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I work for a major parts supplier; probably the most well known in America; and I am still very curious how the company will adapt to an EV future. Simple look

I work for a major parts supplier; probably the most well known in America; and I am still very curious how the company will adapt to an EV future. Simple look at the components listing of an EV reveals that outside of the parts most cars share; suspension components, brakes components, some fluids, filters, lights, compressors (think HVAC), and frills, there is little in common among the brands that third party service centers can work on. I haven't seen really any commonality among packs or even motor designs. I am sure with sufficient volume the motors will eventually be a part that can be rebuilt, replaced, and such, but unless there is an industry move towards a standardized pack design its pretty much going to be full replacement and at the behest of the manufacturer. Owning a TM3 my only real fear is an accident that requires replacement parts. My auto insurance is slightly higher than normal as my agent stated its flagged as difficult to repair and costly. The cost factor includes length of rental reimbursement. People like to put EV adoption solely on range anxiety and some point to charging but long term it is also come down to ease of service and that must include choice of who does that.

AlexMuir 8y ago
I think the market will rise to meet the need for alternative to manufacturer parts. Look at the availability of iPhone spares, for example. Whole screen, touch digitiser, front camera : $20. That said, I think the automotive parts industry is an incredible achievement and I’m constantly blown away by the availability of stuff. Btw I run howacarworks.com and I’m working on a parts-based startup. I’d love to pick your brains. Drop me an email: alex@howacarworks.com.
- close04 8y ago
  > Whole screen, touch digitiser, front camera Usually cheap after market replacement parts in phones really act according to their price. I haven't seen a quality replacement part for these prices. Nothing close to the original anyway. As anecdata, every case I know where an iPhone screen was replaced with a cheap AM part it ended up being replaced again later with an official one. I'm not talking about Apple induced issues but problems with colors, banding, viewing angles, glare, touch response, thickness, etc. These are random articles I found while looking for pictures that highlight these issues [0] [1]. I'm sure this can very well extend to batteries or cameras. This may be acceptable for a phone (even in the $1000 range) but in a car it poses a genuine safety risk. Also it undermines the premise of the original expenditure with the car. If you invest $50.000 in a car you may have an incentive to not use a low quality battery pack for example. [0] https://discdepotstandrews.co.uk/copy-iphone-screens-vs-originals/ https://discdepotstandrews.co.uk/copy-iphone-screens-vs-orig... [1] https://www.hotshot.repair/mo/columbia/office-banter/lets-talk-about-the-difference-between-original-and-aftermarket-iphone-screens/ https://www.hotshot.repair/mo/columbia/office-banter/lets-ta...
  - jdpedrie 8y ago
    > If you invest $50.000 in a car you may have an incentive to not use a low quality battery pack for example. And if you have a phone which is worth the investment, you'll likely pay more for the better replacement part. Maybe take it to the Apple store rather than the shady kiosk on the corner. Likewise, there are a range of quality/price options for replacement auto parts. If I'm working on a car that cost me $1800 and is on its last legs, the aftermarket part for half the price of OEM is fine, even if it's only expected to last half as long. People are perfectly capable of making those judgements calls and weighing the tradeoffs, as proven by the market for both phone parts and auto parts. The battery itself /may/ be something of an exception. I'd imagine as they become more commoditized that concern will become less applicable.
    - close04 8y ago
      My point was that you may be more lax when talking about things order(s) of magnitude cheaper. But overall yes, cheaping out on parts savotges the entire expenditure.
  - rchaud 8y ago
    Those prices certainly look suspiciously low. $20 will just barely cover a disposable screen protector, let alone an actual iPhone replacement screen and camera.
  - sokoloff 8y ago
    > If you invest $50.000 in a car You spent $50K on a car, you don't invest in a car, outside of some of very specific cases (some classic cars and some exotics that are reasonably expected to increase in value).
    - close04 8y ago
      That is an assumption since I didn’t go into the topic. And it’s semantics anyway. A car can very well be an investment, which doesn’t mean it should increase in value, simply that it produces value (carrying stuff for money can bring back more than the car is worth). Which is when taking care of it is more critical, to come back to my point.
Spooky23 8y ago
Personally, I think the economics will keep EVs in a growing niche category. People in general are poorer than they were 20 years ago, and that trend isn’t going away. Outside of the cohorts if folks who buy cars every 3 years, I think the values of EVs will crater as the novelty fades and repairs are a big question mark.
- phicoh 8y ago
  I assume EU will mandate EV cars in a couple of decades. It wouldn't surprise me if california would do the same. An alternative scenario is synthetic fuels or hydrogen. But so far EV seems to most established solution.
  - martin_a 8y ago
    From a German point of view I don't see this. Executives of automobile manufacturers are stuck so deep in the backs of our politicians that you can see them once they open their mouth. After everything that happened around VW and "Dieselgate" nothing happened or changed. It's just depressing to see how this crisis is dealt with by doing nothing because manufacturers threaten with loss of workforce in Wolfsburg etc.
    - phicoh 8y ago
      What changed is that diesel is now 'toxic'. For quite a number of years, car manufactures tries to sell diesel as cool. And now that's gone. At the same time, the world outside Germany is not sitting still. If German manufactures do not make electric cars, companies in other countries will. There is no reason to expect German car companies to lead in EV cars. But once demand and infrastructure is there, they simply have to provide EV models in a large part of the world or risk becoming obsolete. So my estimate is that within one decade, most car companies will have quite a few EV models. Then there may even be an incentive to kill off support for car IC engines. I.e. maintaining one platform (for EV cars) is cheaper than maintaining one for EV and one for IC.
      - 8y ago
phkahler 8y ago
>> People like to put EV adoption solely on range anxiety... This is a term that irritates me every time I see it. EVs have a range problem. You can't drive them long distances without running into charging issues and doing careful planning around it. Telsa has longer range and their network of charging stations, but it still requires planning to deal with. This is an issue with the cars, and to call it "range anxiety" feels like making it some kind of perceptual issue with the driver. Like hey dude, get over it. In my mind this is a subtle way to blame shift from the technology to the would-be customers. Tesla being the one company taking it the most seriously and providing good range and a network of fairly quick chargers. But still, cars don't have anxiety - people do and the problem here is the cars don't meet peoples expectations.
- ForHackernews 8y ago
  Collectively, we do need to get over it. There are all kinds of tradeoffs in life and society, and we can't keep using ICEs. It's the same reason we no longer use uranium oxide in ceramic glazing[0], even though it makes for very lovely, bright colours. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiesta_(dinnerware)#Radioactive_glazes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiesta_(dinnerware)#Radioactiv...
- turtlebits 8y ago
  Range anxiety absolutely exists. It's the fear that you'll run out of power on your trip. It's the same anxiety you get when you're low on gas an unsure if you can make it to a gas station. You do get over it. It takes a while to realize that you generally will have a full charge every day and you stop looking at the gauge.
  - phkahler 8y ago
    >> Range anxiety absolutely exists. But it's still a problem with the vehicle. Go ahead, take your EV on a cross country trip. I worked on the Focus Electric and realized I couldn't even use it as a daily commuter without paying extra attention. Most days it would be more than adequate, but if for some reason I wanted to make a detour from my daily drive - like up to our motor manufacturing plant - it would not make it on the overnight charge. Granted, that car has fairly short range. A Tesla (or Rivian) should go all day in local driving, so they punt the range problem down the road to mostly long trips. But it's still a problem compared to ICE vehicles. My problem with the wording is this: The shortcomings of EVs rightly cause anxiety in people. But lets stop focusing on the anxiety in the humans and start talking about the issues with EVs. Until companies change that attitude, they'll make things like the Focus, Leaf, Volt. Yeah, I think the Volt was a mistake but some people love it and feel that it addressed the range issue nicely. It did address the issues head on, just not in a way that I like.
RankingMember 8y ago
Anecdata: I had a friend have his Model 3 get sideswiped badly while parked outside his house 2 days after he took delivery back in early December and he just finally got it back this past weekend. Kinda puts a damper on that new car exuberance.
twothamendment 8y ago
Range and service are the two big reasons why I can only sit on the sidelines and watch what happens with EVs. There isn't a super charger within 3 hours of me and the nearest service center is over 500 miles away! (Ok, one might be a bit closer, but it is in another country and that has its own set of issues.) Obviously, not everyone has that problem, but distance to a dealer is on my mind, even for my ICE vehicles and it is "only" an hour away. I wouldn't want to go any farther than that.

AlexMuir 8y ago

I think the market will rise to meet the need for alternative to manufacturer parts. Look at the availability of iPhone spares, for example. Whole screen, touch digitiser, front camera : $20. That said, I think the automotive parts industry is an incredible achievement and I’m constantly blown away by the availability of stuff. Btw I run howacarworks.com and I’m working on a parts-based startup. I’d love to pick your brains. Drop me an email: alex@howacarworks.com.

close04 8y ago
> Whole screen, touch digitiser, front camera Usually cheap after market replacement parts in phones really act according to their price. I haven't seen a quality replacement part for these prices. Nothing close to the original anyway. As anecdata, every case I know where an iPhone screen was replaced with a cheap AM part it ended up being replaced again later with an official one. I'm not talking about Apple induced issues but problems with colors, banding, viewing angles, glare, touch response, thickness, etc. These are random articles I found while looking for pictures that highlight these issues [0] [1]. I'm sure this can very well extend to batteries or cameras. This may be acceptable for a phone (even in the $1000 range) but in a car it poses a genuine safety risk. Also it undermines the premise of the original expenditure with the car. If you invest $50.000 in a car you may have an incentive to not use a low quality battery pack for example. [0] https://discdepotstandrews.co.uk/copy-iphone-screens-vs-originals/ https://discdepotstandrews.co.uk/copy-iphone-screens-vs-orig... [1] https://www.hotshot.repair/mo/columbia/office-banter/lets-talk-about-the-difference-between-original-and-aftermarket-iphone-screens/ https://www.hotshot.repair/mo/columbia/office-banter/lets-ta...
- jdpedrie 8y ago
  > If you invest $50.000 in a car you may have an incentive to not use a low quality battery pack for example. And if you have a phone which is worth the investment, you'll likely pay more for the better replacement part. Maybe take it to the Apple store rather than the shady kiosk on the corner. Likewise, there are a range of quality/price options for replacement auto parts. If I'm working on a car that cost me $1800 and is on its last legs, the aftermarket part for half the price of OEM is fine, even if it's only expected to last half as long. People are perfectly capable of making those judgements calls and weighing the tradeoffs, as proven by the market for both phone parts and auto parts. The battery itself /may/ be something of an exception. I'd imagine as they become more commoditized that concern will become less applicable.
  - close04 8y ago
    My point was that you may be more lax when talking about things order(s) of magnitude cheaper. But overall yes, cheaping out on parts savotges the entire expenditure.
- rchaud 8y ago
  Those prices certainly look suspiciously low. $20 will just barely cover a disposable screen protector, let alone an actual iPhone replacement screen and camera.
- sokoloff 8y ago
  > If you invest $50.000 in a car You spent $50K on a car, you don't invest in a car, outside of some of very specific cases (some classic cars and some exotics that are reasonably expected to increase in value).
  - close04 8y ago
    That is an assumption since I didn’t go into the topic. And it’s semantics anyway. A car can very well be an investment, which doesn’t mean it should increase in value, simply that it produces value (carrying stuff for money can bring back more than the car is worth). Which is when taking care of it is more critical, to come back to my point.

Spooky23 8y ago

Personally, I think the economics will keep EVs in a growing niche category. People in general are poorer than they were 20 years ago, and that trend isn’t going away. Outside of the cohorts if folks who buy cars every 3 years, I think the values of EVs will crater as the novelty fades and repairs are a big question mark.

phicoh 8y ago
I assume EU will mandate EV cars in a couple of decades. It wouldn't surprise me if california would do the same. An alternative scenario is synthetic fuels or hydrogen. But so far EV seems to most established solution.
- martin_a 8y ago
  From a German point of view I don't see this. Executives of automobile manufacturers are stuck so deep in the backs of our politicians that you can see them once they open their mouth. After everything that happened around VW and "Dieselgate" nothing happened or changed. It's just depressing to see how this crisis is dealt with by doing nothing because manufacturers threaten with loss of workforce in Wolfsburg etc.
  - phicoh 8y ago
    What changed is that diesel is now 'toxic'. For quite a number of years, car manufactures tries to sell diesel as cool. And now that's gone. At the same time, the world outside Germany is not sitting still. If German manufactures do not make electric cars, companies in other countries will. There is no reason to expect German car companies to lead in EV cars. But once demand and infrastructure is there, they simply have to provide EV models in a large part of the world or risk becoming obsolete. So my estimate is that within one decade, most car companies will have quite a few EV models. Then there may even be an incentive to kill off support for car IC engines. I.e. maintaining one platform (for EV cars) is cheaper than maintaining one for EV and one for IC.
    - 8y ago

phkahler 8y ago

>> People like to put EV adoption solely on range anxiety... This is a term that irritates me every time I see it. EVs have a range problem. You can't drive them long distances without running into charging issues and doing careful planning around it. Telsa has longer range and their network of charging stations, but it still requires planning to deal with. This is an issue with the cars, and to call it "range anxiety" feels like making it some kind of perceptual issue with the driver. Like hey dude, get over it. In my mind this is a subtle way to blame shift from the technology to the would-be customers. Tesla being the one company taking it the most seriously and providing good range and a network of fairly quick chargers. But still, cars don't have anxiety - people do and the problem here is the cars don't meet peoples expectations.

ForHackernews 8y ago
Collectively, we do need to get over it. There are all kinds of tradeoffs in life and society, and we can't keep using ICEs. It's the same reason we no longer use uranium oxide in ceramic glazing[0], even though it makes for very lovely, bright colours. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiesta_(dinnerware)#Radioactive_glazes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiesta_(dinnerware)#Radioactiv...
turtlebits 8y ago
Range anxiety absolutely exists. It's the fear that you'll run out of power on your trip. It's the same anxiety you get when you're low on gas an unsure if you can make it to a gas station. You do get over it. It takes a while to realize that you generally will have a full charge every day and you stop looking at the gauge.
- phkahler 8y ago
  >> Range anxiety absolutely exists. But it's still a problem with the vehicle. Go ahead, take your EV on a cross country trip. I worked on the Focus Electric and realized I couldn't even use it as a daily commuter without paying extra attention. Most days it would be more than adequate, but if for some reason I wanted to make a detour from my daily drive - like up to our motor manufacturing plant - it would not make it on the overnight charge. Granted, that car has fairly short range. A Tesla (or Rivian) should go all day in local driving, so they punt the range problem down the road to mostly long trips. But it's still a problem compared to ICE vehicles. My problem with the wording is this: The shortcomings of EVs rightly cause anxiety in people. But lets stop focusing on the anxiety in the humans and start talking about the issues with EVs. Until companies change that attitude, they'll make things like the Focus, Leaf, Volt. Yeah, I think the Volt was a mistake but some people love it and feel that it addressed the range issue nicely. It did address the issues head on, just not in a way that I like.

RankingMember 8y ago

Anecdata: I had a friend have his Model 3 get sideswiped badly while parked outside his house 2 days after he took delivery back in early December and he just finally got it back this past weekend. Kinda puts a damper on that new car exuberance.

twothamendment 8y ago

Range and service are the two big reasons why I can only sit on the sidelines and watch what happens with EVs. There isn't a super charger within 3 hours of me and the nearest service center is over 500 miles away! (Ok, one might be a bit closer, but it is in another country and that has its own set of issues.) Obviously, not everyone has that problem, but distance to a dealer is on my mind, even for my ICE vehicles and it is "only" an hour away. I wouldn't want to go any farther than that.