If they put a Mr. Fusion on the back of that bad boy I would buy one, lol

 

1.21 Jiggawatts of power baby yeaaah!!!

 

Blitzkrieg I hear what you are saying and I just wanted to share facts on some of the things that you mentioned.

First of EVs have been around for over a decade, so Leaf is far from being first in this, actually it's a first mass produced electric car and available to the public. You probably heard about EV1, then there was Rav4 and Ford Ranger and bunch of others. Most of them went over 100k miles on original pack and you can read up plenty of information on their battery pack degradation. Here is one for Rav4 at 100k: http://www.evchargernews.com/miscfil...av4ev-100k.pdf These are not the same batteries that you see in the laptops that you throw away after a year or so that are polluting the environment. Yes, they'll need recycling at some point, but they are built so they would last for a long time.

Now, lets make one thing clear... Leaf is not Versa, the tests were done in Versa and it may appear they are the same being similar size and form factor, but they are essentially two different cars. The price of Versa also ranges from 10k-18k + tax, so if for $14k you are ok without automatic transmission, traction control, cruise control, keyless entry and not to mention not even an option for navigation or HID/LED lights then go for it. Most importantly Versa performance is nowhere near Leaf's which has 207 pounds of instant torque essentially making the off the line performance on par with v6 Outlander as I mentioned in my initial post. One other point is that Leaf earned all 5 star crash ratings while Versa did not. I drove Versa on a few occasions and I would die in boredom if I had to drive it daily and it's not really as efficient as some other econoboxes.

Lets put price in perspective. It's difficult to compare Leaf to other cars, it's classified as mid size, but has compact look, yet it has plenty of luxury features and performance is on par with v6 cars. The only car it would be close in every aspect is $28k Lexus CT200 minus the leather, but lets make things more realistic and say Leaf is equivalent to $20K (+ tax) car. I paid $26300 for it after the incentives + free charging station. This was OTD price because 10% tax doesn't apply to electrics in our state. So the difference after tax is really $4300. It would take about 2-3 years to break even on the price by staying gas free. Depreciation? I don't think you looked at resale value of our Mitsubishi's. It's one of the worst. I shocked myself by looking at KBB value of my XLS after 4 years with 35k miles it's worth less then half of what I paid. So even if Leaf does worse say 60% loss after 4 years it will be the same amount as Outlander. Seriously, I am not worried about it because I personally don't want to make a habit of car changes every 4 years.

Incentives existed for many various things, including hybrids, home first buyer, cash for clunkers, I was always neutral about them even though they didn't apply to me, but I am definitely glad there is one for EV because otherwise I wouldn't have purchased one.

Limited range? How many miles do you drive per day? Below is a picture from someone hitting 10k after only 6 month (that's 55 miles per day on average), cost of eGas was $340. I am driving on average 25 miles so range has not been an issue. If I had to drive more than what Leaf capable per day I would consider moving closer to work before anything else. I do take longer trips once in a while and that's where Outlander comes very handy.

 

The EPA just released the MPGe (Miles Per Gallon Equivalency) for the new Mitsubishi iMiev. It beat both the Volt and Leaf. The Mitsu gets 126 MPGe City and 99 MPGe Highway.

The Leaf gets 106 MPGe City and 92 MPGe Highway.

You get all that for $5,000 less than a Leaf. Should have waited.

http://electric-vehicles-cars-bikes....etter-epa.html

 

This is part of why your electric car is such a bad idea, and destined to fail (at current technology). Because you REQUIRE another gas guzzler to meet all your needs. So, basically, you just put a great big carbon footprint on mother natures *** because you bought ANOTHER car to meet specific niche desires when you're EXISTING car met all those needs already.

See the irony here yet?

 

bender031177, I see that you purchased 30k XLS, so I have to ask you why didn't you buy Subaru Impreza that's $10k less. It has AWD just like XLS and better gas mileage. Should've done research... Seriously, we don't buy cars just because it has one function, we buy because we have to like a lot of things in it and Miev is a less of car then Leaf in many ways (size, comfort, looks, luxury features) and it wasn't even consideration. Why do people buy Lexus when they could have saved half the price and buy a Toyota?

codetrap, I am going to assume here that you take carbon footprint very seriously, so have you considered to rely on public transportation or maybe ride a bicycle and not buy gas gazzling cars like Outlander (if that's what you have). In my case, I am not claiming here that carbon footprint is important to me and my household has to rely on 2 cars for daily driving and you can't get efficiency and function out of one car type today. That might change in a few years down the road with plugins such as Outlander sport.

http://green.autoblog.com/2011/07/11...o-u-s-in-2013/

 

Klas, I'm not terribly concerned about carbon footprint. However I do believe in being realistic and responsible. I own a 2011 Outlander SAWC, up from my Jetta Wagon TDI. The Outlander met all my requirements, so I bought it. I also have an FJR1300 and a Suzuki S40. I usually commute on my motorcycle, as it's FAR cheaper to run, and parking is less than transit. I used to ride my bike, but since I got bad hip arthritis, I simply can't do the 44k round trip on my mtn bike anymore. At least not till I get a new hip.

What bothers me about cars like the leaf, is they're totally impracticable. They're not responsible. They have a very short range, and a very long charging time. They're not truly environmentally friendly either as the environmental cost of production is horrible, FAR outweighing the cost of producing my Outlander. Read up on the carbon debt at time of delivery. Read up on how foamed lithium ion batteries are produced. Top it off with the almost universal REQUIREMENT to own a SECOND vehicle in order to do anything BUT commute, and it makes the Nissan Leaf totally environmentally iresponsible. There is simply NO NEED for it, yet people are still going out and buying this "toy", because that's all it is, so they can essentially buy "moral credit" and call themselves environmental. The truth is, they would have been FAR more environmentally friendly had they NEVER bought the Leaf at all in the first place, and just kept their original vehicle and used that.

Top it all off with the fact it's poor performance, unreliable distances, and general uselessness, then yes, I'm totally against them. The environments where they actually become practical, like San Diego, or LA, are the same environments where you'd be far more environmentally friendly to buy a scooter.

http://www.autoweek.com/article/2011...REEN/110329945

 

codetrap, you say that you are not terrible concerned about footprint yet you bring it again in your post. Are you sure, you are not in denial?

Also, I am not sure if you are reading what I was saying, especially in my last post about its impressive performance and range needs. Maybe you have different lifestyle where you drive 200 miles daily and tow a boat, then i could understand your point... And I could agree with you that Leaf is impractical and useless for you. However, not everyone can afford the luxury of driving so much daily and towing a boat. Frankly, I see Outlander more of a toy now where I would need it to go skiing or camping hence it gets driven less miles. Its size, AWD and inefficiency has no need in my 5 day work commute. Sitting in a traffic in Outlander is not a pleasurable experience for me. Space is not an issue either, it's even cheaper for me to drive to Costco 2x times to carry 14000 BTU A/C and 55" LCD then trying to cram both in Outlander in one trip, although both would fit in Leaf as well:

 

Nice TV. No boat. Do have a tent trailer though. Hoping to get the air bags I ordered for the springs this week so I can take the family out to the mountains this weekend. I'm sorry you don't like your Outlander anymore. I find mine quite comfortable to sit in traffic with, though I don't do it often as parking a car downtown is about $35/day. Where my bike is $5. Transit works out to $5.20. Close enough that I'd prefer to ride the bike.

I think you're still missing the point though. Almost every single person that claims they bought a Leaf to be environmentally responsible, isn't. All they're trying to buy is moral capital. That's what I object to. The constant harping I read about where "we should all buy EV's because they're all so great and wonderful and they'll save the bunnies and butterflies for our children's children and see how great I am because I bought one and I love it so much and by implication you're a dirty polluter because you don't buy one". When the reality is so far different when one applies critical thinking to the subject. But, the tree hugging hippie wannabies never really think of the total package.. all they see is "bright shiny technology EV car is going to save the world" while they destroy it in the process.

Here is part of what is required to produce that pretty Leaf.. the part they don't really like you to see, Sudbury, Ont.