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Buying an older ev

1361 Views 7 Replies 8 Participants Last post by  ahutcheon, 
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Hi there, I am thinking about changing my 6.5year old Nissan Juke for a small ev. We’ve just purchased a new family car so I’m hoping not to spend much (less than 10k, 7k if possible). I’ve had a look through autotrader and they are mostly a few years old as you’d expect for this budget. I’m really wondering what I should look out for on an older ev? What bits go wrong? Is it the same as a ‘normal’ car where you want low mileage? I assume to battery isn’t as good as when new. What kind of %age would they loose?
it only needs to be a city run around so it doesn’t need to do loads of miles.
Any info or suggestions would be great.
Thank you!
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Breeze said:
Hi there, I am thinking about changing my 6.5year old Nissan Juke for a small ev. We’ve just purchased a new family car so I’m hoping not to spend much (less than 10k, 7k if possible). I’ve had a look through autotrader and they are mostly a few years old as you’d expect for this budget. I’m really wondering what I should look out for on an older ev? What bits go wrong? Is it the same as a ‘normal’ car where you want low mileage? I assume to battery isn’t as good as when new. What kind of %age would they loose?
it only needs to be a city run around so it doesn’t need to do loads of miles.
Any info or suggestions would be great.
Thank you!
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Some early EVs (Zoe in particular) are battery lease cars. The car is cheap but you then have to take on the battery lease which is ultimately likely more costly over the long term, though if you can buy out the lease or it ends soon that might be a bargain. If it's a Zoe 'i' model the battery is owned.
Battery health is important.
A Leaf or a Zoe should be in your range and likely fit the bill pretty well.
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The late 24 KW Leafs seem to be OK, early ones batteries weren't so good. reliability is said to be good, some gearboxes have failed but given it is just a reduction gear it is hard to know why. There is a guy on Orkney who will find cars for a fee at auctions.
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WeeBlueEv
I put a post in the i3 section about how to access secret info. The real capacity of my three year old 33kwh is 30.5 which is good, proving its first owner was kind to the battery!

Only relevant to BMWs. However, such secret info must be available for all EVs. You only need to know the secret access, I assume. Everything is somewhere on the www. When looking at an older EV I think I would definitely seek out any hidden battery data.
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Naturetech
Given your budget, options are limited to: Nissan Leaf 24 & 30kwh versions, Renault Zoe 22kwh and Kia Soul in 27 & 30kwh flavours. The Soul 30kwh would have above average mileage to slip under the £10K target though.
Ask yourself:
1) Which one best suits your needs?
2) What's the general reliability like with each one when they start getting old? In order, best to worse: Soul, Leaf, Zoe.
3) Can you live with the looks of a Soul?
4) Do you like leather seats and more refinements? The Leaf Tekna's got the most.

I'm very happy with my Soul, never drove a Leaf and read some horror stories about Zoes regarding reliability and general 1990s Fiat build quality.
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cah197
Naturetech said:
I'm very happy with my Soul, never drove a Leaf and read some horror stories about Zoes regarding reliability and general 1990s Fiat build quality.
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Sorry, but that’s a bit unfair.

Build quality isn’t that bad, nor reliability. If you read the Leaf forums there are plenty of horror stories.

The reality is they sold many more Leafs and Zoes, so there be more issues.
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T
Generally I would say a UK built Leaf (2013 onwards) is the best option at the cheaper end of the market and the Soul is the better choice if you're spending a bit more (£10k+).

Zoes are good cars but I wouldn't want to own one out of warranty, going by some of the bills people I know have received. Older Leafs are generally pretty robust unless they've been really abused.
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A
I can only speak for the Leaf (I have a 2014), I find it excellent when used within it's abilities (i.e. I normally charge overnight at home and use it within its range on a charge). It'll carry more than I expected, is very nice to drive for (what I regard as) a generic hatchback, and the price is right. It's proved way more versatile than just the cheap commuter hack I thought I was buying to save fuel costs and bring mileage added to then other cars.

Battery condition matters more than mileage, you want to check with Leafspy, mine's at just over 85% state of health (SOH) and still shows 12 bars on the battery indicator (perhaps not for much longer, the first bar disappears at 85% apparently).

For a city run-around, I wouldn't be too worried about exact SOH, but price should reflect SOH (i.e. I might be happy with a much cheaper 70% car). Not sure about UK pricing, older Leafs here in NZ tend to be in the 65% to 85% battery ballpark, and price pretty much follows SOH.
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