Leaf for Dead?

Nissan Leaf's leaving drivers stranded with suddenly uncharged batteries. [Link]

Although the details in the complaints on the MyNissanLeaf forum differ, the common thread in each is the Leaf suddenly paring back the estimates of its range in the middle of a trip, ending in a brief "turtle" mode — marked by an orange turtle icon on the Leaf's dash — followed by the car shutting down to prevent battery damage.

The Leaf's software is supposed to give drivers gradual warnings as they discharge the 24 kWh battery pack, with several visual and verbal notices including a "—-" on the miles-to-empty indicator before the turtle icon switches on. But that wasn't the experience of a Leaf owner from San Diego last month, who was the first to report a shut-down:

"Went from 17 to —- to turtle to dead in about 5 miles. 2.3 miles from dealer. 4.2 miles from home. Part of me is amused that I may go down in history as the first dumbass to drive the car into submission. But I am slightly shaky and upset as I thought there should have been no problem getting home."

Another owner suffered a similar experience, leaving the Seattle airport last month for a 15-mile drive home with the Leaf reporting enough power for 26 miles:

Around downtown the range is down to 8 miles (still plenty to get home, which was by then 5 miles away). At the ship-canal bridge it went into turtle, I barely got off the freeway. 2 Mile from home and after about half the distance it told I would have from the airport, i.e. 13 actual miles driven, it went dead. I actually managed to drive 400 yards in turtle mode. 10:30 pm, wife and screaming kids in the car (which was blocking the right lane of a busy road), just came back from the east coast, cars zooming by and honking, several near misses.