While on the search for some engaging videos on ICE (Internal combustion engine) EV's I came across a company in New Zealand that had a video on upgrading an older, not so efficient, 24KW Nissan Leaf battery to a 40KW battery.
The original 24KW Leaf starts with 124 miles range when new. This range depends on how you drive, whether you use your heating and the outside temperature.
Now the Leaf is 7 years old, most batteries can be less than 80% of its original battery range (92 miles), less than this this deems the battery at the "end of life" however I'm sure some Leaf's have less than 50 miles range out there somewhere. Thankfully the Leaf has a battery health indicator to highlight the quality of the battery, useful when purchasing a used one out of warranty. Ideally you need 12 bars on the dash from what I have read and there is an app you can get called Leaf Spy that further helps, highlighting the health.
There are a number of ways to reduce the degrading of your EV battery, to maximise the life of them. For example, you should avoid keeping your batteries empty or full, ideally you should change your cars charger settings to limit charge to about 80% and don't let it fall below 20%. Lastly fast charging over 15 times in a row has been identified as reducing your batteries life, according to the University of California. If you stick to these ideals this should help keep your batteries in good health.
As the Nissan Leaf is essentially a lower cost and volume EV, the batteries aren't cooled like the ones out of a Tesla for example. Also the chemistry isn't as good. Although if I'm honest I don't know what that means yet 😉.
So these battery upgrades as you can imagine, are an exciting prospect for a veteran Nissan Leaf owner. The cost, however isn't cheap with a healthy used 40KW batteries going for £5000 that I have seen. On a positive note these battery upgrades change the original range of your leaf from 126 to 185 miles sometimes more. This puts the car in a similar range to a Golf e MK 7.5 2017-2020 (186 miles), cheapest Golf e 7.5 I found on Autotrader was £16,990 with 33000 miles on the clock. The Golf e Mk7 2014 -2017 has a range of 124 miles, cheapest on Autotrader right now £12,500 with 36000 miles.
I found a company in Cheltenham EV doing these Battery conversions for £8500 all in drive in then out with the upgrade. The chap that runs the place David who is very helpful and knowledgeable. I believe there are some more companies out there so please get in touch so I can highlight your services.
If you are nearer to Scotland thinking about range of transport try Electron Garage
In Northern Ireland you also have EV Breakers that also offer this service
I hope this was interesting and useful to you Chargeheads. If you have anything to add feel free.
A new video on the subject on this subject https://youtu.be/C4nS_tSQiVQ