21 year old son and fiancee choosing Rural Living over apartment in town.

[Gale Hawkins]

The shop made rebuilding the house much easier because we had a place in store building supplies, etc but we had never used it as an automotive shop until a teenager ran a red light totaling our 2016 Nissan Leaf SL when our daughter was taking the wife to work. Last we made room in one bay and got started stripping of the damage.


This was after we made some room in one bay.


This was the Leaf post accident.



This was after we unbolted the damage that took us about 6 hours because we trying figure out the reinstall process. I thought we had lost the front camera but it was in the tangled mess and still worked. Most donor cars will not have that option.

We have since driven it a couple miles after stripping it down and it drove out fine but did not get it pass 68 MPH. Now we are looking for a parts car to make the rebuild work out $$$ wise. They are not cheap in online auctions. Sometimes the fees are nearly as much as the winning bid.

 

[Alien]

You have your work cut out for you there. Good luck. What a job.

 

[Gale Hawkins]

You have your work cut out for you there. Good luck. What a job.

Other than the windshield most of the rest is electrical and wrenching. Finding a part car is hard at a reasonable price is not turning to be easy but we will in time. Any EV with a battery is in high demand for project cars and off the grid solar storage.

 

[Alien]

Is that an earlier model Leaf or the later one with battery cooling?

 

[Gale Hawkins]

Is that an earlier model Leaf or the later one with battery cooling?

No Leaf cars have battery cooling. Nissan has planned to come out with a new line of cars for a few years that does finally have active battery cooling. I think now that is planned for next year. Since they are priced inline with Tesla's prices where they keep making the Leaf is a question mark I have heard.

Fast charging back to back on a long trip does not work out well for battery packs without active cooling. Tesla came with active cooling in 2008 but Nissan never got on the band wagon when they came out a few years later. It gave the Leaf two black eyes. Nissan did replace our dying 30 kWh battery pack with a new 2020 40 kWh battery pack and is the reason I bought the car back. I had started charging it at night and after each 30-60 miles of driving to help manage the heat issue and degradation has really slowed down. I checked it two days ago and the last month parked State Of Health declined by 0.02% when it was declining about 0.01% daily where driven or parked but had slowed to 0.01% every three days after I started doing short charges once or twice daily for better heat management. I would be driving a Tesla if I had free cash flow.

 

[Alien]

Thanks for the reply. Very informative. I was interested in the new Kona due to the claimed mileage but I think for now I will stick to ICE as I am planning some long trips in the future. Long way between drinks here in Oz. Even the Kona would not make it to where I am planning to go. Minimum is 700 klm in one trip.

 

[RalphVa]

After dating for nearly 3 years they have a wedding planned for September which will be three years since their first date. Just to get started the son was thinking of getting an apartment for a year or two but due to the college rent in Murray KY is expensive.

One of the small local internet providers offers free ads that a lot of locals visit to buy, sell and trade all likes of stuff. I got a set of wheels once for the son's truck and it was where I found the B Allis Chalmers last summer.

View attachment 596901

A couple weeks ago a place 10 miles out of Murray popped up for sale. While it is only 1.6 acres and both the shop and house needs a lot of attention to both clean up and do major repairs. I drive past it a couple times a week now and always thought I would love to have the shop and never noticed the small house that is concealed somewhat to the rear because a row of 45 year old cedar trees that line the state highway. It does have some fruit trees as well that need a lot of attention as well.

The house has 2 bedrooms, a full bath with a fair size living room and about the same size kitchen. There is a 4" deep well and septic system. The crown jewel in my view is the shop on a 55' wide and 50' deep concrete slab and I have not found a crack yet. The 2 bays are 30' deep and one has a Rotary brand in ground single cylinder car lift with a Champion compressor for the lift and shop air. Since the date on the 82 gallon Beaird tank is 1-1956 and the shop was built in mid 1970's must to have been put in used when it was about 20 years old. The 2 horse 220 volt single phase Leland motor may be original driving the Champion REN 10 two cylinder compressor that is to be able to make 200 PSI.

The wife and I closed on the place so they can purchase it for the selling price from us after they get married. They have started the property clean up and removed most of the kitchen down to the walls. The son likes two months finishing his two year diesel college degree at a local state college plus he is working evening in the parts department a national trucking firm while going to school. His fiancee is the same age and has finished some vocational training and a course in RV repair and works in her father's RV repair business rebuilding RV's. Both families are helping them with renovation efforts and think this is a good move long term.

Good that you/they can do this. On the road coming into our road, there's a place that was bought for a couple boys to go to UVa. They bought, built a pond and all. Guess the boys graduated. Recently sold for near $4M. A few people, actually the students themselves sometimes, buy a place and live in it for 4 years (or more) and sell it when graduated. Beats paying rent, and in this case, beats living in town.

Ralph

 

[Gale Hawkins]

Thanks for the reply. Very informative. I was interested in the new Kona due to the claimed mileage but I think for now I will stick to ICE as I am planning some long trips in the future. Long way between drinks here in Oz. Even the Kona would not make it to where I am planning to go. Minimum is 700 klm in one trip.

It may be a decade before EV's rule in rural USA. I take wife to work so that is two 30 mile trips 5 days a week. In the Leaf that is $10 a week and now $40 a week in the old Escalade. Sometimes she is an hour plus late getting off. The electric heat pump keeps me warm or cool.

 

[Larry Caldwell]

It may be a decade before EV's rule in rural USA. I take wife to work so that is two 30 mile trips 5 days a week. In the Leaf that is $10 a week and now $40 a week in the old Escalade. Sometimes she is an hour plus late getting off. The electric heat pump keeps me warm or cool.

My wife and I have discussed this. Unless we are traveling for some reason, a 130 mile round trip is the longest we take. Even a cheap low-mile EV like the Leaf would serve us well. I have a separate 200 amp service to the shop, so installing a 240v. charger would be trivial.

Longer trips would require an IC engine, but if you only drive one often enough to keep it from drawing moisture, a car will easily last 30 years. The best touring car I ever owned was a Buick Park Avenue, a big luxury car that got 30 mpg on the freeway. The seats were 6-way adjustable leather. I called them butt gloves.

Anyway, for short runs, 50 miles to town and 50 miles back, an EV might be a good choice.

 

[Gale Hawkins]

The mint like red 2015 Nissan Leaf with 27K miles we bought for a parts car if we could not resolve the electronics failure that lead Erie Insurance to total out is going to be our parts car. We failed to find the issues as to why the car will not charge and move and spring is here and gas prices are on the rise.

A body shop owner came by to look at our car last night and gave us a price to straighten front bumper brackets and turn the front cap Deep Blue Pearl. Thankfully our 2016 is still driveable so we will load it on the tilt trailer and take it and the parts that need painting to the shop. After our car is back from the shop we will start to moving the parts from the 2015 to our 2016. The van that ran the red light sheared 18" off the nose so we do not know what all is missing so it is good to have a 100% intact car for parts so we have something to go by. Since the charging ports got messed up and everything else this will not be a fast task to sort through but it is doable. The air bags and windshield should be interesting one way or another. Since the 2015 has not been in an accident I think we have a shot at getting the windshield out without breaking it.