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Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

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Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#101
post #80

> To be extra clear, I don't post this stuff because I hate Tesla or anything. In fact, it's just the opposite. I hate seeing Tesla derail themselves with this kind of nonsense. I respect the OP for saying this. But I have a hard time respecting people buying Teslas, or anything from Musk. Is it not obvious that the guy is a charlatan? (and that the fish rots from the head?) How likely is it that you won't be robbed…

Someone called him out on twitter for his flirtation with toxic conservatism. They asked if he remembers what demographic buys 99% of his vehicles.

I didn’t see if he replied.

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#102
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same, though there were about a dozen previous reasons, starting with "pedo guy". This won't help, but I was pretty much long gone as a customer.

Tesla is also thousands of brilliant engineers that transformed the industry, and not just one guy who tweets a lot.

It took "thousands of brilliant engineers" to replace the engine of a vehicle with some large batteries?

I think you're overstating the "brilliance" of the engineers. I have no doubt the core of them working on the battery tech could be in the brilliant category, but the rest of those thousands of engineers are run-of-the-mill automotive engineers.

Would you describe Ford as being composed of thousands of brilliant engineers?

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#103
post #48

So the way I'm reading the post is Tesla swapped out a battery pack for a 60 with a 90 and enabled the 90. Tesla, years later, discovers that even though the hardware for a 90 was installed it should have been software limited to be a 60. (I'm assuming that Tesla only made the owner pay the cost of the 60 battery swap even though they replaced it with a 90). They go and "fix the glitch" and set it back to the 60. Sin…

Welcome to DRM hell.

Basically you're always going to want flexibility in hardware, but infinite limits in usage.

Tesla is in the wrong here. If your hardware allows greater range because it allows flexibility in warranty repairs, they need to eat it.

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A year ago, I would have chosen a new Tesla, hands down (disclosure: I am probably not gonna actually buy an EV for as many years as I can eke out of my trusty Subie). Nowadays, I have chatted with numerous folks that have purchased alternative EVs. The Tesla owners still seem the giddiest (There's a lot of 'em around here), but I have not heard one ounce of buyer's remorse from any of the other brands. The one that…

Bit of buyer's remorse from a Nissan Leaf now that most fast-charging stations don't support CHAdeMO.

OG Leaf owner here, and like sibling, we might have fast charged it twice. To me, fast charging is something useful for road trips. But if you take an OG (or even later model) Leaf on a road trip, that's your own fault. Eleven years of ownership, our upscale golf cart gets us to work, shopping, and everything else we thought we'd use it for when we bought it. And when we bought ours, it had 100 mile range (if you babied it), and no real charging infrastructure to speak of. We knew what we were getting into, and we'd do it again.

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#106
post #21

Devils advocate here. Does the action of the customer service person (and maybe their manager) reflect the real mission of the company? Could it be employees (for whatever reason) not realizing that leaving the full range unlocked is in the best interest of the company?

Why would the company hire employees, particularly those whose literal job description is to represent the company, who act against the real mission of the company? Occam's Razor applies.

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#107
post #17
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software locks themselves are nefarious. Is it the owner's car, or Tesla's?

Maybe this is a controversial opinion here, but I think software locks aren't inherently bad in a car that can be driven by software. I don't really trust Tesla's self-driving software as is, I certainly don't trust some random person's hack of already questionable Tesla code. This isn't an iPhone. Someone mucking about in the software can kill people.

While not exactly equivalent, what if the lock was on MPG on an ICE vehicle? Would that be reasonable?

Li-ion batteries have a huge environmental cost. To hide ⅓ of that material behind software is immoral (imho).

It sounds like they were swapping in a better part because they may have not had the original. In the past that was a “win” for the customer. It seems like Tesla has turned this into a loss for the customer (more weight on the vehicle) and a loss for humanity (70 tons of earth mined for unused lithium).

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#108

Reason 547 why you should not connect your car to the internet. Today it is limiting range because mistake several years ago, tomorrow it will be mandatory ads every time when you start a car.

It’s convenient though. You get live traffic data, international radio in high quality, maps with background pictures, music and video streaming, the possibility to pre-heat or pre-cool the car while walking to it and a few other things.

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#109
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same, though there were about a dozen previous reasons, starting with "pedo guy". This won't help, but I was pretty much long gone as a customer.

Funny enough, it was test driving a Tesla that got me interested in getting an EV as my next vehicle. And like many, Musk's behavior has dissuaded me from purchasing one, and instead likely a Ford.

No post body was provided.

Re: Tesla remotely converts battery pack, cutting 1/3 of range

#110
post #48

So the way I'm reading the post is Tesla swapped out a battery pack for a 60 with a 90 and enabled the 90. Tesla, years later, discovers that even though the hardware for a 90 was installed it should have been software limited to be a 60. (I'm assuming that Tesla only made the owner pay the cost of the 60 battery swap even though they replaced it with a 90). They go and "fix the glitch" and set it back to the 60. Sin…

> The previous owner shouldn't have sold it as a 90 or at least disclosed that, "It's a 60 but Tesla swapped out the batter with a 90 and left it configured as a 90"

I'm not as sure about this take. Imagine if this were something not connected to The Cloud; the seller sells the car they have, its not their responsibility, nor should it be, nor has it ever been, to know that this is a component that's Cloud Connected and Tesla can just take it away with no notice. No other car operates like that; even the new BMW shit isn't like that, its pretty clear "this is a subscription which is bound to your account, not the car".

Very few consumer physical goods operate like that. Here's a correlate: Intel bins chips. Imagine you buy a computer, you get an i5, years later its upgraded to an i7, years later Intel rolls around a software update and says "your desktop only shipped with an i5, we're disabling two of the cores". That's theoretically totally possible with Intel & partners control over microcode & chipset updates; but it would be wild to happen.

Now, put yourself in the shoes of someone selling that desktop: you sell the computer you have, it has an i7, "two years ago the chip was upgraded", that's it. Let's say the price difference between these two chips is, like, 20% of the total cost of the machine. Would you, the seller, accept 20% less; in other words, selling the laptop Intel may or may not create for the buyer, in the unknowable future? Would you, the buyer, be willing to pay 20% more, even knowing (or, more likely, not knowing) that Intel could nerf the performance at any time?

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