2015 Soul EV: My Battery Replacement Story

Cliff said:

KISH, I appreciate your technical expertise! I'm not that technical - I'm just a guy with a 2016 Soul EV+, 31,000 miles, that originally had a 92 mile range, now 65. It has been dropping 1 mile per week for the last 6 weeks. Troublesome. I am also in SoCal, Orange County, specifically. You mentioned some capable dealers. Any recommendations? Sounds like I should get that SOH report soon...

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If you go to the Kia website, you can punch in your zipcode and it shows all the Kia dealers nearby. Then, under filters, select Authorized Soul EV Dealer and it will show all dealers who are certified to sell/service Soul EVs. Good luck on your SOH report.

This keeps me away. Car companies want real money if you run over something in the road or some other accidental damage not covered
by the warranty. I did find used pull-outs from wrecks for under $16,000 but there's no data on how much power is left in those.
Gas is $2.29/gallon in Charleston for my Smart Fortwo. That's 8,017.89 gallons of regular gas. It'll run over 330,000 miles for the price of this critical repair you got for a few weeks of your time. I wonder how they would have treated a 40-year-old secretary with this issure who knew nothing of all the acronyms and specifications......

Sorry to intrude on Kia EV owners forum. I got more information in an hour here than I could have gotten in a year standing in the local service dept. Thank you all for posting your real-world experiences.....

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You're welcome. Gas in CA is around $3.69 for regular right now, so the electric savings add up a bit quicker than in SC. Then again, the average cost of electricity is around $0.25/kwh, so it's really hard to say. Everyone has their own level of risk aversity. If your battery degrades within the warranty, Kia will replace it. If you crash your car, your car insurance will fix it (or likely total it for the Soul EV, and then you can get another). If the car is out of warranty or you don't have car insurance, then yeah I'd say steer clear of any/all EVs at this point.

Update on my car after exactly 8 months and 6k miles later:







SOH is down to 106.5%. The Min/Max cell voltages still look good and are equally balanced. The Min/Max deterioration values have changed again. The max det is at 3.9% on cell #3, and the min det is at 3.0% on cell #1. Max det is down from 4.7% and the min det is up from 0.4% from 2 months ago.

Hi, first time poster. Just wanted to add my story. Original owner as of June 2015 on lease in Atlanta, to GA. Lease was to end June 2018 and we struggled whether to buy or turn in. Due to circumstances in busy life we decided to extend lease the 6 months, to Dec 10th, that was offered by KIA.
In August 2018 the range started to decrease dramatically, like others have stated. We were down to 60miles on a full charge. We took it to the KIA dealer who stated our driving caused the issued and if we drove the car "correctly" for the next 15+ drives, the range would come back. I knew this was BS, but we decided to give it a try. After 2 weeks no improvement in range. So we took it back to the KIA dealership and sure enough they decided the battery was bad and needed to be replaced. They offer a loaner car, KIA Niro hybrid, which we gladly accepted. The Niro is a cool car!
Oh, did I say we went to the dealer on Sept 7th. It is now Jan 2019 and still no repaired car and we are on our second loaner, KIA Sorrento. I'm not a fan of the Sorrento. To big.
We've run into a very interesting situation. Our lease ended on Dec 10th. We think we want to buy out the car since it will have a brand new battery, but we need to test it first. I have been getting calls from a nice gentleman at KIA every 3 weeks or so giving me a repair ETA update. I even went to the dealership. They have 2 Soul EV's waiting on battery replacement and state theres a nationwide shortage. Latest ETA for new battery to be ready is Jan 23rd.
I've talked to KIA every week in Dec about what to do since I do not have a car to turn in and may want to buy it, but I cannot buy a car that is inoperable. They are very nice and understand and just say keep us informed when the car is repaired.
We love the car. Question, would you buy it with a brand new battery? Given that Soul batteries have been upgraded to 30Kwh, are they replacing with newer batteries?

To be honest, in your situation I would not purchase the Soul EV. Heat kills the battery and you have been through 1 battery in 3.5 years, so odds are that you will be in the same situation in about another 3.5 years. Will you still have a valid battery warranty at that point?

From what others have reported, batteries are replaced like for like, you don't get updated to the bigger battery.

As you like the Niro hybrid, I would try and see if you can stretch the lease on your current Soul EV until they release the Niro EV. Double the range, double the power and a liquid cooled battery that should handle the heat a lot better.

I agree 100%. Your lease expired more than a month ago, I don't know why you're even involved with that car? Just return it and move on. I hope you're not currently making payments for a car that you don't even have.

Have you considered getting a Niro PHEV now or waiting for the new Niro EV to arrive later this year? If you really want to keep your own car, with a brand new battery, make sure you're getting a good price from KIA.

Thanks for the posts. From what I know the new battery would still covered under the original 10 year, 100.000 miles terms. But I will confirm. No we are not making payments on the car.
We are struggling because we love the car and it fits our in town needs. And, the very low cost to operate vs ICE car, and very low electric rates here.
With the new battery wouldn't the car have a higher resell value? However, I do not know the market for Soul EV's.
I wish we could buy the Niro, but too expensive at this time.

Yeah, that's a good question to ask (whether the replacement battery continues the original 10yr/100k warranty). In that case you should be OK buying the car since if it goes below 70% again, it will be replaced (assuming you want to go through that headache again). 2015 Soul EV should be worth $11-13k used currently in 2019, do some searches online. However, even with a new battery I doubt it will have a higher resale value.

Kish said:

Yeah, that's a good question to ask (whether the replacement battery continues the original 10yr/100k warranty). In that case you should be OK buying the car since if it goes below 70% again, it will be replaced (assuming you want to go through that headache again). 2015 Soul EV should be worth $11-13k used currently in 2019, do some searches online. However, even with a new battery I doubt it will have a higher resale value.

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+1
Won't have a higher resale value since most people looking at Soul EV are aware of 10yr 100,000mile warranty.
The new battery status would be more important for affecting resale towards end of warranty.


On that note; my 2015 Kia Soul EV was approved for Battery replacement. (Mark Kia in AZ will service Soul EVs) Sad news is my surface adviser said it may be 6 months before a new battery is put in it. So I have a loaner Optima for now. Since I saw people saying New batteries were supposed to arrive on Jan 23rd, O was hoping maybe I will get lucky and have a quick replacement.

Hoping that is the case and not just that I'll have to wait for the batch to arrive.

Anyone else in Arizona have their Soul EV battery replaced in a timely fashion? (Under 30 days)

I doubt that anyone in AZ has theirs replaced within 30 days. Soul EV was never allowed to be sold in AZ right? So I'm willing to bet that AZ has lowest priority when new battery shipment comes in. CA probably has the highest priority.

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Every Soul EV that has gone to Arizona has suffered severe battery degradation. There is an old thread about this.
Arizona SOUL EV Heat testing

My advice. Do not buy a Soul EV in Arizona.

JejuSoul said:

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Every Soul EV that has gone to Arizona has suffered severe battery degradation. There is an old thread about this.
Arizona SOUL EV Heat testing

My advice. Do not buy a Soul EV in Arizona.

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I had read that thread before purchasing.
I do not regret buying a Soul EV in Arizona. Mark Kia at least handles EV servicing rather than having to transport vehicle to Palm Springs, which was a huge factor in deciding to purchase a used "Compliance Car."

As long as it is covered by the Factory 10 year 100,000 mile Warranty and Dealer is providing a loaner vehicle for the length of repair...it seems like a much better deal than a used Leaf, Fiat 500e, E Golf, or Focus Electric alternative within the same price range. (Toyota RAV4 EV was almost twice as expensive used with no factory warranty.)

Hoping things will be different with upcoming liquid cooled Niro EV & Soul EV.

I'm up for a battery replacement now too. Started a new thread about it. Not clear how long it will take for the battery to arrive.

Given that Kia is eating the cost of rental cars for many months while owners wait for replacement batteries to arrive, why in the heck wouldn't they just ship a bunch over in advance to save all that rental car loss?

RT

My guess is that KIA has a corporate discount with the rental car agency, so it's probably costing them not much per day. Probably cheaper than having shipping a bunch of $16k batteries from SK to US and having them get baked sitting around in a warehouse somewhere.

The end of my saga has arrived. The battery replacement arrived, 6 months later, and the car was put back together. Since it was a lease, we decided to buy out the lease, IF, the residual value was negotiable since the residual value of the car was higher than KBB and NADA values. Both the dealer and KIA finance would not negotiate. And strangely I thought everything was negotiable. So they got their car back.
Fyi, they gave us loaner cars straight off the dealer lot, not rentals. Our last loaner was a 2019 Sorrento.
Good luck to all who have to have to have their battery replaced.

Kish said:

I doubt that anyone in AZ has theirs replaced within 30 days. Soul EV was never allowed to be sold in AZ right? So I'm willing to bet that AZ has lowest priority when new battery shipment comes in. CA probably has the highest priority.

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Update: I got my Soul EV back today

Has a 2018 Optima as free loaner. Mark Kia also replaced my 12Volt battery free of charge.

Went in 1/14/2019 and got back with 2/22/2019 so not 30 days from when I took it in.

However I only took it in because of the post saying batteries should be arriving on Jan 23rd. so considering I did get my vehicle back within Thirty days of Jan 23rd...I am guessing my replacement came from that shipment allotment.

roysco said:

..... Latest ETA for new battery to be ready is Jan 23rd. ....

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Do you have any idea what the tested SoH % was (for 47-48 miles on GOM)? The paperwork didn't mention a specific number. Just curious.
Anyways, glad that saga is over. Enjoy your "new" car!

Kish said:

Do you have any idea what the tested SoH % was (for 47-48 miles on GOM)? The paperwork didn't mention a specific number. Just curious.
Anyways, glad that saga is over. Enjoy your "new" car!

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On the Dealership paperwork that showed cost...papers that I had to sign saying Warranty covered cost(?)

It had SoH% that showed up was 44%. Stating SoH was low enough to warrant repair.

Vehicle had a Max of 67 miles when I bought it used in the fall, but the factory warranty is what swayed me to wards the Soul EV purchase rather than a 2017 Leaf.

Currently getting 94 miles driven before the 25% indicator comes on. Driving in non-ECO D until battery shows below 85% and then switching to non-ECO B mode for some recovery.

Hopefully the last time I will need another battery it will be near 2024, just before warranty will no longer cover battery.

Update on my car after exactly 1 year and 1 month and 9k miles later:







SOH is down to 105.1%. The Min/Max cell voltages have started to become slightly unbalanced: min sits at 4.12V and max is at 4.14V. The Min/Max deterioration values have changed: The max det is at 5.8% on cell #55, and the min det is at 4.0% on cell #14. Max det is up from 3.9% and the min det is up from 3.0% from 5 months ago.

Just wanted to chime in and say big thanks to everyone who relayed their experience on this thread, especially Kish - because of you all I knew exactly what questions to ask and what to watch out for as I brought my 2016 Soul EV in to Kia over my high-voltage battery losing capacity.

My range has been taking a dump over the past few months, too - but because I knew the precise test to ask for and stood there while the tech was performing it - I had the luck of being his first service of the day - I could make sure it got done and my car didn't float around in the queue of "we haven't diagnosed it yet."

...and it turns out the SOH test is just the tech plugging in an OBD reader and tapping a few screens on his tablet. 3 minutes from plug-in to result. I met the tech at 9am and by 9:15 he had verified that by battery SOH was 48%. Nobody gave me any runaround after that, yep, we'll order the part, yep, here's your rental car.

So thanks, guys, for arming me with the handful of phrases it took to make me sound to the service advisor like I knew more than him and to not screw around.

Sweet! That's great to hear, and you're welcome. In and out in 15 mins at a Kia dealer, that must be a record time! The magic keywords are "Give me HV battery SoH report!". Now the question is, how long this entire ordeal will take for you? For me it was done in 8 days, but others had to wait for months.

As an aside, SoH at 48% is crazy low. Are you the original owner of the vehicle? What kind of condition was the car in for the last few years? 48% of the original EPA miles (93) is like 45 miles. That means a round trip of no more than 22 miles without having to stop to recharge, ouch!

As another aside, I downloaded the new Soul EV Spy android app to see the battery voltages in an easy to read format, and everything seems to be in order: (this is fully charged battery at 100% SoC)