Battery degredation

[MrDRMorgan]

Just wanted to share my battery degradation experience. I purchased my 2016 Spark EV In October of 2019 with around 23k miles and the initial reading was 15.47kwh. Now at 28k miles the latest reading was 14.40kwh just a few days ago. I’ve tried my best to baby the battery and I’ve only fast charged once but who knows what the previous two owners have done.

I have a 2016 Spark EV 2LT that I purchased used with 6500 miles on the ODO. At 23k miles on the ODO my TorquePro battery capacity measurement was 15.7 kWh. At 28k miles it was 14.6 kWh and recently, at 30k miles, it measured 14.3 kWh.

On May 15, 2020 and at 30,332 miles on the ODO, the battery capacity measured 14.3 kWh with my most recent driving consumption being 6.3 mi/kWh. My current full-charge GOM reading is 90 miles. For the last 20k miles (almost 2 years), my mi/Kwh average has been 6.02 with a minimum of 5.03 and a maximum of 6.71. I anticipate crossing the battery degradation warranty point in about 2 years when the ODO reaches 60k miles.

 

[CSW]

I have a 2016 Spark with 43k miles on it as of yesterday. I am not happy with the battery degradation......

I drove it yesterday until I had 1 mile of range left, the energy usage screen said I had used 13.2 KWh of energy at 99% usage.

So that means my battery capacity is now only 13.2 KWh !!!

WEAK!

Original capacity was states as 19 kWh.

SO has lost basically 6 KWh in 4 years??!!

At this rate, the battery will be ready to be replaced under warranty (maybe. hopefully, wishful thinking) in less than a year with
about SIX years AND 55 thousand miles left on the battery warranty.

Plus, soon I will not even be able to make my 50 mile round-trip commute on one charge! weeeeeak.

Plus plus, I just bought this spark a few months ago off its lease.

Did I make the wrong decision?!!?

I like my Spark, but this is very disappointing.

 

[TheLondonBroiler]

soon I will not even be able to make my 50 mile round-trip commute on one charge! weeeeeak.

Did I make the wrong decision?!!?

I like my Spark, but this is very disappointing.

I know the feeling all too well. With a 62 mile commute and fast chargers being taken offline in my area, the Spark didn't work for my driving anymore. I bought a Bolt (which I understand isn't feasible for everyone), and I don't worry about range anywhere near as often.

Only you can decide if you made the wrong decision. Personally, if I could do it again, I would have bought a Volt or just waited.

 

[MrDRMorgan]

I have a 2016 Spark with 43k miles on it as of yesterday. I am not happy with the battery degradation......

I drove it yesterday until I had 1 mile of range left, the energy usage screen said I had used 13.2 KWh of energy at 99% usage.

So that means my battery capacity is now only 13.2 KWh !!!

WEAK!

Original capacity was states as 19 kWh.

SO has lost basically 6 KWh in 4 years??!!

At this rate, the battery will be ready to be replaced under warranty (maybe. hopefully, wishful thinking) in less than a year with
about SIX years AND 55 thousand miles left on the battery warranty.

Plus, soon I will not even be able to make my 50 mile round-trip commute on one charge! weeeeeak.

Plus plus, I just bought this spark a few months ago off its lease.

Did I make the wrong decision?!!?

I like my Spark, but this is very disappointing.

This does not surprise me at all. I also have a 2016 Spark EV which currently has 30512 miles on it and a TorquePro measured battery capacity of 14.3 KWh as of 30 May 2020. My data shows I am losing 1.0 KWh every 7600 miles. But.... my average mi/KWh is currently running > 6.0 since February. I do not know why. My GOM read 93 miles after the last full charge on May 30.

Normally, I charge at home using a 3.3 KWh L2 EVSE. On the road I am not too concerned about battery degradation as long as I have "working" DCFC stations along my routes of travel. As an example, on Fridays, I usually have to drive from my my home in Manteca, CA to Oakland and back. This is a 135 mile round trip. I have access to a number of working DCFC locations along my route so I really do not give much thought to getting stranded. However, to be sure, there are many destinations that are one or more DCFC stations too far.

Right now I estimate I will hit the warranty replacement point at 60,000 miles.

 

[CSW]

Welp, I am committed to the spark now..... for better or worse as it is said.

If I can get my place of employ to install a 120v outlet for me to use, I will be golden as I drive
25 miles each way...... and stuck there 8+ hours a day, so even 4 miles an hour of range be great.

but that like a big deal to them, prob cost $100 bucks and I would pay them $200.....

It sure will be interesting to see how Chevy handles the warranty claims once they start coming in.......

I hope they want to avoid a whole LOT of negative reports of then NOT covering their battery warranties.....
would scare off a lot of people from buying EVs in general in the future.
--------
As a side note, our other car is a 2018 Volt..... 40k miles on it, no battery degradation so far it seems......
(12k miles on gas, 28k miles on EV motor)......

I find spark more fun to drive than Volt, but Volt is a lot more luxurious feeling over spark.

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

a little background, i purchased my used June 2016 built Spark EV mid-March of 2019, so it was less than 3 years old then, as a lease return from the same dealer with 46K miles. my reasoning was to buy as fresh a HV battery as i could , regardless of miles on the clock. currently it has 54K miles. i've used a 400V charger twice during all this time and mostly get my juice from 120V at home with only a few 240V charges sprinkled in between. i never let the charge get too low, but when i charge it's always to 100%. GOM range used to show around 100 miles at full charge, this was mostly throughout 2019. since about the beginning of 2020 my GOM range started showing 80 miles when fully charged, quite a drop and i'm not sure why.

is it possible to calculate HV battery capacity without using any tools such as TorquePro, etc.? if so, please explain how one would do so. thank you

 

[TheLondonBroiler]

is it possible to calculate HV battery capacity without using any tools such as TorquePro, etc.? if so, please explain how one would do so. thank you

If you charge to 100% and drive until the energy usage screen says you've consumed 50%, look at energy used (kwh) and multiply by 2. That should be pretty close to the actual figure. Some on the forum say you should do this driving with as little regen possible (ie driving on a clear interstate), and I tend to agree.

 

[MrDRMorgan]

is it possible to calculate HV battery capacity without using any tools such as TorquePro, etc.? if so, please explain how one would do so. thank you

If you charge to 100% and drive until the energy usage screen says you've consumed 50%, look at energy used (kwh) and multiply by 2. That should be pretty close to the actual figure. Some on the forum say you should do this driving with as little regen possible (ie driving on a clear interstate), and I tend to agree.

Also, try to maintain a constant speed and avoid headwinds or tailwinds.

 

[CSW]

The GOM is not a good way to figure battery capacity, it can vary widely.

I would follow the advice of driving till 1/2 empty and check.

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

thank you, that makes sense since to get a somewhat accurate calculation you don't want to reduce the kwh used by using regen or get a "push" from tail wind or a "push-back" from a head wind, etc, just discharge the battery with little to no external forces applied. i'm also assuming that getting an occasional push from your significant other won't help the estimate either

i'll give it a try and post the result.

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

this may be a dumb question but where is the energy usage screen that will tell me i've consumed 50%, is it the screen with the horizontal battery with the green bands? thank you

 

[NORTON]

Press that 'Leaf' button on the far right.
That screen has 3 sub-screens.

You don't have to nail 50%.
It's just using more than 50% makes for more accurate battery capacity data gathering.
Then do the math with '% used' and' kWh used'.
Keep a record of multiple readings. They vary a bit.

 

[TheLondonBroiler]

this may be a dumb question but where is the energy usage screen that will tell me i've consumed 50%, is it the screen with the horizontal battery with the green bands? thank you

 

[MrDRMorgan]

this may be a dumb question but where is the energy usage screen that will tell me i've consumed 50%, is it the screen with the horizontal battery with the green bands? thank you

Turn on the car's power and press the button with a LEAF on it. The LEAF button is located to the right of the fan speed dial below the center display on the dash.

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

looks like i'm getting a calculated HV battery capacity of 15.68 kWh so far, 5.8 kWh/37%. i will post another calculation as i drive more than 50% on this charge...

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

one thing i just realized, with 92F outside, shouldn't i see some energy go towards battery conditioning? thank you

 

[TheLondonBroiler]

one thing i just realized, with 92F outside, shouldn't i see some energy go towards battery conditioning? thank you

I'm probably opening up a different can of worms, but it depends on a bunch of conditions.

The Spark battery "doesn't like" being ~86°F or above. Since batteries are dense, they are slow to change temperatures with ambient temperature. If you leave the Spark outside in the shade, the battery temperature will likely hover around the days average temperature (ex daily temperature high is 90°F, overnight is a low of 70°F, it's likely the battery will be 80°F +/- a few degrees). Drawing a lot of power, adding a lot of power (highway driving or fast charging being those scenarios), or leaving the Spark out in the sun on a hot day, are going to up the battery temp and therefore likely lead to use energy to cool the battery or otherwise said, "Battery Conditioning."

Owners in a cold climate might be a better source for battery temps that induce battery heating, but if memory serves me correct, the battery doesn't want to be any colder than 55°F and will start heating at around that temp or below (that's what it is in my Bolt too, however the Bolt pack will tolerate high temps up to 100°F, different chemistries).

Hope that explanation was of some use.

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

perhaps even if the temp outside is in the 90's it doesn't mean the overall HV battery temp is such and conditioning is not warranted. i'm just trying to figure out if i have an issue with my battery conditioning system. just so you know, this reading was taken after a short trip to the grocery store where i left the car parked in the mid-day sun for about 15-20 minutes and then came home into a much cooler garage taking this reading immediately upon driving the car in. perhaps the battery just didn't have enough time to heat up for the conditioning system to kick in...

 

[NORTON]

one thing i just realized, with 92F outside, shouldn't i see some energy go towards battery conditioning? thank you

Another thing that might be happening is if the battery was charged at that temp, it was being cooled while plugged in and charging.
And then your 28% worth of driving might not warm it up enough to a display separate 'BC' number.

But, most likely, it may be that if you are running the AC for the cabin, the 'freon to battery coolant' heat exchanger is also always cold and the battery coolant could be flowing through it without generating a separate BC number. The coolant pump determines the flow rate needed to keep the battery happy.
Since the AC compressor is running it may be hard to quantify how much of the energy the BC loop consumed.

I'm not sure if I ever saw a BC number in the summer when I had the AC on.
I'm sure I get separate 'Climate Setting' and BC numbers in the winter when I haven't had the car plugged in for a while and it's colder than a w...
But in that case there is a separate coolant heater for the cabin and the BC loop.

edit: Another example of this is after doing a DCFC when the AC system was cooling the pack big time even though it was in the 70's when I drove off in the car with the windows open and just a little fan running I felt cooled air coming from the vents for quite a while after leaving the DCFC unit.
I don't remember if it displayed a BC number that time.

So, Old Mold, what you need to do is take one for the team and drive it in really hot conditions without the cabin AC and see if you get a BC number by itself!! :lol:
I'd do it ,,, but I'm not that into it..... :roll:

 

[MoldyWalnuts]

you may have a point there as i always see that the A/C is on after i come to unplug the charger after a night of charging. i've mentioned this before in one of my posts here. this would certainly explain why i don't see any BC energy used, and yes i was driving with cabin A/C on all the time yesterday. as for taking one on the chin for the gang, i may just do that right now as i head out for another short run to the store, etc. i'll post it here shortly. thank you, you've put my mind at ease, somewhat :lol: