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Transportation

Will Electric Cars Last Longer Than Combustion-Engine Cars? (qz.com) 393

Long-time Slashdot reader jimminy_cricket shared Qz's report on some of "the highest-mileage Teslas in the world": Few have driven a Tesla to the point at which the vehicle really starts to show its age. But Tesloop, a shuttle service in Southern California composed of Teslas, was ticking the odometers of its cars well past 300,000 miles with no signs of slowing... These long days have pushed Tesla's engineering to the limit, making Tesloop an extreme testbed for the durability of Elon Musk's cars.Tesloop provided Quartz with five years of maintenance logs, where its vehicles racked up over more than 2.5 million miles, to understand how the electric vehicles (EV) are living up to the promise of cheaper vehicles with unprecedented durability compared to their conventional combustion-engine counterparts.

The results reveal Tesla to be a company still ironing out bugs in its products, but one that pushes the limits of what vehicles can do. "When we first started our company, we predicted the drive train would practically last forever," Tesloop founder Haydn Sonnad told Quartz. "That's proven to be relatively true." He notes that every car except one, a vehicle taken out of service after a collision with a drunk driver, is still running. "The cars have never died of old age," he added....

[T]he implications could be huge. Every year, corporations and rental car companies add more than 12 million vehicles in Europe and North America to their fleets. Adding EVs to the mix could see those cars lasting five times longer -- costing a fraction of conventional cars over the same period -- while feeding a massive new stream of used electric cars into the marketplace.... One of the first surveys done on EVs came this March when New York City revealed its first lifetime analysis of fuel and maintenance costs for its light-passenger fleet. It found conventional vehicle maintenance was two to four times higher than the $386 spent on EVs. That's before gas... If EVs continued to perform well past this point, the economics of the car market could change. Lower fuel prices and more durable vehicles could, theoretically, push total cost of ownership below conventional vehicles.

Several of the Teslas in their fleet have already driven nearly half a million miles.
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Will Electric Cars Last Longer Than Combustion-Engine Cars?

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  • Yes (Score:4, Informative)

    by Ryanrule ( 1657199 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @12:36PM (#59423144)
    Yes
    • Re:Yes (Score:5, Insightful)

      by taiwanjohn ( 103839 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @12:44PM (#59423176)

      I would also add that Tesla (the company) will outlast many of the incumbent auto OEMs. They are arriving late to the EV party, and very few of them have vehicles on offer that really challenge Tesla on price, range, and features. Sure, there are some cheaper EVs out there, but they don't match Tesla's range, or if they do they're more expensive. The transition to EVs is going to happen a lot faster than they expect, and they simply don't have the capability to ramp up production in time to catch up.

      • Re: Yes (Score:4, Interesting)

        by saloomy ( 2817221 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @01:27PM (#59423288)
        I actually think they can catch up in the Morning V space, but I still agree with your premise. It's not the electrification that will end it for them. It's the ancillary experience. 5yo Model S cars are still receiving and running the latest software updates. A Brand New F150 still has to go into the dealership to get a software update (good luck doing that for free). Everything else that makes Tesla's more compelling, the other manufacturers just don't know how to operate that way. Netflix in the car? Yeah. Right.
      • I would also add that Tesla (the company) will outlast many of the incumbent auto OEMs. They are arriving late to the EV party, and very few of them have vehicles on offer that really challenge Tesla on price, range, and features.

        I always thought that the strategy of the traditional ICE manufactures was to wait and hope that Tesla would crater. Then they could buy up Tesla technology and patents at bargain basement prices. And then they wouldn't need to invest like Tesla did in developing their own technologies.

        In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if some of the traditional car makers had secret "shorting funds" to help spread Tesla FUD.

      • Spot-on.

        But unfortunately, the government will probably bail-out the old IC car manufacturers.

        • But unfortunately, the government will probably bail-out the old IC car manufacturers.

          That depends on which party is in power. In 2008 in the Senate, the auto industry bailout bill received 40 yes votes from Democrats and only 10 from Republicans. The no votes were 4 Democrats and 31 Republicans.

      • The transition to EVs is going to happen a lot faster than they expect, and they simply don't have the capability to ramp up production in time to catch up.

        The transition to electric vehicles can only happen if there is enough production capacity to keep up, and I have my doubts that Tesla is going to reach the output of companies like Honda, Ford, or GM any time soon.

        I would also add that Tesla (the company) will outlast many of the incumbent auto OEMs.

        If Tesla is to outlast the incumbents then it will have to be able to stay ahead of the next Tesla. Tesla was able to move so quickly to building a car that sold well because it didn't have the inertia of factories, people, etc. that held it to a given product or market. Someone could come in w

    • Me too (Score:5, Interesting)

      by goombah99 ( 560566 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @12:56PM (#59423204)

      I tend to run my cars out till they are very low in resale value. The consequence of this is that if they get in to any fender bender then the insurance company totals them. If they require repairs for safe operation then I take the Totaling Insurance offer. Likewise I sell my cars when I reach a milage or decrepitude where the likely cost of single repair for a major subsystem will be 50% of the value of the car. e.g. the transmission. I do that before I need that repair.
      Otherwise if I'm spending less than $1000 per year on upkeep I hang onto them.

      I don't see EV's eliminating the totaling problem for venerable cars, but I can see them removing the latter. I will be able to run them till I actually don't need them for the use case I have at that point in my life.

      • so you what, just drive around looking to get into accidents?

        • My car was hit two times. once parked, once standing still, being hit by an oncoming car driving into my lane. These things happen, I wouldn't know how to prevent those.
      • I don't see EV's eliminating the totaling problem for venerable cars

        Telsa Autopilot has a much lower accident rate per mile than human-controlled cars.

      • by dfghjk ( 711126 )

        What does it say about someone who includes insurance settlement as a standard element in his purchasing calculus?

  • by DogDude ( 805747 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @12:38PM (#59423156)
    That's one thing I'm really excited about. No much less fucking time and money at the mechanics. It'll just be suspension and wheels and tires. All of the kajillion moving parts that make up the engine will be *gone*. I'm thrilled that that'll be one less thing I have to worry about.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • But you can't fix any of it yourself or take the cars to some "unauthorized" mechanic

        Just like I don't care that batteries I never have to replace are sealed in phones, I also do not care that parts that will never need repair are not user serviceable...

        I am pretty sure Tesla owners can at least change tires though. :-)

      • Fix what? Electrical issues with my BEV? Battery pre-conditioning routine? A regenerative breaking issue?

        BEV issues aren't like changing your own oil, plugs, and wires or swapping out a water pump. The mundane "fix it yourself" shit of ICEs largely doesn't exist in BEVs. It's mostly complicated as shit, you probably shouldn't do this without a certification, or it doesn't exist.

    • EVs use brushless servo motors to drive the wheels, so the worst that could mechanically wear out on those is their bearings -- which, if the motors are designed properly, should be easily replaceable in a mechanics' shop. If not there would eventually be a very robust supply chain of rebuilt motors, just slap them right in -- after the half a million miles it took for them to wear out.
      The servo motor controllers could develop faults, but that's just a bolt-in electrical part. If they're of a robust design
  • No problems at all. Original engine and transmission.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      how much did you spend on maintenance?

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • Tesla's new drive unit is rated for 1,000,000 miles. Sure the batteries won't last that long at full capacity - but I am really curious to see how long the batteries will really go.

        Here's a Model S with 400,000 miles on it:

        https://electrek.co/2018/07/17... [electrek.co]

        Thats quoting the same source as this post does. He's running a shuttle service, so he gets a lot of miles in a short time.
        Very typical for that kind of use.

        The service records are interesting.
        A pair of Tesla headlights costs $2800? That's expensive!
        The Mercedes "recommended frequency" line items make no sense. No one just changes timing chains at 125K miles, or blower motors at 75K, or plugs at 50K, or ECU's at 125K. I'm calling bullshit on all of it.

    • Sure, but is that typical for your model of vehicle?

      Saying that the top 1% in longevity can break 300k miles isn't remarkable. Having a model of car that, short of a collision, is almost certain to be running just find well beyond 300k is a game changer.

    • I got a little over 200K on my 1999 Ford Ranger before I traded it to a guy to paint my living and dining room. He shipped it to his brother in El Salvador - and it's still running strong, 4 years later. Damn thing would never have anything go wrong with it, so it made it hard to justify trading out. Manual 5 speed, only thing I did (besides tires and brakes) was regular oil changes, air filter change ever 50K miles, and one battery. Didn't even change the spark plugs.

      Now, my current main ride, a 2015 H

  • by jfdavis668 ( 1414919 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @12:43PM (#59423172)
    Car companies are running into issues they never had to deal with before, since cars are lasting longer now. The interiors are wearing out. Not just physical wear, but obsolesce. Particularity as electronics become more important, car interiors are becoming obsolete before the car is worn out. They now have to look at ways of upgrading them over their lifetime. But, also the interior parts, which used to outlast the car, are now requiring replacement. Manufactures don't make new seats for 12 year old models. Previously, if you did keep a car for a long time, you could go to a junk yard and find a part. Now the cars are lasting, and except for wrecks, aren't in junk yards. It is a total change in mindset for companies to have to stock parts they previously didn't worry about for far longer after the car was manufactured.
    • by Joce640k ( 829181 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @12:50PM (#59423188) Homepage

      Manufactures don't make new seats for 12 year old models.

      If only there was a way to solve that problem...

      • by e3m4n ( 947977 )

        IF only cars held to a specification on where the holes line up on parts in a car the way they do with ATX, ITX, mATX, etc. Imagine the spacing on the mounts for the seats in a car always being in an exact location so aftermarket seats could be purchased and installed in a chassis without it having to be for _that_ exact car. Things would be highly affordable if that were the case.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @01:08PM (#59423228)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

      Apparently the upcoming generation of batteries actually needs to be heated to fast-charge without being damaged. This, of course, is the simplest circuit of all: resistive wire.

    • Electric cars are only slightly more complicated than your washer and dryer. Complexity is the enemy of reliability.

      The failures I've seen most often on cars I've owned, and helped others fix, have been electrical problems. This will be things like the power windows not working, power locks acting funny, and weird HVAC behavior. Mechanical issues tend to be things like doors, locks, latches, and (again) power windows. Problems with things like turning signals and brakes don't go away with getting an electric power plant either.

      A modern automobile is quite complex but I'm not so sure the engine has much to do with it.

    • Electric cars are only slightly more complicated than your washer and dryer.

      And if you think of your car as an appliance (and many people do) you will be happy with them.

  • Tesla will be fine. The legacy car makers, not so much. They seem to be too set in their old ways to have any chance of catching up. Ford and Chevy are $hitting bricks with the popularity of the Dodge Ram for example. Dodge improved the truck part a little, but Tesla'd up the interior and it sells like hotcakes. Ford and Chevy, even with updates can't quiet get it right; even their "big" screens are not even iPad sized. With attitudes like that, yeah, they have no chance of catching up with Tesla even when
  • I thought batteries had a limit to the number of charges they could take and Tesla only warranties that for six years. So the answer would be no because the battery will be the weakest link. Sure I guess some people will elect to replace just the battery but that will be a pretty big pill to swallow.
    • The summary conveniently leaves out the bits from the article about battery life / cost still being a big question yet before we can actually start worrying about car markets changing or collapsing. Not to mention that after the initial period where electric vehicles are built and supported well enough to create mass demand for them, the inevitable "cash-in" phase will arrive, and all of these costs will go up, and the vehicle quality will decline.

      • by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

        Battery costs are only going to come down. Even if you replace after ten years, it won't cost near as much as the original one did. You probably want to get the internals (nav system, autopilot, etc.) upgraded at least that often anyhow, and planned maintenance is never as much of an inconvenience as failure in use.

        • Get the nav system upgraded? Christ, I'm lucky if I get a new phone in that time. How much will these cars be worth on the used market if you have to spend $20K on them 8 years in?
        • Battery costs are only going to come down. Even if you replace after ten years, it won't cost near as much as the original one did

          Keep telling yourself that.

          • Battery costs are only going to come down. Even if you replace after ten years, it won't cost near as much as the original one did

            Keep telling yourself that.

            Yep, still trending down. [commodityr...hgroup.com]

        • Battery costs are only going to come down.

          I don't believe you. There is already a shortage of vital material for meeting current demands and it takes a long time to ramp up mining. The places that have the best mines are in some cases also places that might not like us all that much.

          We are trading an import problem of oil with an import problem of things like rare earth elements, lithium, cobalt, and more. Unless the US federal government pulls it's collective head out of it's ass and encourage domestic mining we will have a shortage very soon,

        • What I was implying about costs going up was that beyond the "investment" period for building a market for electric vehicles, they would rely on overcharging for parts and service as they always have, so regardless of whether the actual costs should come down, they probably won't. And relative to actual, un-subsidized (by the car makers) costs, the prices will probably rise.

    • I thought batteries had a limit to the number of charges they could take and Tesla only warranties that for six years.

      It's not so simple. If you keep the batteries between 20% and 80% SOC (state of charge), then battery life is vastly improved. Charging to 100% (and leaving it charged at 100%) has a big impact on life, so avoiding this (and avoiding deep discharge) will typically result in much longer life.

      Also, if you buy your EV in CA, then you get a 10 year warranty on the battery.

      • Tesla already does that. To avoid the damn things losing half their capacity every TWO years.

        Call me in 10 years, when all current teslas will be at the toxic waste landfill because their batteries are dead but deliberately an integral part of the chassis instead of easily replaceable.

        • Tesla already does that. To avoid the damn things losing half their capacity every TWO years.

          Call me in 10 years, when all current teslas will be at the toxic waste landfill because their batteries are dead but deliberately an integral part of the chassis instead of easily replaceable.

          Stop spreading lies. Tesla batteries were designed with swapping capability. They are designed to be replaced in 90 to 120 seconds with a lift machine. Tesla was originally going to offer battery swap stations instead of superchargers.

          What oil company is paying you to lie?

    • Various researchers estimated that the battery in Tesla vehicles ought to last for 300k - 500k miles, and have around 70 - 80% capacity left at that point. Results from the field appear to support those figures, and that includes Teslas used as taxicabs, which will be predominantly charged on Superchargers rather than more gentle wall boxes at home. So you're good for at least 300k on the battery... where cars rack up only 150k miles over their lifetime on average (according to Consumer Reports).
      • So you're good to 300K provided you are ok with 80% of the battery capacity.
      • There aren no batteries on the market with that kind of stats. No matter how much you cheat with smaller charging cycles than the claimed capacity.

        I give them 2â"10 years before they are all trash.

        • There's extensive data from Tesla owners on battery life. On average they report around 10% degradation after 150k miles and just under 20% at 300k. If you read TFA, Tesloop's experience supports that data. They also report that battery replacements have thus far eaten 1.2% of their total maintenance outlay (a few batteries were replaced under warranty as well)
        • Considering what decade old roadsters are selling for I'm suspecting you are full of shit https://www.autoscout24.com/ls... [autoscout24.com]
  • by HuskyDog ( 143220 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @01:11PM (#59423238) Homepage
    The title asks whether EVs will last longer than conventional vehicles, but the linked article is much more about total costs over a fixed period (10 years) which isn't the same thing.

    It seems reasonably likely that the total cost of an EV over 10 years will be less than internal combustion because the fuel costs less, many components which require regular replacement don't exists (oil, spark plugs, exhaust etc) and they are less likely to break down. BUT, is this the same as "lasting longer"? To answer this question we have to ask what causes a vehicle to no longer be worth owning and I think that might vary by where you live and how many miles you do. Here in the UK - where it rains a lot - very many vehicles are scrapped because of corrosion problems rather than mechanical breakdown. I can't think of any reason why an EV should rust any less.

    I suspect therefore that EVs will last longer than petrol and diesel vehicles, but that the effect will be much more noticeable for owners who do high mileages or who live in dryer climates.
    • by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

      It should be possible to seal quite a bit more of the car against road salt, because there are fewer moving parts in general. This may or may not slow down the onset and progression of body corrosion.

  • by Big Bipper ( 1120937 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @01:21PM (#59423264)
    Nor spring pot holes nor salted roads. It's not just the drive train that wears out on IC vehicles. The running gear ( suspension shocks steering ) also takes a beating as mileage climbs. Wait till they have a fleet hitting 300,000 miles with winter conditions and then see.
  • I was recently shopping for a used SUV. I bought a 2011 Forester with 110,000 miles for about $7500.

    How do people feel about buying a used EV with the same age and mileage? Would you only do it if the battery had been recently replaced?

  • Great. They'll last a lot longer. So will the mini-mortgage that you have to take out to buy one. Paying $45K+ for a four door sedan (Model 3) is still a big chunk of change for the average American (that's without the longer range battery and other features).

    Show me all of your spreadsheets about how savings will come years down the road, and I'll show the car payments today.

    When Teslas and its competitors are on par (by cost) with average sedans for the middle class, and the range issue is at parity with

  • Many electric cars are like rolling laptops and Tesla is a prime example of this. While their batteries are meant to last half a million miles and their electric motors a million, what about simply lasting a few decades with or without all those miles?

    I had reserved a Tesla Model 3 in 2016, but when I was eventually offered one for a lot more than I had hoped, I had to reevaluate. It seems to me that Tesla's strategy is really to set up an automated taxi fleet capable of making hundreds of thousands of mi
  • Are changed because of high wear on interior and exterior, not due to any sort of mechanical problems. Further, the reality is that the engines aren't what fails in cars.
  • In college, my friend's 1970s Buick had just passed 350,000 miles; it had the original (5.7 L) engine. Today, the (mis-intentioned*) laws have been forcing cars to be made lighter, which usually means "weaker"; so it's not a fair comparison. My 50-year old car has sat outside 24/7 for 30 years and is rusting some, but still works. Can you imagine trying to deal with an EV's software a half-century later? Lol.

    * What's the point of forcing manufacturers to redesign a car with slightly better gas mileag
  • by rlp ( 11898 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @03:17PM (#59423646)

    Great - unless you live outside of California

    https://www.zerohedge.com/news... [zerohedge.com]

    • Great - unless you live outside of California

      https://www.zerohedge.com/news... [zerohedge.com]

      This has been proven to be 100% the fault of the owner.

      Watch the video and you can see that two bolts have been sheared off (probably from an accidental impact driving off road) that allowed the componentry to form a scoop that is not there normally.

      Better headline would read Tesla damaged in accident drives weird and other stuff!

  • by toonces33 ( 841696 ) on Sunday November 17, 2019 @05:28PM (#59424138)

    But I went with Hyundai Kona, and not a Tesla.

    The more I read, each manufacturer seems to have their own strengths and weaknesses. Tesla, being new to the game, has trouble with fit-and-finish issues, but has mastered the EV end of things. Other manufacturers have largely mastered fit-and-finish - they are playing catch-up on the rest of the technology. Nissan got out to a good start initially, but they have failed to update the Leaf, and for some reason that nobody can explain, still insists on air-cooled batteries.

    Battery supply is a huge limiting factor for many manufacturers. New capacity is being added all the time, and the price of batteries is dropping. Batteries is probably where Tesla has the edge right now - they have locked up substantial supplies of the things.

  • by fish_in_the_c ( 577259 ) on Monday November 18, 2019 @10:10AM (#59426222)

    I regularly go visit my relatives in Florida. ( Many people have monthly even weekly trips that are in the 4 to 8 hours range, I sometimes go to Minnesota which is a 19 hours of non-stop driving).

    Any trip that takes longer then 5 hours is going to require you to add an additional hour for every 5 to stop and (recharge). Added is the fact the batteries are the most expensive part that wears out the most quickly. They SHOULD NOT be recharging batteries _in_ the cars, what is needed are stations that automatically replace the batteries in under 5 min. Then the use case for electric cars will meet or exceed gas cars and the only other possible point of contention is purchase prices.

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