Batteries dead after 5 years

Author
Discussion

ruggedscotty

5,626 posts

209 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Do you use a fiat 500 to tow a 2 tonne trailer from lands end to john o'groats….

No you don't so same argument with your comment. There are cars for different tasks, your 100K a year super salesman may not suit an electric car yet but Mavis taking Mandy and Martin to school and back and dipping down to the co-op for the messages and doing 5000 miles a year it would suit.


its all about picking the right tool for the task,

98elise

26,589 posts

161 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Ransoman said:
ElectricSoup said:
It's almost as if engine and drivetrain failures never happen outside warranty on ICE cars. Huh.

Run a car outside warranty, you risk losing it due to mechanical failure. Whatever fuels it, compressed dinosaurs or electrons. It's the probability here that counts - it's a low probability risk so most of us don't worry about having a contingency if it happens. Given the numbers of electric cars failing compared to ICE cars, I'd say the risk is lower with an electric car. But it's still there, and it might get you. All there is to it really. Could always get the bus if the risk of car ownership is too great.
But engines last far longer, Almost never fail if well maintained and tend to outlast the car it is fitted to. If you put an ICE car in storage for 10 years, chances are it will work, only needing a change of oil and rubber drive belts (And a new battery :P).

A complete engine rebuild by a specialist on an Alfa v6 costs around £3500. less than a quarter of an ICE battery replacement.

And trust me, as someone who works with battery powered tech on a daily basis (Li-ion, Ni-CAD, NI-MH, lead etc) it is never a case of "If they fail", Always when they fail. Approx 10% of our laptop batteries don't last beyond the warranty period(2 years). after 5 years only 40% of them still last longer than an hour. At 10 years old, 10% still hold a charge if you are lucky. Compare that to an ICE car. I bet 90% of cars on the road today that are 10 years old still have the original engine and not had significant engine work. 9% of them have had a catastrophic failure due to poor servicing or extreme mileage.

UPS Batteries must be replaced every 5 years and only a percentage of them actually make it to the renewal time.

Every mobile phone I have ever owned has been replaced, not because it is old or outdated, but because the battery degrades to under 50% of orignal capacity. The phone I use today is the oldest phone i have ever owned and is 4 years old. The battery hasn't lasted a full day for around 6 months now.

If a laptop comes out of storage and it has been in longer than a year, there is a 50/50 chance it will ever hold a charge again. I have even seen macbook batteries balloon out after being stored flat.
None of those have a sophisticated battery management system and come with an 8 year battery guarantee, or are you predicting massive battery failures on 8 year old teslas?

oop north

1,595 posts

128 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Monkeylegend said:
Don't known about you but in my driving career of 50 years I have had at least 50 cars and averaged about 20k miles a year, and for the last 15 years averaged 100k miles a year, and in all that time I have never had a single engine failure.

I hate to think how many of today's battery packs I would have worn out covering the same distance.
100k a year? Do you work for national express?

Monkeylegend

26,386 posts

231 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
oop north said:
Monkeylegend said:
Don't known about you but in my driving career of 50 years I have had at least 50 cars and averaged about 20k miles a year, and for the last 15 years averaged 100k miles a year, and in all that time I have never had a single engine failure.

I hate to think how many of today's battery packs I would have worn out covering the same distance.
100k a year? Do you work for national express?
Nope, I was self employed.

98elise

26,589 posts

161 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Monkeylegend said:
But if they are to be a replacement for the ICE they need to be suitable for "extreme case use" as you put it, and as I see it we are many years away from that situation, assuming we ever get there.
I don't think any thinks EV will suit all drivers. The future is a mix of hybrid and EV. Even the government realise that, and that's what's being legislated for.

kambites

67,561 posts

221 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Monkeylegend said:
But if they are to be a replacement for the ICE they need to be suitable for "extreme case use" as you put it, and as I see it we are many years away from that situation, assuming we ever get there.
Who says they're ever going to be a complete replacement for ICE cars?

Monkeylegend

26,386 posts

231 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
kambites said:
Monkeylegend said:
But if they are to be a replacement for the ICE they need to be suitable for "extreme case use" as you put it, and as I see it we are many years away from that situation, assuming we ever get there.
Who says they're ever going to be a complete replacement for ICE cars?
They won't be, but there are many who would love to see the end of the ICE.

kambites

67,561 posts

221 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Monkeylegend said:
They won't be, but there are many who would love to see the end of the ICE.
Are there? I've never met one. There's plenty of people who wants see internal combustion engines banned from cities; and plenty who want to stop burning fossil fuels in them, but neither of those things is the same as completely getting rid of internal combustion engines.

I think we'll see EVs making up the majority, possibly a large majority, of new cars sales in my lifetime but there will still be ICE powered cars on the road when I die. As long as I'm capable of driving, one of them will be in my garage. smile

Monkeylegend

26,386 posts

231 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
kambites said:
but there will still be ICE powered cars on the road when I die. As long as I'm capable of driving, one of them will be in my garage. smile
Something we can agree on smile

I will be nearly 90 in 2040 yikes so not bothered personally but I really do think the best years of motoring and the motor car are already behind us in all it's related aspects.

gangzoom

6,298 posts

215 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Ransoman said:
Every mobile phone I have ever owned has been replaced, not because it is old or outdated, but because the battery degrades to under 50% of orignal capacity. The phone I use today is the oldest phone i have ever owned and is 4 years old. The battery hasn't lasted a full day for around 6 months now.
Funny you should say that I've just replaced the battery on my S7 for a total parts cost of £8, £6 for the battery and £2 for back cover glue. I expect to get another 3 years of use with no issues.

The battery pack our Tesla can be dropped out and swapped over in less time it takes to replace the rear ARB on my old 335i. But actually the project life of the battery is longer than life of the rolling chassis, thats with me doing about 15k per year.

The only reason I will replace the pack is if Tesla offer a bigger range battery with better 0-60 perfomance (due to higher voltage). But that has to be weighed against financial cost given the current pack offers me enough speed/range 99% of the time.

Jag_NE

2,978 posts

100 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Out of interest, on a hybrid does it matter if the batteries are kaput further down the line, other than increased FE of course? I presume it would just behave like a conventional power train but am not sure. If the car was 100k miles plus I probably wouldn’t care so much by that point.

anonymous-user

54 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
98elise said:
Ransoman said:
ElectricSoup said:
It's almost as if engine and drivetrain failures never happen outside warranty on ICE cars. Huh.

Run a car outside warranty, you risk losing it due to mechanical failure. Whatever fuels it, compressed dinosaurs or electrons. It's the probability here that counts - it's a low probability risk so most of us don't worry about having a contingency if it happens. Given the numbers of electric cars failing compared to ICE cars, I'd say the risk is lower with an electric car. But it's still there, and it might get you. All there is to it really. Could always get the bus if the risk of car ownership is too great.
But engines last far longer, Almost never fail if well maintained and tend to outlast the car it is fitted to. If you put an ICE car in storage for 10 years, chances are it will work, only needing a change of oil and rubber drive belts (And a new battery :P).

A complete engine rebuild by a specialist on an Alfa v6 costs around £3500. less than a quarter of an ICE battery replacement.

And trust me, as someone who works with battery powered tech on a daily basis (Li-ion, Ni-CAD, NI-MH, lead etc) it is never a case of "If they fail", Always when they fail. Approx 10% of our laptop batteries don't last beyond the warranty period(2 years). after 5 years only 40% of them still last longer than an hour. At 10 years old, 10% still hold a charge if you are lucky. Compare that to an ICE car. I bet 90% of cars on the road today that are 10 years old still have the original engine and not had significant engine work. 9% of them have had a catastrophic failure due to poor servicing or extreme mileage.

UPS Batteries must be replaced every 5 years and only a percentage of them actually make it to the renewal time.

Every mobile phone I have ever owned has been replaced, not because it is old or outdated, but because the battery degrades to under 50% of orignal capacity. The phone I use today is the oldest phone i have ever owned and is 4 years old. The battery hasn't lasted a full day for around 6 months now.

If a laptop comes out of storage and it has been in longer than a year, there is a 50/50 chance it will ever hold a charge again. I have even seen macbook batteries balloon out after being stored flat.
None of those have a sophisticated battery management system and come with an 8 year battery guarantee, or are you predicting massive battery failures on 8 year old teslas?
Also, the original points are rubbish. Go look round a current scrap yard/breakers. You'll see this:



wall to wall cars that look almost perfect (no rust) but are effectively worthless because the mechanical bits have worn out, and because of that, even a small, relatively easy and cheap to fixed fault leads to the car getting scrapped. A modern ICE has a design life of 10 years and 150Kmiles typically, beyond that, you are on borrowed time. To say "engines almost never fail" is not only un-true is completely contrary to all the evidence. In the vast majority of cases, an ICE with 200k on the clock is, literally, worthless, because it's knackered. Sure it might run and drive, but what comes out the tailpipe and well it drives will be very very seriously degraded compared to a similar car on say 60kmiles.

And that complete engine rebuild for £3k. It's only that cheap because a network of aftermarket specalists has grown up to support that need (BTW if engines "never fail" why is their a network of aftermarket specalists who repair them???) As EVs become more common, guess what, a lot of those specalists that currently rebuild engines (generally very, very badly) are going to start repairing batteries (which are a lot simpler to work on btw, with pretty much zero moving parts and zero tightly tolleranced mechanical parts)

For some reason, people latch onto the fact that batteries wear out as you use them, but seem completely blind to the fact that an ICE also wears out EVERY TIME YOU USE IT..........



anonymous-user

54 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
R4PID said:
hunter 66 said:
Missed a shift on my ICE and new engine was 20 K and 6 k to fit ......could not happen in the Tesla
What ICE was it...!?
Maybe never actually did happen. Almost impossible to do unless you mistakenly change into a lower gear when accelerating. In any case it’s hardly a weakness to be attributed to the vehicle.

As said by others, many (most?) ICEs will carry on for many years of properly treated.

Having said that EVs are more tolerant of misuse and abuse so maybe they’re more suited to many.

gangzoom

6,298 posts

215 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
It's also worthwhile remembering not all EV battery packs and cells are created equal. The first Tesla Roadsters were out in 2009 and very very early US Model Ss are now out of warranty, certainly if battery degradation is an issue in these cars we'll hear about it sooner rather than later given the amount of money bet on Tesla failling.

Having owned a BMW 335i that leaked various fluids constantly, rattling turbos, failed water pump than fuel pump, and needed carbon build up walnut blasting from the valves all before 50K and 5 years. I fail to see how our EV can be less reliable or costly to maintain. Infact I recon I've nearly done as many miles in the EV in 18 months as in 4 years of 335i ownership, I suppose thats the difference between owning a car that just works versus one that spent half its life in the garage!!

https://electrek.co/2017/03/22/tesla-battery-cell-...

flight147z

976 posts

129 months

Tuesday 13th November 2018
quotequote all
Isn't the key point that ICEs COULD fail and lead to a big bill but there is a question whether batteries WILL ultimately fail and lead to a big bill?

In almost every case I've relied upon batteries performance is notably worse after daily charge cycles within 2 years. Are electric cars really immune to that?

I think they will match the predicted future transport model well. If more cars are leased/hired etc less people will care

Edited by flight147z on Tuesday 13th November 23:07

Heres Johnny

7,226 posts

124 months

Wednesday 14th November 2018
quotequote all
lowdrag said:
There are the usual replies above, but in over 50 years of car ownership I have never had an engine fail on me. I've rebuilt two one for more power and the other because it had done substantial mileage, but in the last 25 years I've paid out £4,000 only in car repairs - and I change my cars every 150,000 miles. Yes, i guess servicing is dearer, but still considerably less than battery packs it seems. The last rebuilt engine cost only £6,000. But I accept thatthe world is changing whether we want it to or not but I'm still not yet convinced in the economies of EVs.
Only spent £4k in 25 years, the last one costing £6k. And like good old Wheeler dealers, you’ve only spent a few quid on parts because you did all the labour yourself free of charge, something 99% of the population can’t do.

A touch of crestive accountancy?

gangzoom

6,298 posts

215 months

Wednesday 14th November 2018
quotequote all
flight147z said:
In almost every case I've relied upon batteries performance is notably worse after daily charge cycles within 2 years. Are electric cars really immune to that?
EV packs do degrade, some faster than others. But a well designed pack thats not absued to death (constant 0-100% rapid charging) will out last the rolling chassis.

But designing a pack isn't easy, even Tesla have designed bad packs. Infact the most degredation resistant pack Tesla designed is looking like the orignal 85kWh pack that was first introduced in 2012. The 90kWh packs are by far the worst, and no one has any data on the Model 3 packs.

Nissan Leaf packs degrade much faster than Tesla packs due to no thermal regulation, even Hyundai packs suffer from clear degredation when quite new but not much real world data.

Jaguar are telling owners charging to 100% everyday is fine for pack life, which is utter BS, but does Jaguar really care? Once the warrant period is over they are looking for any excuse for customers to trade in.

In short EV battery pack design/build is about as striaght fowards as designing a modern turbo combustion unit. They all do the same but perfomance varies hugely between brands.

Because EV packs are sensitive to how they are used/charged buying used EVs is actually quite a gamble. Get one which the owner has abused the pack and your end up with a car that may exhibit much more degredation than you suspect.

I would have no issues buying a 5 year old 85kWh Tesla with a view of keeping it another 5-10 years. Same car with a 90kWh pack, am not sure. A Nissan Leaf, not a chance. I3 probably. Zoe doesn't matter as the battery would on lease. Ioniqi/Kona/iPace/Model 3 who knows there isn't enough longterm data.


Edited by gangzoom on Wednesday 14th November 06:56

98elise

26,589 posts

161 months

Wednesday 14th November 2018
quotequote all
REALIST123 said:
R4PID said:
hunter 66 said:
Missed a shift on my ICE and new engine was 20 K and 6 k to fit ......could not happen in the Tesla
What ICE was it...!?
Maybe never actually did happen. Almost impossible to do unless you mistakenly change into a lower gear when accelerating. In any case it’s hardly a weakness to be attributed to the vehicle.

As said by others, many (most?) ICEs will carry on for many years of properly treated.

Having said that EVs are more tolerant of misuse and abuse so maybe they’re more suited to many.
The OP specifically said he buzzed the engine on a miss shift. It is quite common on elises as they are driven enthusiastically, and often on tracks.

Personally I've had two engines fail due to timing belts, and a cheap car scrapped as the clutch replacement was over 1k. You've also now got the problem of DPF failures resulting in multiple 1000's in repairs. There was a recent thread where one failed after a year and was not covered by the manufacturers warranty.

RizzoTheRat

25,162 posts

192 months

Wednesday 14th November 2018
quotequote all
gangzoom said:
EV packs do degrade, some faster than others. But a well designed pack thats not absued to death (constant 0-100% rapid charging) will out last the rolling chassis.
Someone posted a link to a tesla owners group database on battery data some time back. Interestingly cars that had mainly used tesla rapid charger network seemed to show less battery degradation than average. No idea of that's down to poor quality home chargers, being left on charge overnight, or what, but interesting as most people would assume rapid charging isn't good for a battery.


Edited by RizzoTheRat on Wednesday 14th November 08:22

RobDickinson

31,343 posts

254 months

Wednesday 14th November 2018
quotequote all
Tesla packs have many advantages (not unique..) large packs are used less overall, can charge and deliver more power at a lower 'C' rating etc.

The Tesla owners data shows first 5 percent degradation happens fairly quickly then levels off, 300-500 thousand miles should be reasonable on average.

Others like the leaf are far more situational, I wouldn't own a leaf in a hot climate or if I needed to rapid charge often..

My own outlander phev eats its battery relatively quickly given its 12kwh and puts out 60kw(does have active cooling) , but it's still at around 90 percent after 57,000 km

Which is another point on ev's, with a cheap obd2 dongle and phone app you can tell the exact state of the battery and monitor how it performs, far harder to do that with an ice car.