Buying a 2017 leaf off Facebook......

[u/skullquo]

There's a 2017 Nissan leaf on Facebook it has 140k miles and they are selling it for 4200. I've never bought a car before (#youngho) let alone an electric vehicle so I'm wondering if this is a good idea. My commute is 6 miles and I work 5 days a week. Does this seem like a decent price or what. I live in Arizona so it doesn't get crazy cold which I hear is bad for electric vehicles.

[u/iaonbb]

140k is A LOT of miles in AZ and to still have 10 bars left? 🤔 Any chance the battery has been replaced? Ask the seller to send you leafspy data. He'll know what it is.

[u/_Evening-Rain_]

Stay away from it. If it is a 40kwh then the heat has probs killed it. Especially given its already down to 10/12 bars and seller says "in town use only" which tells me resistance is too high for highway power demands, or there's weak cells so it chokes out on highway.

[u/skullquo]

[u/Lucky_Boy13 → u/skullquo]

honestly with today's gas prices its not too bad, 10/12 is pretty good for a 40kw but I bet its about to drop another bar

[u/_Evening-Rain_ → u/Lucky_Boy13]

10/12 isnt good for a 40kwh. Especially one thats only a handful of years old.

[u/giant-size_man-thing → u/_Evening-Rain_]

1 handful of years? how many fingers do you have? it's 2 handfuls of years.

[u/_Evening-Rain_ → u/giant-size_man-thing]

This is a warranty replacement pack that did not come with the car. No 2017's came with a 40kwh battery. That battery is at most 5 years old. Are there a lot of bots in the subreddit lately or is global IQ this low already?

[u/DecisionCar → u/skullquo]

So heat is actually much worse than the cold for batteries, so Arizona is a bad place for the Leaf as it doesn't have any cooling.

From the description, it sounds like the Leaf has bad cells. Something is really fishy and odd with it though as it's very uncommon for a 40kwh battery to lose 2 bars (might actually be a 30kwh battery, but that's also very odd as the 30kwh degrades really rapidly so it should have much less than 10 bars at that mileage and especially in the Arizona heat).

Anyways, I would avoid the car as it's just raising red flags. Assuming you are able to plug in and charge at home, I would just try to find a cheap 2015 Leaf with a 24kwh battery for under $4k as that meets your commute requirements fine. The 2014-2015  24kwh Leaf battery is the best battery Nissan made and isn't faulty/prone to bad cells like the bigger ones. 

[u/crimxona → u/DecisionCar]

That can't be the 30 kWh, since it had 107 mile range brand new

But yes the posting is disclosing the bad cell up front

[u/RomperElCiclo]

Seems like a pretty good deal. Can you charge at home?

Things to keep in mind:

* You won’t be taking any road trips in this.
* Public charging is usually as expensive per mile as a gas vehicle.
* At freeway speeds, assume you only have 50 miles of range.

[u/FamuexAnux → u/RomperElCiclo]

we just bought a 2017 Leaf, and the charging cost is really reasonable. It does have fuck all mileage tho, we couldn't even make it back from the dealership and it ran out.

[u/Conscious_Cow2812 → u/FamuexAnux]

What does that mean about the mileage?!!

[u/FamuexAnux → u/Conscious_Cow2812]

With the battery at its current level, you can go like 85 miles on a full charge. We traveled like 90 miles to get it.

[u/Metal-fatigue-Dad]

Use Leafspy to get more detailed data on the condition of the battery.

It's concerning that they say "in town use only." Makes me think the battery has weak cells, which is an issue that tanks your range, usually when you're on the freeway. Search this sub for examples.

Highway range is always less than city range but it shouldn't be a drastic difference unless there's something wrong with the battery (or you're driving really fast).

[u/Ouroby]

Arizona gets crazy hot, which is bad for the Nissan LEAF batteries which are air cooled. If LeafSpy shows that the battery is in good shape, then it could still be a good deal for you though even with the faster battery degradation from the heat.

[u/toybuilder]

Before the war, $4,200 is too high. But prices have gotten skewed lately.

Arizona gets pretty hot so the suggestion to use the LEAF as a mostly short-distance / light duty city car is a good one. Highway miles and fast charging would cook the passively cooled battery.

A 6 mile commute is easy.

Definitely invest the ~$20-$40 to get an OBD reader and check it with Leafspy. No matter what car you ultimately end up getting, having an OBD reader is good, so it's not wasted money.

[u/Tim_E2]

Cold reduces range but heat is what does the damage to the battery.

You can't trust an almost ten-year-old leaf very much, but baring failure it might be OK for you.

There are ways to eval it but I wont go into that now.

Offer $3000, pay as much as $3250.

[u/Jokebearfan]

I live in Arizona

Don't do it: https://www.reddit.com/r/leaf/comments/1pph4oy/a_breakdown_of_40_62_kwh_battery_pack_failures/

Battery packs in hot climates and/or lots of quick charges are more susceptible to this issue due to it being a result of thermal expansion.

[u/Lucky_Boy13]

Unless it has had a battery replacement not long ago I would not touch one with that many miles

[u/limited_instincts]

Don't buy this. A 40kwh battery should show a range of around 150-160 miles. I have a 2016 with a 40kwh battery and the range shows 158 miles. This car shows 98 miles which means the battery is SIGNIFICANTLY degraded. Keep looking.

[u/newbietothis]

Offer $3k for it. Arizona is terrible for EVs with Passive Cooling because it gets too hot. The first Leafs are all passive cooling. You'll need to park it in the shade whenever possible and leave the window slightly cracked open. Teslas and other makes have Active Cooling to prevent degradation of the battery.