Tesla responds to "bricking" issue • Hacker News Board

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#241

Post by dhughes » Sat, Feb 25, 2012, 2:31 PM UTC

eduardordm wrote: post #218

grellas wrote: post #200

Deposition line of questioning suggested after reading this piece: Q. Is it true that the battery has catastrophic failure when it drains to zero and is left in that state for a sustained period? A. The company has built in countless safeguards to ensure that the battery never drains to zero. Q. That is not what I asked. Please answer the question. A. It is an unfounded rumor that many owners have incurred such a cat…

Answer to your first question: No. The battery is fine, the stupidity in understanding that Li-ion batteries must never be fully discharged is the only catastrophic failure here. Why can't I down vote your post? :( PS: Don't buy any RC model (or diesel engines!), they all suffer from the same "catastrophic failure".

What about diesel engines? I have a diesel, have run out of fuel (clogged filer), have had air in the system - bled it out, was dangerously low on radiator fluid but no ill effects.

All that over the span of ten years and I still drive it actually the engine is the best part the rest of the truck is falling apart around the engine.

Add to those no spark plugs, no spark plug wires, no distributor, a more durable engine design, higher efficiency compared to a gasoline engine.

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#242

Post by btbuilder » Sat, Feb 25, 2012, 5:49 PM UTC

mkramlich wrote: post #236

btbuilder wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I call foul on the "if you paid 100k for a car you should be able to pay 40k to recover from a mistake" logic. If we were talking about a regular gas car - many families have cars worth $60k and we'd still be asking serious questions if, by inaction, we ended up with a $24k repair bill.

And to continue your logic, if you buy a new car for $20k, it's entirely possible through neglect and failure to follow manufacturer's maintenance requirements that you'll end up with a car that no longer works and requires at least $6k to get the engine and transmission back into good shape again. R The pattern being that sometimes things which are expensive to buy are also expensive to repair. In a gas-powered car,…

How much neglect do you need to get a car's engine and transmission to fail?

Even if you didn't change the engine and transmission oil for 18 months that wouldn't happen. I bet it wouldn't happen if you didn't change it for 24 months.

Compare and contrast with not plugging in a car for < 4 weeks.

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#243

Post by jaggs » Sat, Feb 25, 2012, 8:20 PM UTC

Two words: Nissan Leaf.

Quote - "Nissan spokeswoman Katherine Zachary tells Motoramic that the all-electric Nissan Leaf "will never discharge completely, thanks to an advanced battery management system designed to protect the battery from damage." Thanks to a combination of different management and battery cells custom-designed for the car, Nissan has sold 22,000 Leafs and never suffered a similar failure. Tesla's acolytes may find no fault in the charges, but other automakers know there's little margin in blaming customers for not asking the right questions."

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#244

Post by jaggs » Sat, Feb 25, 2012, 8:23 PM UTC

tfb wrote: post #51

shock-value wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except in this case you wouldn't be destroying the battery "on purpose" obviously, but rather through neglect or ignorance. It's a fail in the sense that this technology has been exposed to be clearly unready for wide-scale adoption, and the company in question has barely even acknowledged the issue, let alone outlined steps it is taking to fix it or improve the design.

You can neglect and ignore maintenance of gas-powered engines too. Stop getting oil changes and never check/refill it and see what happens to your engine. It will eventually be "bricked". Just like gas-powered vehicles need to be maintained, so do electric ones. EVs actually happen to require less maintenance. Simpler too. I would say that the EV equivalent of oil changes is to keep it charged above some minimum.

Err...it will take a very long time for a conventional gas engine to get 'bricked' as you put it. And the cost to repair will not be $40K. This line of argument from the apologists it a little weak methinks.

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#245

Post by Unseelie » Sat, Feb 25, 2012, 9:36 PM UTC

vacri wrote: post #204

schiffern wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it wouldn't with a Tesla, either. The car shuts down before you can discharge the battery enough to damage it. If, after you ran out of gas, you didn't fill your gas tank for weeks and ignored the car's insistent complaints that it should be filled with gas, then you would have a point. But I doubt you've ever done that.

I've driven my car until the tank was empty, then left home to go on a trip for two weeks. When I came back, there was still enough fuel to let me go get more. Everyone seems to think that Tesla owners are housebound in these threads.

Clearly, if there was fuel left that you could derive motion from the thing, it wasn't quite empty...

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#246

Post by droithomme » Sun, Feb 26, 2012, 12:27 AM UTC

nknight wrote: post #237

droithomme wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a photo of a typical car battery that is sold in the US, in fact this is one of the top brands, Sears DieHard. http://s.shld.net/is/image/Sears/02833023000-2 Sears has a nationwide network of car maintenance shops called Sears Auto Center that has been quite popular for tire, battery, and alignment work for decades. http://www.sears.com/automotive-services/c-1023947 Information about its warranty are printed i…

It says "3 Year Free Replacement". First, what does this have to do with the assertion about prorated warranties? Second, I don't know many people who have to replace their battery within three years.

The comment said the person felt people didn't know about battery warranties. But their existence is written on the side of the battery for brand names. Many Prorated ones like this Sears one have a period over which the prorated value is 100%. After the 3 years, the 100% declines on a linear slope, ending at 0% at 100 months. You could of course have looked this up rather than ranting and making dumb comments.

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#247

Post by nknight » Sun, Feb 26, 2012, 8:49 AM UTC

droithomme wrote: post #246

nknight wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says "3 Year Free Replacement". First, what does this have to do with the assertion about prorated warranties? Second, I don't know many people who have to replace their battery within three years.

The comment said the person felt people didn't know about battery warranties. But their existence is written on the side of the battery for brand names. Many Prorated ones like this Sears one have a period over which the prorated value is 100%. After the 3 years, the 100% declines on a linear slope, ending at 0% at 100 months. You could of course have looked this up rather than ranting and making dumb comments.

I think if you'll look back through the thread, I've made two brief comments demonstrating how your assertions that we should all know about prorated battery warranties are faulty. Others have made similar comments. This is neither ranting nor dumb.

If you don't want to be challenged on your assertions, you should probably find somewhere other than HN to make them. It's kind of what we do here.

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#248

Post by veyron » Sun, Feb 26, 2012, 6:44 PM UTC

droithomme wrote: post #246

nknight wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says "3 Year Free Replacement". First, what does this have to do with the assertion about prorated warranties? Second, I don't know many people who have to replace their battery within three years.

The comment said the person felt people didn't know about battery warranties. But their existence is written on the side of the battery for brand names. Many Prorated ones like this Sears one have a period over which the prorated value is 100%. After the 3 years, the 100% declines on a linear slope, ending at 0% at 100 months. You could of course have looked this up rather than ranting and making dumb comments.

Note that this requires you to look at the battery.

My BMW, for example, has its battery in a very obscure location (behind the seats) and there are mere terminals in the hood for jumping.

Re: Tesla responds to "bricking" issue

#249

Post by onemoreact » Mon, Feb 27, 2012, 3:00 PM UTC

droithomme wrote: post #166

onemoreact wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you leave an IC car for a long period of time with 1/2 a tank of gas you can destroy the engine. Gas like everything else breaks down and if you left leave your car sitting for a long time you may need to completely drain the gas tank. PS: Gas can noticeably degrade in as little as one month depending on ambient conditions. But, condensation is the largest risk for mid term storage. After 1 year you will probably…

I've done this plenty of times. It's a common risk in cold climates when tractors, cars and lawnmowers are parked outside and one forgets to drain the tank. It gums up the carburetor. So you rebuild the carburetor, which takes 1 hr and $5 to do at home, or $100 at the dealer. Not $40,000. It also doesn't "destroy the engine". There is a high probability either don't know what you are talking about and made that claim…

First off most cars build after the 1980's don't have a carburetor and generally use fuel injection. Also, to much water in the tank can easily lead to a blown head gasket among other things.

Second most cars don't cost 40k, but if your talking about a say a bugatti veyron it's not that hard to do 40k of damage. If you want to compare it to the cost of the car then for an older car having a few thousand dollar repair bill can easily cost more than the car is worth.