U.S. production of the 2013 Nissan Leaf moved one step closer to reality earlier last week. Leaf Motor production started trials at its facility in Decherd, where Nissan will start official U.S. production of the 2013 Leaf electric car’s motor production line–and its staff–are going through final production test runs before the plant commences official motor manufacturing later this year.
Currently made in Japan, the Leaf’s electric motor contains around one mile of copper wiring, and takes Nissan longer to assemble than a conventional gasoline engines. Nissan says it takes around 25 shift workers in total to ensure an electric motor is made correctly from its raw materials to finished product.