An internal combustion engine doesn’t just fall apart though. It’s a collection of smaller, less expensive parts that wear and fail and can be replaced. A monolithic, proprietary battery that must be replaced as a unit is much closer to what you’re describing. What you’re saying about sales and service is absolutely true for the first owner and there are even bonus maintenance pros like pretty much never having to do brakes, but that’s not what I’m talking about. Same as I told the other guy, link me the cheapest EV you consider usable. It’s going to cost at least as much a battery. If it doesn’t, it needs one. There are potential answers to this like battery standards, modular designs, recycling programs but no one seems to push for them, electric=green, problem solved, back to consuming
My dad’s a mechanic, most cars get junked at engine failure because it requires a ton of labor to rebuild an old engine. While there are a lot of parts, pulling an IC engine out for repare is not a cheap task.
Like battery tech tends to improve over time. It being both the major constraint with the cars and the most frequent large replaced part means there’s a chance that when you do swap the batteries out your vehicle range increases
In the future, there will be more EV repair shops and aftermarket battery packs, but right now, these cars do not last as long as ICE on roads and that negates any green claims. Wrecker Tesla motors are cheap because there are so many of them.
I’m your new dad, the world has changed, and some idiot with a socket set and can-do attitude (hi) is 100% saving most of those junked cars. I’ve pulled motors with hand tools in gravel lots before and will likely get stuck doing it again. This is hell and the choices a lot of people face aren’t about which new thing would be better to buy. There is absolutely no sub–$5k EV market and if you’re clever and patient you can get a “junked” ICE car going for free
Batteries don’t just fall apart or stop working. They very slowly lose capacity over many charge cycles, but they very rarely just stop working. Actually, total failure of a battery pack is a lot less likely than catastrophic failure of an ICE engine if something goes wrong. And if you look at the lower cost of maintenance, and vastly lower cost of charging vs fuel over the lifetime of a battery pack, the cost to replace one ends up being far lower than what you will spend maintaining and driving an equivalent ICE vehicle for the same amount of time.
Yes, there are up-front costs, but they’ve come down a lot, and you can get a lightly used EV for a lot less than you probably think.
Lot of words, no sub–$5k EV listings. Again, my car was $700, 1 to own it 6 to fix the engine. Not at all hypothetical. I have a pretty solid idea what a used one costs and can find ICE beaters ~$500 all day. Post em if you’ve got em
An internal combustion engine doesn’t just fall apart though. It’s a collection of smaller, less expensive parts that wear and fail and can be replaced. A monolithic, proprietary battery that must be replaced as a unit is much closer to what you’re describing. What you’re saying about sales and service is absolutely true for the first owner and there are even bonus maintenance pros like pretty much never having to do brakes, but that’s not what I’m talking about. Same as I told the other guy, link me the cheapest EV you consider usable. It’s going to cost at least as much a battery. If it doesn’t, it needs one. There are potential answers to this like battery standards, modular designs, recycling programs but no one seems to push for them, electric=green, problem solved, back to consuming
My dad’s a mechanic, most cars get junked at engine failure because it requires a ton of labor to rebuild an old engine. While there are a lot of parts, pulling an IC engine out for repare is not a cheap task.
Like battery tech tends to improve over time. It being both the major constraint with the cars and the most frequent large replaced part means there’s a chance that when you do swap the batteries out your vehicle range increases
In the future, there will be more EV repair shops and aftermarket battery packs, but right now, these cars do not last as long as ICE on roads and that negates any green claims. Wrecker Tesla motors are cheap because there are so many of them.
I’m your new dad, the world has changed, and some idiot with a socket set and can-do attitude (hi) is 100% saving most of those junked cars. I’ve pulled motors with hand tools in gravel lots before and will likely get stuck doing it again. This is hell and the choices a lot of people face aren’t about which new thing would be better to buy. There is absolutely no sub–$5k EV market and if you’re clever and patient you can get a “junked” ICE car going for free
Batteries don’t just fall apart or stop working. They very slowly lose capacity over many charge cycles, but they very rarely just stop working. Actually, total failure of a battery pack is a lot less likely than catastrophic failure of an ICE engine if something goes wrong. And if you look at the lower cost of maintenance, and vastly lower cost of charging vs fuel over the lifetime of a battery pack, the cost to replace one ends up being far lower than what you will spend maintaining and driving an equivalent ICE vehicle for the same amount of time.
Yes, there are up-front costs, but they’ve come down a lot, and you can get a lightly used EV for a lot less than you probably think.
Lot of words, no sub–$5k EV listings. Again, my car was $700, 1 to own it 6 to fix the engine. Not at all hypothetical. I have a pretty solid idea what a used one costs and can find ICE beaters ~$500 all day. Post em if you’ve got em