[tony1tf]

Had to call the AA out this evening. My wife was driving the Leaf (Gen2 12 months 5100 miles) - backing it out of a car parking space - foot on brake, engage reverse, release parking brake, brake pedal still depressed, car shot backwards. Fortunately she had the presence of mind to stamp back on the foot operated parking brake. Engaged forward - same problem.
Clearly not a good idea to set out on her journey home, so she called the AA.
There was a noise from under the bonnet - the ABS system engaging at the bottom of the pedal travel, also could hear brake servo noise on slight pedal depression. Turning off the ABS made no difference. Pedal goes to the floor.
Connection to the diagnostics showed e-brake failure code, can bus problems, and 3 wheel sensors faulty.
AA man said he could reset the fault codes, but was not prepared to do that because the car was still under warranty, so the manufacturers would complain. His system said he couldn't tow it without a wheel lift - not even slowly with a hard tow bar. So its being collected tomorrow on a flat bed and taken to the local dealer.

Anyway, the reason I am writing this diatribe is that the foot brake did not work - pressure on the pedal did not operate the brakes and bypass the servo - a real safety hazard. This could have caused a major accident had the car been moving at normal speed - dont know whether regen braking would have worked. My wife is still very shaky, and we have lost confidence in the car.

Has anybody else had dangerous brake problems - I have seen various more minor issues - not as serious as this.
Tony

 

[Aceshigh]

That is worrying. I was always under the impression that the brakes were servo assisted, such that if the servos failed you could still use the brakes.

Yes you'd have to stand on the pedal and it wouldn't be as easy to stop the car but let's face it, in a real emergency braking situation you don't exactly tickle the pedal...

Could it be that your wife only had the brake pedal depressed slightly? As above, without the servo assist it takes a lot more force than normal to stop a moving car, even one that is moving slowly.

And how did you turn off the ABS? I didn't think you could disable it under normal usage, unless you pulled a fuse?

 

[howartp]

Scary!

Interesting that the car must have been detecting the brake pedal to some extent if you were able to start it and select reverse and forward.

 

[thinfourth]

Am i right in thinking that to allow regenerative braking the ABS unit lets the brake pressure bleed away?

Dumb idea

 

[Number64]

There was this

Brakes Stopped Working - Almost Crashed!

required a new loom part I believe.

 

[tony1tf]

Thanks for the feedback. I searched before I posted and didnt find the other thread. I wouldn't be at all surprised if I have to wait months for the repairs.
Regarding whether my wife depressed the pedal fully - as far as I know she tried everything including wondering if she had pressed the accelerator rather than the brake. when I arrived, the AA was already there, and the car was parked so we didn't check whether there was any braking action. The pedal, went right down and as I said the ABS system could be heard kicking in. The system can be turned off with a switch on the dash (car symbol with squiggly lines under it) and the same symbol comes up on right side of dash. However this did not change the reaction of the car to depressing the brake pedal - same noises.

 

[knoxie]

Our MK1 Leaf sort of did this once, foot on break, put it in to reverse and it jumped backwards without me lifting my foot off, I had to stand on the breaks to stop it moving then put in neutral, rebooted and it was fine, it did it twice over 2 years of ownership, the pedal came back up though and was OK so likely a different fault to yours but none the less quite scary, we soon forgot that though and we are on our second car.

 

[Edd Beesley]

Thanks for the feedback. I searched before I posted and didnt find the other thread. I wouldn't be at all surprised if I have to wait months for the repairs.
Regarding whether my wife depressed the pedal fully - as far as I know she tried everything including wondering if she had pressed the accelerator rather than the brake. when I arrived, the AA was already there, and the car was parked so we didn't check whether there was any braking action. The pedal, went right down and as I said the ABS system could be heard kicking in. The system can be turned off with a switch on the dash (car symbol with squiggly lines under it) and the same symbol comes up on right side of dash. However this did not change the reaction of the car to depressing the brake pedal - same noises.

That button turns off the traction control, not the ABS.

 

[tony1tf]

I'll keep you informed of progress. The car has been flat bedded to a local Nissan garage who can't let me have a Courtesy car till 27 April because there are so many Nissans in for repair. Here is a photo of my Leaf Spy fault code screen - the AA's system also showed 3 wheel sensors in error.

 

[chris jarvis]

very interesting and concerning thanks for sharing. This incident ought to be forwarded to the chief Engineer and head of Nissan Safety and Road worthiness at least the UK division for now. Please make them formally aware. so that they cannot plead "no body told them". They have a duty of care and need to investigate the fault and the potential cause. Obviously there is an error code but that isn't the cause. In terms of system safety engineering and failure modes it is a symptom or a hazard outcome of the incident not a cause. The error code was generated because something failed. On a safety critical systems such as breaks the systems are usually backed up by redundant systems or fail safe devices that slam the brakes on in an emergency (like pneumatic brakes loosing air int eh cylinder they slam on). To get a road worthy qualification certificate it has to be proved that a single point of failure cannot lead to a catastrophic outcome (Death). Res Ispa Loquitur, the evidence speaks for its self the brakes failed dangerously and this can happen to any of us now that its proved possible. I want a recall and a fail safe solution !!!!

 

[chris jarvis]

Nissan To Remedy LEAF Brake Issue Caused By Very Low Temperatures + High Humidity There is a recall how do I know my used leaf has had it?

 

[tony1tf]

Car picked up today from Sandicliffe Motors in Loughborough - we gave them a few extra days to fix it because we were on vacation. They kept me well informed with progress, and the large amount of work required to persuade Nissan to pay for the repairs under warranty. I have not got a full report yet, because there is still some approval going on of the Nissan warranty claim, and I am told it could be 28 days before I get the report. However I have been told that the brake servo unit was replaced at a cost of over £1000 for the unit with labour costs on top. They have given the car several test drives in cold and warm conditions and are happy that all is OK.
Leaf Spy now shows all error codes are cleared and I am happy that the brakes are now fine.

However, I have another problem, now - somewhere between me leaving the car for the AA to pick it up and take it to the garage and my collection today, the windscreen has developed a large curved crack:

No - that white line isn't a smear from the wipers, but a complete crack through the windscreen - you can feel the step. It definitely wasn't there when we last drove the car. I have in-car video of the AA picking up the car on the flatbed, and no damage seems to occur there, however, soon after taking in the car for servicing, the garage disconnected the in-car camera - watch this space - I will let you all know how this progresses.

 

[RoyOb]

How could they try to return car with cracked windscreen and think you will not notice it?

 

[Aceshigh]

How could they try to return car with cracked windscreen and think you will not notice it?

"That wasn't there when we parked it up after the service, you must have smashed it in the 5 seconds it took you to open the door and sit the car.

And anyway, we can't accept liability for damage to customers car's while on our premises. It says so on the sign... That small one right there... You can see it you squint and look behind those bushes..."

 

[neilev]

The may have had dash out and damaged it then

 

[Stead]

bloody hell that's madness, we had a customers car towed into our place with a smashed windscreen, we all saw it on the low loader, foolishly none of us asked to right it on the inspection kinda assuming it came in like that we don't really need to say no more.

customer picked up car, then came back next day angry as hell, we are a small independent and ended up changing the windscreen as we couldn't prove we hadn't done it, and annoyingly the CCTV angles didn't quite get it, saw the smash as it drove in but as it was dropped off out of clear view of CCTV we couldn't say we hadn't done it, even though you see the car unloading you couldn't see the windscreen of the car until it was turned around.

Weirdly they didn't complain when they picked up the car....

anyways my point is with what you've said and the dash cam should be easy to get them to sort it out, Maybe it was the same recovery driver that recovered a car to us and just enjoys smashing windscreens!

I would of thought a fancy Nissan dealer would have some decent quality CCTV they can show you to backup them not damaging it....

 

[James_leeds]

Just read your thread. Hope you get answers soon.

One question though: do people use the foot operated handbrake? I just press P as I would in an auto petrol car.

 

[tony1tf]

Just read your thread. Hope you get answers soon.

One question though: do people use the foot operated handbrake? I just press P as I would in an auto petrol car.

You can only use the "P" button when you are stationary - a very hard "pawl" or "dog-clutch" is engaged and the car rocks back and forth on it for a while. I dont know what is the max speed is at which you can engage "P" without damage, but it must be very low. On the series 1 Leaf there was an electrical button operated handbrake which was similar in action to the foot pedal except only one setting - no ratchet. I guess it was dropped for safety reasons, in case of electrical failure.

 

[Tony Hoyle]

I've got into the bad habit of switching off and not using 'P' since it seems to do it automatically anyway. Then handbrake (which I invariably forget to take off before driving off later and have the car beep at me..)

 

[Dave Algeo]

Weren't there a few cases where people didn't engage the foot / parking / handbrake and the car rolled when charge was lost? I always engage mine now, just in case.