lease agreement the other point I'd make is trim related I'd really advise against settling for the base spec vizier model as it does without a significant part of the technology that's really improved this car like the pump driven heating system that probably does more than anything else to extend this revised model's range you don't get a quick charge port either or an extra gearbox B mode that increases regenerative braking able to charge the battery as you drive you also do without the option to set up charging remotely and you miss the car Wings telematic system with a Sat Nav that always knows where the nearest public charging point is and can direct you to it ultimately what it all boils down to is the realization that trying to save money on a base Leaf vizier variant is a false economy getting you a car that in truth isn't much of a step forward from the original Leaf model in other words finding another two and a half thousand pounds to get yourself into the mid-spec a center model that includes all of these things is therefore a wise move think of the cost to one of those as being somewhere between 22 and 24 000 pounds depending on your method of purchase and you've probably got a good idea of what you're going to need to Shell out for a realistically equipped version of this car to put that kind of outlay into perspective you're talking of spending a couple of thousand more than you'd need to get yourself a decently specified version of a comparably sized mainstream diesel engine Focus or astrocise family hatch which is a premium that of course you'd very rapidly recoup in fuel and tax savings the money Nissan asks is also about the same as you'd pay for a comparably sized petrol electric hybrid like Toyota's Prius and a lot less than a comparably sized diesel electric hybrid like peugeot's 3008 hybrid 4. plug-in versions of both these cars have been developed but they're a lot more expensive you probably wouldn't be considering this Leaf at all though if you still had half an eye on a conventionally engine car so let's assume that you're fully bought into the whole idea of pure EV motoring you then to decide whether to fully commit to it with a battery-only powered vehicle like this one or to choose an electric vehicle with a so-called range extender engine a little petrol unit your EV will carry around to cut in and keep you going should you exhaust the battery range the range extender option is potentially tempting but it's also expensive the three models you could choose the Vauxhall ampira Chevrolet Volt design and BMWs smaller but trendier I3 all require a 30 000 pound budget for that you could get a leaf and a second hand conventionally engine run about for longer trips in most cases though someone who can afford a car like this will already have another conventionally engine vehicle in their driveway we're talking about someone then who's no real need to dilute the electric vehicle concept with range extender technology someone who wants to slash their motoring costs rather than merely trim them with a hybrid or a Frugal Diesel and someone who's probably already looked at the few other pure electric vehicles out there and dismiss them in favor of this Nissan which would be understandable true I can understand why conventional buyers put off by this Nissan's futuristic looks might consider renault's fluency and Zoe models but these are smaller less practical cars that aren't much cheaper the pure EV designed sold by Mitsubishi Citroen and Peugeot is Tiny and expensive and all electric versions of Ford's focus and Volkswagen's golf are just expensive if having considered all of this you decide that it is a Nissan Leaf that you really want then you're going to want to know what's included in the standard spec regardless of the purchasing route you decide to take as I said the entry level vizier model lacks some key technology as well as many of the niceties you'd want in a car of this price there are front fog lights air conditioning he'll start assist and a full speaker audio center with Bluetooth USB and iPod compatibility but that's about it one for taxi folk perhaps which is why most British customers will buy in at mid-range a center level and get 16-inch alloy wheels Auto headlamps and wipers power folding mirrors a rear view parking camera rear privacy glass and a six speaker sound system as well as the key EV items I mentioned earlier the more efficient aircon the extra gearbox regenerative brake mode the remote charging functionality the quick charge port and the car Wing sat nav to guide you to the nearest public charge point here I've gone a bit further and opted for the Top Line techno version for a couple of thousand over the cost of the center model you get a package of nice to have but not essential luxury items larger smarter 17-inch allo Wheels LED headlamps heated leather seats a seven speaker Bose audio system and a 360 degree around view monitor that uses four wide-angle cameras to allow you to view your car from the front the side or even from above safety kit runs to ESP stability control the usual electronic braking and traction AIDS six airbags and isofix child seat fastenings as for options well there are only a handful of those and all seem pretty important to me maybe not so much metallic paint but certainly the rear roof spoiler that incorporates Space Age solar cells to boost the 12 volt battery provided to power ancillaries and a must-have is the 6.6 kilowatt onboard charger which halves your charging tires but only works with a seven pin plug socket you'll also need to allow a little extra for Nissan's 240 volt 16 amp charging Box installable by British gas or Scottish gas which bolts into your home electricity Supply to reduce overnight charging time [Music] assuming you can afford The Upfront asking price then cost of ownership is an area in which this Nissan shows up very well indeed the phrase no-brainer Springs to mind here's why let's start with most buyers biggest potential saving which will actually be nothing to do with fuel and everything to do with the fact that this car attracts absolutely no benefiting kind company car tax potentially saving uh owners thousands every year let's say for example that I switched to this car after running a comparably sized diesel rival say a Vauxhall Astra 2 liter cdti Auto for example where I had to do this I'd find just over 300 pounds extra in my pay packet every month it'd be like being given a 3 600 pound annual rise well actually it'd be better than that since I wouldn't have to pay for a tax disk my maintenance costs would be about 15 lower fewer moving Parts you see I'd be exempt from from the London congestion charge and in some cities I wouldn't even have to pay for parking and we haven't even got to fuel savings yet which the AAA reckon would on their own enable you to recoup the difference between this car and a conventional diesel competitor in under three years specifically Nissan reckons that the savings you could expect would add up to around 800 pounds a year over a typical annual 9 300 mileage in comparison to a diesel rival you want me to break that down well on a pence per mile basis reckon on it costing you about three Pence per mile to run a leaf in comparison to about 11 Pence per mile in a modern Turbo's arrival and before you ask yes that does take into account the increased electricity charges that you'd incur with this Nissan specifically expect this car to cost you about two pounds in electricity every time you charge it up from empty to take your range from zero to a maximum potential 129 miles that figure assumes you've opted for the center or techno models offering the development improvements that have created that much improved range it used to be 110 miles in the original version of this car remember though that you'll struggle to achieve a three-figure total operating mileage unless you habitually Drive in eco mode and make full use of the regenerative braking Nissan reckons the daily charging process will add about 25 pounds on your monthly um electricity bill which most will happily pay to offset the average monthly 145 pound outlay that otherwise have spent fueling an equivalent petrol or diesel motor charging of course is a whole issue in itself and is a process that Nissan has done its best to simplify despite the industry's failure to agree upon a common plug type or recharge lead length recharging will take around 12 hours when your car is connected to a normal household socket or around eight hours if said socket is boosted by Nissan's optional 240 volt 16 amp charging box you can Quicken that time even further if you swap the normal 10 amp cable and 3-pin plug that comes as standard for the 32 amp cable and 7-pin plug of an optional 6.6 kilowatt onboard charging system which can halve charging time great if you've had a seven pin socket installed at home but in my experience it's a lot harder to find one of those at public charging points when you're out on the road even rarer to find on the go are the so-called quick Chargers that have apparently been stalled along so-called corridors of power on major routes in Asia Europe and North America these deliver 50 kilowatts of high voltage direct current and can replenish a depleted battery to around 80 percent of its capacity in just 30 minutes if and when those are added in at garages and Motorway service stations across our land there'll be a rush for electric vehicles like this one own this car and you'll soon learn to sort out your own personal charging regime with plugging in at night or topping up the battery at a public point when you go shopping becoming second nature should the very worst happen though and you forget to connect up head off in a rush and find yourself stranded out of range on the highway halfway to where you're going Nissan will provide a free recovery service for the first year to sort you out a leaf Stranded by the roadside isn't after all very good advertising for them but it's unlikely to overcome to that to ensure that it doesn't your dealer will give you what the brand calls its care EV Leaf customer commitment promise a scheme offering five Peace of Mind pledges first a proper 24-hour test drive to enable you to properly get to know your car before you sign on the dotted line for it second the opportunity to Rapid charge for free at any Nissan dealership with a rapid charging unit a fast-growing number have just check for your nearest location third the option free of charge to borrow a conventional petrol or diesel-powered Nissan model for up to two weeks so that you're covered for any special occasion that may require a really long trip you just pay for the fuel and insurance fourth there's the free pan-european roadside assistance I just mentioned should you ever get stranded by the roadside and fifth there's a free battery state of health guarantee covering capacity battery loss that's below nine bars out of 12. within the first five years or sixty thousand miles and what about the green issues well you can tell your green bearded friends that nearly 100 of the vehicle weight is recyclable and that the bio fabric used to trim the seats is 100 derived from sugarcane but this whole issue of eco-friendliness is of course a lot more complicated than that some in the green lobby get very angry about the whole pure electric car zero emissions ethos they reckon that ignores the well-to-wheel demands of supplying the electricity that powers cars of this kind I'd respond by pointing out that these people usually completely Overlook the fact that CO2 figures for conventional cars failed to take into account the logistical cost of getting fuel to the pump Phil if you're one of those enviro-conscious folk I'll tell you that Nissan has calculated that the burden of filling your batteries in this car will result in a theoretical and highly theoretical 54 grams per kilometer of CO2 being released into the atmosphere based on typical use of the UK's energy grid which means that a leaf driver will still be having nearly half the environmental impact of a small petrol electric family hatch like Toyota's Prius and this car will reassure you of that fact as well if you go into the car Wings telematics energy economy or eco tree sections in the infotainment section it'll tell you just how many so-called Eco trees you've saved on your previous Journey how your driving Stacks up against others worldwide and even how many grams of carbon dioxide have been saved by pure electric vehicles up to any given date and the other issues you'll need to be aware of in running a leaf well Insurance ranges between groups 23 and 25 so you'll be paying a bit more to your broker than you would be for a conventional diesel-powered family hatch uh what about battery longevity well after around five years of use it is true that you can expect your batteries to be down to 80 percent of their original charge potential but by that time most owners will have traded in their car for another this may affect resale values though also bear in mind that after five years you'll have to pay for a subscription to the uh very clever car Wings telematic system that drives much of the neat driver information software as for your warranty well it's the usual Nissan three-year 60 000 mile package for standard components but there's a revised supplementary five-year sixty Thousand Mile coverage plan for the batteries that includes the so-called state of health Clause covering you against excessive charging capacity loss that's the one I mentioned earlier [Music] Nissan is a brand that knows what it's talking about when it comes to electric power with an EV history that stretches all the way back to 1947. only with the introduction of lithium-ion battery technology in the 1990s so did their EV development really take off and a car like their original Leaf become possible early all-electric adopters liked it but wished it were cheaper better to drive and could go further on a quicker charge so Nissan has delivered this improved model offering small but significant improvements in all these areas the remaining issues all have to do with things that are less in this Japanese Brand's control a lower operating range is possible from current Battery Technology but only at a price higher than typical Leaf buyers would be able to pay even without this longer Journeys ought to be quite feasible in a car of this sort but they won't be until a more powerful and widespread public charging infrastructure is in place to make them possible but that doesn't mean I wouldn't recommend this car for the right kind of buyer operating range certainly isn't the issue the murdering press have cracked it up to be do they seriously think that anyone able to afford to spend this kind of money on a car of this sort will help from a single car household of course not likely buyers will be considering this as a second or maybe even a third vehicle for short run use I'll wager though that once they get one in the driveway they'll be using it for 80 of the time this Leaf won't be for everyone of course those without a garage will join single car families and long distance commuters in dismissing it out of hand but then no car is for everyone as the Japanese brand points out you wouldn't buy a GTR Supercar for family use or a Pathfinder SUV as a city Runabout when Nissan has succeeded though is in finally offering us a relatively affordable family-sized pure electric car that's pretty free of compromise a model you could pretty painlessly switch into from something conventional which leaves us with what a defining moment in electric vehicle history it certainly feels like it

Channel: Car and Driving - Car Reviews

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Keywords: nissan leaf, nissan leaf 2023, nissan leaf 2022, nissan leaf 2018, nissan leaf review, nissan leaf 2022 review, nissan leaf battery replacement, nissan leaf zx10r, nissan leaf electric car, nissan leaf 2012, nissan leaf 2015, nissan leaf charging, nissan leaf key fob battery replacement, nissan leaf battery upgrade, nissan leaf 2017, nissan leaf carwow, nissan leaf used, nissan, car and driving car reviews, car and driving

Id: uOCTyfSfiZs

Length: 37min 56sec (2276 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 21 2023