If You Want Nissan Leaf or Chevy Volt/Bolt Check Out How The Battery Is Cooled

Does anyone know how Tesla Model S and Model 3 batteries are cooled?

They might introduce liquid cool in the future, but this should of been known before buying. We did not like the Bolt, to chunky and a want to be SUV with cheap interior...we research and knew this was a difference between the two cars, but most people don't buy the leaf car for distances of greater than 300 km....in winter passive cooling will work just fine...

Apparently Nissan is addressing the battery cooling issue in the 2019 leaf, which will include active cooling.

Honestly, active cooling isn't really needed unless you live in Arizona or Texas. I'm happy to pay less to not have it.

Tesla does the battery cooling the superior but more expensive way... It’s worth informing people about these differences if they’re unaware. But yeah - bottom line is you couldn’t buy a Leaf or an electric Smart4Two or other cars like them at the price points they’re at otherwise. If they’ll cover failing batteries under a decent warranty and they’re not as costly a battery as a huge Tesla battery (hint: they’re not)? It may not matter much. Pay for battery swaps if and when needed and you’ll still be better off cost-wise than having paid a lot more for the car.

How the batteries are cooled or heated is important to know, especially if you live in warmer climates. It definitely is not a point that Nissan mentioned in advertising, but most anyone who knows a Leaf owner has heard stories of the loss of range over time because the batteries are air cooled. Also range can be shortened by overcharging the batteries as well. I have two friends who owned Leafs, and the range was supposed to be 90-100 miles when new, but it was realistically around 72 miles. The difficulty for one of the friends was that his daily commute to work was 50 miles round trip, and depending on temp, speed, and load he was having a harder and harder time of making the 50 mi. round trip with any miles left over. Over 3 years of driving his real battery range went from 70 miles to 52 miles, and I believe that was because the batteries were air cooled.

I've had 3 Volts and so far none of them lost range over time. The Volt's batteries are similarly affected by temperature, speed, and load, but I averaged between 35 and 46 miles per charge (it was rated at 38 miles), and with all 3 Volts the maximum range remained the same as long as I had the cars, and I attribute the fact that there was no range degradation to the active cooling and heating of the batteries.

The Tesla, Volt, and Bolt all use liquid glycol for cooling, but the designs are different. The Tesla has a single cooling tube that snakes coolant through each battery. The Volt has coolant channels that run in plates that separate each battery, and the Bolt (like BMW's EV cooling design) uses bottom cooling plates beneath the batteries to manage the temperatures.

My friend whose Leaf could no longer make it to work and back has since bought a 2017 Volt, and interestingly the new Volt gets 58 miles of range, so he makes it to work and back without using gas. He has had the new Volt for a year now and he said that the range is unchanged.

While the main content of this article is true, some details were not included. First, many people charge at home, and will seldom if ever need to fast charge. That's an important bit if information that should have been included. My soul EV has air cooling, pushing cool air from the AC through the battery. It also scavenges heat in the winter and uses that to warm the battery pack. This system works great for most people in temperate climates. So, to make this article more complete, this extra info should be included.

I have the LEAF Gen1. I'm North American and, yes, I think about 'range' limitations' while knowing, full well, I've basically bought the perfect 'Town Car'. I'm not kidding myself... It's challenging (can be fun) to think other than 'town car'. (I repeat: 'Hey Stupid.. It's a TOWN CAR'). Get it?

Nissan (& most buyers) are more interested in lease pricing, so the battery is designed to last 3 years.

"The highest mileage Chevy Volt today has passed more than 460,000 miles and there's very little degradation of the batteries, thanks to a well engineered thermal management system," Real says in the discussion."

Chevy Volts don't have a fast charge capability, this statement is asinine in the context of discussion.

The lack of thermal battery manager is what led me to pass on a Leaf and get a used BMW i3.

This article is full of factual errors. Few EV owners know the range of their vehicles - you don't necessarily start a trip at 100% charge nor do you end at 0%. And conditions vary. The Bolt would not exist without the Leaf. They are, until 2019 at least, apples and oranges. When we compared the Bolt to the Leaf (2017), the lease price on a Leaf was 1/3 that of a Bolt! Plus every Chevy dealer had no DCFC and broken level 2 stations. So sad to see Bolt drivers struggling to charge their cars at stations in CA paid for by Japanese gov't that charge at 36kW/hr because Chevy did not build infrastructure to support their parasitic cars. We regularly drive our inferior Leaf 200-250 miles/day in 105 degree heat with 3-4 DCFC stops. No battery degradation thus far according to Nissan; yes it has turtled to limit output but we still can go 65 under those conditions. Battery will cool rapidly while you break for dinner or even while driving at night. At 11 battery temp bars (out of 12), car will still charge at 30kW/hr. Others report 600 mile trips in one day in summer heat. I would like to see actual sources regarding long-term battery disposition before being convinced. Is Tesla the only responsible electric car maker?

My son is on his second leaf - the first was a 2013
lease - he turned it in at 36 months- second he purchased used. is now 5 years old and just about to the third lost bar. To maintain battery life he no longer fully discharges nor fully charges his leaf other than if it is absolutely needed. The leaf is only used minimally during the week taking kids to school etc. and he keeps it at about 50% charge and almost never lets it get to 100% charge unless he is going to drive it immediately. (and he NEVER fast charges it) He has level one and level two chargers in garage the max being a 6.6 KW.
He also has an e Fiat that is used by his wife as her daily driver she drives 51 miles each way and is able to charge at work. She charges at work with a level one until about 2pm them switches to a level 2 till 5pm - is timed so that it is driven almost immediately after the full charge is achieved.They do something similar in the evening - but she leaves for work with each am with about an 80% charge.She is able to do this as she does not use ac in the am plus drive to work has a drop in elevation.The Fiat is now at about 70
% capacity. He bought both of these e cars for around $8000 to $9000 dollars and pretty much driving them for close to free as he charges at around 6 cents per KW.
He still loves the leaf and tells me he will buy a replacement battery when battery will no longer support their needs.
After seeing his experience with the leafs I purchased a 2015 chevy volt new in Oct of 2015. I now have 35000 miles on it with no noticeable battery range loss. Love the car , I have had one program fix (in 3 1/2 year) by the dealer as car would not charge Now have received a recall notice re. battery voltage issue where car may shut down if a cell voltage drops too low. Have yet to have that done. I have a level one and a level 2 (3.2KW) charger in garage - went for one year using level one but now with level 2 have stopped using the level 1.
All in all a learning experience for both of us.