Minor Car Crashes Mean High Tech Repairs (cnn.com) 105
"With all the improvements in car safety over the decades, the recent addition of a plethora of high tech sensors and warnings comes with increased costs," writes longtime Slashdot reader smooth wombat. "And not just to have to have them on your car. Any time you get into an accident, even a minor one, it will most likely require a detailed examination of any sensors which may have been affected and their subsequent realignment, replacement, and calibration." CNN reports: Some vehicles require "dynamic calibration," which means, once the sensors and cameras are back in place, a driver needs to take the vehicle out on real roads for testing. With proper equipment attached the car can, essentially, recalibrate itself as it watches lane lines and other markers. It requires the car to be driven for a set distance at a certain speed but weather and traffic can create problems. "If you're in Chicago or L.A., good luck getting to that speed," said [Hami Ebrahimi, chief commercial officer at Caliber] "or if you're in Seattle or Chicago or New York, with snow, good luck picking up all the road markings."
More commonly, vehicles need "static calibration," which can be done using machinery inside a closed workshop with a flat, level floor. Special targets are set up around the vehicle at set distances according to instructions from the vehicle manufacturer. "The car [views] those targets at those specific distances to recalibrate the world into the car's computer," Ebrahimi said. These kinds of repairs also demand buildings with open space that meet requirements including specific colors and lighting. And it requires special training for employees to perform these sorts of recalibrations, he said
"The change that we've seen in the last five years is greater than we've seen, probably, in the last five decades," said Todd Dillender, chief operating officer of Caliber Collision, one of the biggest auto body repair companies in the United States with more than 1,700 locations across 41 states. [...] With a rapidly changing industry, qualified auto body repair technicians are in short supply, just as they are in the engine repair business. That's also led to upward pressure on pay in the industry as technicians have to be highly qualified and educated, Dillender said. That's good for people who work in the industry, of course, but tougher for those who pay, and for the insurance companies who, in turn, pay for the repairs. A new study from consumer automotive group AAA says the cost to fix sensors and cameras in new vehicles "now accounts for more than a third of the post-crash repair costs," reports CNN. However, "no one, including AAA, recommends not getting these features because of repair costs," since many of them can cut crash rates in half and improve a car's overall safety.
"They're not going to prevent everything," said Greg Brannon, director of automotive engineering at AAA. "And when you are in a crash, there are additional costs so it's sort of the old 'there's no free ride' when it comes to these things."
More commonly, vehicles need "static calibration," which can be done using machinery inside a closed workshop with a flat, level floor. Special targets are set up around the vehicle at set distances according to instructions from the vehicle manufacturer. "The car [views] those targets at those specific distances to recalibrate the world into the car's computer," Ebrahimi said. These kinds of repairs also demand buildings with open space that meet requirements including specific colors and lighting. And it requires special training for employees to perform these sorts of recalibrations, he said
"The change that we've seen in the last five years is greater than we've seen, probably, in the last five decades," said Todd Dillender, chief operating officer of Caliber Collision, one of the biggest auto body repair companies in the United States with more than 1,700 locations across 41 states. [...] With a rapidly changing industry, qualified auto body repair technicians are in short supply, just as they are in the engine repair business. That's also led to upward pressure on pay in the industry as technicians have to be highly qualified and educated, Dillender said. That's good for people who work in the industry, of course, but tougher for those who pay, and for the insurance companies who, in turn, pay for the repairs. A new study from consumer automotive group AAA says the cost to fix sensors and cameras in new vehicles "now accounts for more than a third of the post-crash repair costs," reports CNN. However, "no one, including AAA, recommends not getting these features because of repair costs," since many of them can cut crash rates in half and improve a car's overall safety.
"They're not going to prevent everything," said Greg Brannon, director of automotive engineering at AAA. "And when you are in a crash, there are additional costs so it's sort of the old 'there's no free ride' when it comes to these things."
This property is known as fragility. (Score:5, Interesting)
Its opposite is robustness. The latter is usually a compliment, and the former is an insult.
Re:This property is known as fragility. (Score:4, Interesting)
If it cuts accidents down, the feature outweighs it's repair costs.
If it increases accidents from being broken, then it should not be an always-on feature.
Ultimately the solution is to not have 8 different car manufacturer's having 8 different ways to calibrate things. Build one standard calibration system and then have one "test track" in every city that every garage uses, and also new drivers have to take their tests on.
Re:This property is known as fragility. (Score:4, Interesting)
Build one standard calibration system and then have one "test track" in every city that every garage uses
It doesn't even need to be that elaborate. Just place two shapes on the wall of a store (Walmart, Costco, HEB) and designate a parking spot that is a known distance from the wall and centered between the two shapes. You select "calibrate" on the setup menu in your car and it recalibrates the sensor for distance and angle.
If the two shapes (Blue circle, green square, orange triangle?) are on the north side of the building, they should be in sunlight most of the day, all year. The manufacturers would all have to agree on the shapes and colors to allow this type of self-calibration, but it's better than requiring every body repair and glass replacement shop to have an expensive optical alignment station.
Re: This property is known as fragility. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:This property is known as fragility. (Score:5, Informative)
If it cuts accidents down, the feature outweighs it's repair costs.
If it cuts them down enough. Still, the article has enough details to make a guess:
1/3rd of repair costs are for the accident avoidance stuff. So we can assume that it increased repair costs by 50%.
Cut crash rates in half:
50% of 150% = 75%
A car that is 150% as costly to repair if it gets into an accident, but is half as likely to do so, has average repair cost at 75% that of the car without said features.
IE It saves you on repair costs, on average.
More complex work would be necessary to account for things like accident severity, that vehicles can simply end up totaled, initial cost of the avoidance stuff, savings from avoiding hospital stays and morgues.
But in general, it doesn't take much accident avoidance to actually be worth oodles of money.
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Dont forget that managing to avoid an accident also could mean that you are probably avoiding pain / suffering if you are involved in that accident. And the costs associated with the medical needs due to the accident.
And presumably increase in your insurance after that accident.
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I didn't forget that stuff - it's under "savings from avoiding hospital stays and morgues."
Though yes, an accident avoided is a accident not on your insurance bill. Though these days they're actually looking at how you drive and charging accordingly.
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There's also savings in insurance premium increase due to making an accident claim, costs to the other party in the accident, lost work time dealing with the car, costs of being injured (medical and lost work), etc.
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Theoretically, that would be built into the insurance bill by the "this car costs 75% as much to repair as it's not smart equivalent" bit. Also, covered costs of being injured with "avoiding hospital stays." Though perhaps that wasn't the best worded.
I was intending for "account for things like" to mean that it's not an exhaustive list.
Re: This property is known as fragility. (Score:2)
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You know not all states require "safety inspections", right?
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Free-DUMB
Re: This property is known as fragility. (Score:2)
Can't have car accidents if my car is in the shop. Smart!
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I'd rather have a car that is MORE basic...take out all the stuff I don't need..I don't need 500 sensors outside the car.
I've been driving long enough to not need lane warnings, I really don't need cameras everywhere, I don't use them...I'm old school and actually turn my HEAD to look where I need to look...and use my mirrors.
This stuff not only is $$ in a minor fender bender, but upfron
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In all fairness most things tend to break when they're hit by a vehicle.
Re:This property is known as fragility. (Score:4, Informative)
These "fragile" parts actually reduce the incidences of accidents in the first place, and reduce the amount of damage your body receives when something does go catastrophically wrong.
I'd rather replace a bumper designed to crumple up and absorb the crash energy, than get my bones broken.
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Yes, but there's a difference between a $50 headlight and a $1,000 headlight, and I'm not sure "prevents broken bones" justifies the total cost difference.
Sometimes manufacturers make things stupidly complex and expensive for no reason, and I'm pretty sure I don't need to drive an $80K SUV to be safe.
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The issue is that while you may feel a $50 headlight is adequate because you are protected by a few tonnes of metal, the pedestrian you didn't see due to poor lighting has so such defence.
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The vehicles may be more fragile, but hopefully the various sensors and automatic braking systems actually result in cars that stop accidents from happening in the first place. Even the simple rear bumper sensors that give you beep alerts about stuff behind you have definitely saved me a bump into more than one low car park bollard that I didn't notice.
More advanced systems that brake automatically can save you from rear end collisions with other vehicles or collisions with static objects and pedestrians in
I would just tell them to deactivate them all (Score:1)
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Re: I would just tell them to deactivate them all (Score:2)
Happened to me recently (Score:5, Informative)
Had a cracked windshield and got the glass replaced. Needed recalibration after windshield replacement. We were told it would take 3 hours, but technician came to our house--windshield was also replaced in 1 hour at our home--took 10 minutes and we were charged $550 for the calibration.
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Re:Happened to me recently (Score:5, Informative)
The sensors are mounted to, and often optically coupled with, the windshield. When removed and reinstalled they are disturbed and should be recalibrated.
=Smidge=
Re:Happened to me recently (Score:5, Informative)
Why is recalibration needed after a windshield replacement? Are there sensors in the windshield?
The typical windshield on a high end car has lane monitoring equipment, cameras, does vehicle / traffic sign detection, and has a rain sensor. That rain sensor needs to be perfectly glued to the windscreen. Most items just need to be aligned correctly. Slight misalignment is handled by calibration. The rain sensor needs to be calibrated against the specific glass since it relies on IR reflection off the glass and needs to know at what point the reflected signal is low enough to be considered "wet windscreen".
$1000 tail lights (Score:5, Interesting)
Replacing the tail lights on some vehicles can be insanely expensive due to the lane-avoidance sensors and other stuff in them.
For example, the left-side tail light for a 2024 Ford F150 is $695.00, and that's used. That's for just one tail light, not the pair. God only knows what a new one costs.
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That's ridiculous.
I recently replaced the taillights on my Jeep with some I got from Amazon. Total was $100 and I could have gone way cheaper.
Re:$1000 tail lights (Score:4, Insightful)
Do your tail lights include radar for detection of vehicles in your blind spot, or are you comparing apples to steak?
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No they don't. That is my very point. I was confirming that all that extra unnecessary shit drives up costs to insane levels.
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God I hope NOT...
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For example, the left-side tail light for a 2024 Ford F150 is $695.00, and that's used.
2024 is a new model/body style, so of course it's expensive to source a used one. A 2023 taillight with the BLIS radar, on the other hand, can be had in the $200 range [ebay.com].
Finally time for OBD-III? (Score:5, Interesting)
Car's are going the way of modules and networking, it would probably be a good time to introduce open diagnostic compatibility. So many bad stories are just about the fact that you need dealer tools for so many functions when in so many cases the calibration procedures are not that different from any other firmware update. If you have access to a mechanic grade scan tool they really do just step by step you through the process.
Car's have always benefitted from pretty much de-facto right to repair, more technology doesn't have to impede that, it's just gotta catch up.
There is an OBD 3 from SEMA but it's been on the books for like 2 decades or something.
https://fbaum.unc.edu/lobby/_1... [unc.edu]
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Car's are going the way of modules and networking...
i thought you were going to say "software defined"
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Automotive Ethernet [motortrend.com] was the thing I was thinking of so I suppose it also is?
I think it'll be along soon with the EV transition along with the shift to 48V power so if there's gonna be an ethernet network in my car I want owner access to it mandatory.
Isn't life grand? (Score:5, Insightful)
Thanks to the nanny state, we have the privilege of paying more for a car because of all these mandated doodads, our insurance goes up because it costs more to repair, and if you happen to be in an accident will pay more out of pocket money because of the exorbitant costs to replace and reconfigure.
I am so glad my car doesn't have any of this crap (aside from anti-lock brakes). No software thinking it knows better than me what gear to be in, no sudden lurching when a car pulls in front of me on the highway and radar cruise control slams on the brakes, no annoying beeping when I'm still six inches from the yellow or white line, no jerking of the steering for the same. Instead of making people better drivers we try to bubble wrap them then charge them more for it. That's the American way.
Re:Isn't life grand? (Score:5, Informative)
Of course the cost/benefit would also vary wildly from one "doodad" to another, so there is no answer 'in general.'
Re:Isn't life grand? (Score:5, Informative)
The cost/benefit analysis is not so simple, since the costs avoided by preventing a crash are huge. How many sensor bumpers can you pay for with the savings of avoiding a million-dollar personal injury lawsuit? Yet those savings do not factor in to a "cost to repair" figure.
Of course the cost/benefit would also vary wildly from one "doodad" to another, so there is no answer 'in general.'
My state mandated insurance rates have risen 20% over prior year and accident claims are up substantially.
Re:Isn't life grand? (Score:4, Interesting)
The cost/benefit analysis is not so simple, since the costs avoided by preventing a crash are huge. How many sensor bumpers can you pay for with the savings of avoiding a million-dollar personal injury lawsuit? Yet those savings do not factor in to a "cost to repair" figure.
Of course the cost/benefit would also vary wildly from one "doodad" to another, so there is no answer 'in general.'
My state mandated insurance rates have risen 20% over prior year and accident claims are up substantially.
If the number of accident claims are up, the fuck was the point of an extra $15K worth of mandated accident avoidance tech bolted to every new car for again?
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good for business
Re: Isn't life grand? (Score:5, Insightful)
My guess (just a guess) is that minor bumps that would have gone unreported in the past are now being reported and fixed. That minor bump that just scuffed the bumper in the past may take out a pricey sensor or two on today's vehicles resulting in the car constantly warning you that the system is degraded or disabled, prompting the owner to get it fixed (at the expense of the insurance companies).
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If the design of cars is to blame for rising car insurance, then the prediction would be that home insurance is unaffected, correct?
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If the design of cars is to blame for rising car insurance, then the prediction would be that home insurance is unaffected, correct?
There are obviously multiple reasons for both rate changes and increased claims.
If there was a "home shield" installed in homes that purported to magically reduce instances of property damage by 50% yet both insurance prices and property claims kept raising regardless of substantial and ever increasing install base of "home shields" it would lead me to the same obvious question why are my rates increasing 20% over previous year and why the increase in claims?
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I checked on the last post about automated braking, and found that AEB is available as part of a $500 driver assist add-on, and at least one insurance company offers a 10% discount for it. So for that specific case, it pays for itself in 3ish years. Unless you don't have one, in which case you might get no discount but your insurance covers repairing other people's doodads.
I bet OP thinks that he can get a discount on insurance by not having fairly cheap safety features.
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And...don't forget...staying off the fucking phone!!!
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And...don't forget...staying off the fucking phone!!!
That's easy. My phone is often at home when I am driving somewhere.
Re:Isn't life grand? (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead of making people better drivers
Just curious, what's your solution to making people better drivers that isn't also running into that nanny state thing you mentioned?
There's way more people on the road today than yesterday, going to be more people on the road tomorrow than today. At some point, just saying "make better drivers" doesn't work anymore without some sort of intervention. We can build it into cars or we can hire 100,000 more patrol to nanny us. But either way you slice it, I'm curious how you purpose we fix things that isn't "nanny state".
I'm all ears.
Re:Isn't life grand? (Score:5, Funny)
Just curious, what's your solution to making people better drivers that isn't also running into that nanny state thing you mentioned?
Evolution
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The flaw in that argument is that often the poor driver is protected by having a few tonnes of metal around them. Even back before all the modern safety systems, people bought Volvos because they were built like tanks, i.e. they kill the other guy and not you. It's even worse for pedestrians and cyclists.
Maybe instead of an airbag, a big spike should come out of the wheel in the event of an accident.
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Just curious, what's your solution to making people better drivers that isn't also running into that nanny state thing you mentioned?
Evolution
OK, that's a plan for 10,000 years from now... what about this decade?
Improving driver education and law enforcement tends to work, but branded "nanny state" by people who don't want to admit being shit drivers.
I'd also argue that we should be increasing driver engagement, but then the same people as above who drive automatic SUVs with soft suspension that provide absolutely no feedback from the engine or the road will also whine bitterly.
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Just curious, what's your solution to making people better drivers that isn't also running into that nanny state thing you mentioned?
You're begging the question. The OP is complaining about sensors being expensive to replace while also complaining about the car enforcing a safe following distance making an accident less likely. The OP can't answer your question because he is objectively a poor driver without the situational awareness to see someone wants to pull in.
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The OP can't answer your question because he is objectively a poor driver without the situational awareness to see someone wants to pull in.
Four decades of driving around large parts of the country, by myself, zero accidents. So of course I'm an objectively poor driver.
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Instead of making people better drivers
Just curious, what's your solution to making people better drivers that isn't also running into that nanny state thing you mentioned?
There's way more people on the road today than yesterday, going to be more people on the road tomorrow than today. At some point, just saying "make better drivers" doesn't work anymore without some sort of intervention. We can build it into cars or we can hire 100,000 more patrol to nanny us. But either way you slice it, I'm curious how you purpose we fix things that isn't "nanny state".
I'm all ears.
I'm not the parent poster, but in my state of the US, the solution has been implemented years and years ago: optional driver's education. Take a certified course, and you get a reduction on your insurance rates for seven years. Why do you get a reduction? Because, statistically, after taking the course, you get in fewer accidents. It avoids the nanny state objection because it is optional, but the benefits are so clear that there's nearly full participation. Pure carrot, no stick, and it works.
Or, we t
6 inches from the yellow line (Score:2)
My parent's tree farm is on a two-lane highway, and when the road was repaved, the crews installed rumble strips along the yellow highway centerline.
I would be working outside and I would hear noises that sounded like a compression brake on a big diesel truck, but it came from a pickup or an SUV. I finally figured out that motorists were make that noise by drifting towards the center line and running over those rumble strips.
Those rumble strips are a great safety feature to wake up an inattentive driv
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, and if you happen to be in an accident will pay more out of pocket money because of the exorbitant costs to replace and reconfigure.
Only if you are at fault. You're thinking about this one dimensionally, there are multiple variables here, the second important one being rate of accidents which are objectively far lower with all the fancy new systems in place. I would happily pay $900 for a fender bender instead of $300 since it means I only need to talk to my insurance company and take my car to a garage 1/3rd of the time thanks to those sensors helping avoid a significant number of accidents.
I am so glad my car doesn't have any of this crap
People said that about seatbelts too.
no sudden lurching when a car pulls in front of me on the highway and radar cruise control slams on the brakes
If you h
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I think you've stated the American way quite succinctly. Fuck everyone else on the road and sidewalks who you might hit because of the substandard safety equipment in your car. Your car insurance might be cheaper and that's all that matters.
Scam (Score:5, Interesting)
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Where are the AFFORDABLE cars?
I'm sure the Chinese will be happy to oblige this time around. Also, if a sensor is not necessary for the car to run, people short on funds will just let them be when they break. Warning dashboard LEDs will be ignored, OBD errors will be suppressed.
Also, I get the impression that a lot of people with a tight budget prefer to buy a large used car rather than a small new car for the same money.
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Vehicle safety in most countries is a regulatory requirement to prevent accidents, injury and deaths. It's not some vast conspiracy to make you pay more for a tail light. And boo hoo if it costs people slightly more money up front to avoid accidents.
Socialism at its finest... (Score:1, Interesting)
It sucks that my insurance rates are soaring because other people are buying EVs which are so delicate that a 2-3 MPH hit will total them, especially the EVs that have the batteries as part of the frame. All the while, my existing ICE vehicle runs without issue and can be repaired indefinitely.
Re: Socialism at its finest... (Score:2)
This is not the worst case. Wait until you hear what happened 2 weeks ago to a family driving a Vinfast car in Pleasanton
Re: Socialism at its finest... (Score:4, Insightful)
This incident? [msn.com]
Police said the car was traveling on Foothill Road when it hit a pole, then a tree, causing a massive blaze and killing the four occupants.
I'll note that at one of my former workplaces, we lost an incoming family in basically this same thing. Gasoline car, if I remember right. Doesn't take an EV to have an accident like this.
The owner of the vehicle filed the complaint last week, writing that before the crash on multiple occasions, the steering wheel was automatically veering to the right, even when lane assist was turned on.
Then don't freaking drive it. Especially don't lend it to a family that you care about.
Re: Socialism at its finest... (Score:2)
I had typed a very long response to this, and then Firefox mobile refreshed the page and lost it. Sigh.
Yes, gas cars blow up.
We drive an EV and PHEV. The EV had a battery fire recall. But didn't blow up. And got a free new battery.
We don't know what really happened with the Vinfast. I would bet on bug / malfunction. Unlikely to be a murder suicide, IMO. Not impossible. One guy drove his whole family in a Tesla over the railing and into a cliff. That was even captured on video by a dash cam.
Amazingly they al
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I had typed a very long response to this, and then Firefox mobile refreshed the page and lost it. Sigh.
Yeah, these days I tend to type longer posts into notepad++ for just that reason.
My main point in my reply, I guess, is that that's an anecdote - as you said, we don't really know what happened yet, if we ever will. Is it possible that the Vinfast has one or more design defects, much like the pinto back in the day? Yes. But that's more diagnosed with "X/Y Vinfasts have caught fire, when the expected rate is much less than observed." Not a single accident.
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I agree, a single accident is not enough. Unfortunately, the data may for other accidents may simply be unavailable. The founder of Vinfast, chairman of Vingroup, the largest conglomerate in Vietnam, has an outsized influence in the country. To the point that you'll read stories about people criticizing Vinfast online getting questioned or even arrested by the police. There is no first amendment over there. And the corruption seems to run at the highest levels. I have no problem at all believing that somet
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I drive a 17 year old Jeep. Full coverage is about $400/year.
It also doesn't have TPMS or any of that other CRAP that more modern cars have.
Amazingly, I've made it to 53 years old and have any kind of serious car accident. My suspicion is that I will go the remainder of my life without doing so. I'm certainly willing to take the risk. I definitely do NOT want a new car with all the crap on it.
My wife bought a 2024 Honda CRV. I won't drive it unless I have to. So now she gets to drive us around whenever we
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So now she gets to drive us around whenever we go somewhere in "her" car.
And we're all safer for it. We thank you for, what for you must have been, sacrificing your balls for our benefit.
Tell your wife I said she's a fucking hero.
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Not really. She is a horrible driver. It's a real white knuckle experience.
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In the mean time, the rest of us mere mortals who totally don't think you're not full of shit about your own driving acumen, will gladly share the road with your wife.
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You make a lot of claims with no data.
In the last 17 years, my wife has been through 4 cars, with two at fault accidents and Four moving violations.
I'm still on the first car, with no accidents or moving violations.
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Don't be lazy- this is well known. You could have googled.
I'll start your path to enlightenment: Let me know what your complaints are about that source, and I'll grab you another. [nsc.org]
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Yes, when someone presents facts that you don't like, they're obviously lying.
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These anecdotes may be inaccurate for a variety of reasons, as anecdotes generally are.
You could be full of shit. You could have an unreliable recollection. You could, for all we know, barely survive by the skin of your teeth as every fucker on the road manages to narrowly avoid your dangerous ass. They're anecdotes. They're not data, and they're not facts.
What I present was a set of facts. Statistical facts.
Their interpretation is pretty open, but the numbers beh
"Not just the cost of materials.." a blatant lie (Score:4, Interesting)
The article makes a claim that specialized repair technicians are needed to repair the technology.
In reality, this ia a blatant lie.
Many vehicles, once parts are replaced, they're replaced and they're good to go. This includes sensors, replacement wiring harnesses, cameras etc.
However, they require "calibration". The calibration processes are simple, often times requiring the vehicle operator to use a vertical wall or something similar to "calibrate".
However, calibration is out of the hands of vehicle owners locked behind software running old versions of Windows XP. Manufacturers commonly lock repair features taking the right to repair away. This includes 3rd party repair businesses and preferring "calibration" to occur at dealerships and "authorized" service centers.
The reality is, things could be and should be a lot cheaper, but dealerships making them unnecessarily complicated.
This "speciality" technician issue is a single 4 minute 59 second youtube away from slashing costs and length of waits at dealership lines.
Yep (Score:3)
We have an Ioniq 5. Parked where the front bumper just dragged on a stone. Backing up? On an older car, you would have had a lot scratches on the bottom of the metal bumper. On a modern car like this, plastic parts shattered, sensors fell out - it's a mess. An expensive mess.
It's not so much the sensors (which are all ok) as the materials. Plastic instead of metal, presumably for weight savings. But a "bumper" is supposed to be able to "bump". Not just break into pieces.
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Welcome to EV land. (Score:2)
This is even more true for all EVs which come loaded with much more high tech components. I wish someone brought this point up when they praise EVs for their low maintenance cost.
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This is even more true for all EVs which come loaded with much more high tech components. I wish someone brought this point up when they praise EVs for their low maintenance cost.
Well, the summary does not say that all this calibration of sensors means EVs have higher repair costs than ICE cars. In fact the drive train of EVs is far simpler and more robust that the compless clockwork mechanism of an ICE drive train. What they are talking about here are environmental sensors and if you stuff an ICE car full of these same sensors they incur the same repair costs as they would in an EV because sensors do not need less calibration by simply by virtue the fact that they were installed in
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Exactly. Every modern car in Europe, regardless of means of propulsion, will have lane keeping assist, emergency brakes, abs and all the other mandatory stuff and on top of that will have parking sensors, cameras etc.
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EVs don't need to be that way, they could've just replaced the ICE with electrical engine and batteries, but as the car ended up having higher cost (which is decreasing fast but still high) some manufacturers decided that adding all this bells and whistles would help justify the cost, and the others copied, causing this association in the consumers that EVs HAVE to be that way, and manufacturers like it because they can sell premium cars that have higher margins.
I just wish that they removed most of these o
EVs are too powerful (Score:2)
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EVs aren't loaded with high tech components. Particular manufacturers like Tesla might appear to go that way, but if you drive an EV by anyone else the exterior, interior and software isn't especially any different to any other vehicle of the same age regardless of propulsion. In some cases the car is even built on a vehicle platform suitable for EV or ICE variants of the same vehicle - most of Stellantis cars are that way. And EVs do have lower maintenance because they don't have mechanical parts that need
Uncomfortable (Score:2)
Personally, this makes me uncomfortable. If I get into a pothole, do my sensors de-calibrate and I need to pay $$$$ to re-calibrate them?
Road markings? (Score:2)
... if you're in Seattle or Chicago or New York, with snow, good luck picking up all the road markings.
As somebody who lives in a place covered by snow for much of the year I fell compelled to point out that if the lane assist relies on detecting road markings it's basically going to be useless anyway for at least five months a year. I just hope these cars have a reminder feature to nag me into doing the re-calibration come spring but not before the road authority finally gets around to renewing the road markings. They usually do that in spring around here and even then they tend to be sloppy about it which
Standardize (Score:1)
Happy with my dumb a$$ non-EV truck (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Too expensive to own cars? (Score:2)
Maybe that is the plan, make cars so expensive that people stop driving cars because they can't afford it. All under the guise of "your own safety".
Costs (Score:2)
Not just sensors (Score:2)
Uh (Score:2)
With a rapidly changing industry, qualified auto body repair technicians are in short supply, just as they are in the engine repair business.
The problem with the auto body repair business is that it's toxic AF. Most people don't last long in that environment, sometimes literally. When you spray paint, it's around half solvent. There are water based paints, but they don't perform as well as the solvent-based ones. When unibodies are painted they spray the whole thing and then bake the paint so hot that it reflows, which is how they get a good result even with water-based paints. Body shops can't do that when they make a repair.
Engine repair is mu
The real answer is cash flow (Score:2)
The car companies build them such that they *want* it to cost more.
Evidence:
1. In the early eighties, someone I knew who was a mechanic for a car dealership in a tiny town in VA, and who specialized in transmissions, told me that at that time, he was spending out of his pocket $3k-$4k PER YEAR for "special service tools". The car companies were *deliberately* changing the design to force mechanics to keep buying. (Note that your Phillips head doesn't need replacing till it wears out.)
2. In the late nineties
Don't forget windhields. (Score:1)