Nissan Leaf brake failure

Flip the Fleet, a coalition of over 1,150 electric vehicle (EV) owners from New Zealand, has become aware of over 60 reported failures of the electrically-driven brake control unit, pictured below, in Gen-1.2 or 1.3 Nissan Leafs manufactured between November 2012 and February 2016.

Flip the Fleet is aware of 46 reported failures in the US, 10 in the UK and Ireland, and five in New Zealand.

Drivers who have experienced the issue have described the braking to feel ineffective and stopping ability was reduced or non-existent. 

"Our research has led us to believe that these failures can be attributed to faulty ‘Series-A’ firmware that is written into the brake control unit at the time of manufacture (or a subsequent firmware update to ‘Series-B’)," said Flip the Fleet. 

"Analysis of the vehicle’s fault code history after a failure indicates that the other systems in the car no longer get any response when trying to communicate with the brake control unit. In other words, it appears that the brake control unit ‘crashes’, causing a partial failure in the overall braking system of the vehicle.

"We haven’t found anything that implies that these failures can occur in any other Nissan vehicle, or, any other electric vehicle. Specifically, in relation to other Nissan Leafs, Gen-1.2 or 1.3 models manufactured in March 2016 and later have a revised ‘Series-C’ version of the brake control unit firmware, and we have not been able to find any reported failures in Nissan Leafs running this ‘Series-C’ firmware.

"Gen 1.1 models manufactured in 2011 and 2012, and Gen 2 ‘40kWh’ models now in production appear to be running fundamentally different classes of brake control unit firmware, and we have not been able to find any reported failures in these Nissan Leafs."

Flip the Fleet is asking anyone who may have experienced with any issues to fill out a form.