Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#401

Post by dev_tty01 » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:23 AM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #116

passivate wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>that they won’t accept a hack fix (however safe it may be) - that car is going to be sold to someone once the lease expires, they just can’t take the risk But why are you calling it a hack fix? Also, why would a competent third-party repair shop be "risky"? A customer should be free to pick out an experienced and competent repair-shop just the way they currently do for their cars. And if they don't want to, they can…

> A customer should be free to pick out an experienced and competent repair-shop just the way they currently do for their cars. And if they don't want to, they can take it to the dealership like they would have anyway. I would agree, as long as that third party has insurance in the event their fix (due to work performed on the high voltage battery pack) causes a failure resulting in the loss of the vehicle and liabil…

No chance. The battery is loaded with sensors. Any charging is going to stop immediately if the temperature gets too high. Even your cell phone has battery temperature sensors built in to the battery pack.

People get all sorts of repairs done all the time. What makes a Tesla so special? Ever had your brakes replaced at a repair shop? Somehow the world doesn't stop turning and all the liability issues you speak of don't seem to be a problem, yet brake failure would be very bad.

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#402

Post by Meph504 » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:24 AM UTC

gameswithgo wrote: post #320

Meph504 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> why would a competent third-party repair shop be "risky"? because of terminology like this "Electrified Garage also notes that the cooling system doesn't get anywhere near as hot as an internal combustion engine, and it's not likely that it would either, given that the operating temperature for most lithium-ion batteries is well below 60 degrees Celsius." So this repair is made on anecdotal observation of ideal con…

As someone who has a great deal of experience working on high performance cars and racing them, I feel your characterization of this fix as a “hack” is ridiculous. People do more questionable fixes and ferraris and lambos regularly.

Do you rent most of them? Because that is the crux of matter, if the guy owned the car, hell I'm all for them doing what they want, and fixing how they choose, and I think Telsa should legally be required to provide the manuals, software, and within reason make the parts available.

But this case is, that the guy is renting the car, and Tesla wants him to fix to their standards, and he's trying to pass of this fix, which you have to admit is questionably, and they didn't agree to it.

In this case, I'm not sure how right to repair would make any difference.

And when your motor is going to only last 30k miles, you can probably get away with a lot more, as opposed to a fix that is expected to last 200-300k.

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#403

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:27 AM UTC

dev_tty01 wrote: post #401

toomuchtodo wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A customer should be free to pick out an experienced and competent repair-shop just the way they currently do for their cars. And if they don't want to, they can take it to the dealership like they would have anyway. I would agree, as long as that third party has insurance in the event their fix (due to work performed on the high voltage battery pack) causes a failure resulting in the loss of the vehicle and liabil…

No chance. The battery is loaded with sensors. Any charging is going to stop immediately if the temperature gets too high. Even your cell phone has battery temperature sensors built in to the battery pack. People get all sorts of repairs done all the time. What makes a Tesla so special? Ever had your brakes replaced at a repair shop? Somehow the world doesn't stop turning and all the liability issues you speak of don…

[deleted]

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#404

Post by kube-system » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:28 AM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #342

kube-system wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tesla doesn’t market their cars as exceptionally repairable, I don’t think that repairability was an engineering priority. Prioritizing certain product attributes above others is not “shoddy engineering”, it is part of the normal textbook engineering process. The project management triad is a relationship between Cost, Quality, and Timeline. Elon wanted to be the first-to-market with an affordable modern electric car…

It doesn't matter, the industry as a whole has marketed cars as repairable (mostly indirect marketing). They had to 100 years ago and it stuck. Tesla doesn't have a choice as the precident is already set in law

Meh, that legal precedent is pretty weak. They have to sell you parts for 10 years and are held to some basic standard of warranty.

It’s 100% legal to make it a complete PITA to repair a car both in the cost of labor and parts. Italian exotics have been doing it for decades.

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#405

Post by abrokenpipe » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:32 AM UTC

kube-system wrote: post #260

abrokenpipe wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually rentals require/include max comprehensive insurance (regulations vary based on the state in US), so if the warranty doesn't cover it then the insurance should. While I am on the side of right to repair I don't see how this is that relevant to the issue. It seems like more of an issue with insurance/rental laws, transparency in legal agreements, tesla's pricing & service being a bad deal, and possibly negligen…

The article doesn’t say his insurance wouldn’t cover it. It says his comprehensive coverage on his insurance wouldn’t cover it. Which is highly likely because this type of incident is usually a collision claim. If he has comprehensive at all then he almost certainly has collision coverage. It’s just that, then it’s $16k accident that’s he’s at fault for.

I'm not sure if it said he had comprehensive, sounds like he didn't, but the wording is a bit strange.

> "the owner's insurance policy didn't cover comprehensive claims from road debris"

My guess was that this would have been a comprehensive claim, but he didn't have that insurance plan. Could just be a deceptive play on words to evade the real issue...

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#406

Post by kumarvvr » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:32 AM UTC

wtallis wrote: post #399

kumarvvr wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, 60 psi? Thats like 40 meters of head. So you must be using booster pumps to get the pressure. Never knew this. In India, 99.99% of all homes have gravity flow and static pressure, so except for very tall buildings, no one gets pressure more than 5 - 10 psi.

40m doesn't seem at all surprising if you consider the height of a water tower built somewhere with higher elevation than most of the town. My house is 20m lower than the base of either of the two nearest water towers, at least one of which is ~75m tall. A few years ago, the town completed migrating one of the outlying areas with lots of new development into their central pressure zone, resulting in an increase by 45…

Sorry, for got to mention. Most of India does not have direct water connections.

Most homes have borewells, storage tanks and intermitten municipal supply. So there is no direct line from local municipal water tower to homes.

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#407

Post by RHSeeger » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:35 AM UTC

wtallis wrote: post #399

kumarvvr wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, 60 psi? Thats like 40 meters of head. So you must be using booster pumps to get the pressure. Never knew this. In India, 99.99% of all homes have gravity flow and static pressure, so except for very tall buildings, no one gets pressure more than 5 - 10 psi.

40m doesn't seem at all surprising if you consider the height of a water tower built somewhere with higher elevation than most of the town. My house is 20m lower than the base of either of the two nearest water towers, at least one of which is ~75m tall. A few years ago, the town completed migrating one of the outlying areas with lots of new development into their central pressure zone, resulting in an increase by 45…

> Pressure reducing valves are used anywhere the pressure going into a home is above 80 PSI, and those are a lot more common than homes needing their own booster pumps

My house has one of these, as the pressure would go up to 90 psi sometimes (iirc). Weirdly, my water pressure isn't consistent and can still burst to a "visibly from the tap" higher pressure for a few minutes at a time. I have no idea what causes it.

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#408

Post by dev_tty01 » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:36 AM UTC

DannyBee wrote: post #292

cartoonworld wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The right move is to route the coolant lines away from harmful road debris or add a shield or deflector. If the coolant line is the protection for the case, that sounds like a big mistake. The owner is indeed lucky that the bunge snapped off rather than crack the case, spilling gallons of toxic coolant all over the place and resting his un-burnt flesh in the failsafes of this battery monitoring system. It really smac…

Look. I will never own or consider a Tesla given what i've seen, and will happily take them to task. But i think this is a bit far. It's pretty common in ICE vehicles for the oil pan to be easily damaged by road debris, and the oil it spills is more toxic than coolant. In particular, the Tesla's use glycol for cooling, which is not that bad to spill (certainly better than most oils). So while certainly not better tha…

Yes. Don't forget that Chrysler sold a car where the water pump was at the highest point in the system. Slightly low coolant level, no more pumping, no more cooling, no more driving. Lots of manufacturers make a few cost-cutting, weight-saving, or whatever choices that ultimately harm durability.

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#409

Post by kube-system » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:40 AM UTC

effingwewt wrote: post #379

tylersmith wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a stretch to describe road debris hitting the undercarriage of a car a "collision". The insurance that covers such an event is literally called collison insurance.

Indeed. I have full coverage with Geico, as well as uninsured motorist coverage, damage etc. Well the other night some asshole decided to pac-man all the cones on the highway late at night so we had to navigate a field of almost impossible to see cones (the borders are black and there were no lights up). Several cars, including mine ended up running over a few. I got lucky as it just messed up my paint a bit on the f…

Yikes. That’s an unfortunate but sadly common mistake. Terms like “full coverage” don’t really have any real meaning, despite people repeating the made-up term.

I am fairly certain that it would be illegal for an agent to sell that to you without clarifying.

Funny enough, one of the first articles to pop up in a search for this is from Geico: https://www.geico.com/information/aboutinsurance/auto/full-c...

Re: Tesla’s $16k Quote for a $700 Fix Is Why Right to Repair Matters

#410

Post by hnburnsy » Tue, Jul 13, 2021, 4:40 AM UTC

41209 wrote: post #266

Couldn't the lease holder just buy the car from Tesla if they want to do weird stuff like this ? I know I wouldn't want to buy an electric car if random guys been messing with the battery pack. Edit , isn't the bigger story the insurance not covering it ?

Tesla does not allow the buy option at the end of the lease for Model 3/Y. On the insurance, the leaseee admitted he made a mistake and omitted coverage.

https://www.tesla.com/support/leasing/lease-end-options