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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

#641

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You can order a new car, configured as you like, with almost any brand. You'll get an ETA and a tracker that shows when it's going into production, when it's leaving the factory, when it's on a ship/boat/truck to your dealer, and when it's ready for pickup. You can get most dealers to agree in writing not to add any markups if you reserve a car with their dealership as the delivery point. That's how most people are b…

You technically can sometimes, but in my experience it's really difficult to actually do that. Dealerships get limited custom order bank allocations, and if you're not really early when the MY order bank opens your order will potentially slip a model year or even more (at least for in-demand models). For Hyundai specifically I was looking for the Limited trim, and I've been told they're only allocating custom orders…

I've done it twice with VW for ID4s. There's no special time period to order, and you don't need to talk to a dealership first, you can order from the VW website any time. If your car doesn't go into production until after a model year rolls over, then you get that newer model year.

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

#642

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> > in what world > In our world? Based on the thread, Tesla did a battery service on a model of car with a 60 battery. Unless it was stated as upgraded, after the service it is still a 60 car to the manufacturer. A 60 car that just happened to be able to run at the performance level of a 90 version. They then state this is a bug and fixed it. It is completely irrelevant what type of car it is, they installed a 90 ba…

> and enabled it Did they though...? If they did you'd think there'd be documentation of that provided as a part of the service. The problem with this is that there is no direct comparable parallel. Physical removal is not allowed, and that most agree with. But this is not the same, there was no physical change, only a software lock. You and I would maybe like it to be treated the same, but it isn't yet. Software lic…

Did they enable it? Yes. They did. Or it wouldn't have worked. And they wouldn't have been able to disable it.

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

#643
post #17

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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…

The energy cost difference with regenerative braking is essentially negligible between these two cars. Adding several hundred pounds to my EV driving around makes little difference by my measurements. And as to the idea of the lithium being wasted, that might not necessarily be true as well. Its not like those extra cells will never be used, its just the pack will never really hit 100% charge and will never really hit 0% charge, it'll essentially always be somewhere above 0% and below 100%. This will allow better wear leveling over the whole pack, so if the car is used a decent bit it'll get more miles on its life than the smaller pack.

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

#644

Consumers have the power here and are giving up more and more rights every day. In the EU they can now remotely speed limit your car. If you think the push for EVs is for the environment think again, they are a dubious tradeoff with a bigger environmental impact. The EV push is meant to take away your control over the assets that you "own". If you don't fight back now, you won't be able to own anything in 5 years.

Oh jeez. This has nothing to do with EVs. Most EVs, in fact, are nowhere near as intrusively leashed to the mothership as Teslas are. My wife's Bolt is just a car that happens to use electric motors instead of gas. As are most EVs. Also, if you think EVs are worse for the environment, then you are exposing your ideologically-driven ignorance.

when you factor manufacturing emissions and impact , along with grid impact and waste , EVs are a clear loser

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

#645
post #276
post #142

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I hear this a lot about Tesla: "I would have chosen a Tesla, but now..." But now, your choices are among legacy car makers and their dealer networks, which were never a joy to interact with most of whom, Hyundai and maybe Nissan excepted, are just bringing out their first serious EVs. Yeah, Tesla is overhyped. But their competition mostly, still, sucks. Nobody has, and nobody will for at least another year or two, ma…

In Ford's case, a dealer network with no ability to negotiate (Ford told them the pricing was fixed) so there goes the biggest complaint. Other than that, I get a local business I can sue if something goes wrong and regulated by local authorities. Sounds better to me!

Ford is not legally allowed to state that. However I think they are strongly pushing the dealers to that.

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

#646
post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear this a lot about Tesla: "I would have chosen a Tesla, but now..." But now, your choices are among legacy car makers and their dealer networks, which were never a joy to interact with most of whom, Hyundai and maybe Nissan excepted, are just bringing out their first serious EVs. Yeah, Tesla is overhyped. But their competition mostly, still, sucks. Nobody has, and nobody will for at least another year or two, ma…

It kinda sounds like the Tesla after-purchase support is less than a joy, though.

Experiences are highly mixed. The Tesla mobile services is a joy for many people for any kind of smaller issue. They just show up while you work or when you don't need your car.

The software support in terms of updates is very good, and you still get updates to years old software.

Where they struggle is not enough service capacity and parts shortages. What you would expect from a car maker growing 50% and the service capacity has not grown as fast.

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

#647

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It would be amazing if Tesla were a worker cooperative where that were possible. Trying to hold Elon to a standard in his companies gets you fired, not him: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-17/spacex-fi...

How can any self respecting individual work in such an environment? It's sad to know there are so many talented engineers that spend all of their days making amazing things that Elon just takes credit for.

I'm sorry but working for Tesla and building electric vehicles is more useful and more moral then most other companies. No matter if you think the CEO is an ass.

If people knew or cared all the dumb shit all other car CEO said in their live, or all the corruption they engage in with the Union bosses and the list of things goes on.

Compare working at Tesla and working at Lockheed Martin for example. How can self respecting engineer work there? You are literally building bombs that illegally blow up US citizens (and weddings) around the world.

So if 'CEO fired a some people who clearly were not on board with CEO management style' is the reason for a moral panic, there are a whole lot of places you can never work at. And that's fine, but lets be clear about that.

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

#648

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

Exactly, so they should do the only logical thing and vote out Elon as Tesla's CEO so he stops destroying whatever public image they have left. Elon doesn't "do" anything besides be a double edged hype machine.

It my shock you, but most people in the world down know who Elon Musk is and the same goes for many people in the US. And many people, some the same don't know that Tesla and Elon Musk have anything to do with each other.

Also, firing the CEO when the company is growing at breakneck speed while also having industry leading margin. Just for example, Tesla NetIncome this Q matched Ford and GM combined at 1/10 the revenue and in a Quarter where Tesla main factory was mostly closed.

So I guess the question is how highly do you value image compared to 12 years of amazing growth.

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

#649
post #498

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

Which is why more and more auto companies are opening offices in SV to poach them. Hell, when was the last time Tesla released a new car? The Big Auto companies are rolling out new models every other week. Fact is, Tesla blew a lead and aren’t impressing.

Yeah other car companies are really, really good at announcing new car models. I mean look at GM, so amazing by 2025 they are gone have 30 EVs.

Of course in the last 6 month they have sold less then 10k EVs, about what Tesla does in a week or so. But I guess they announced many new models.

> Fact is, Tesla blew a lead and aren’t impressing.

A lead in what? They are dominating both in terms of volume and in terms of profitability. A few years ago everybody was hype about how VW would blew Tesla doors within a year or two, well turns out Tesla still matches VW for growth.

> Hell, when was the last time Tesla released a new car?

The question is, what is the goal? To release a car because you have released a car? Is that your goal?

Because what matters in the real world is growth and profit. And if you have a fixed supply because of chips and batteries. Just building more different models while you can still sell your existing model is just financially idiotic.

Other manufactures like VW spend billions to turn the ID.4 into a Skoda that is basically the exact same inside.

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

#650

Are there any new EVs that aren't 4-wheel iPhones? Heck, it feels like all new cars are like this (vehicle is "managed" by the car company). I'd love to buy an EV that was basically like the original Tesla Roadster: four wheels, a bunch of batteries, and that's it. The only way I know to get this is to do your own EV conversion. Not 100% sure, though. ???

Yes all new vehicles have computers and can be upgraded. Mercedes even has a car where you are not allowed to open the hood. Welcome to the modern world.

> four wheels, a bunch of batteries, and that's it.

Go watch tear-down the car, there is a lot more.

However I don't think cheap EV like the Bold are nearly as managed and basically work like an old school car.

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