Retrofitting Fast Charging To A Nissan Leaf EV

Electric cars have been around for a while now, and thus they’re starting to get chopped up and modded just like any other car. [Daniel Öster] is one such person doing the work, and recently posted his efforts to retrofit fast charging to an base-model Nissan Leaf that didn’t ship with the feature.

[Daniel] uses special high-voltage insulated tools when working on EVs for safety.

It’s an involved swap, requiring the substitution of several parts and surgery on the wiring loom. Cost of components was just 700 euros but the swap required 20 hours of labor. The vehicle in question is an early model Leaf that was already fitted with an upgraded 40 kWh battery, and the owner desired an upgrade to CHAdeMO fast charging to better use the larger pack.

The swap required the power distribution unit to be replaced, and the CHAdeMO port to be installed in the front of the car. The vehicle control module (VCM) also had to be opened in order to run a wire to a relay to activate the fast charging subsystem. Finally, wires had to be spliced to get everything to play nicely between the car and the fast charger.

[Daniel] had the benefit of quality forum resources and a Nissan Leaf that already had CHAdeMO to reference, which helped a lot. At the end of the day, the fast charger worked first time, much to [Daniel]’s relief. We’ve featured his work before, too. Video after the break.