2016 Soul EV+ Battery Replacement - Remanufactured?

[JejuSoul]

A comment I posted today on the German forum talking about replacement packs.
Akku nun getauscht ehem. / Soul 2015 lädt bis 94% nach BMS Update / Antrag Akkutausch
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Screenshot taken today from - KiaPartsNow website



The interesting aside that I take from this is that the SK Innovation E375 cells for the original soul EV were in production from July 2014 to May 2016.
The newer E400 cells for the MY2018 Soul EV began production exactly a year before that car was released. There must have been a considerable stock of the older cells when the changeover occurred. But given that the original cells are no longer produced and presumably no longer in stock replacement battery packs must now use the newer cells. A possible exception to this is the refurbished packs seen in the US. Theoretically they could get the older cells that are in good condition from crashed cars, or from cars that had a replacement battery but only a single cell was bad. I am guessing this has happened based on the fact that my replacement pack is obviously better than the original and yet many US posts have commented that the new battery does not seem to be so good. The part number for those packs is 37510 E4200R REMAN PACK ASSY-BATT.

 

[JejuSoul]

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Here in Jeju a friend of mine went in for his replacement battery last week.
He only had a 1 week wait between getting an official SOH of 64% and taking the car in for the new battery.
There is still a pile of crates with Soul EV batteries outside the service centre.
It took them 2 hours to do the swap.
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[kiaaruba]

HI to all, I am in the process of trying to buy a Remanufactured battery pack with part # 37510-E4200R . As i live in Aruba I have to ship this battery by sea freight to Aruba from USA, for the export I need an MSDS (material safety data sheet) of according to shipping regulations the battery is a HAZMAT item. Can anyone provide me a MSDS of the battery pak with part number 37510-E4200R or 37510-E4200?
Would be great. Thanks in advance

 

[DrivingForce]

Just curious, but this 70% SOH guarantee seems a little ridiculous. In theory, if they gave you a 70% battery and then in a year it deteriorated to 65%, they'd have to replace it again. Makes much more sense to give owners the best replacements available.

 

[IanL]

Just curious, but this 70% SOH guarantee seems a little ridiculous. In theory, if they gave you a 70% battery and then in a year it deteriorated to 65%, they'd have to replace it again. Makes much more sense to give owners the best replacements available.

It seems that, in Europe, they currently give you at minimum, a complete set of new cells, so you start again at 100%. Although maybe not in the US?

 

[MrFlibble]

So, I just got a call from Kia. Turns out that my battery has failed. My range went from around 90 miles down to 37 in very short order recently. (55535 miles on Odometer) And it cannot run well for long periods on the highway before displaying the “turtle” icon on the dash.

It will be a 6 week wait for the new battery (I will take the car back in the meantime) but I was promised the 30 kWh battery as a replacement.

I am pretty happy about that!

 

[FLKiaEV]

My 2016 Kia Soul EV has been at my local Kia dealer since November 26, 2021 waiting for the replacement battery to arrive. Luckily, a) it's covered under warranty and b) they have supplied me with a loaner car, a 2021 Hyundai Sonata. Nice car, but every day I am reminded why I miss my EV! So next Wednesday it will be two months that I've been waiting. Considering the state of the world right now I'm a little worried that I'm not going to get my car back until later in the year. I hope I'm wrong.

 

[MrFlibble]

So.... It's 3 months later and.... no battery. Car currently has a range of 29 miles max.

Disappointing so far.

 

[FLKiaEV]

Yep. Twelve more days and it will be 4 months that I've been waiting for a battery. I have been assured that it is being manufactured and then being shipped, but it seems that even Kia Consumer Affairs can't get much more info than that. At least the dealership gave me a loaner car - a gas 2021 Hyundai Sonata - so I can at least still go to work, etc. I can only imagine how much that rental car bill is going to be for them (it's from Enterprise Rent-a-car).

 

[biffidum]

Finally got my battery replacement, so I thought I would offer that hope to anyone still waiting (was ordered Oct 13, 2021 arrived Mar 31, 2022 ). I have not probed the new battery with Soulspy yet, but I'm thinking it is a regular 27kW battery as it has not displayed a range above 145km in three charge cycles. Although, after limping along with 44km range for months now, 144km it feels luxurious!

This time around we will be charging to 80% most of the time. If I can get almost 6 years with a battery that I basically abused (highway speeds, mostly 100% charging all the time, etc..). This should at the VERY least, last another 6 years. That means that I would have owned a car for approx 12 years with 220,000km (estimated) with NO maintenance fees whatsoever. Our brakes are not even half worn!

Win win....

 

[FLKiaEV]

Exactly my thoughts, biffidum: I will be charging to 80% most of the time with the occasional 100% charge only because I hear that it helps to calibrate the battery if it is fully charged approximately once every 10 cycles or so.

I've now been waiting 4 months and about 12 days, but I SHOULD be getting the phone call in the next few weeks because the Kia Consumer Services lady called me a while back and said they are fulfilling the October orders currently and mine was from November, so fingers crossed...

The Warranty Manual that comes with the car says that they reserve the right to replace the battery with a used one with a SOH of at least 70%, but it sounds like they are manufacturing new ones in this situation. Besides, it wouldn't make sense for them to give me one that is close to the "replace" threshold since I have more than 4 years left on the vehicle warranty and they'd probably be replacing it again. So, again, fingers crossed!

 

[FLKiaEV]

UPDATE: Amazing coincidence, but on my way to work today I got a call from Kia Consumer Relations telling me that my battery is FINALLY leaving Korea and that it will hit the California port on April 25th. After being sent to one of Kia's parts warehouses and then to my actual dealership it will probably be the first or second week of May when I get the call from the dealership saying that it's ready to be picked up. By that time it will have been just over five months that my Kia has been awaiting the battery at the dealership...

 

[IanL]

...... Besides, it wouldn't make sense for them to give me one that is close to the "replace" threshold since I have more than 4 years left on the vehicle warranty and they'd probably be replacing it again. So, again, fingers crossed!

Your car is a 2016, with the old technology cells. Your replacement battery should have the new tech, cells, which suggests you are very unlikely to need a new battery in 4 years. No-one knows yet how long the new cells will last, but mine is over 4 years old, and still not dropped below the 100% mark. My estimate is that is at something like 102-103%.

 

[FLKiaEV]

Ah, that's great to hear IanL! I was kind of hoping they'd replace it with the slightly larger 2018 battery pack (30KWH instead of 27KWH), but either way I'll be happy to be seeing 100-ish miles of range. Wow, 4 years old and still holding at 100%? That's great! I will definitely be taking extra super good care of this one (even more so than the previous one) by charging to 80% as much as possible and rarely using DC Fast charging. I hear it's a good idea to charge to 100% about every 10 cycles too.

 

[IanL]

I expect you will still get a 96 cell-pairs battery. The 30kWh battery has 100 cell-pairs, so you should have 96/100x30 = 28.8 kWh . Not bad!

 

[FLKiaEV]

Is that the usable capacity or does that 28.8 include the buffer?

 

[IanL]

My understanding is that the 30kWh capacity is the usable capacity, and so excludes the buffer. Therefore the 28.8 also excludes the buffer.

 

[FLKiaEV]

Cool. REALLY looking forward to getting my car back! The battery pack is scheduled to arrive at the port in California on or around April 25, but with the slow pace of the unloading of freighters I'm hoping that it won't be sitting on a boat at the port for another 2 or 3 months waiting to be unloaded... <Fingers crossed>

 

[Mdbuilder]

Ah, that's great to hear IanL! I was kind of hoping they'd replace it with the slightly larger 2018 battery pack (30KWH instead of 27KWH), but either way I'll be happy to be seeing 100-ish miles of range. Wow, 4 years old and still holding at 100%? That's great! I will definitely be taking extra super good care of this one (even more so than the previous one) by charging to 80% as much as possible and rarely using DC Fast charging. I hear it's a good idea to charge to 100% about every 10 cycles too.

I've had my replacement battery for a couple weeks now, it is charging to 103-105 miles. Seems pretty accurate as the miles since the last charge + the miles on the meter add up to 103+ as I drive it down to 20% or so.

 

[FLKiaEV]

Good to know, Mdbuilder. I'll report back on how many miles I end up with with a full charge once I get my car back.