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Post by chuq on Jan 10, 2018 19:59:00 GMT 11
Has anyone here ever set up their Leaf for sleeping in? I'm not usually into camping, but was recently invited with a few friends to go a camp spot for a weekend. I wasn't planning on it, but I thought about using the Leaf as a makeshift campervan. After all, the location is within travel range (with a couple of well placed charges) from home, has powered sites, and I've become very familiar with caravan parks after completing a few long trips. To top it all off, the location he mentioned is in a reasonably remote location where I doubt anyone has taken a Leaf to before  I've heard about Tesla "glamping" but did not consider the possibility of doing this in the Leaf. After a quick search online I have found a few others who had done this: Pros: - Free. I already own the car and so it is just the cost of a powered site.
- Easy to set up. Just park!
- Sleep in climate controlled, bug free, comfort
- No noise or pollution while car is running overnight
- The back windows and boot are already tinted for some privacy.
- The novelty of it!
Cons: - I have a wife and three kids. This will be a max 2-adult or 1-adult-2-kid trick. We already own a 2 person tent though, so this could complement that.
- Not a lot of cargo space left. The footwells of the front and back seats, and a small amount on the front seats. Probably only a 1-2 night thing.
Things to find out: - Internal dimensions. Can I fit? I'm about 175 cm. Others have slid the front seats forward, tilted them forward, and reversed the back seat headrests to provide more of a flat surface. This will be easy enough to measure once I get a chance to rip the kids' car seats out and try it.
- Running the climate control while plugged in. I've read this *isn't* possible, but I'll need to confirm. It isn't a deal breaker.
- Corollary to above: If it is necessary to run the climate control while the car isn't plugged in, how much of the battery will it use? Some of the sites have reported about 7% of the battery - this sounds a bit low, but if it is correct - great!
Things to buy: I was going to separate this into things I needed to buy and things that were optional, but to be honest, it's all optional, just to varying degrees! Stuff I already have - sleeping bags/pillows. - Mattress. I could sleep on the flat surface, but I'd like to be comfortable. Others have found mattresses which will fit. Mark Larsen found a product called Truck Bedz which makes mattresses with wheel cutouts to suit car boots. (Truck Bedz)
- Cargo organiser. This is for the "dip" in the boot space - it has been suggested to be necessary in order to create a flat surface. (Example - eBay) These are reasonably expensive, so I would like to avoid if possible - I should be able to work around this by filling the space with items of the right height.
- Mosquito net. You can get a net which stretches around the boot and back doors and is secured by closing it in the front doors. The boot can them be left open if it is a warm evening (probably not recommended for sleeping), or the back windows can be left open slightly, with the netting covering the openings. I'm not sure how well they work but they are cheap. (Example - BCF)
- Stick on window shades. For both privacy (although some are already strongly tinted) and insulation (no point making the climate control work harder than it has to). (Example - Supercheap)
- A beefier USB charging block. The car only has one USB port, which I understand is limited to 500mA, so a 12V (cigaratte lighter) to multi-USB charger may be needed if I want to glamp it up a bit more. (Example - Jaycar)
Anything else tried it? Anything else I should consider? |
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Post by iamlsd on Jan 10, 2018 20:52:47 GMT 11
If you start the climate control with the phone app while plugged in it will stay on for about 2 hours - might get you off to sleep ok. You can also set a timer to start the climate change with the phone app but I'm not sure if you can do both? There a few examples of running an inverter connected straight to the auxiliary battery positive and an earth point (http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=37&t=13097) which would give you plenty of power. 2 or 3 self inflating camping mats wouldn't take up too much room.
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Post by alison on Jan 11, 2018 9:44:09 GMT 11
Have been thinking about this, thanks for the research!
Also have three kids so currently we have ICE SUV plus caravan for these sorts of trips, but the more we get addicted to EVs the more we think about it. Caravan is fun but lugging a small house around behind us isn't really sustainable.
For now I think the compromise would be travel by Leaf then stay in a cabin.
As for luggage how about a roof box? We have two dogs so they'd have rights to the boot, meaning we'd need more than just footwells for the five of us.
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Post by rusdy on Jan 11, 2018 13:20:17 GMT 11
Has anyone here ever set up their Leaf for sleeping in? Well, my 3-year old took a nap in the Leaf too many times! Does that count?  He often fell a sleep in the car on the way home. When the remote AC via app work, I always do that and let him sleep in the car with AC on. When the app doesn't work (too often!), then I'll leave the whole car on. Barely consuming power once in the garage (thanks to the shade). Love the idea 'glamping' in the Leaf, but not possible for me in Western Australia, yet. My battery is now degraded enough for me to cause real range anxiety (only 13kWh usable, I need at least 13.5kWh to go 'out of town' (to keep up 110kph limit)). Relying only on fast chargers on remote towns that sometimes vandalised, travelling with little kids, enough to deter me travel outside CBD at the moment. If I were to do it myself, I would, but not with kids. If anyone have recommendation on a good site near Perth CBD (City of Swan fast charger opens up places on the hills), I'll do it! |
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Post by chuq on Jan 11, 2018 16:28:05 GMT 11
Have been thinking about this, thanks for the research! Also have three kids so currently we have ICE SUV plus caravan for these sorts of trips, but the more we get addicted to EVs the more we think about it. Caravan is fun but lugging a small house around behind us isn't really sustainable. For now I think the compromise would be travel by Leaf then stay in a cabin. As for luggage how about a roof box? We have two dogs so they'd have rights to the boot, meaning we'd need more than just footwells for the five of us. Yeah at the moment we have the ICE station wagon and stay in cabins. Caravan would be great if we could afford it, and had space to store it .. and could tow one with the Leaf! We don't have any fast chargers near us so there are limited places where we can stay which are within range. A 1-2 hour top up charge at 15A helps but that is about as long as I could justify with the family in tow! A roof box would hammer our range, unfortunately! |
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Post by EVangelist on Jan 12, 2018 8:18:02 GMT 11
Has anyone here ever set up their Leaf for sleeping in? Pros: - Sleep in climate controlled, bug free, comfort
- No noise or pollution while car is running overnight
Things to find out: - If it is necessary to run the climate control while the car isn't plugged in, how much of the battery will it use? Some of the sites have reported about 7% of the battery - this sounds a bit low, but if it is correct - great!
Hi Chuq - re your comment "No noise or pollution while car is running overnight" I don't think that's true. When the car is charging, the coolant pump makes a continuous noise. Worse still, if the air conditioner is running, the A/C pump is even noisier. If you have a garage, try turning on the A/C then stand outside of the car. I suspect if you ran the A/C overnight, other campers would get really annoyed, assuming they are close by. However the A/C doesn't use much power when in cooling mode - from memory the energy gauge shows only a few hundred watts, so you could run the A/C for many days non-stop before depleting the battery. It's heating mode that sucks up the battery. I haven't thought about ever putting a mattress in the back, but only a few days ago on one of the Tesla forums someone posted a pic of their Model 3 with seats folded down and they could just fit in an inflatable full-sized double mattress, almost perfectly flat. I wish I could find it - I was a bit bug-eyed at the thought! |
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Post by chuq on Jan 12, 2018 21:21:43 GMT 11
EVangelist, that's true, when I said "silent" I guess I meant it relatively - in comparison to having a petrol car idling all night!
I've stayed overnight in caravan parks before (stayed in a cabin, had the car charging at a powered site) without any issues. If I was right up next to a tent I guess that could be annoying, but in general there is a dedicated section for powered sites (where the caravans and campers (... and EVs!) would be.
This will be part of the learning curve I guess!
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Post by chuq on Jan 12, 2018 23:54:31 GMT 11
A bit more on the mattress. The Truck Bedz one got a particularly poor review over at MyNissanLeaf - www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=51&t=16684&start=10#p368571 The Exped Megamat appears to be pretty good though. The Exped comes in two sizes - 197x77 or 197x130. The Leaf, at it's narrowest point (between the rear wheels) is 105, so while the small one will fit, it's only a single. Length wise - if the front seats are slid all the way forward and tilted all the way forward, there is 190 of space. Might be a squish but a 197 long mattress could fit there. I'd like to find something closer to the actual width though, so it can be a potential 2-person solution. On paper a king single mattress size is 106 - perfect! But I can't find any camp mattresses in that size. I'll keep looking! (all sizes in cm) |
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Post by chuq on Jan 15, 2018 7:53:57 GMT 11
A bit more research over the weekend.
It seems my biggest issue will be finding something bigger to put in the back seat footwells. Having the front seats all the way forward introduces a massive gap here. I'm on the lookout for items (preferably storage boxes of some sort with a solid lid) which are 36x50cm base x 50cm height. The 50cm height is fairly specific as it needs to match the level of the back seat relatively closely. There is a bit more flexibility with the base.
I have learned it's very hard to search for items of specific dimensions online. Volume, no problem!
If anyone has seen anything, please let me know... Happy with plastic tubs, suitcases, storage ottomans, whatever!
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Post by chuq on Jan 21, 2018 11:46:50 GMT 11
I'm not having much luck finding appropriately sized storage items here! Seems to be a rather unusual shape. But they are absolutely vital - this end will support my head so it needs to be the right height and reasonably strong! It's not like it's a tiny gap either!  |
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Post by iamlsd on Jan 22, 2018 8:55:53 GMT 11
Would some cardboard boxes do the trick. You can collapse them flat in the boot when driving then unfold 2 to fit in the foot wells. Another piece of cardboard laid on top to make a nice flat surface to go under your mattress / pillows?
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Post by Feng on Jan 22, 2018 9:58:15 GMT 11
Maybe corflute for extra strength and durability? You can't recycle them like cardboard though.
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Post by chuq on Apr 22, 2018 18:24:38 GMT 11
Sorry for the delayed replies! I was hoping to find something rather solid to fit in this spot - as I'll be needing as much space as I can for storage. Cardboard doesn't seem particularly strong (especially being folded up and down all the time, it would lose it's strength!)
But of course, you raise a good point in that the area shown in my photo is with the front seats forward - which of course won't be the case when I'm driving. But I'm envisaging something that is movable from boot to footwell.
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Post by brunohill on Apr 22, 2018 22:11:05 GMT 11
It looks like the perfect spot for an additional battery pack to me.
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Post by chuq on Apr 23, 2018 15:11:15 GMT 11
It looks like the perfect spot for an additional battery pack to me. Perfect, if it was within my budget.. and was removable! |
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