
Nissan Leaf 2.Zero
I bought myself a new car this year and after two years of looking at electric cars, I’ve finally bought one! As of Tuesday, I now own a Nissan Leaf 2.Zero in black.



Why did I buy an electric car?
I’m a fan of green tech, so at some point I had to put my money where my mouth was and purchase a car that was significantly cleaner than my petrol car. My previous car was 10 years old and the brakes aren’t quite what they used to be… so I was contemplating fixing the vehicle or passing it on to family and getting a new one.
My commute to work is 40 miles each way and it costs me about £50 a week to run my petrol car. At work, we have free charging points (enough for 8 cars and increasing) – so the temptation to save some money on fuel finally got too great. Plus the new leaf that came out early this year had enough range for me charge the car to 100% at work, then drive home and back to work, using works free charger again 🙂
So what’s it like?
Well like I said above, I’ve only had it since Tuesday, but at first it was really odd… My previous KIA cee’d, I could feel the road through the steering weel and pedals – I almost felt connected to the road. This new car is “fly by wire” as in, the steering wheel isn’t connected directly to the wheels, so there’s no feeling in the steering wheel or pedals. The first day I took it to work, I must admit it made me quite anxious. Luckily I spoke to someone who told me this was quite natural to feel anxious and that it’d take time, but I’d get over it! The second day I took it to work was a lot better – I’d taken the drive assist off (that helped a lot!) and it just felt more natural.
Teething problems
The first day I took it to work the tyre pressure warning came on half way to work and then on the way back. Not sure if it’s a faulty sensor, but it didn’t reappear on Thursday… This weekend I’ll take it to the petrol station (haha) to check the tyre pressures.
Nissan EV Connect – can’t get it to work at all… Reading the http://www.speakev.com/ forum, it requires a TCU reset because the car has a greyed out car icon with a red cross through it. So if you’ve bought this car and see this (below in the red box)… you’ll have to go back to a dealer to get it fixed.

I got in the back of the car on Wednesday at work, closed the door and then found that both doors had the child-lock on!! Haha!
The Handbrake is nifty. During the test drive, Derek (sales guy from Cambridge) mentioned that it was possible to put the handbrake on and then drive off with it on. This does work and is one of the reasons I decided to purchase the car, but the manual says not to do it… He’s hopefully going to find out for me why the manual says you shouldn’t do it.
Things I’ve found out
Don’t put the handbrake on if the car is moving (even at 5mph which is the speed I tested it at)!! It makes a hell of a noise!
I can drive from work to home doing 70mph (where possible) with the heater set to 23.5C and back again to work and still have 50 miles on the guess-o-meter (GOM)! Cool!

(Picture above shows battery percentage after the test run)
The blind spot warning is really useful!
What’s next?
Other than that – just keep driving it as much as possible to find out all the new features and get used to the ride.
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