Featured EVs have fewer repairs?

Not in the Common Wealth since the Sunday Mail was sued by Sudbury for slander. <GRINS>

Bob Wilson

 

Not so, gear oil is also present, but it tends to be treated as a lifetime fill.

Also, smog checks aren't wear items, but they are expenditures related to the legal operation of the vehicle in the areas where they're required.

 

It has to do with the large investment Toyota made into the entire production line for NiMH batteries, and they like to squeeze their investments dry. Just look to the Yaris and Corollal models in the US. They were and still are using 4 speed automatics for years after the competition switched to more efficient models, and their engines are dated in terms of technology the company has available.

BASF had an announcement a few years ago now that NiMH has room for improvement. The main hurdle for it is cost. The required nickel simply costs more than lithium. To everyone except for perhaps Toyota, Li-ion is cheaper than NiMH at this point in time. maybe BASF will come through with what they say, but that won't change the fact that nickel is simply a rarer element here on Earth.

 

We'll I've got my spare Gen-1 pack stored with the Kugerands.

Bob Wilson

 

The only real measure it lifetime maintenance costs...or at least 10 or 12 years.
But we don't have that much data yet on EVs.

Mike

 

From what I’ve seen, one of the biggest advantages of EVs is how much simpler the drivetrain is compared to traditional gas vehicles. Fewer moving parts usually means fewer things that can fail over time, especially when it comes to oil systems, transmissions, and exhaust components. That said, I think people sometimes underestimate how important specialized maintenance still is. As EV adoption grows, having access to reliable ev repair services will probably become a much bigger discussion, especially for battery diagnostics and software-related issues. I also wonder how independent repair shops will adapt over the next few years since most EV repairs still seem heavily tied to dealerships and manufacturer systems.

 

unfortunately, after 25 years of hybrids, there are still very few repair shops outside of dealerships.
I hope ev repair becomes more commonplace, but it won't as long as we're fixated on gassers

 

It seems to me that mechanical repair is becoming less and less common in general. It's more about general maintenance and then suddenly, "Oh! You know you need a new engine (or transmission, or both, or an HV battery as in the case of EVs) and it will cost more to fix than what the car is worth."

 

Assembly is optimized to reduce costs. Design for field repair is more expensive and seems to be a lost art. One that seems to be an anti-goal of manufacturing. For an extreme example, see ‘John Deer’.

Bob Wilson

 

the trade off seems worth it to keep new car prices down. I want to explore car prices and inflation

 

this is interesting.price-inflation
the only problem is that you can't compare apples to apples. cars are so much better today than the 70's, when I first started driving.

 

My first car was a 1960 Volvo PV544 in 1964. i suppose my 3 person family has had at least 30 cars in the intervening years. Every make and model under the sun (but no turbos nor plug-ins nor EVs).

I have had a single failure I paid for by me (an Acura transmission at 70k miles due to a poor recall repair done 20k miles earlier by a dealer). Zero oil or exhaust repairs.

And if I have a failure, I have dozens of convenient shops that know how to repair them.

 

My co-worker has a Tesla and had to replace tires after a year! Why? Because it will burn rubber on all 4 when you floor it and who doesn't like showing that off to folks??? (I made him show me twice!!)

I haven't confirmed it, but heard car insurance can be 10-15% more than for an ICE vehicle...that would stink since rates are, already, insane here in mini-California...I mean, Colorado.

 

I changed to a different, longer wear, lower rolling resistance tires for my Model 3. Now I get ~60,000 miles out of them using:

• Replace rear drive tires when wear bars are flush
• Front tires to rear
• New pair on front

This minimizes tire costs while increasing from ~4 mi/kWh to ~4.5 mi/kWh. Still goes like scat in traffic.

Bob Wilson

 

You must not drive in the rain much. Down to the wear bars!?!? Any idea what that does to your stopping distance when there are puddles of rain in the tire ruts on the road? Google tirerack's tests. Scary how tread depth affects how fast you hit something with worn tires when newer ones would have stopped you. Can be as much as a 50 MPH difference.

And was in a tire shop the other day and reading some of their signage while waiting. Was very specific about new tires go on the back.

 

We get a little wet in Dixie. Since March 2019, no surprises with one exception, OEM on front and my efficiency tires on rear.

There was an unfortunate instability with FSD that limited cruise top speed:

• Quality 4-wheel alignment raised critical speed 5 mph
• Max sidewall pressure added another 5 mph
• Replaced OEM tires and problem solved

Manual steering had enough driver feedback to suppress the oscillation but defeated why I bought FSD.

I do appreciate references to other sources. Retired engineer, I like to run my own tests as sometimes “common wisdom” is not so wise. <GRINS>

Bob Wilson

 

over on the bolt forums, a few people only got 15k out of the front tires because the high torque can easily spin them from a stop.
so far, at 13k, mine look like new, and most seem to get 40+.
oems are Michelin self sealing.
bolt has no scheduled maintenance until 5 year coolant change.