Are you gonna get an electric car anytime soon? (Or do you already have one?)

[Lyle Romer]

I had exactly the same idea many years back... battery packs that could be swapped at the service station within a few minutes... Problem solved?
As a matter of fact, Tesla showed exactly this same idea about 10 years ago. Like most stuff that involves Elon Musk, it remained vaporware and the demonstration was probably fake.

If you analyse the situation, then you quickly come to the conclusion that a field-swappable battery solution will not work in practice. The battery is the very core of an electric vehicle. Swapping the battery in an EV is more like swapping the engine in an ICE. The battery usually is the single-biggest ticket item in your EV and it has been highly optimized to fit the specifications of the car. Also, the technology around this very battery is in constant motion. While the contents of "vehicle fuel" have somewhat evolved over the last century, the progress here is very slow. Combine all those factors, and it's clear that a field-swappable, universal battery pack will not work in the foreseeable future. The thing is, you don't need to be a genius to come to this conclusion. Why Electric Space Jesus still needed to perform this stunt for everybody to see, is probably just to keep his EV-Ponzi-scheme going.

I really want to believe in a bright future where we can all zip around in our fusion-driven flying electric Delorians, like it's 2015... the reality is that someone forgot to apply logic and science somewhere (which usually are pretty much in line). We don't yet have that magical source of free electric energy and neither do we have sufficient unicorn dust to store that same energy in large quantities.

The demonstration was probably real. I think Musk likes to push the envelope of what is possible and practical and a lot of things his companies try end up not being one or the other (or both). In the case of the swappable battery it would be a logistical nightmare to keep enough a the station. Also, since it is the most expensive part of the EV it would not be great for a consumer to not be able to take care of their battery to maintain value. The biggest "con" to EV ownership is charging time on the road. I think Tesla was trying to address that and change the perception of EV use to get more adoption.

I think Elon is the embodiment of the TS Elliot quote that, "only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go." A lot of the ideas he pushes end up in the "going too far" category which is why they never end up coming to fruition. On the other hand, some things like rapidly reusable rockets do come to fruition.

[Ryan Gallagher]

I know that Aptera talks a mean talk about planned user reparability, but in practice I have no idea if that would extend to servicing batteries at the sub-pack level once they hit production. Purely from a liability standpoint I seriously doubt anyone, no mater how right-to-repair-aligned they are, is willing to tell the owners to start re-working cells within packs. Lots of amps in those things.

I think the solution there would be to make the packs more modular by design, replace a bad cell group at a fraction of the price of the whole pack. But that approach comes with sacrifices or complications on the density, efficiency, and pack cooling/warming engineering side of the equations.

[Leo Enticknap]

Agreed; therefore, mass EV adoption is not going to happen until Type 2 people feel confident enough to buy in; because Type 2 people are, I would guess, around 70-80% of the overall consumer market.

[Ryan Gallagher]

This whole repairability / battery cost thing is really going to be the anchor on the heels of the electric car revolution, I think. Early adopters are going to buy any new gadget, but the "mainstream" really hasn't embraced EVs enough and with the kind of stories like the above, never will.

Agree. And beyond that, I think there are fundamentally two types of people when it comes to personal vehicle purchases. And the pattern can probably be discerned by how often they replace their phones.

1. Buys the "new shiny", into a new phone/car every 3-5 years, perhaps even enjoys shorter term "leases".
2. Does not buy a new phone/car thing again until the old one stops performing it's primary function and is not economical to repair.

It still feels like most EVs are meant for the Type 1 person. Type 2 people who are tempted by an EV at this stage of development are likely in for a disappointment, as that replacement window (or extremely expensive part replacement) will most likely come sooner than they are used to with their traditional fuel vehicles.

[Marcel Birgelen]

I had the idea once that EV batteries ought to be standard sized, and just slide out by being pushed from one side. That way you could drive your EV into a dealership, park next to the specialized machine that holds a stack of new batteries, and the machine would slide your new battery into place while pushing the old one out the other side. You could be in and out in 10 minutes or less. That idea will never work though, because it makes too much sense.

I had exactly the same idea many years back... battery packs that could be swapped at the service station within a few minutes... Problem solved?
As a matter of fact, Tesla showed exactly this same idea about 10 years ago. Like most stuff that involves Elon Musk, it remained vaporware and the demonstration was probably fake.

If you analyse the situation, then you quickly come to the conclusion that a field-swappable battery solution will not work in practice. The battery is the very core of an electric vehicle. Swapping the battery in an EV is more like swapping the engine in an ICE. The battery usually is the single-biggest ticket item in your EV and it has been highly optimized to fit the specifications of the car. Also, the technology around this very battery is in constant motion. While the contents of "vehicle fuel" have somewhat evolved over the last century, the progress here is very slow. Combine all those factors, and it's clear that a field-swappable, universal battery pack will not work in the foreseeable future. The thing is, you don't need to be a genius to come to this conclusion. Why Electric Space Jesus still needed to perform this stunt for everybody to see, is probably just to keep his EV-Ponzi-scheme going.

I really want to believe in a bright future where we can all zip around in our fusion-driven flying electric Delorians, like it's 2015... the reality is that someone forgot to apply logic and science somewhere (which usually are pretty much in line). We don't yet have that magical source of free electric energy and neither do we have sufficient unicorn dust to store that same energy in large quantities.

[Mike Blakesley]

This whole repairability / battery cost thing is really going to be the anchor on the heels of the electric car revolution, I think. Early adopters are going to buy any new gadget, but the "mainstream" really hasn't embraced EVs enough and with the kind of stories like the above, never will.

I had the idea once that EV batteries ought to be standard sized, and just slide out by being pushed from one side. That way you could drive your EV into a dealership, park next to the specialized machine that holds a stack of new batteries, and the machine would slide your new battery into place while pushing the old one out the other side. You could be in and out in 10 minutes or less. That idea will never work though, because it makes too much sense.

But what do you expect from an industry that can't even think to make all their charging ports universal.

If the gasoline car was designed today, every brand of car would require it's own brand of gas.

[Leo Enticknap]

Well this author has come up with a distinctive metaphor for a car breakdown:

Electric cars are dying fast and the repair industry is lagging
The demand for mechanics who can take apart the battery pack and repair a dead cell has vastly outstripped supply.

By Bradley Brownell / Jalopnik
Published Yesterday

When you were a kid and you had a little radio control car that you zoomed around the kitchen floor or built jumps for in the back yard, did you throw it away when the batteries died? For many owners of early electric vehicles from a decade or more ago, that seems to be the answer to electrical issues. If your 2012 Tesla Model S shits the bed, should you throw it to the scrappers, or invest some time and money and get it back on the road? Unfortunately, the demand for mechanics who can take apart the battery pack and repair a dead cell has vastly outstripped supply.

A recent report form NPR affiliate KUOW Puget Sound tracked down a Tesla driver who had to decide what to do with a bricked Model S. Christine Barnes was told by Tesla that the car needed a brand new pack, and it would be around $20,000, more than the car’s value.

“We thought about spending the money just because it was a perfectly good car other than this happening,” Barnes said. “There was nothing wrong with it, and I loved that car. But then, we decided that was just not smart.”

Early EV adopters with cars no longer covered by a warranty of any kind are running into issues with longevity of these complex electric systems. The non-dealership car repair industry has not kept pace with the proliferation of EVs, and as such, there are very few places that can affect the repairs needed to keep these cars on the road. As luck would have it, Barnes found a shop that could do battery repairs to her Tesla, Medlock and Sons, but the shop was so backed up that it would still take years.

“We have like 350-plus appointments for Model S battery repairs, and we just don’t have time to go any faster,” Medlock said.

“Tesla told them it needed a battery, because Tesla only replaces the whole thing. They don’t do component replacement like we do,” he continued. “Any Model S that has been supercharged a lot, early ‘12, ‘13, ‘14, those cars, their batteries are failing,”

If there were more technicians trained to work on batteries, the life of older EVs could be extended, said Gary Fantozzi, director of automotive programs at Shoreline Community College. His department trains future mechanics for carmakers like General Motors and Tesla.

“We could start changing out small sections of those batteries that are degrading on us and allow the battery to go longer,” he said.

But Fantozzi said carmakers aren’t particularly motivated to invest in that kind of workforce training, and many of them don’t allow mechanics to work on the batteries at all.

“There’s only a couple of manufacturers out there that actually allow you to get into the batteries and actually do some of the repairs,” he said.

Fantozzi believes that there isn’t much financial incentive for carmakers to work on batteries if customers — faced with the high costs of replacing them — are willing to buy new cars instead.

For a little while I had an old Nissan Leaf that I truly enjoyed driving. It was extremely cheap, though its battery pack had degraded to the point that it could really only do 40 miles on a charge. I had wanted to find a new battery pack for it to increase range, but sourcing a known-good pack was difficult and expensive, and finding a shop to do the work was even more difficult. That car is still on the road, and I hope it remains so for many years to come, but I’m worried about who will do the work when it eventually needs to be done.

If you’re a young mechanic getting into the industry, learn how to safely and reliably repair electric and hybrid vehicles. I’d stake a claim on you having plenty of work to keep you busy for the rest of your life.

A version of this article originally appeared on Jalopnik.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Here is Sabine Hossenfelder's POV (with a European perspective):

https://youtu.be/1yK7_LCbvec?feature=shared

Here's my POV on the matter (with a bit of a German perspective):

[Leo Enticknap]

From the Daily Wail:

The used electric car timebomb - EVs could become impossible to sell on because battery guarantees won't last - find out if you are affected

By Toby Walne

Updated: 04:14 EDT, 1 May 2024

Money Mail can today reveal a timebomb looming in the second-hand market for electric vehicles (EVs).

Our investigation found that many EVs could become almost impossible to resell because of their limited battery life.

Experts said that the average EV battery guarantee lasts just eight years. After this time, the battery may lose power more quickly and so reduce mileage between charges.

Many EVs will lose up to 12 per cent of their charge capacity by six years. Some may lose even more.

Yet the cost of replacing an EV battery is astonishingly high, our research found.

In some cases, the cost of a replacement battery is as much as £40,000. For certain EVs, the cost of replacing the battery could be ten times the value of the vehicle itself on the second-hand market.

That means used EVs have a limited lifespan — which makes them a bigger and bigger risk as the years go by.

Research into EV batteries is yet to be conclusive and the second-hand EV market is new, given the first popular EVs were rolled off the production line in 2009.

Last night, one motoring expert said customers should be wary of buying a used electric car beyond its warranty (typically eight years), as after that timespan there is no easy way of measuring how much the battery will degrade before it needs replacing.

This may mean you end up needing to pay for an expensive new battery.

Motor expert Shahzad Sheikh, who runs the YouTube channel Brown Car Guy, said: ‘With a decaying battery, the range will be poor and you may find it becomes increasingly hard to resell the vehicle after eight years.

Buyers will know that they’ll only get a small amount of life out of the car so will pay only a small sum, if anything at all.’

This problem is exacerbated by the fact all new cars coming onto the market by 2035 will be electric and motorists will have to get used to paying around £10,000 more than it’s petrol equivalent, for a vehicle which is not built to last as long.

Take a new petrol-driven Renault Clio — it costs around £20,000, while its all-electric opposite, the Renault Zoe, costs closer to £30,000.

While you can drive a traditional petrol or diesel car for around 200,000 miles over 14 years before the engine needs fixing or replacing, by comparison a new EV is typically guaranteed under a warranty for 100,000 miles over eight years.

Should your petrol engine need replacing you can expect to pay around £5,000, but replace the battery on your EV outside warranty and you’re looking at an eye-watering £13,000 to £40,000, depending on the make of your car, if you fit a manufacturer’s new unit.

And there are external factors at play with battery degradation — including use of fast chargers and even a colder climate.

The high cost of EV batteries is a result of it being difficult to mine metals such as nickel, cobalt, lithium and manganese that are used in the lithium-ion batteries.

They are also in demand for the production of other electronics, including mobile phones and laptops.

In the most extreme cases, such as with a 12-year-old Nissan Leaf that cost £2,000 to buy, you can pay as much as £24,000 for a brand-new replacement 24kWh battery.

However, most owners would upgrade to a newer 40kWh Nissan battery costing £12,780 before garage installation fees of around £2,000. This later battery has a bigger capacity but can still be fitted into older models.

T hese high costs to maintain an electric car do not bode well for a fledgling second-hand market believes Shahzad Sheikh, who points out: ‘Early adopters have already bought electric cars while the next wave of buyers are looking for value for money — and struggling to find it.

‘The second-hand market might seem a natural place to look for an EV but unfortunately it is fraught with danger as the batteries are worth more than the car. If the battery stops working, the vehicle becomes almost worthless.’

Vehicle trading website AA Cars agrees and says that nearly half of all potential second-hand EV buyers are put off because of concerns about battery life.

Rightly so, according to the RAC. It cites the Nissan Leaf as one of the most popular second-hand EVs which by the time it reaches eight years old may have lost 20 per cent of the range it had when new.

This is due to the battery losing its efficiency, so achieves a distance of 99 miles between charges rather than the theoretical 124 miles.

This may be fine for local trips but impractical for long motorway journeys. The RAC adds that motorists might expect the battery to lose perhaps 2 per cent of its power each year to such degradation.

While motorists may try to save time using a service station fast-charger, these generate more heat which accelerates a chemical reaction inside the lithium-ion battery that can lead to a loss in the capacity it can hold over time.

To prolong the life of the battery it may be better to charge your car on a slower mains-connected home charger.

Weather also plays a part in how long your battery will last and EV batteries operate best at a temperature between 25-45 degrees Celsius.

If you live in a place with freezing winter temperatures, then this will slow the chemical reactions in EV batteries, which can also reduce the charge held over time — and therefore lower a car’s overall range.

So you are better off charging your EV car inside a garage rather than outside during the cold winter months.

Tom Barnard, of EV experts Electrifying.com, advises motorists to buy a second-hand car with a battery still under warranty. This typically covers the first eight years of motoring or 100,000 miles — whichever comes first.

He says: ‘If you purchase an EV older than eight years with more miles on the clock then you are taking a gamble on the battery holding out. You cannot just look at the mileage clock as with a traditional car.

‘There is a wide combination of other variables to consider with an electric car battery.

‘Battery degradation might also become a more important consideration in the future — as we try to be more sustainable — and perhaps be included in an MOT.

So, our advice for those who might be nervous about battery life is to buy a car that is still covered by warranty.’

Concerns about battery cost are not helped by a lack of transparency within the industry — with prices of a new battery not advertised.

Money Mail requested prices directly from Nissan and no definitive answer was given. Purchasing a battery for your second-hand electric vehicle is not an isolated cost either.

You must also consider the labour cost of replacing it, says David Smith, a director at car dealer and garage Cleevely Electric Vehicles, in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.

‘As a general rule-of-thumb you might budget £2,000 for a specialist to do the task. Batteries are typically placed flat along the length and breadth of the car just above the floor plate and usually not too difficult to get at.

There is a certain element of DM scaremongering in this article (not to mention some questionable claims: if all the planned maintenance is done per the manufacturer's recommendations, the current generation of ICE will likely make it to nearer 300,000 miles than 200,000 before requiring seriously expensive attention, e.g. a new head gasket), but its core point - that the condition of an EV's battery will likely have a big impact on its used resale value - is, IMHO, fundamentally valid. One that has always been slow charged and kept within the 20-80% range will likely be in better condition after 100K miles than one that has been repeatedly supercharged and then operated in freezing temperatures, for example. I would expect to see tools developed to assess a battery's actual condition as part of the resale process.

[Martin Brooks]

I'll believe the solid state battery in production that soon when I see it. As far as pricing, those prices in China will NEVER translate to the same range if/when imported to the US. Even if it was the exact same vehicle, no matter which party is in power they will make sure that Chinese manufacturers aren't able to undercut the US car companies.

The range they are getting I'd have to research. I don't know how the safety regulations compare in China. It's possible that they have more lax crash requirements which would lead to a lighter vehicle and therefore longer range.

They won't be that price if imported, but not because Democrats or Republicans will see to it that they're priced higher (unless a future administration puts import taxes on them). They'll be priced higher because of transportation costs and the high ncosts of setting up a dealer and service network. And they'll be priced higher because if there are still Federal incentives in place, they won't be entitled to them.
The main thing that makes EV's heavier are not crash requirements. It's the weight of the batteries.

[Lyle Romer]

I have a Hyundai Ioniq 6 and love the car, but there have been some recalls and bugs, especially concerning the 12 volt battery. My building does have L2 chargers in the garage. I get two years of free charging at Electrify America Level 3 DC chargers. Many Walmarts have them as well as two malls near me. At DC fast chargers, it takes around 18 minutes to charge the car to 80%. Many utility companies give rebates if one charges during off-peak hours. The thing I like best about the car is the silence. And the performance is spectacular.
If I were younger, I probably would have waited a few more years for better technology, like solid state batteries, although I was driving a 20-year-old car and it was time to dump it.

There are some amazing things going on in China. There's a car called the Zeekr_007 that has five trims ranging from $29,400 to $42,000 translated to U.S. $$. The four lower trims use a Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries, which are better environmentally than Lithium Ion batteries and they claim a 428 mile range and being able to get 311 miles of range in 15 minutes at a DC Fast charger. The upper trim uses Qlin batteries from CATL that claim a 540 mile range. All but the lowest trim includes a 21 speaker Dolby Atmos sound system. But obviously if they were exported to the U.S., they would have to be priced far higher due to the costs of setting up a dealer and service network as well as marketing.

CATL is also producing another Lithium Ion Phosphate battery that they claim will get 621 miles on a charge. Four models use it now and 50 by the end of the year. And Chinese brand Hyper claims that they'll be using solid state batteries by 2026 that will get a 621 mile range.

I'll believe the solid state battery in production that soon when I see it. As far as pricing, those prices in China will NEVER translate to the same range if/when imported to the US. Even if it was the exact same vehicle, no matter which party is in power they will make sure that Chinese manufacturers aren't able to undercut the US car companies.

The range they are getting I'd have to research. I don't know how the safety regulations compare in China. It's possible that they have more lax crash requirements which would lead to a lighter vehicle and therefore longer range.

[Martin Brooks]

I have a Hyundai Ioniq 6 and love the car, but there have been some recalls and bugs, especially concerning the 12 volt battery. My building does have L2 chargers in the garage. I get two years of free charging at Electrify America Level 3 DC chargers. Many Walmarts have them as well as two malls near me. At DC fast chargers, it takes around 18 minutes to charge the car to 80%. Many utility companies give rebates if one charges during off-peak hours. The thing I like best about the car is the silence. And the performance is spectacular.
If I were younger, I probably would have waited a few more years for better technology, like solid state batteries, although I was driving a 20-year-old car and it was time to dump it.

There are some amazing things going on in China. There's a car called the Zeekr_007 that has five trims ranging from $29,400 to $42,000 translated to U.S. $$. The four lower trims use a Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries, which are better environmentally than Lithium Ion batteries and they claim a 428 mile range and being able to get 311 miles of range in 15 minutes at a DC Fast charger. The upper trim uses Qlin batteries from CATL that claim a 540 mile range. All but the lowest trim includes a 21 speaker Dolby Atmos sound system. But obviously if they were exported to the U.S., they would have to be priced far higher due to the costs of setting up a dealer and service network as well as marketing.

CATL is also producing another Lithium Ion Phosphate battery that they claim will get 621 miles on a charge. Four models use it now and 50 by the end of the year. And Chinese brand Hyper claims that they'll be using solid state batteries by 2026 that will get a 621 mile range.

[Steve Guttag]

Here is Sabine Hossenfelder's POV (with a European perspective):

https://youtu.be/1yK7_LCbvec?feature=shared

[Leo Enticknap]

And charging intensity, too. The higher the charging current, the hotter the battery gets during charging. I even notice this with my little NiCd charger for 1.5v AAs and Ds. If I charge them for a day at 200 mAH, they remain stone cold throughout. But if I need some urgently and do them at 2,000 mAH for an hour, they get hot enough to be uncomfortable to touch.

If you're using a public charging station to charge up your EV, there's a limit to how long you're willing to sit around watching cat videos on YouTube, so you're going to charge as fast as you can. The high amperage, combined with the sheer size of an EV battery pack, creates a substantial overheating followed by thermal runaway risk. My guess would be that hybrids are trickle charged by the gas engine when it's running most of the time, and when they are plugged in to charge, it'll be on a regular 120V/15A outlet, the current from which which can't create an unmanageable amount of heat. Combine that with a battery pack around a fifth of the size of one in a pure EV, and the fire risk is an order of magnitude lower.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

Battery pack size and location probably makes them less susceptible to becoming an inferno.

That's entirely possible. Last I saw, they were under the back seat, not under the car.