Nissan LEAF First Drive, Plus Honda Prelude & BMW iX3 Reveals

Welcome to the podcast of Motor Week, television's original automotive magazine.

Motor Week is made possible by auto value and bumper to bumper and tire rack dot com.

Here's your Motor Week podcast host, John Davis.

And welcome to Motor Week podcast number 362.

I am indeed your host John Davis and boy do we have a jam packed show for you this week.

We have no less than three new vehicles to talk about, one from BMW, one from Honda,

and one from Nissan. We also have a lightning round on how current events

are changing Porsche's product plans. And a viewer wants to have more information on how we

actually test cars here at Motor Week. And finally, how some automakers are coming up with

inventive ways to extend the EV tax incentives that expired at the end of September.

So lots to talk about and doing just that today are our over the edge reporter, Greg Carlos.

That is me. Our digital producer, Jessica Ray.

Hello, hello.

And staff writer extraordinaire, Alexander Kellum.

Audi.

All right. First up, that BMW I mentioned specifically the long awaited EV version

of their most popular model worldwide, which is the X3 Compact Utility.

This is the new iX3 SUV. Jessica, it certainly has big shoes to fill, can it?

I mean, this is, it's such a weird time, I think, for this vehicle to be making its debut.

I feel like it's probably a little bit more important globally than I think that's a good

in the US. But nonetheless, you know, they still sell a lot of X3s here in the US.

It's their second highest volume vehicle here after the X5. So between those two utilities,

it makes up the bulk of BMW sales.

Yeah. So when you, when you think about it, you know, and, and also

this is an all electric vehicle. That's kind of why it's, it's a little bit

funny that we're talking about it during this time. But yeah, it's sort of debuting

BMW's six generation electric systems, right? You know, they've been doing PHEVs and EVs for

a few years at this point. Certainly veterans of it.

Yes. And so now they're moving away from initially where they had started, at least here in the US,

where they were taking combustion chassis and sort of making it work for both ICE and for

BEV or, or PHEV powertrains. So they were doing that for a long time.

Which we all applauded, but now they've, they've pretty much put that in the rear view mirror.

Yeah. This time, this really, truly is their all new, all electric, exclusively electric

platform. And it's debuting a new design language for them as well, the new a classa, which

That's as close as I can get. So which, which you probably know more about the

importance of the historic aspect of new a classa. That was, it's inspired by the

60s and 70s design language from BMW. That's what they say. And I think you can look back,

say at the 2002 and see a little bit in the grill. The first thing I see is the 2002.

But the rest of it seems to be like that's where the inspiration stopped.

Yeah. I mean, it's definitely modern. I think you can see where the, they've sort of taken

another step forward from the IX. This kind of hones in a very specific modular,

futuristic design language. I thought you were going to talk about how ugly it is.

Well, I didn't want to say that quite. I know styling is in the eye of the

beholders, but the IX was certainly not the, didn't win any bellow the ball awards,

I think for our parents. And this actually, I think is,

I think this makes the IX look very attractive. Yes. Now again, this is, you know, taste is,

is quite subjective. So there's that. But I do think, you know, without looking on the exterior

of this, the, of this model, it's really important to actually dive into the details,

what's underneath its skin, which is truly impressive. We've been talking,

But you know, I'm so superficial.

Now we've been talking.

All right. I know. I know you're trying to give details. I'll hush.

You're going to get the good stuff, John. You know, we've been talking probably,

if you've listened to our podcast, we've talked a lot about architectures for electric vehicles.

Specifically, we've talked about 800 volt architectures. And so a lot of times,

some of these models will have an 800 volt architecture, but maybe they can't charge

quite as quick as that architecture could peak at, for example. And so that's where this new IX3

kind of moves us into the next generation of EVs. It's an 800 volt architecture,

and it's also supported a max charging rate of 400 kilowatts. So that's actually more technically

than what you could get right now at a DC fast charger, because right now,

they only go up to 350. So this is what we would refer to as future-proofed,

because the future is coming, we're going to be able to charge faster. And so that's impressive

because they're saying that you could get 175 miles of recuperation in about 10 minutes. So

with a total range that they're saying to of 400 miles. So we're kind of reaching the specs on

this or kind of reaching to points that are grasping at what the standard should be within

the next five years. These are the numbers that we're kind of expecting. Or what you can get on

a Tesla now. I mean, that's the one thing that gets me about all this is they still, except for

very few vehicles, when it comes to something near mainstream, they still are the mileage

or range champs. Well, I guess technically for vehicles under $100,000. Obviously, we know the

lucid air can go much further over 500 miles. But yes, you were correct. BMW previously did

not have a vehicle that could hit range numbers quite like this. I want to say the IX probably

wasn't seeing much more than 300 miles of range, 320, something like that. Now, what I do think too

is really interesting is that it looks like at home, you can pull 19.2 kilowatts on a level

one or level two, level two charger, which that's impressive because I guess I think right now

most vehicles are looking at about 11 kilowatts. So I don't believe the battery pack on this is

very big either. I don't think they said exactly what it is. They didn't say what it is yet.

Okay, so we don't actually know what the battery pack size is. But standard NAX port,

I will say we should also mention the interior of this, which is funky for sure. Kind of matches

the exterior. The central screen is diagonal. It's at an angle. Do you like your infotainment

in italics? Because this screen is in italics. And they're running counter to what,

instead of blending it into the instrument panel like so many brands are doing it,

they've got just another big, in this case, weirdly angled horizontal tablet in the middle

of the dash. Yeah, and it does have this, and we've seen it in concepts too before, but like

some other brands are doing, it has this panoramic screen that goes across the bottom of the dashboard

that's sort of like inlaid back there, like right here, and which clearly is like where your

speedometer is and other information. It's there looks to be like next to no buttons here.

So yeah, I don't know. I don't know. It's in line with what they told the press. So I think it was

two years ago that eventually they think all the information that you normally need like speedo

and climate and so forth will actually end up being projected up onto the windshield. So this

is just below it. So they're moving in that direction to basically get all this information

ahead of you and maybe even above in your eye line. Basically what Lincoln's doing. Yeah,

very much. Very much. I think it's interesting because I thought like, I don't know, a year ago

or so many months ago, Europe was going to incentivize, what was it, something about bringing

buttons back into infotainments? Well, the public is speaking and basically saying that they'd like to,

well, they're probably getting concerned that so many aspects of a car that used to be routine,

you now have to look away from the road into some kind of a screen and take your hands off

the wheel to touch it. Yeah, the controls are on the steering wheel, but you know, half the time

people don't master those. Yeah. Anyway, so when are we going to get more info? Because this is such

a critical vehicle that you would think that they would be pretty anxious to spell it out.

I don't, I'm not 100% sure. I think it's still a little bit up in the air because I, this is a 26

model. Yeah, it's got to be soon. Probably soon. Oh, probably next year. Early next year is going

to be in production. Right. So it should arrive next summer. So what do you think?

You know, I've had my say. Alex, you've been very quiet. You wrote the article on it.

That bold of you to assume I remember what I wrote like a month ago or three weeks ago or whatever

it was. Yeah, like you said, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think with modern BMW,

they could stand to go into an optometrist, but I think they've done a little bit.

They have a history of doing that though, of getting people sort of churned up by their exterior.

It doesn't take away from their, the great driving aspect. Sure. Yeah. And obviously,

we haven't driven this, so we can't really comment on that. I actually, when I saw the pictures of it,

I actually did not hate the way it looked. I thought it was, it's quirky, it's interesting,

it's a little different. The steering wheel, if you didn't like having three spokes, now you got

four. So that's cool. It's an across. And actually, I have a funny story about this car because

about two weeks ago, I was on 95, regretting my decision to get on 95. And in my rear view,

I saw a camouflaged vehicle and it's coming up, it's rolling up, and I can tell it's a BMW.

And it pulls up next to me and I see that spoke in the steering wheel going straight up and it's

got the jersey tags and I'm thinking, well, there you go. This is, this is a prototype here. I'm

seeing it live in action. Of course, like a good driver, I did not take a picture of it, but I've

got the dash cam footage somewhere. So I'm, I don't recall, are they talking about building this in

South Carolina? Or have they said anything about that? Because that is where the bulk of X3 production

is. And it's, we reported that it's going to be made in Hungary. Right. Okay. Given the situation

with EVs in this country, that makes sense. Greg, any comments? Yeah, nothing to add any

actual information. I just think it's, I think it's funny that for so long, people were just

hammering BMW about this big kidney grille, like it got bigger. Now we found the other direction.

Everybody was starting to be like, Hey, it is what it is. That's what it looks like.

They go back to the small and now people are hating on the smaller like this is the original

side. Like it is like 2002 BMW sticks in my mind, like, you know, like it's cemented there.

So we go back to what everybody's been clamoring for for years. And now we're all like, Yeah,

that's that doesn't look right. So I think the small grill works. I think what I have problems

with is just what's around it. It's, you know, it's, it's the only thing that's really familiar

up there and granted, you know, stylists always like to do something new. But the combination of the

what would you call it almost arrow like a receding headlamp and and the side grills next to the

twin kidney, they're trying to get a smiley face on it. I'll give them that. I'm just anyway,

I'm curious to see if it drives. So I remember the I X. I that was driving for the first time.

I'm like, this doesn't really drive like a BMW, right? We didn't. Yeah. But you get into like

an I four and you're like, wow, this might be the best four series sort of an M four.

And I think that's important for us to know they have, they, they have gone very quickly

from providing a luxury EV that was, I hate to say fairly soulless, but certainly didn't feel like

a BMW to cars that we think exemplify the history of the brand. And we're looking forward to see

if they've rolled all that into this. We're going to go right quickly to the second car on our list

today. And if you think we've been talking about the past, this next one up is a real

blast from the past, that being the return of the Honda prelude, the first prelude arrived here

way back in 1979 as a sporty two door coupe. It was lightweight, nimble and vastly underpowered,

gaining the nickname Quaylude. But it was still a great grand touring car and it stuck around

through five generations and brought with it a lot of innovations, including rear wheel steering,

active rear wheel steering and variable valve timing until it disappeared after the 2001 model

year. And here we are 25 years later, the 2026 prelude is back. Same long hood short rear deck

GT profile. Alex, you think it's going to be anything more than just a blast from the past?

Are they looking to make this? It has to be, because it doesn't have pop up headlights.

So I should mention very quickly that we're just talking about it. We have not driven it yet. We

will be driving it soon. So consider this the prelude to the prelude. I thought about that one.

I knew that that was working in your head. All morning. All right, sweet. All right,

that's where I peek on this podcast. Yeah, so I guess we'll start with the powertrain because

that's probably the most interesting thing here. So it's a hybrid and we've kind of known it was

going to be a hybrid. We've been talking about this car for like two years now. But they've kind

of given us the deets. It's a two liter inline four, 200 horsepower, 232 pound feet of torque uses

both that engine with electric motors. And that may sound very familiar to some of Honda's other

portfolio or items in their portfolio. And that would be like the Civic hybrid. Now you may be

wondering about the transmission. And this is the part that I knew I was going to have to talk about

this. There's no manual transmission option. No three pedals. No three pedals. Only two pedals.

Which right there is a disappointment. And that is a disappointment. I assume it has something to

do with the hybrid powertrain. Right. And instead, we're getting an ECVT. Why? No, are we?

Well, well, well, that's Honda has Honda has not labeled it. There's no transmission. They simply

say, okay, we know it's an automatic. Let's put it that way. But they haven't put any labels on it,

even though, as you just said, it has the hybrid powertrain lifted out of a Civic hybrid,

which does have an ECVT. Yeah, but they are not referring to it as referring to it as such.

They're actually not referring to it at all. They say whatever they want. It's all marketing.

It really is kind of amusing. It's kind of amusing that they're being so coy about something

that's fairly obvious. We don't really believe in labels. As soon as I saw I was on the run down

to talk about this car, I was like, I'm going to avoid it. And then I got there and said,

oh, I'm going to bring it up. Stir the pot. I'm going to stir the pot. All right. The people want

to know. It will have an automatic transmission of some form. And so what they're doing is they're

adding this S plus shift, which is, so there's paddle shifters on the steering column,

or maybe on the wheel. They're up there, regardless. And this feature kind of simulates

gear shifts and blips. Which is not new for transmission. But it's not transmission.

Right. No. It's all electric. Yeah. And it's front wheel drive. So it's kind of retaining that

aspect of the, you know, historically. There's a video of it. You can go look at it and see,

listen to it and see it. Oh, yeah. Yeah, they sent us the actual Honda video. Yeah,

they sent us the B roll package. So that's the powertrain, which, you know, you can take that

or leave it if you will. I have my, maybe that'll be my rant later, but I'll see whatever. You know,

it's a good looking vehicle. Again, I'm back on the styling. It favors the previous

preludes. I think it looks like a modern rendition of the last one they made. So I give them

good marks for that. Yeah. They didn't try and create something that has no reference to the

name at all, which we've seen lots of automakers do. Right. Yeah. So and to talk about the styling

a bit, when this car was first kind of being not like it was just beyond the rumor phase,

like we knew it was going to be a thing, but we didn't really know anything about it. And we

have seen this in person already at like auto shows, I should mention, there was kind of the

initial thought of like, oh, this will be a competitor for some of the other Japanese sports

coupes right now. So the GR86 from Toyota and Subaru's BRZ. That's not really going to be the

case. This is more going to be, or at least they're pivoting it to be more of a touring car.

Which was what the original prelude was. But size wise, it's not far off. If you want to,

you know, if you're trying to visualize how big this thing is compared to the GR86,

I actually brought up to compare the measurements really quick. The wheelbase on the prelude is

about 103 inches. And on the GR86 about 101 give or take. So right there, you know,

wheelbase is about the same length is where there's a little bit more of a substantial change here.

And that's because of the preludes kind of more GT proportions. It's going to be just shy of 180

inches. Whereas the GR86 is 168. So there is a difference there. So it is going to be a little

bit bigger. It's going to be a little bit wider. And as for the actual seating inside of it, like

with that greater length, you're also going to get more room, more volume inside. It does have

rear seats. Not sure who's going to use them, but it is a two plus two coupe. Yeah, Jessica will use

them. I can fit back there. And you'll, well, if you're back there, you'll have 32 inches of rear

leg room. Something they confirmed about a month or two ago, maybe a little longer than that,

is that the preludes also going to use the Civic Type R's suspension and its Brembo brakes. So

you get the dual axis front suspension, you get the bigger Brembo. So that should make it a bit

sportier. But again, this is a touring car. And as such, actually, they haven't confirmed pricing

for us yet. We're still waiting on those details. But they did say this is going to be sold as one

trim. There will be different colors and interior options, but it will be a one trim car. You know,

it's pretty bold of them that most everybody else is abandoning the two door coupe market.

And to get back into it, they must know something that we don't, the four door coupe market, which

is not a four, not a coupe at all. So any other comments about it? I mean, I'm kind of, I like

the look of it. I'm intrigued. It'll have a proven powertrain. It'll be probably lightweight and

nimble, like the old ones. I mean, there definitely has been a little bit of a void in their lineup

when it comes to like when the the Civic Coupe left, you know, while I understand why it left

their lineup just because of just not as many people want them. But there are a lot of people

out there who that's all they want. That is all they want. And the Civic being the

one of the best selling sports coupes, like affordable ones in, you know, that you can buy,

I think that this if priced correctly will be a really great point to add back into the lineup.

Any thoughts, Greg? Yeah, I want to go back to this whole transmission non transmission thing.

I know everybody loves to talk about that. I'm willing to give it a try. I know a lot of people

have, you know, certainly had their thoughts on it and most of them negative. But I'm going to equate

it to the Ionic 5N. Yeah, that's a good comparison. Which obviously has no transmission. And it's

simul- everything is simulated. So like everything, they actually have paddle shifters that can act

as paddle shifters. It blips the throttle and it actually produces fake engine noise. Again,

there is no engine in this electric car. And I bought into it totally. I thought it was,

I thought it was pretty cool. And then I drove it and I thought it was awesome. So

I'm going to give Honda the benefit of the doubt on this. And I did, like I said,

there's a video out on it and I watched it sounded every bit as good as like the the Ionic 5N did.

So, you know, I'm willing to give it a chance. And it's just where we are. I mean, like we

bemoaned the loss of manual transmissions. And, you know, now it's like they're trying. They're

trying. Most people don't care. I get it. You know, most people do not care about these things

that we care about. So the fact that they're still trying to make some people care a little bit about

it. They're trying to keep. I just recently kind of got hung up on this. They're trying to keep

put back maybe even the soul of a car. The essence of what made one vehicle different from another.

And I think you could argue that EVs and hybrids and even internal combustion engine cars,

we've made them so smooth, they've lost that soul. So any attempt to put it back, I think, is to be

applauded. And I do think like we made the comment like it's bold of them to kind of enter this this

coupe market. And I have to wonder if part of it was they did want to wait for this hybrid power

train they were working on. They knew they wanted that. That being said, and I alluded to this earlier

and you brought up like how this is kind of like the Civic Coupe people have waited for.

We recently drove the Civic SI, the refreshed SI. And it makes me wish that this was a two-trim car

where maybe the base offering had the 1.5 turbo and the SI with that six-speed manual.

And I think that would just be like best of both worlds. You have the hybrid tour for people that

want it. And then you've got the kind of like, you know, just the fun little Civic.

And you'd sell about a thousand. Yeah, I mean, I get that.

Yeah. I mean, I think I like, you know, the idea that here you have, you're starting off with the

hybrid power train, which gives you a boost of power, the same amount of power that you would

have in a Civic SI. And but better fuel economy, obviously. So this would be a good daily commuter.

And then you're adding in this S plus shift feature so that if you want to have a little fun

with it and decent suspension and brakes. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I think it's I think it's a really

I think if people have to shift their thinking around it a little bit,

but this could be a much cooler car than I think a lot of people think.

Okay, let's move there. I can't wait to get behind the wheel of it.

By the way, we want everybody to know stay tuned just a few minutes. We're going to

take a look at the latest iteration of really the EV that took battery electrics from concept

to mainstream in this country. And we're talking about the Nissan Leaf. But first,

we're going to do our lightning round right after I thank our sponsors for this podcast.

And for everything Motor Week, auto value and bumper to bumper. And also the folks over at

tire rack.com. We know our viewers and listeners appreciate your dedication to all things Motor

Week. To refresh your memory in our lightning round, we give everybody used to be 30 seconds,

but now it's basically until I get tired of listening to them, a time to talk about a topic

that is trending. And here it is. Porsche, like other brands, has decided to pull back on its

plans to make its lineup fully electric, mostly because of what's going on here in the US, but

also some rejection in Europe of pure EVs. The news is the next generation 718 cars will have gas

powered version. 718 was slated to become an EV only model as production on the gas models was

supposed to end very soon. This is a familiar story to the McCann, which now produces both gas and

EV models. What do we make of these changes at Porsche? And is this something we're going to see

at other brands, i.e., maybe even BMW? Yeah, Greg? Okay, I'll go. I think what we have to remember,

first and foremost, as much as we love in this case, like Porsche, right, and they make these great

cars, we have fun driving them and all that. At the end of the day, they are a business. Porsche

exists to sell cars and to make money. They are going to do what behooves them. And I'm not blaming

them for that. So I'm just saying that when the world changes, when there is, like you mentioned,

rejection or a little bit more of a change in industry trends and what consumers are buying,

they're going to adjust with that so they can keep making money. So I just see this as a way of them

doing that. You know, Volkswagen has already said that the ID buzz is going to end up being,

having an internal combustion engine version of it. At least that's what I recall. So I think this

not necessarily knew it's going to become more of a trend. When you've only got 10 or 20% of your

customers eagerly awaiting an EV of a model, then you've got to do something. You've spent all this

money on development. Yeah, my takeaway is just as much as we think of business and specifically

automakers, it's like these big machines that it's like a cruise ship. You can't just slow it down and

stop it. You think it takes time. But things like this happen and like all this money, excuse me,

that they spent on EV technology and how quickly they're just like, yeah, okay, no, we're just

going to throw that money away or at least put that in the back. That's kind of what I'm taking

from this is we think of these decisions as long term decisions when they're really not. They really

can just like, you know, they call the CEO calls a meeting and says, hey, we're not doing this anymore.

That's it. Here's the gas engine back in this thing we said is only going to be EV. You've got huge

factories with tens of thousands of employees around the world. You've got to build vehicles.

You can't just lay people off. Your contracts keep making it so. In many cases, you must pay

workers even if they're not working. You've got to move the metal as they used to say.

I think what I marvel at it is, is we actually can see these decisions made in fairly short

amount of times. It used to be when a car maker gets wrong, they had to wait five to seven years

to get the right model into design work and get it out. Now, obviously, they can do it much quicker.

So I actually applaud where we are that they maybe not turn on a dime, but they can turn on

a quarter anyway. Nice. I think we're skeptical when we heard that the 718 was going completely

electric from the beginning. I certainly was. Especially knowing the history of that vehicle,

this is the vehicle that was supposed to help save the brand, that they could sell more of them,

that they necessarily would a 911. And then here you are making it all electric

and maybe less appealing than you would initially. I'm the only one in this room that around these

mics that remembers the first Boxster. Yeah. And it was the car that was, like you said,

was supposed to save the brand less expensive than the 911. Get back to that real genuine sports car

field. Now, of course, it's a very expensive model like everything else. But, you know,

between the Boxster and it is really the essence of what the Porsche sports car

is because it doesn't have a backseat. To me, it's like I think of the Boxster more than I think

of a 911. I think about a pure Porsche driving experience. And when I heard it was going to go

fully V, I thought, oh, well, really, okay, that's not up my tailpipe anyway.

So anybody else have another comment on it? I'm glad to see them being forthright about the

decision. Yeah, some more Porsche engines. No. I mean, the one thing I will say is I believe that

the gas models are going to be on higher trims, which is an interesting thing to do. But you have

to look at the used market. The used market for Porsches is not on the lower trims.

When someone went a Porsche fan and Porsche fans, even for a 718, they've got somewhere with all.

When they buy, if they are thinking about resale, they look at used Porsches. It's hard to sell one,

say without the Chrono package. You just can't sell it. And so they're going for that. Yeah,

you'll buy it. I buy it, but we're not typical. I understand what you're saying. I know what you're

saying. Okay. We have a viewer question, and this is an email they came in from Jay,

and he's talking about our road test. He says, I really like your road test for comparing vehicles,

especially body roll. He said he's in a forester and he's looking for improvement.

Are all of our tests through the cones at the same speed, and are the cones always the same

distance apart? Greg, would you like to address that? They started the same speed.

The entry speed is always the same. 35 miles an hour. Sometimes, if I'm getting a little bit

bored, like we're barely even putting the car through its paces, we've got all the shooting

done, it's like I'll pick it up a little bit. Well, I think that's the concept. You go in at 35,

if that was effortless, then you maybe kick it up to 40 next time. To test the car and have a baseline,

I always start at 35, and then I start picking it up, and then show off a little bit for camera,

start to then assess how it compares to the next level of vehicles. So, yeah,

35 is the start. Sometimes, they'll end at 38. Sometimes, they'll end at 40. So, I've gone as

high as 50, 52. And the cones, yes, they are all exactly the same. 100 feet apart. And just to

give you a little background, Jay, when we were at our former test facility, 7580 Dragway in

Monrovia, before it closed down, we didn't have enough space to do 100 foot slalom. So, we did an

80 foot slalom. But the 100 foot slalom is pretty much a standard of all people, through all people,

that test cars in the media today. This kind of brings the whole body roll concept brings up

something that I've been noticing in our tests. I might have brought this up before, but cars just

don't roll anymore. They don't. We take the cars, specifically the cars we take to Robling. I'm

watching this footage, man, and we're driving as fast as we ever have. And then I go back to

log the footage or watch the test. I'm like, man, why do we look so slow? It's not because we're

driving slow. It's because cars just don't react. They don't look like they're going fast. You're

not leaning into the corner anymore. They do not roll like they used to. And I'm not just talking

about the highest end stuff. I mean, it's just like even like GR, like we were talking with the

Prelude and GR86, or what do we call it now? Yeah, GR86. Yeah, sorry. But even like the

last year, we had a WRX and a GR Corolla. Yeah, I mean, you look at our old Retros,

they look so fast, but they're actually not that fast because they just they're like rolling. They

look like they're being driven fast. So yeah, I mean, it's nothing makes you lift your foot off

the pedal quicker than a car that really rolls along. Because if it starts rolling, you know that

something is going to lose traction pretty soon after that. We can empathize with Jay, though,

and he's in a forester. And yeah, there's there's some body roll. And it's a tall vehicle made for

cargo handling. So Jay, when you do your slalom test at home, stick it to 35 no more.

Maybe push the cones out a little bit. All right, thank you, Jay, for that. I want to remind

everybody listening that all of our Motor Week information, including our road test and just

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doesn't matter what you put in it. So download the Motor Week app today, take it with you and

take it from us. You'll never miss a mile of Motor Week. Now it's time to move on to our last

vehicle of interest this week, the Nissan Leaf. As I mentioned, it really showed how

practical EVs could be when it arrived here in December of 2010. I remember because I went to

Washington, D.C., where USA Today reporter Jim Healy and I got our first chance to drive it around

Tyson's Corner. It was a very big deal. It had a range of 75 miles that has steadily improved and

made the Leaf the best-selling EV of all times, and it's not a Tesla. It's a Nissan Leaf. And now

we fast forward to the new 2026 Leaf, which has a lot more than new to just a longer range. Greg,

you actually drove it. Why don't you tell us more about the new Leaf? I actually did drive it. And

I resisted saying turn over a new Leaf. I'm sorry. Yes, I know. He does them better than I do.

I was going to say his timing is better because we were sure if you were going to host us, Sir

Natchan, I think I was going to say the Leaf heads into a new season. As long as you didn't say it,

as long as you didn't say it didn't fall like a Leaf. Good thing I'm not hosting today.

My own Leaf story is that it was the first car I ever did drive-bys on here as a motor

weekend turn. Yeah. So yeah, I kind of like that original Leaf. And like it's quirky and specifically

that little shifter, the little joystick shifter. That was my first time ever using something like

an EV. I think it was the first time we'd really seen something like that. Yeah, like Prius had,

was it before Prius? Did the Prius have that before the Leaf did? I want to say yes. Yes,

yes, of course it did. It's not the same, but the same concept. It was a similar concept,

like joystick. Yeah. Anyway, pretty cool. So yeah, I drove the new one. We were in San Diego

a few weeks ago, and Jess, you went on the first look, right? Yes. So you got to see the styling and

did not get to drive it. So speaking of Prius, to me, it kind of looks like it's got the same

like profile shape, very aerodynamic, very much like we almost like we went back in time to where

what we thought like aerodynamic looked like in the 80s. I'm not saying that's a bad thing. It just

has like a very smooth, clean look from front to back. And unlike other cars now, it seems like

every car we test that's new, it's like bigger, longer, wider, you know, this, this. The Leaf is

actually shorter than it was in the previous generation. And it is, I think a little bit wider,

but shorter in both length and height. And it's now, according to Nissan, a utility. I don't know

it's smaller. It doesn't have all-wheel drive. That's so that's it. And right now,

there actually are a lot of two-wheel drive utilities around. Yeah, I remember the CHR,

the Scion, the Toyota, yeah. So it's got a hatch. Yeah, it has a hatch. Somebody asked in the press

briefing like, what makes this a utility? What are the criteria? And it was kind of like an awkward

moment. Nissan was just basically their answer was, and I'm paraphrasing, is because we say so.

We just decided it's a utility. Chances are you're sitting a little bit higher, which is

popularly one of the prior requirements. I don't feel anything. You're a tall guy. Did you feel

like you were right on the ground? I felt close enough to the ground. I'll tell you this. I know

professionally, like that to me is not a utility. I'm a professional utility driver.

You can even talk me in to say in the Subaru Crosstrek is a utility, which of course they call

a utility. I would argue no, but I say it's closer than the Leaf is. I digress. 75 kilowatt

hour battery pack. So it's a bigger battery pack, and it can get up to 300 miles of range,

303 miles specifically on the S plus grade. That's kind of the benchmark we've talked about for years.

That is, for right now, all Leafs come with that 75 kilowatt hour battery. They are going to come

out with one with a 52 kilowatt hour battery. They said in the springtime of 2026, and that'll

have around 200 miles of range, and you would assume be even cheaper. But this S plus grade

right now is the base at just over $31,000, which is refreshing. Isn't that the least expensive?

It's the least expensive EV you can buy, and you're getting 300 miles of range,

and that is pretty legitimate. This is what I think we all throw out, like the Lucids and the

Tesla. This is what we want. This is what we wanted. That's what I love about the Leaf,

and I always have loved about the Leaf is like, let's have a cheap EV. Let's have an EV for the

mass. It's like the Volkswagen approach of the bug, right? The people's vehicle.

From that aspect, I've always loved the Leaf. It's not a perfect vehicle.

It's really small for me. I don't think I could live with one with two kids,

and even just by myself, it's a little bit small. Now the second row is even smaller than it was

before. I sat in the back seat, and I couldn't even get my feet with my shoes on under the

front driver seat, and there's absolutely no leg room. Granted, yeah, I'm taller than average,

but even somebody who's like six foot, five, 10, it's going to be cramped back there.

But if you had two kids, what do you mean? What car seats back there might be?

Yeah, you could. Yeah. What do you think about car seats?

Elementary school aged kids. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. You know, growing family.

Think of it as like the third row in a lot of SUVs. It's like really, it's only going to help you.

That's a good way to do it. This is a commuter car. Excuse me. It's a utility.

It's for you to go to and from work. You know, so the thing that Nissan does really well is they

pack a ton of premium features into a car that doesn't cost a lot of money. Granted, we drove

around in the 40,000, 40 plus thousand dollar platinum plus grade, which has only like 200,

and hold on. Let me check my notes here. 278. I have it right here. Hold on. Just

let me check my notes. 259. 259 miles of range in the platinum plus. That is the top grade.

The reason it's the same battery, the reason you don't get as much range is because it has

19 inch wheels, bigger wheels and more features, more weight equals less range. So, right, you know,

if you really want max range, you're going to have to stick with the base. But if you want the most

features, go to the platinum plus. Nissan thinks they're going to sell the most of the mid grade,

which is SV plus. That gets you 288 miles of range. Again, just it's just more features. So,

it's more weight than that base level. And I tend to agree with them. It's really well equipped.

You have a 14 inch screens rather than the 12 inch base screens. And that's, I say screens,

because it's, it's the gauge screen in front of the driver. And then it extends to the infotainment

screen. It looks kind of like one seamless screen, but it's two. It's just, it's a really tidy,

high tech looking package. And I think a lot of people will, at that price range,

are going to be really impressed with it. You know, again, we were in platinum plus,

so you got some really, the cooler features like a panoramic sunroof, which has the, I forget the

technology, but basically you push it, push a button and it frosts over. And you can probably

help me with whatever that's called. I think electroluminescent, there you go, is the term you're

looking for. But it doesn't do it all at once. It actually kind of make it a design element,

which is pretty cool. So, you know, it's kind of like a look at, I don't know, like a show off

feature. It's like you push this button and it, it, it frosts over in steps. So like instead of

just going from clear to frosted, it goes like one section, two sections, three sections, four

sections. But it's like a design element because like halfway through, like there's like the

leaf that is scripted out. So like you can see it and then when the sun comes through,

it actually creates a design element of its own. Yeah, like leaf will be like on the seat.

Some stylists had a great time with that. Oh, I mean, yeah, I mean,

Jess could probably speak more to the styling and stuff. I actually drove it. It, it's fine.

And I don't mean that in a bad way. Just like, just like we said, the latest Prius had turned,

turned from sort of a, I won't say ugly duckling, but into an attractive vehicle. This is now the

most attractive leaf they've ever made. Don't expect like Tesla EV speeds. It's the, when you

take off, it's like a gradual acceleration. So for, if somebody's coming from a gas engine,

it's going to feel more natural. There's plenty of power to pass around town. Like we were zipping

around. Like everything felt great, exceptionally quiet at low speeds, which I think is a big deal.

Like I think that's what makes people feel like they're in a premium car is when they are isolated

from the outside noise. Now you get up to 50, 60 miles an hour. It's going to get a little windy

in terms of like you actually hear wind hitting the side mirrors and starting, starting to creep in,

but around town, really exceptionally quiet. Regen braking. Again, that's something I could

rant about this, but paddles on the steering wheel, control regen braking, but only I think in like

SV plus and above. Not really sure what they do in S plus. Again, we only drove the platinum plus.

It's one of those weird things like they save money by not having paddles on all of them.

Anyway, so that in, in my platinum plus, I was able to control regen braking. And that is important

because the brake pedal itself like doesn't feel nearly as good as if you just rely on the

regen braking. So I mean, like not even touching the brake pedal at all. There's like no, nothing

really happens the first two inches, which is like really disconcerting to me. So I just kind of

pumped up all the regen braking and just used one foot and it doesn't have one pedal driving. It

can't stop itself, but it's pretty darn close. It's close to it. Yeah. And it's, there's like EV

or regen step mode. There's a, there's a, you can control like three levels of regen. And then

there's an extra one that you have to push a button on the dash. So that gets you as close to

one pedal driving as possible. But again, it's not one pedal driving, but the disconcerting

thing is so complicated. I know, I know, I know. So the wood like, and I was like, okay, cool. That

makes sense. But I'm a left foot breaker. So my foot is like always hovering around the brake

pedal. And I noticed with that mode engaged, that pedal actually moves. Like, so when it's

breaking, it moves away from my foot and I hate that. Such a terrible feeling. So I ended up not

using that mode at all because I wonder what the purpose of why that's why in that moment, maybe

it was pre-production. So I will say that we were driving pre-production vehicles. And that's

one of those quirks. Yeah. So I do, I will have to feel and it's not the same. Yeah, but

like I, I don't want to bash a cheap car because I love cheap cars. And I think we need more of them.

And for $31,000 and even to the SV plus grade at about $35,000, like a lot of really cool,

useful safety features are all standard. Like all that good safety stuff that everybody wants,

blind spot, cross-traffic alert, like that's standard. That's, that's what we want in 30,

$35,000 vehicles. It's fascinating. We've all sit around talking about EVs really need a low-cost,

high content vehicle to be come popular even as a second car. And the Leaf has continued to offer

that and has sold okay. But this one really takes that almost above what anybody expected.

So Nissan kind of, let's face it right now is not the greatest time for Nissan's company.

But they've got a winner here. They just need to really do some targeted marketing to get all

those people out there that still want an EV are willing to give it a chance, don't need necessarily

the government incentives to be able to afford it and make it that standard commuter. I've got

everything I need car that would translate into a lot of sales. I'll close with two final things.

One is a housekeeping thing that I forgot charging. So it has two ports. It has two

ports. Now kind of explain that for a lot of people. It's got both types plugs. Correct. So

passenger side port is the NACS port, North American charging standard. Which is the Tesla

port. That's the Tesla one that everybody's eventually going to switch to. That is DC fast

charging only. So you can't, if you say you had a Tesla, got rid of it, bought a Leaf,

you had an at home level two AC charging charger, you cannot use that Tesla NACS port

to AC charge the vehicle. You can only do DC fast charging. You can only do DC fast

charging on that passenger side one. Now on the driver side, there is a J1772 plug, which is only

for AC charging. So you can do level one. That's like plugging into your 110 outlet or your level

two, which is that, you know, 200 or sorry, 240 volt charging. You can get an adapter though,

I suspect. Correct. Yeah. But I'm just saying you, so you can, most cars now you can do AC and DC

on the same port. You just have to extend, if it's a CCS, you have to extend that little.

This is again, very getting complicated. But if you stop in a motel overnight and it has the Tesla

level two chargers, not the fast chargers, you would actually, you would need an adapter to plug

into the right side. Correct. Because if you plug that Tesla level two adapter into the DC

fast charger, it probably won't work. It will not work. Yeah. Yeah. But and for, you know,

it does also say it on the charger itself, DC only. My final point is the, I've already said

that I love the leaf. I think it's a charming vehicle. I was worried it was not going to be

charming anymore because it kind of grew up with styling, more mature, but it's still that like

fun kind of quirky little thing, some really cool colors. There was like one like maroon color

that I just thought looked awesome on the road. So I think it doesn't try to be anything that it's

not. And I think we need more of these cars. But um, boom, very good. Thanks. Again, can't wait

to drive it because I remember driving the first one. Our last topic before we wind up this podcast

are rants and raves. Anybody got anything they want to throw out there? Because if you don't,

I do. Well, I was just going to be back off of what I already said, like the whole packaging

of options, like with Nissan and these battles for the regen braking, like the auto windows.

A lot of times, like the base models will have just the driver side where you just push it once

and it goes down or up. Come on, man, like put them all. Like, well, I mean, it's a programming

thing, right? I know when you sell like tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of vehicles,

yeah, well, come on, dude, like, give me. Well, you know, it's funny about that. So like, I have,

obviously, I only have two windows in my Jeep because I run a soft top and I have a two door.

And so my windows are automatic, both up and down, like so I can just click and it's fine.

When I got my Maverick, the only one that was automatic was the driver's side and it was only

automatic down. And I was like, there are 15 years between these vehicles and you're telling me that

you couldn't put the automatic, like, it's not just a convenience feature every carshow.

I asked, I asked, I forgot what the, oh, it was a Hyundai Sonata. I went to the preview and I was

talking to the public affairs guy and I said, why don't you have some feature? I think it was a power

passenger seat. In their top trim, they didn't have a power passenger seat. And I said, why not?

This is supposedly your near luxury model. That drives me kind of crazy. And they said,

we look at the market and we see what our rivals have for different trims and that's how we pick

it up. So in other words, they looked at whatever they thought was competitive and said, ah, we

don't need that. That's what they do. So that's great. Thanks guys. Okay, my rave

is based on something I read just today in automotive news. And that is for your information,

we're actually recording this podcast on September 30th. So this is the last day technically that

the federal tax incentives for EVs will be in effect and that means $7,500 for a new EV.

We all know that most people out there are not actually buying EVs outright. They're leasing

them because that's where the real deals are. I read today that both General Motors and Ford,

according to automotive news, have a plan to extend the $7,500 federal incentive on electric vehicles

at their U.S. dealers. And this is for vehicles that are on their lots right now. And they want

to extend this incentive for the fourth quarter. And the way they're doing that is they're using

their finance arms to go to the dealers and say, if you want to keep that incentive on that vehicle,

you need to put money down on that vehicle right now as a lease. So you have prepared that vehicle

legally to be leased anytime between now and the end of the year because you've essentially already

started the process. And this is because the IRS said that if you start the process before the end

of September, you can complete it after that and still get the $7,500 tax incentive. So they're

going to their dealers and saying, go ahead and do that, put money down, start the lease process

on any EVs still on your lot that you want to get rid of. And then when people come in interested

on them, interested in them, you can offer them a lease because it's already started with the tax

incentive, which is my thinking incredibly clever way to kind of protect yourself and to make sure

that if you've got EVs left on the lot that they will still be competitively priced at least for

the end of the year. So that makes sense the way I described it. They've essentially started the

lease process before they even have a customer for the vehicle. Basically they've got the paperwork

going before a customer even comes in the door so they can take advantage of it

pre-October 2025. Now the caveat on this, it's possible of course that the federal government

can change its mind and make this so it doesn't apply but right now as of us recording this. So

before the September 30th deadline, go anyway and ask them if they have any of these vehicles

to lease like a Maki for example or an Equinox that they have already started the leasing

process on that they can give you a special deal on. It's a good chance they will say yes.

Wow. Pretty interesting stuff. Very interesting. Okay, for Over the Edge reporter Greg Carlos,

digital producer Jessica Ray and Alex Kellum, our staff writer. Thank you very much for joining

us today and thanks everybody out there for listening to our podcast. If you're wondering

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