Wait... Nissan LEAF Battery Replacement Just Went OPEN SOURCE!?

electric vehicles have popped up several times in the automotive history books and at one point were more common on the world's roads than those pesky complicated and bothersome internal combustion engines and their newfangled fuel petroleum distillate but when electric vehicles made a reappearance as serious contenders to the internal combustion engine 13 years ago Nissan's humble Leaf so-called because Nissan wanted it to be known as the leading environmentally friendly affordable family car was the first electric vehicle to hit serious production volume launched in the US in the last few weeks of 2010 and with more than 650 000 sold since then around the world it's reasonably easy to get hold of one on the used car market if you happen to live in a country where they were sold it's also reasonably easy to get hold of spare parts for them and there's an active Vibrant Community of enthusiasts ensuring that as many Leafs stay on the road as possible opening up truly Affordable Electric transport to those with more modest range requirements unfortunately the early Leafs battery didn't last as well as that of more modern EVS to date if you've needed to replace your Leaf's traction battery you've either had to be willing to pay a Nissan dealership a large chunk of change be willing to pay a third-party repair specialist a large chunk of change or happen to be a pretty hardcore hardware and software engineer capable of understanding the intricate electronic messages that go between the battery pack and the car on its can bus except now if you're someone who's happy to turn a wrench can follow appropriate high voltage safety protocols and isn't afraid of getting stuck in you might be able to do it yourself Nissan Leaf battery Replacements just went open source in a move that could make Nissan Leafs far more affordable repairable and long-lived on the used car Marketplace so strap in I'm gonna explain it all thank you before I get into the fangirling over this particular announcement I'm going to discuss why Nissan Leafs are more likely to need a battery replacement than some other electric vehicles on the used car market today then I'm going to explain the reason why Nissan Leaf battery Replacements are even possible and then finally I'll delve into the particulars of this exciting open source news and explain what if you're interested you need to do next and so I should jump straight well ish to the Leaf's biggest floor and no it's not the looks or its limited range or even the fact that it used to demo as its fast charge protocol of choice no the Leaf's biggest flaw throughout its 13-year production run to date is the fact that it relies on passive air cooling to keep its battery pack at a sensible temperature as opposed to the active liquid thermal management that most electric vehicles use today for those who aren't in the know lithium-ion battery packs are a bit like us they don't like it too hot and they don't like it too cold get them too cold and like us on a cold morning they might be a little sluggish to get moving make them too hot and like us on a really hot summer day at least if you're British they start to overheat and get a little poorly the answer to a healthy happy battery pack that lasts a long time is proper care and for most EVS on the market today part to that care includes building specially designed liquid-based cooling systems that circulate coolant through channels in the battery pack in order to ensure that entire pack stays at an Optimum temperature regardless of what the weather is like and how hard they're working systems like this are called active thermal management passive thermal Management Systems meanwhile keep battery packs cool in hot weather by utilizing the passage of air over and around the battery while the vehicle is in motion they might be fine keeping a car's battery pack reasonably cool in temperate climates but as soon as the battery pack is asked to deal with extreme temperatures on a hot day or has to deal with the extra heat that comes from Rapid charging multiple times in a single day it will struggle to keep the pack cool when the vehicle is not in motion and sometimes when it even is and just as we humans can suffer heat stroke a passively cooled battery pack that's subjected to extreme temperatures can undergo microscopic structural changes at the cell level that can ultimately cause the battery to behave as if it's far far older than it actually is resulting in reduced range per charge longer charge times and less peppy performance although the majority of Nissan Leafs made to date are still living the battery equivalent of happy healthy lives on their original battery packs and listening to REM because they live in temperate climbs aren't put through a lot of stress and aren't rapid charged multiple times in a single day while covering tens of thousands of miles per year Nissan Leafs that live in warmer climates or are regularly rapid charged multiple times in a single day are now suffering significant premature battery aging and while owners of cars with batteries that aren't doing great often trade those cars in for a newer model because they can their former cars end up on the used car market and can be a real steal for those looking for a round Town Runabout but they may not have the remaining battery health to satisfy the duties of anything more than short distance commuter roles their Motors and their power electronics are just fine and their Interiors may have many more miles to go but if their battery pack aren't happy you either have to live with the consequences of a really short range EV or pay for a replacement pack although Nissan Leafs are originally designed with 24 kilowatt-hour battery packs Vehicles built after 2016 have come with a varying assortment of different capacities from the 30 kilowatt-hour battery pack offered on the very last of the first generation Leafs through to the 40 and 62 kilowatt hour battery packs available on second generation Leafs made from 2017 and 2018 respectively and while there are some slight differences in the pack designs of all of those they're similar enough dimensionally that it's possible to physically fit the 62 kilowatt-hour battery pack found in long-range Nissan Leaf pluses to an original nissanly from say 2012 with minimal mechanical changes in the mounting mechanism the Leaf's electronic system though is more complex and some clever hardware and software is required to convince your older leaf that getting a new battery is A-Okay which brings me to the massive cottage industry which has sprung up in the last few years offering to help Nissan Leaf owners replace their car's battery packs for an identical one from a lower mileage Leaf of a similar age or to upgrade their battery pack to a higher capacity one from a newer Nissan Leaf model and unlike Nissan which will charge you an arm and a leg and only give you a replacement pack with the same specs that your car came with these independent Specialists have helped many older Leafs stay on the road when their original battery packs became too sick to carry on or have helped those who didn't want to replace their car get longer range performance for less than the price of a new vehicle and far less than Nissan will charge you for that aforementioned official battery swap these Specialists Source low mileage known good battery packs often from wrecked Nissan Leafs add to the necessary hardware and software tweaks and give your car a brand new lease of life but the cost of doing this upgrade is still reasonably pricey depending on where you go and which company you use and which battery pack you choose a battery replacement from a specialist like this can range from six or seven thousand dollars all the way up to fifteen thousand dollars or more but if you own the car outright you don't want a new one it's still cheaper than a brand new car from an automaker with a massive wait list as is often the case with aftermarket upgrades though you're paying the Specialists for the materials and the equipment they use as well as the time energy and money that has gone into reverse engineering designing and properly testing the solution that they're selling to you but over the last weekend electrical engineer and Evie Advocate Darla from Dallas EV repair in Finland and the YouTube channel of the same name announced that he had decided to open source his own battery upgrade process in addition to crafting a very detailed how-to guide on GitHub detailing all of the usual precautions that you need to go through in order to safely work on high voltage battery packs he linked to the hardware that you need to physically place on the car's controller area network between the car's battery management system and ECU as well as the software that you'll need to flash onto it in order to achieve a successful battery swap what makes this truly impressive though is that the microcontroller Hardware required for the battery swap the thing that sits on the can bus can be purchased for under 25 add in the cost of a replacement battery pack from a local vehicle recycling center and you could be on your way to probably the most affordable battery replacement for Nissan Leafs that's ever been available in announcing the decision to open source what has been a major source of income for him Darla said that he simply can't keep up with demand and I'm paraphrasing offering just battery Replacements was holding up other work he wants to do such as developing and building a CCS upgrade path for Nissan Leafs to enable them to operate on CCS fast charging stations a byd battery emulator that lets you use Salvage EV battery packs to work with cheap affordable solar inverters as a backup power solution for your home and a whole lot more and frankly I hope if you're watching this and you want to see more support for the leaf for years to come you'll follow me in becoming a patreon supporter of Darla which I now am open sourcing software isn't done for financial reasons it's done because you want to make the world a better place and frankly Darla is working super hard to make that happen and Dallas also a really amazing person to boot at this point let's discuss the elephant in the room though the actual challenges and risks associated with doing this kind of battery swap on your own electric car battery packs are heavy they require careful handling and swapping one in your garage isn't exactly easy however if you have a friend with a shop or you have a lift and you're able to follow some basic Common Sense electrical safety rules and best practices it is possible to safely work on them doing this of course means that you're on your own if you screw it up it's on you but while some people will clutch at pearls and go but electricity can kill you and it is dangerous I want to politely remind you that an improperly fitted fuel pump incorrectly rebuilt engine or even a poorly wired sound system can result in big booms and much destruction and as a society we've come to pretty much accept that shade tree mechanics can range from terrifyingly incompetent just watch her just rolled in video on YouTube if you don't believe me through two really super competent and better than your average garage mechanic and by the way if you're interested that's how Carrie one of my former Morris miners a 1.8 liter k-series engine hot rod traveler that I sold to help a family member in the States pay a medical bill ended her life after selling it to someone my BMW baiting 70 in second gear monster of a death trap burned to the ground because her new owner decided to install a custom sound system themselves rather than pay a professional to do it he chose poorly anyway back to the leaf and the now open sourced battery upgrade path if you're interested in seeing electric cars last well beyond their first three owners and you want to see cars like the Nissan Leaf continue to sell for a few thousand on the used car market helping people who would never before have dreamed of going electric to actually drive electric it's projects like this that really mean a lot that as well as projects like the open source inverter projects that exist to help enthusiasts convert internal combustion engine vehicles to Electric drivetrains using recycled parts and production EVS these Grassroots efforts will dramatically accelerate the transition to Electric not another 50 or 60 000 insert your currency of choice EV full of subscription services and lockdown Hardware they might help wealthy people go Electric but they won't help anyone else and projects like this will also stop cars like the Nissan Leaf from being converted into gasoline vehicles which is happening in some countries like Sri Lanka for example where admittedly trade sanctions make it pretty hard to buy official battery packs for gray market import Nissan Leafs but there some people have been converting Leafs with poorly battery packs to gasoline engines because it's easier to Source the parts for an internal combustion engine conversion or maybe a hybrid conversion than it is to get an honest to goodness known good replacement battery pack at least prior to this I hope Darla's solution and others like it help turn that particular thing around are you happy to see this project go open source would you like to give battery replacement a go yourself and would you welcome other vehicles getting similar treatment on the aftermarket Enthusiast open source Community tell me below and on that note we are done with today's video if you have comments drop us a polite note Below in the Discord chat room on Mastodon or if you are a patreon supporter in the comments there if you want more subscribe hit the bell and follow the links below to regularly support us with a YouTube membership or a patreon subscription you'll also find links to our Kofi Bitcoin and swag store as 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Wednesday Friday and Saturday on the main Channel a day earlier if you are a patreon supporter or YouTube channel member Plus on a Sunday you can catch up with us with a chicken and garden update and Sunday musing on take two and with that I hope you enjoy the rest of your day I hope you support dala with a patreon subscription and as always keep evolving foreign lots of people have been asking me for a classic mag update and I'm afraid there isn't one today because I've just been just run off my feet trying to do things formula is coming up we're taking a week off for July 4th lots of other cool stuff is happening but I do want to take this moment to thank all of you who helped Michael and Moss with the the fun for their cat Raven uh their cat was very very sick and many of you all stepped up to the plate and made a donation to help them be able to afford the immersive vet bill for that cat and Raven has made it through the first surgery is doing okay I know Michael and Moss are very 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Channel: Transport Evolved

Views: 106,275

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Id: UiM0JQC4C0c

Length: 17min 53sec (1073 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 21 2023