Nissan drops app support for the original Leaf | Hacker News Reader

Nissan drops app support for the original Leaf

techradar.com

24 pointsoidar28 comments

I think this is pointing the finger in the wrong direction. Data infrastructure is infrastructure, and you can't build out infrastructure without some kind of plan for migration. All these entities (cars aren't remotely the only ones affected by this kind of obsolescence) built long-lived devices and deployed them on a network that "We All Assumed" would be supported in perpetuity, just like electricity.

But it's not. And as the death of 2G approached we all watched in apathy, when Someone Somewhere should have been coming up with a plan for how to upgrade or sustain 2G devices in the field.

Nissan should have been party to that decision, but it wasn't their problem alone.

This is not a technical limitation. Nissan upgraded the modems in their cars in 2016 when AT&T switched off 2G in America. Now the cars are old they are choosing not to do the upgrade in the UK.

https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1102612_nissan-leaf-con...

They didn't upgrade the modems in the old 2014 leafs, I was able to purchase the 3G upgrade, but then a year later they discontinued service anyway.

A pricey field upgrade makes sense in 2016, when EVs were seen as a niche & risky proposition. I can see why they're not bothering now.

It seems like this isn't new? It happened in the US, on Jan 1, 2023.

My car, a 2015 Hyundai, has been without app support since the beginning of 2023. Some vehicles effected were only 4 years old at the time, being manufactured with 3G radios as recently as 2019.

I've been without this service for over 2 years now since I haven't deemed it necessary to be connected to my car, but in no way has my car felt like it was "e-waste."

Maybe because it's associated with an EV, it's suddenly more hard hitting than when it occured to ICE vehicles?

Hyundai end of service announcement: https://owners.hyundaiusa.com/us/en/resources/blue-link/2g-3...

Something I think we're missing the mark on with the EV transition is not taking the opportunity to make EV batteries more generic, which would make them cheaper to replace.

Imagine who's going to take the time and money to replace these batteries when these vehicles are 20 years old. Will there be classic EVs 20 years from now, or will they be disposable because nobody is making replacement batteries?

Yes, of course the economics of repairing classic cars is also an issue with traditional internal combustion vehicles, but isn't the goal of EVs to be greener in the first place? Disposable cars don't seem very green to me.

Replacing the batteries on a leaf is now possible, even the earliest ones. People can buy an aftermarket battery and install it. Far from being disposable, the components of the batteries after replacement are reused, sometimes the battery itself lost some large percentage of its capacity, but it is useful enough. The issue with the replacement batteries is that the computer in those old leafs doesn't account for larger batteries, so the range calculations are all wrong.

I think what I'm suggesting is more along the lines of regulatory bodies working with OEMs to determine a set of physical battery and software standards that are shared across all vehicles in the market. The goal of these standards being batteries of common sizes that would fit in any other vehicle of a particular class.

Obviously, Nissan can't keep the 2g network around even if they wanted to. But if they had simply used a USB port you could throw in a £20 modem.

It is terrible decision by Nissan, but the article makes false clickbait claims about "disposable cars" when in reality all functionality prevoiously exposed via app will still be available via car touch screen.

"Much of the disappointment from owners surrounds the sudden loss of key functionality, such as the ability to remotely heat or cool the vehicle, as well as the option to set up charging schedules..."

Seems like this is only the UK - in the US this could trigger a class action lawsuit.

I don't know the details of this service for Nissan but I'm curious. Since usually app based remote start is subscription based, would stopping this service still be eligible for a lawsuit? Assuming the key based remote start still works.

My Ford Focus EV lost its 3G-based connectivity a year or two ago but they did offer to install a new 5G radio if I wanted (for a price). Since I never used any of that limited functionality, I didn't bother but they did have a migration strategy.

Click bait. Truth is it's closer to them not putting AM radio in cars any more.

They can still update/get access over WiFi, Bluetooth or directly just not of the 2g cell network, that's all.

No, the only remote control for the aircon, charging etc is via a box with a 2G connection, and a proxy that the app connects to.

There is no local WiFi alternative. Bluetooth is only for audio & calls.

The functionality can still be accessed from the car itself, including reprogramming the timers.

You can replace the remote functionality with a kit sourced from the OVMS project - about £200 I think. Considering it for my 2015 Leaf.

Hmm, the OVMS project looks interesting. But I don’t quite get it, is it kind of OpenWrt project, but for cars? My car has a native support, I see.

Not used it yet, but the illustration on openvehicles.com shows an OBD-II port at one end, and black box with a DB-9 and lights labelled "GPS" and "GSM" :) So I guess ... it puts your car online, and you can read/control anything you could normally control from an OBD-II diagnostic app? But it looks like well-packaged sets of car-specific diagnostics and controls, not the raw interface you usually get from OBD-II apps.

I use OVMS on my 2010 Tesla Roadster and it’s likely a good option for people who don’t mind a bit of DIY to get it installed and to buy a SIM card. It supports most of the functionality of the car so I assume it can do that on a Leaf as well. Leaf is on the supported car list.

The article specifically mentions features like remotely turning on the heating. Given that "The NissanConnect EV app .. will shut down from 1 April 2024" it sounds like this is going away, even if the car is connected to WiFi.

Yes, because the app doesn't directly talk to the car. It talks to the cloud service and the cloud service sends the instructions to the car over 2g. Unacceptable. Those radios should be modular enough that you could upgrade it with a 3g/4g modem, you could charge for the part.

I'm now starting to get old enough to get annoyed like my predecessors who hated any car with a computer in it at all. My car is 23 years old, runs like a champ. I can't imagine throwing a car out in 10 years, or buying a car from any company that thinks that's something anyone should do.

It all starts to make sense when you only look at customers of car companies (those who buy brand new or off-lease) - and how long they hold on to cars for.

According to https://www.autotrader.com/car-shopping/buying-car-how-long-... it's about six years.

So the automakers literally do not have to consider anything at all after ten+ years except how governments will complain.

How will the app talk the car without a cloud service? Are you technical?

If you can swap out the 2G module for a 3G module, then the company has lost it's excuse for shutting down it's cloud. Companies that make a car that consumers expect to last 20 years should operate the cloud for the lifetime of the car.

Plenty of apps let you connect directly to things, why wouldn't this be possible?

Because they didn't build it that way. I worked you a company that wrote software for connected cars like this. Universally those platforms were the absolute worst. Underpowered, unreliable and sold for far to much.

Right, we're saying that it could have been built that way.

...or updated to do so.

You pronounced it clickbait and then implicitly acknowledged it wasn’t in the next sentence. Even Nissan’s PR people agree that a feature present when people bought the vehicles is no longer available.

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