[Roger Bamforth]

I've just got LeafSpy and have charged the car up to 100% as indicated on the dashboard and LeafSpy is telling me it's 266 GIDs (94.7%). Is that normal, it seems low to me?

The car is a Mk2 Acenta and is only 3 months old and has done 1300 miles.

 

[Paul_Moxhay]

This is notoriously difficult to be definitive about. The battery capacity varies with temperature a fair bit so just because your battery is only getting 266 GIDS at 100% that in itself may not indicate a problem.

A brand new battery should show 281-284 GIDS but that is at 15-20degC not in cold temps. I would expect it to take less charge if the ambient temperature was much below 15 degs which it has been overnight recently.

Given the temps we have overnight at the moment it might be normal.

Before I got worried I would charge it at 15degC and see what you get. Today might be a good day for it but wait until this afternoon so the battery can warm up a bit.

 

[Roger Bamforth]

That's interesting. My wife has just come home with the Leaf so I've plugged it in and we'll see what happens. Although the car's temp. gauge says the external temp. is 13° so maybe I'll have to wait until later in the Spring to get a definitive answer.

What would I do if this is a true reading anyway? I suspect that "Hey Nissan, give me a new battery it's only charging to 100% and has 12 bars" isn't going to get very far.

Also, I have a much bigger problem with the Leaf to worry about at the moment.

 

[h8ten]

Is that just a blue lacquer over the chrome badge and it's flaking?

 

[Roger Bamforth]

Yes, that's exactly what's happening. It's three months old.

 

[Paul]

Seen that a few times around the internet, should be a straight swap warranty job.

 

[Roger Bamforth]

Seen that a few times around the internet, should be a straight swap warranty job.

Yes indeed, I'm sure there'll be no problem getting it replaced when I get round to it. I had a little chat about it with @evmeerkat on Twitter when he tweeted a photo of his badge, which was somewhat worse than mine.

 

[Roger Bamforth]

Anyway, back to the plot. 266 GIDs at 100% charge again. This time I remembered that LeafSpy also tells me the battery temp. it was 11° when I looked first thing this morning, although I've no idea what it was when charging yesterday evening.

I'll wait for some warmer weather before looking at this again. I'm also wishing I'd waited until today to charge up, our solar panels are outputting 1.9kW at the moment. I really should keep an eye on the weather forecast more.

 

[Roger Bamforth]

Panic over .

Firstly, despite all the warmer weather we've been having the battery temp. hasn't got over 11-12°. However, we went to Cambridge on Saturday (45 miles each way) and that trip warmed the battery up. I was starting to think the low-ish full charge reading wasn't temperature related as the battery temperature was 19° when we charged up at the Cambridge Park and Ride and it still charged to 266 GIDs. However, after driving home, we charged again overnight with the battery temp still at 18° and this time it charged to 283 GIDs. So I don't really think there's a problem at all.

Incidentally, on the first page of LeafSpy (the voltage for each of the 96 cells) the display for all but two of the cells has now turned red instead of blue. I gather this something to do with "shunting" but don't understand what this is. Does anyone know where I can find an explanation. Thanks.

 

[snfosberry]

Remember who the SoC gauge and the DTE gauge work for...! Nissan.

It's pretty clear both portray their own version of the truth, and I'm fairly convince that the first has been coded to always show 100% result when the charge cycle stops (regardless of actual kwh in the pack) and the other will show 12 bars of health for as long as possible, until there is obviously some serious range loss.

How full were you when you started charge for the 266G?

Mine really likes to be empty.

 

[Paul_Moxhay]

Incidentally, on the first page of LeafSpy (the voltage for each of the 96 cells) the display for all but two of the cells has now turned red instead of blue. I gather this something to do with "shunting" but don't understand what this is. Does anyone know where I can find an explanation. Thanks.

The way I understand it is that a shunt is a resistance across a cell to provide a load. The Battery Management System (BMS) controls the shunts as a means to balance the voltages between the cells in the pack. How and when they are switched on and off is complex and controlled by the BMS.

I have yet to find any reason why we might be interested in when the shunts are on or off and so I just ignore the red/blue colours. If anyone can tell me what use that info might be then I am all ears.

 

[Roger Bamforth]

Thanks Paul, you're right, I don't think I need to know any more than that.