this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2023
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Oh, and you get to change your battery in 3 years for $20k because it's worn out.
There are some big problems that get glossed over that you learn about when you own one, unless you've done enough research to know when people are blowing sunshine up your ass.
Current battery technology easily lasts 10 year. The good ones even outlast the car they are installed in.
Our Prius lasted 12 years before we sold it, and it was still going strong. Newer batteries have improved their life expectancy. My experience makes me doubt your claim both on life expectancy and cost. A quick search estimates the (battery) cost between $2000-$4500, depending upon installation cost. We replaced the Prius with another hybrid that gives us 65 mpg/28 kpl. When infrastructure gets better, We will fully switch to electric. ICE engines really are that much more inefficient. Equivalent electrical costs are pennies per gallon. edit added: (battery)
I don't know about that price, even used EV batteries aren't that cheap. I just bought 43 kWh of LFP batteries for my home and they were almost $10K, and that's less capacity than most EV batteries.
I did a search to buy Prius batteries. I remember searching for how to replace batteries years ago and downloading the instructions. There were quite a few steps because of the potential of fire, if shorted out, but otherwise was pretty straight forward.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/155688032892?chn=ps&amdata=enc%3A1a2PXQDe8Q9uosuxnz69ArA87&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-117182-37290-0&mkcid=2&mkscid=101&itemid=155688032892&targetid=1644837436283&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=9018572&poi=&campaignid=20125739985&mkgroupid=149128855676&rlsatarget=pla-1644837436283&abcId=9312975&merchantid=6296724
NiMH is pretty ancient tech for batteries. These would only be relevant to that specific model, and they're reconditioned. Search up EV CATL LFP batteries and see how much those run.
I worried about the battery until I had this thought (and looked at the 8 year warranty ):
Phone battery, charged every night, approx 1000 charge cycles thus lasts 3 years ish.
Car battery, charged as needed maybe every 4-7 days. Approx 1000 charge cycles thus lasts 12 to 21 years. Total battery failure is something else entirely but you said "worn out".
If you needed to charge every night it might mean short range which means cheaper battery to replace or you are doing lots of miles. My car could do 200 miles easily before recharging or up to 300 with more care. If doing 200 miles a day you are doing 73,000 miles per year so in 3 years 220,000 approx. Any car probably needs some serious work done to it after that much.
Anyway we are still bringing this tech along so I reckon either prices will drop and/or car manufacturers will make them more serviceable so you don't need to replace the whole thing but maybe sub modules at a time.
I don't know where you got that info from but that is certainly not the norm... There are Tesla cabs in Vegas with over a million miles, and most of these battery packs retain close to 90% of their capacity even after 10 years. I'm sure there are exceptions, but 3 years is silly.
Yes there are problems and hurdles to overcome but I'd rank that pretty low.