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Comment by lupusreal | Hacker News Reader

I doubt the value proposition of buying used EVs will ever reach parity with ICE unless the government forces some new battery warranty/replacement scheme onto EV manufacturers. I was talking to my credit union about this while applying for an auto loan and they said I'd have to be out of my mind to even consider a used EV. A Japanese ICE with 100k miles on it has a high chance of giving the second owner another 100k miles with no major expenses besides oil changes. With used EVs that battery pack is a ticking time bomb waiting to blow a hole in your wallet.

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Here's data on EV battery replacement rates:

https://www.recurrentauto.com/research/how-long-do-ev-batter...

Replacements do happen, but a lot of them are under warranty. Batteries are lasting longer than people expected, mainly due to really good management systems. These days the industry expects them to usually last the life of the car, though that allows for a range reduction down to 70% of the original.

Further tweaks to battery chemistry will probably improve things further. I might not buy an EV with 100K miles on it just yet, but I'd do 30K; a lot of the warranties go to 100K.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/carltonreid/2022/08/01/electric...

Agreed the replacement rates have been lower than anticipated.

The only problems have been the predictable ones - bad designs like the early Nissan Leafs which had no thermal management.

That said, the amount of datapoints here should increase by orders of magnitude over the next 2-3 years as the first million Model 3s roll out of their 8 year battery warranty period.

I'm sure that once there is regular demand for battery replacements, the cost won't be much different than an engine rebuild.

So even the pessimist case for EVs today is "well the TCO is lower for the first decade but then..." and I think we will be solving the "but then.." soon.

> allows for a range reduction down to 70% of the original.

which means when buying a car, you expect the range listed on the label to only be 70% effective.

What do you mean? When I buy an ICE car I am not buying it with the expectation that the engine and transmission will die imminently. Why would you assume 70% capacity for an EV?

That is surprising, I've always thought the value proposition of used EV would be miles ahead of ICE vehicles, at least the more modern ones. A quick google also confirms that the average life expectancy in mileage of EV is already ahead of ICE cars. Generally, EV have the reputation of requiring much less maintenance.

Ever have your phone or laptop not hold the charge it used to when you first bought it? The same thing happens to car batteries. This certainly doesn't help with people's range anxiety.

I'm on the sideline waiting for the battery tech to improve a bit more before buying my next (electric) car.

As an aside, I'm horrified by what new privacy invasive "features" these cars will include in all electric cars.

> I'm horrified by what new privacy invasive "features" these cars will include in all electric cars.

My main horror with EVs, particularly Teslas is putting everything on a tablet display in the middle.

Its like it was designed by some kid who's never driven a car.

Its a safety issue, frankly. IMHO.

In many U.S. states using a cell phone while driving is illegal under distracted driving rules. It should be the same for touch screens of all kinds.

Data is a bit light on the ground given we haven't had masses of EVs for all that long. But I wouldn't necessarily have this expectation based off of phones and laptops.

EVs have really high-end battery management systems and cooling, which will have a huge impact on battery life.

Heck even my phone is lasting better these days with just better software battery management in Android. My current oneplus 9 is going on three and a half years old and hasn't notably degraded in battery life. Whereas I'm pretty sure I remember all my previous phones having noticeable battery degradation after a year or so.

>Ever have your phone or laptop not hold the charge it used to when you first bought it?

While true, the analogy is bad. The phones (and to some extent laptops) are notorious of the overcharge. The Li-Ion (cobalt) normally should be charged to 4.22V or so. Tool batteries usually do not go over 4.18V. Yet, the phones are happily pushing 4.35V - which provides longer life per charge initially, plus a proper planned obsolescence later.

EV do proper battery management AND cooling.

At the very extreme end, Apple Watch batteries have a 3.87 V nominal and 4.45 V end of charge voltage. Most lipoly pouch cells would turn into a balloon trying to do that once.

> Generally, EV have the reputation of requiring much less maintenance.

I'm sure you could generate a maintenance figure for EV that was lower than ICE if you wanted to. But I doubt that figure would be significant, maybe 10-15% if you're lucky.

Why ? Well, let's face it, an EV is still a car. So you still have 99% of the same old things ... tyres, brakes, shock-absorbers, windscreen, windscreen wiper blades, washer fluid, AC gas etc. etc. etc.

And then, of course, if there are problems with your EV battery, or its time for an EV battery replacement, then that 10-15% saving goes out the window. :)

> an EV is still a car. So you still have the same old things ...

No, an ICE has a very complex drivetrain with thousands of moving parts. Belts, transmissions, gears, fuel filter, oil seals and gaskets, batteries (ICE's need them too), spark plugs, fuel pump, fuel injector, alternator, radiator and water pump, catalytic converter, etc etc .

Brakes also wear slower on EVs since regnerative braking captures some energy.

Electric motors themselves are far more reliable and simpler than ICE motors.

since you mention the radiator, the EV needs quite the cooling as well; although I do agree for the most part. The electric motors are a lot simpler than even a small engine lawnmower.

> batteries (ICE's need them too)

I've replaced a few ICE batteries in my time. You can replace them at home in 5 minutes and they are a gazillion times cheaper than an EV battery. :)

> ICE has a very complex drivetrain with thousands of moving parts. Belts, transmissions, gears, fuel filter, oil seals and gaskets

This whole thing about ICE is FUD IMHO. Yes, complex, but on modern ICE vehicles is highly-reliable.

Also I would argue with EVs you are replacing ICE "complexity" with other complexity. For example, in EVs you now have individual motors on four wheels (i.e. potentially four points of failure), you have all the software in EVs etc. etc. etc.

I would also argue that the ICE "complexity" of what you speak is NOT where the bulk of ICE maintenance costs come from. Afterall, topping up the oil and replacing gaskets is kids work.

The bulk of ICE maintenance will ultimately be the same as EV maintenance, i.e. all the wear-and-tear parts I listed already, such as tyres.

Most EVs don't have four motors on each wheel. They'll have one or two.

It also depends a lot on what type of ICE we are talking about. A very high power output downsizing engine with two turbochargers, direct fuel injection, EGR, intercooler, electric oil pump(s) (for turbo cooling), variable valve timings and/or lift systems etc. -- what you'll typically find in a high trim ICE mid-class car -- has far, far more parts and experiences a lot higher stresses than e.g. the naturally aspirated port injection engine you might find in a city car.

I suppose the reply was not meant to be a direct response to my comment?

Those "complex parts" (engine and gearboxes) usually only require yearly oil changes and replacement of minor parts as you mentioned (spark plugs, plug wires, belts, tensioners--maybe injectors every 100kmi) for the first quarter million miles. At 10kmi/yr that's 25yr.

The complexity as defined by parts count doesn't have much practical impact on TCO.

That said, my BEV is currently in service due to the charger shorting out for some reason. Not sure which came first, but the battery cable harness also got damaged and had to be replaced.

A quick change once the parts arrived they said. The car is still under warranty so won't cost me a dime, but if the bill they presented me with is real and not some "medical bill" shenanigans, the charger alone would be 1/8th the price of the car as new, total repair cost 1/5th...

So yeah, still some expensive parts that can break. Was quite happy with very little maintenance costs so far, but if that price was real and charger breaks after warranty is out, the whole value proposition is quite different.

It's not 99% of the same things, you have cherry picked.

There's many studies comparing the cost, I've never see any that put the saving as low as 10 to 15%, 50% is a more common figure.

Most manufacturers grantee their batteries , mine has a 10 year warranty.Batteries developing problems and needing to be replaces is not really a thing.

> It's not 99% of the same things, you have cherry picked.

No, I have not cherry picked.

Because the remaining 1%, topping-up oil, replacing gaskets, belts etc. is simply not where the bulk of ICE maintenance costs come from. This sort of stuff can be done cheaply and easily by your local garage.

The bulk of the ICE and EV maintenance costs is the same, the stuff that gets exposed to the wear-and-tear of the elements, i.e. your tyres, your windscreen, your shock-absorbers etc. etc.

An EV does not make you immune to getting nails in your tyres, chips in your windscreen, cracks in your shock-absorbers etc. ....

> Most manufacturers grantee their batteries , mine has a 10 year warranty

As with most things of this nature, I would be interested to see the wordings of such warranties, particularly the exclusion clauses. :)

> There's many studies comparing the cost...

And if we exclude studies funded/conducted by the EV companies or others with vested interests ? :)

> your tyres

i've heard, not 100% sure if true, that EV tends to push the tyres harder, as they accelerate harder. This means tyres lasts for less for an EV.

> that EV tends to push the tyres harder, as they accelerate harder.

I would think the regen breaking might also put wear on the tyres, especially for those people who like it set in the more aggressive modes.

It’s the driver. BMW tires and brakes do not last long too.

> Most manufacturers grantee their batteries , mine has a 10 year warranty

A ten year battery warranty means most used car buyers would be without a battery warranty. My current car was 12 years old when I got it, and in basically pristine condition. Good ICE cars are very durable in a way that the batteries in EVs simply aren't.

You’re heavily oversimplifying things. If you look at some random Volkswagen or BMW service plan - it’s always about engine. Oil, belts, chains, spark plugs, air filters. Parts optimized for a profitable quick replacement at a dealership. Easily 600-900€ yearly with today’s prices.

There are also gazillion things to fail and to be repaired. Sensors, hoses, cables, alternator, fuel lines, clutch, exhaust system. All these parts were replaced in family’s petrol cars during last years.

I doubt, that today’s Teslas will have battery problems. They have enough knowledge for volume production. Expect 2% early battery capacity degradation though.

> 99% of the same old things ... tyres, brakes

Aren't brakes one shared system where electric vehicles have an advantage? With the widespread use of regenerative braking, most of the energy of motion is bled off without friction on wear parts. EVs still need brake discs and calipers to maintain a full stop (particularly on an incline), for emergency braking, and as a failsafe, but the parts should experience much less routine wear.

Additionally, your list omits the entire exhaust system, which is full of components that can foul up or corrode. Combustion exhaust gasses can be pretty corrosive stuff, particularly when combined with water condensation on short trips/cold days.

Used EVs tend to be quite expensive for now, at least in EU. But it's certainly also affected by supply/demand, there are simply not that many used EVs for sale yet.

And at least in case of Teslas it's mostly the higher models in higher trims, since those are the ones the early customers bought.

I assumed there would be a market for new aftermarket batteries but it hasn't developed at all. Theoretically a battery pack isn't the most complicated thing and electrical compatibility is a lot easier to achieve than for a ICE.

I saw a teenager on YouTube replace the battery on an early LEAF with a newer, higher capacity pack from a later model and (separately) a Chinese firm offering replacement packs for the same car at capacities never offered by the OEM.

Notably the kid said the hardest thing about the swap was sourcing the replacement battery.

Rich Rebuilds used to do stuff like this too.

I really think given a few more years when millions of Model 3s/Ys reach their 2nd/3rd owners, we will see this become more routine.

Also people talk about pack replacements like they are a single monolith but many cars have packs composed of 10-20 modules. Some modules can even be repaired at the cell level. So costs can trend down over time.

The trend has been towards unrepairable monolithic packs. You could do module replacement in the model S packs but since model 3 it's all full of foam.

Swapping for a used battery is pretty easy if you have a lift. Far easy than swapping an ICE engine. It makes sense that there's more aftermarket batteries in China as they have far more EVs and willingness to tinker. We in the US have become cultural allergic to tinkering, everyone cries that you're voiding the warranty or it's too dangerous.

1. Sourcing is difficult. Would you buy some random batteries from China? Do you trust the dealer that it won't fry your customer in few months after installation? Can you verify that what they are selling is what you have in your hand?

2. You need to know a lot about batteries and even more about battery management system and then know how to integrate batteries + BMS into a car. Sure you might be able to reuse existing BMS for a car you are targeting but it will quickly become a bottle neck in your manufacturing if you do so.

3. Pairing of parts. Related to point 3. You might be able to build a battery pack, are you able to also force the car to take the battery pack? Car might outright refuse to talk to it, because it is not paired and OEM won't let you pair it, because "safety", but more like safety of their profits.

4. Shipping of Lithium batteries in general is huge PITA. Try to ship battery of any size with Fedex/DHL/UPS. They either outright refuse to or you will pay a lot of extra.

It just seems like instead of the cost being a function of miles, an EV's cost function would include miles and battery age or usage.

You are talking out of your posterior. EVs are far more reliable and have less maintenance than ICE vehicles.

You say that and maybe some stats prove it but then when insurance rates are significantly higher and we see horror stories of drivetrain failures or battery failures, it makes it harder to jump on board.

>insurance rates are significantly higher

The insurance rates are higher because they gotta cover six months of rental car while some unobtanium back ordered headlight takes 3mo to ship to the one body shop in 100mi that won't actually get around to working on it for another 3mo (I'm exagerating a little here but not nearly as much as I wish I was).

We all pay for it on some level.

Less than ICE vehicles generally, including American and European shitboxes? Perhaps. Better than a Japanese car with a clean history? Not according to the auto loan people at my credit union.

Quite frankly, I trust them a lot more than internet commenters. They have a financial incentive to have good statistics on how cars keep their value. What's more, I trust them a lot more to make recommendations based purely off those statistics, uncompromised by ideology and/or environmental concern. Internet commenters are the same clowns who would have me believe it's rational and practical to give up my car and rely on public transit... in America. So yeah, I bought a Jap ICE car.

The people at your credit union know nothing about car reliability. There have been studies about EV reliability and it is much higher than any ICE vehicles. Battery degradation is averaging 1-1.5% per year, which is basically nothing. Stop spreading misinformation.

Also "Jap" is considered a slur.

Would love to read those studies if you have a link. I keep hearing say that in theory EVs should cost less but then you read things like Tesla having very high insurance costs.

When I search online I see a lot of back and forth. Some claim EVs breakdown more other say ICE (https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-reliability-owner-s..., https://thedriven.io/2024/03/13/the-data-is-in-evs-far-less-...).

It does feel like who makes the car says more about the reliability than EV or ICE at this point.

Tesla has high insurance and potentially repair costs (in the case of an accident) because of how they construct their vehicles; lots of glue and permanent bonding of components. They prioritized ease of construction and not repairability in case of body damage. They would have this issue if they built ICE vehicles too. Mechanical/drivetrain components are repairable.

Modern cars in general are quick to be totaled when they get into an accident because of this general trend. It's not isolated to EVs.

EVs are very repairable, but also just have far fewer moving parts and those they have are put through far less stress than comparable components in an ICE vehicle. It was obvious that they would be more reliable as long as the batteries were not an issue. The batteries aren't an issue, so EVs are way more reliable and will last a lot longer than ICE vehicles. The remaining issue to be solved is infrastructure for people in multi family buildings and road trips. We'll get there.

There's a Consumer Reports survey (note: not a study as widely mis-reported) that gets all the Google results when you search about EV reliability, which paints a terrible "80% worse than ICE" picture. But this is extremely misleading. First, it's lumping together any and all issues with cars from software glitches to a busted transmission. Obviously severity needs to be taken into account, but also many EVs are being either made by start ups like Rivian and Lucid or are on totally new platforms by legacy manufacturers and have had buggy software due to those issues like the VW iD4. But most of these issues do not make the car undrivable and get fixed via software updates, and should not be thought of in the same way as traditional car problems like "my check engine light came on and now the timing has been pulled back and my car is slow." Also, keeo in mind, it is a totally unscientific, self reported survey. So, I would not use it for purchasing decisions.

Instead, I'd look for scientific studies which are unfortunately much hardee to find on today's Google which is so biased for recency and wide reporting. One good resource is this site which at least addressed the battery reliability myth: https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/electric-vehicle-myths

EVs as a category may be much more reliable than ICE. That doesn't mean every EV car RIGHT NOW is more reliable than every ICE vehicle RIGHT NOW.

Teslas are the most popular EV. That fact they're shit to repair DOES matter. It means if you're comparing a Model 3 to an Accord you might end up spending less on maintaining the Accord. Those are the real comparisons consumers are doing right now. Theoretical EV comparisons are worthless.

Their job is to finance vehicles, of course they know about car reliability. Please get a grip.

LMAO. No, they absolutely do not. Tbat is not a prerequisite of financing vehicles. Not remotely. It is absolutely hilarious you think they do.

It's hilarious that you are so mad about this. I suspect you are ideologically compromised in exactly the way I described earlier. People usually don't get so worked up about thinking somebody else is wrong unless there's some sort of political angle.

If I default on my auto loan, all the credit union gets out of it is repossessing the car. They therefore need to know what the car is actually worth and have a good idea of what the car will be worth for the extent of the loan period. If they mess this up they stand to lose money, not just on my car but every car they finance, and they're a conservative financial institution that doesn't like to lose money. Getting good statistics on cars is comparably cheap. It's hilarious that you don't know how this works.

I am not at all "worked up". It is literally hilarious to think loan officers know anything about cars.

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