141–150 of 161 posts
The other thing is, that you should be able to enter tow mode just from an external power supply, so it will be trivial to pull it out of your garage.
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I've run down the battery on my car, motorcycle, mower, or other vehicles I don't often use. It is not an expensive ($40,000) fix -- often it just takes a recharge because lead-acid batteries are not as easily damaged as lithium-ion. Replacement is relatively cheap too. When you talk about tire deformation, this is rare and would not happen before many years of disuse. And engine seizure? Again, unlikely to happen ev…
> When you talk about tire deformation, this is rare and would not happen before many years of disuse. My Ford owner's manual says otherwise. According to it, the tires will be damaged at a prolonged period, if the car sits at the same spot. Maybe not deformed per se, but damaged. It's recommended that the car should be placed on supports if long-term (say, more than a month) storage is required.
My personal experience says otherwise.
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The response from Tesla does not contradict that notion. Note this quote: "It's true that a full discharge to zero percent state of charge can potentially be damaging to a battery. " Notice that "can potentially be damaging" is a weasel phrase for "brick". Further Tesla argues that to avoid discharge to zero percent "all that needs to be done is to tow the vehicle to a charger". Again, this misses the main point of t…
My understanding of what this post meant is that a full discharge is prevented by the controller in the battery itself - much like in laptops, and much like everyone here was surprised that the Tesla battery does not have. So, to be clear, my understanding of this post, with full clarity, is: "A full discharge is disastrous. However, the situations reported were not full discharges. The controller in the battery shut…
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I think the fact that you are agreeing with an article either written directly by Tesla PR or paid for by Tesla PR, which has a minority opinion on the matter, which is backed up by statements which are in disagreement to both knowledgeable parties and the Tesla owner's manual, is frankly unflattering. I bet I can find some blogger who can make a better argument about the holocaust never happening, then this lousy ex…
I stated an opinion and my reasons for holding it. I don't owe you a disclaimer about whether the linked article (which I didn't reference, btw) happens to be full of shit. If you form all of your opinions worrying about all the idiots or evil people who might happen to agree with you, or use your arguments to further their own nefarious ends, you're destined to lead a very quiet life. > ICE proved itself. ICE isn't…
Secondly, my argument is not that you should worry about who also supports your argument, -but if you are going to agree with an article, find a better poster child. Otherwise, your argument holds little value as the original article refuses to support itself with research or references. I am certain that there is an article that accomplishes your opinion AND supports itself with evidence of some kind. Instead it sounds like before you even read the article you had your opinion, found the first article that agreed with your opinion, and called it a day.
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Nobody said an electric car is maintenance free. The problem here is that it can total itself in a relatively short time just from not being used. Your statements about seized engine and deformed tires are not valid in the timeframe we are talking about here. It's unlikely even for the battery to go, and if it does that's a trip to the store and $100, not a $40k service plus getting an UNTOWABLE vehicle to California…
I find it seriously hard to believe that there's not a manual drivetrain disconnect. I do find it easy to believe that a tow-truck driver didn't know it had one, as I've seen them drag automatic vehicles rather than pull the transmission disconnect. I also don't find it hard to believe that most people don't know that these things exist.
It's interesting that they did not refute this untowable claim in their rebuttal.
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>Which, for many drivers, may as well be $40k. Did you really go ahead and conflate $7,000 and and $40,000? $7000 buys me a decent used car. $40,000 buys me a brand new Toyota Prius (MSRP $24,700) with almost enough change left over to buy a brand new Hyundai Elantra (MSRP $15,345). $7,000 is not a small chunk of change, by any means. It's a lot less, however, than $40,000. Conflating the two does no one any good.
I'm saying I put the same level of effort, as a consumer, into avoiding a $7k repair as I would a $40k repair. That is: maximum effort.
Telsa should institute a completely unconditional agreement to replace your batteries should they fail for any reason for $7K (or less).
They are the ones that actually are more aware of what can brick one of these things so let them demonstrate the unlikeliness with their pocket book.
And we both agree that $XK leads to no difference in attention from the owners.
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I've run down the battery on my car, motorcycle, mower, or other vehicles I don't often use. It is not an expensive ($40,000) fix -- often it just takes a recharge because lead-acid batteries are not as easily damaged as lithium-ion. Replacement is relatively cheap too. When you talk about tire deformation, this is rare and would not happen before many years of disuse. And engine seizure? Again, unlikely to happen ev…
Firstly, given that gas contains up to 10% ethanol now, no, your engine will be seriously damaged if you leave your car with gasoline in it for ten years and then start it without flushing it first. That's because the ethanol attracts water, and water does not compress as easily as gasoline, and the attempt to spray a high volume of water into your cylinder and then compress it will likely destroy something along the…
If a car is left to sit for a year the gas will be bad, but there will likely be no further repair necessary other than flushing the fuel system. This is relatively cheap. Even if one mistakenly tries to start it and gets water in the engine, the repairs are far less costly than the $40,000 battery price tag on the tesla.
I had mentioned a decade specifically in regard to engine seizure -- you will not have this problem over a shorter time period such as one year. Nor will you have dry-rot of your hosing or any other major mechanical malfunction. Ruined gas and a dead battery are about the limits of damage in the one year period -- possibly a tire may go flat.
The big deal is that if I leave my $80k gasoline car in a garage for a year it will take very little to get it running again. Probably a few hundred bucks. Perhaps up to several thousand dollars if I foolishly try to start it and get very unlucky. But you can't reasonably construct a scenario where a garaged gasoline car is likely to sustain $40,000 in damages just from safely sitting out of the elements. It's just not possible, period.
It turns out that the poster of the original story is the owner of one of the 'bricked' Teslas. This was apparently leaked to hurt his credibility but at least for me it only enhances it, as it seems he had a first-hand experience with the brick problem. http://jalopnik.com/5887499/who-is-trying-to-smear-the-tesla...
> "I'm not stupid, it wasn't a mistake" Any lithium battery is damaged after 2 months at 0% charge. How isn't that a mistake?
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I'm pretty sure anyone ever burned in a gas-fueled vehicle fire would gladly go back in time to fork over $40k to avoid that experience. The reason gasoline is dangerous is that it stores a lot of energy. You need a lot of energy to move a heavy car a couple of hundred miles, and keep the occupants comfortable with heat and/or air conditioning. A battery in a Tesla contains a lot of energy. The dangers compared to a…
The real issue is that those events are extremely rare given the intensely frequent use of ICE vehicles. Replace all the ICE with electric vehicles, and you'd see just as many electrocuted people. It's simply not a real argument.