10 ms·

Which auto maker's electronics are likely to be reliable for the 25-year nominal life of the vehicle (US fleet average age is 11.8 years and rising)? And which

Which auto maker's electronics are likely to be reliable for the 25-year nominal life of the vehicle (US fleet average age is 11.8 years and rising)? And which will have spare parts available for that long? I'm thinking about buying a new car, but I'm worried.

PinguTS 7y ago
My Volvo S60 is getting 20 years in 3 month. Many premium cars from the 1990s are getting to the 30 year mark, which will mean they are getting a historic car badge. Most of them still work. Only some with failed sealings need replacements.
- Merrill 7y ago
  I have a 2005 Accord which has been quite reliable, but it is an LX and doesn't have much of an infotainment system. I'm worried about repair of things like the video cameras, LCD screens, and infotainment systems that are in the new cars once a decade or more has passed. Cars are a pretty hostile environment for those systems.
  - Marsymars 7y ago
    Don't forget speakers! Old cars with four or six speakers can have all their speakers replaced with off-the-shelf models pretty easily, but I expect replacing all 15 speakers in a Model 3 in a dozen years to be fairly nightmarish. Comparison of some old car speakers: https://www.crutchfield.com/S-FPB2k6hbguH/learn/mad-science-speaker-project.html https://www.crutchfield.com/S-FPB2k6hbguH/learn/mad-science-...
jbarberu 7y ago
We have two 03 vehicles that are going strong. The electronics are simple enough that I expect them to keep going unless there's ever water intrusion :) It's a Honda and a BMW for what it's worth.
JohnJamesRambo 7y ago
My family’s ownership outcomes strongly suggest getting a Toyota. I’m driving my Dad’s old 2001 Tundra pickup with 350k miles on the same engine. I was amazed when I bought it from him how every switch still worked, the original AC still blew cold. This is not my normal experience buying used cars from other manufacturers. Usually at about 150k miles they turn into a clown car of various systems failing. Someone put thought into each component on the truck and how it would age.
- LeonM 7y ago
  Toyota has been known for their reliability for a long time now. I can attest that with my Lexus, it's 13 years old now and in the 7 years that I have owned it, it has had zero defects. Last year it even got recalled (12 years after production) because the fuel filter might not have been installed correctly in the factory, so they replaced it for free. That said: I still do every scheduled maintenance, which helps tremendously. The main problem with older vehicles is that people stop following the recommended services as the car gets older. Which is of course the opposite of what you should do with an old car.
  - celticmusic 7y ago
    > That said: I still do every scheduled maintenance, which helps tremendously. The main problem with older vehicles is that people stop following the recommended services as the car gets older. Which is of course the opposite of what you should do with an old car. exactly this. I've been driving my Toyota for 15 years, never had a problem with it. But I still, to this day, have it maintained. The cost of that maintenance is pennies compared to purchasing a new car. If you can afford it, it's foolish not to.
  - ryanmercer 7y ago
    > Last year it even got recalled (12 years after production) Toyota is great about that. There was something in the steering column that needed replaced on my '95 T100 and and 15 years later they sent a notice offering to fix it for free. I never did get it replaced, it was a 'we gotta keep the vehicle for a couple of days' and we'd been driving it since it was brand new without issue so I decided to keep on since the risk seemed incredibly minimal.
mywittyname 7y ago
There are plenty of 90s era car electronics that are going fine. The sensors are going to be maintenance items after 20 years, but there's no reason to think the solid state components won't normally last 25+ years. Spare (electronic) parts shouldn't be an issue with major brands. I've seen the same sensor used on a dozen models from several manufactures produced over 10+ years. As Takata exposed, there aren't that many parts suppliers around the globe, so a lot of commodity components are shared across the industry. For long-term part replacement, I'd be far more concerned with construction techniques like plasma-transferred wire arc sprays used for creating cylinder linings. This technique cannot be replicated outside of the factory, thus, they kind of make engine blocks disposable (they can be sleeved, but they won't perform the same and will require different piston heads).
- slg 7y ago
  > but there's no reason to think the solid state components won't normally last 25+ years. Except this article is specifically about solid state components failing in a much shorter timeframe.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - myself248 7y ago
    Except most cars don't rewrite their flash every few seconds. Most modules with flash in 'em are programmed once at the manufacturer, reflashed once or twice during assembly, maybe reflashed once more at the dealer before delivery, and that's it. Maybe again post-sale if there's a recall or TSB or something that can be fixed in software. Flash quite happily lasts 25+ years if you don't abuse it far beyond any flash manufacturer's wearout specs. Go figure!
    - t34543 7y ago
      Airbag control modules do constantly write data. The last 5 seconds or so of sensor and input data is recorded for crash investigations.
kube-system 7y ago
Good process ensures good results: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Toyota_Way https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Toyota_Way
bluGill 7y ago
Depends. Electronics manufactures won't promise any CPU will be available for that long (Odds are someone reading this should be thinking I'm partially responsible for that policy in my company). When spare parts are not going to be made the companies will try to predict how many will be needed in the future and order that many. This will be your biggest limit: you need a part there is a good chance the part is failing more often than expected and so the manufacture is out of stock and they cannot get more. (or sometimes they can, at a cost of $1000 each, minimum order 10,000 - the manufactures want to sell the new shiny replacement even though it isn't compatible) Even if the above isn't an issue, storing electronics not on a circuit board is not easy, but I'm probably not supposed to talk about those issues. (You can research them)
throwaway5752 7y ago
Prius's routinely get to 300-400,000 miles. The used market is full of 10+ year old Priuses with 200k+. You may have to replace a transaxle and hybrid battery, but they are $1k each. Part of it is Toyota, part of it is the Atkinson cycle engine.
- beerandt 7y ago
  >hybrid battery This isn't a trivial cost
  - throwaway5752 7y ago
    No, it's not, but all cars require maintenance and you should know what they are an amortize them over the time you expect to have a car. For the added car life usage you should get on either Prius component, it is a bargain.
  - rasz 7y ago
    its ~$1K, or less if its just one faulty module https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3RCdrh666w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3RCdrh666w
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    I don't know how much it actually costs, but taking the numbers here at face value, $1000 over 200,000 miles is half a penny a mile - that is clearly trivial compared to running costs of any car. One way to look at it, is if you assume $3/gallon gas and 50 mpg, then the cost of the battery is equivalent to reducing the gas mileage to 46 mpg, all else being equal.
    - beerandt 7y ago
      Sure it makes sense amortized, but it's the equivalent of buying a gas engine that needs a rebuild. It's a significant up front cost to consider against a purchase price.
      - 7y ago
i_am_proteus 7y ago
When the alternator in my 1983 Mercedes 300D quit, I started the car off a jump and drove it dead-electric to the store for a replacement part. I believe the only semiconductors in the car are in the timing circuits for indicators and wipers, the tach and fuel gauge amps, and the radio. Past results do not guarantee future performance: no new cars are this simple.
- coolspot 7y ago
  1983 Mercedes Diesel has electronic fuel injection and ABS.
  - wiggles_md 7y ago
    ABS yes, but it’s a Bosch mechanical pump. There’s a reason for the manual stop lever on it! There is an “electronic diesel system” that feeds into the ALDA system, but the car will run without ALDA. I don’t think the 300D had EDS though. If there is ever a nuclear apocalypse, the giant mutant cockroaches that survive will be driving around in style in 80’s diesel Mercs.
- wiggles_md 7y ago
  Up until around 89 (I think) you could have even tow started it! The instructions are even in the manual. They are incredible machines.
- noonespecial 7y ago
  I once drove my '76 300D for more than a week with no electricity whatsoever. No generator, no battery. Hill started it or borrowed a fresh battery when I needed to start it and let it run until I was done with it. Electricity was strictly optional on those cars.
brandonmenc 7y ago
I bought a 2000 Toyota 4Runner a few years ago at around 160k miles, put a few thousand dollars into required routine maintenance, and it runs great. Sale price plus maintenance divided by time owning it currently has me at $275/month and dropping.
- benj111 7y ago
  What's "a few years"? $275/month is $3300pa, so you're already at a minimum of $6600 for a near 20 year old car, which doesn't sound particularly cheap. I'm on a lower monthly cost of ownership for 3 years ownership of a 6 year old car.
  - brandonmenc 7y ago
    I've owned it for 45 months. I'd like to get another 5 years out of it as a daily driver with minimal upkeep. Also, it's not a car - it's an SUV - so it's going to cost more than a car. I bought it because I really wanted an old 4Runner, not because I wanted the cheapest car.
    - benj111 7y ago
      Car is a general word for 4 wheeled motorised personal transport? SUV is hardly more specific. A 2 wheel drive with slightly increased ride height is classed as an SUV these days. Your mention of costs seemed to imply that it was cheap which didn't seem to me to be the case.
      - brandonmenc 7y ago
        Wow, OK, you win - you got a cheaper car than me. Congrats. However, anecdote vs data: "Used car payments hit record $400 per month as prices top $20,000" [0] So I still think I've done pretty good with my purchase. [0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2018/11/08/used-car-prices/1928840002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2018/11/08/used-ca...
        7y ago
dsfyu404ed 7y ago
EEC-IV and EEC-V (Ford) ECUs haven't yet found the "late" stage of the bathtub curve and they're 15-35yo give or take. I'm not familiar with other brands of ECU but I suspect that they tend to be similar. If you look at all brands there's probably some that don't last because they were subject to the capacitor plague but they're clearly so few and far between that no brand has developed a reputation for ECUs crapping out. I wouldn't personally be worried about electronics failures. Physical failures of the electronic systems are far more likely. Because this is a decently upscale crowd on HN everyone is going to tell you Toyota/Honda. I'm not going to write the mini-novel it takes to explain why but it suffices to say that is one filter bubble's opinion and other bubbles will have other opinions. As someone who has fairly extensive experience with vehicles that most here would consider far beyond end of life I assure you the badge on the grill matters far far less than what you use the vehicle for and how you treat it. Anything will "last" 25yr if you're willing to baby it there, put a bunch of money into it or just deal with it having all sorts of NVH issues in years 20-25. Trying to predict what vehicle and configuration will last 25yr with the least work (the unstated assumption in these discussions) is a complete and total fools errand because the equation is dominated by variables outside, or mostly outside your control.
crooked-v 7y ago
If you like niche cars, the Mini Cooper line has dealerships with replacement parts going back to at least the 2001 models (and probably can custom-order stuff for earlier models), and an endearingly nutty online fanbase that sells both custom aftermarket parts/upgrades and original OEM parts for both the 'modern' BMW-made line and for the classic cars. The word online is that these cars take a lot of maintenance, but I haven't had any trouble with mine (2012 model, 90K miles, original electronics) aside from needing a new fan belt and a new battery. And of course the Countryman line is basically just a BMW SUV with the Mini branding and dealership network. If you want a vehicle that's less 'will the parts be available' and more 'will it just last forever', though, you can't go wrong with a Toyota Hilux.
rodgerd 7y ago
Toyota commit to 20 years of parts. (I can probably still get new mechanical parts for my 23 year old Ipsum, but I doubt the in-car electronics are replaceable except from the second-hand market)
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
Animats 7y ago
That's a problem. The design life for the Ford EEC IV, used in 1980s Ford vehicles, was 30 years. My 35 year old Ford Bronco is still using the original electronics.
perl4ever 7y ago
I thought there were laws and regulations requiring automakers to reserve a certain number of spare parts for everything they make and support it for a period of time.

PinguTS 7y ago

My Volvo S60 is getting 20 years in 3 month. Many premium cars from the 1990s are getting to the 30 year mark, which will mean they are getting a historic car badge. Most of them still work. Only some with failed sealings need replacements.

Merrill 7y ago
I have a 2005 Accord which has been quite reliable, but it is an LX and doesn't have much of an infotainment system. I'm worried about repair of things like the video cameras, LCD screens, and infotainment systems that are in the new cars once a decade or more has passed. Cars are a pretty hostile environment for those systems.
- Marsymars 7y ago
  Don't forget speakers! Old cars with four or six speakers can have all their speakers replaced with off-the-shelf models pretty easily, but I expect replacing all 15 speakers in a Model 3 in a dozen years to be fairly nightmarish. Comparison of some old car speakers: https://www.crutchfield.com/S-FPB2k6hbguH/learn/mad-science-speaker-project.html https://www.crutchfield.com/S-FPB2k6hbguH/learn/mad-science-...

jbarberu 7y ago

We have two 03 vehicles that are going strong. The electronics are simple enough that I expect them to keep going unless there's ever water intrusion :) It's a Honda and a BMW for what it's worth.

JohnJamesRambo 7y ago

My family’s ownership outcomes strongly suggest getting a Toyota. I’m driving my Dad’s old 2001 Tundra pickup with 350k miles on the same engine. I was amazed when I bought it from him how every switch still worked, the original AC still blew cold. This is not my normal experience buying used cars from other manufacturers. Usually at about 150k miles they turn into a clown car of various systems failing. Someone put thought into each component on the truck and how it would age.

LeonM 7y ago
Toyota has been known for their reliability for a long time now. I can attest that with my Lexus, it's 13 years old now and in the 7 years that I have owned it, it has had zero defects. Last year it even got recalled (12 years after production) because the fuel filter might not have been installed correctly in the factory, so they replaced it for free. That said: I still do every scheduled maintenance, which helps tremendously. The main problem with older vehicles is that people stop following the recommended services as the car gets older. Which is of course the opposite of what you should do with an old car.
- celticmusic 7y ago
  > That said: I still do every scheduled maintenance, which helps tremendously. The main problem with older vehicles is that people stop following the recommended services as the car gets older. Which is of course the opposite of what you should do with an old car. exactly this. I've been driving my Toyota for 15 years, never had a problem with it. But I still, to this day, have it maintained. The cost of that maintenance is pennies compared to purchasing a new car. If you can afford it, it's foolish not to.
- ryanmercer 7y ago
  > Last year it even got recalled (12 years after production) Toyota is great about that. There was something in the steering column that needed replaced on my '95 T100 and and 15 years later they sent a notice offering to fix it for free. I never did get it replaced, it was a 'we gotta keep the vehicle for a couple of days' and we'd been driving it since it was brand new without issue so I decided to keep on since the risk seemed incredibly minimal.

mywittyname 7y ago

There are plenty of 90s era car electronics that are going fine. The sensors are going to be maintenance items after 20 years, but there's no reason to think the solid state components won't normally last 25+ years. Spare (electronic) parts shouldn't be an issue with major brands. I've seen the same sensor used on a dozen models from several manufactures produced over 10+ years. As Takata exposed, there aren't that many parts suppliers around the globe, so a lot of commodity components are shared across the industry. For long-term part replacement, I'd be far more concerned with construction techniques like plasma-transferred wire arc sprays used for creating cylinder linings. This technique cannot be replicated outside of the factory, thus, they kind of make engine blocks disposable (they can be sleeved, but they won't perform the same and will require different piston heads).

slg 7y ago
> but there's no reason to think the solid state components won't normally last 25+ years. Except this article is specifically about solid state components failing in a much shorter timeframe.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- myself248 7y ago
  Except most cars don't rewrite their flash every few seconds. Most modules with flash in 'em are programmed once at the manufacturer, reflashed once or twice during assembly, maybe reflashed once more at the dealer before delivery, and that's it. Maybe again post-sale if there's a recall or TSB or something that can be fixed in software. Flash quite happily lasts 25+ years if you don't abuse it far beyond any flash manufacturer's wearout specs. Go figure!
  - t34543 7y ago
    Airbag control modules do constantly write data. The last 5 seconds or so of sensor and input data is recorded for crash investigations.

kube-system 7y ago

Good process ensures good results: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Toyota_Way https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Toyota_Way

bluGill 7y ago

Depends. Electronics manufactures won't promise any CPU will be available for that long (Odds are someone reading this should be thinking I'm partially responsible for that policy in my company). When spare parts are not going to be made the companies will try to predict how many will be needed in the future and order that many. This will be your biggest limit: you need a part there is a good chance the part is failing more often than expected and so the manufacture is out of stock and they cannot get more. (or sometimes they can, at a cost of $1000 each, minimum order 10,000 - the manufactures want to sell the new shiny replacement even though it isn't compatible) Even if the above isn't an issue, storing electronics not on a circuit board is not easy, but I'm probably not supposed to talk about those issues. (You can research them)

throwaway5752 7y ago

Prius's routinely get to 300-400,000 miles. The used market is full of 10+ year old Priuses with 200k+. You may have to replace a transaxle and hybrid battery, but they are $1k each. Part of it is Toyota, part of it is the Atkinson cycle engine.

beerandt 7y ago
>hybrid battery This isn't a trivial cost
- throwaway5752 7y ago
  No, it's not, but all cars require maintenance and you should know what they are an amortize them over the time you expect to have a car. For the added car life usage you should get on either Prius component, it is a bargain.
- rasz 7y ago
  its ~$1K, or less if its just one faulty module https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3RCdrh666w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3RCdrh666w
- perl4ever 7y ago
  I don't know how much it actually costs, but taking the numbers here at face value, $1000 over 200,000 miles is half a penny a mile - that is clearly trivial compared to running costs of any car. One way to look at it, is if you assume $3/gallon gas and 50 mpg, then the cost of the battery is equivalent to reducing the gas mileage to 46 mpg, all else being equal.
  - beerandt 7y ago
    Sure it makes sense amortized, but it's the equivalent of buying a gas engine that needs a rebuild. It's a significant up front cost to consider against a purchase price.
    - 7y ago

i_am_proteus 7y ago

When the alternator in my 1983 Mercedes 300D quit, I started the car off a jump and drove it dead-electric to the store for a replacement part. I believe the only semiconductors in the car are in the timing circuits for indicators and wipers, the tach and fuel gauge amps, and the radio. Past results do not guarantee future performance: no new cars are this simple.

coolspot 7y ago
1983 Mercedes Diesel has electronic fuel injection and ABS.
- wiggles_md 7y ago
  ABS yes, but it’s a Bosch mechanical pump. There’s a reason for the manual stop lever on it! There is an “electronic diesel system” that feeds into the ALDA system, but the car will run without ALDA. I don’t think the 300D had EDS though. If there is ever a nuclear apocalypse, the giant mutant cockroaches that survive will be driving around in style in 80’s diesel Mercs.
wiggles_md 7y ago
Up until around 89 (I think) you could have even tow started it! The instructions are even in the manual. They are incredible machines.
noonespecial 7y ago
I once drove my '76 300D for more than a week with no electricity whatsoever. No generator, no battery. Hill started it or borrowed a fresh battery when I needed to start it and let it run until I was done with it. Electricity was strictly optional on those cars.

brandonmenc 7y ago

I bought a 2000 Toyota 4Runner a few years ago at around 160k miles, put a few thousand dollars into required routine maintenance, and it runs great. Sale price plus maintenance divided by time owning it currently has me at $275/month and dropping.

benj111 7y ago
What's "a few years"? $275/month is $3300pa, so you're already at a minimum of $6600 for a near 20 year old car, which doesn't sound particularly cheap. I'm on a lower monthly cost of ownership for 3 years ownership of a 6 year old car.
- brandonmenc 7y ago
  I've owned it for 45 months. I'd like to get another 5 years out of it as a daily driver with minimal upkeep. Also, it's not a car - it's an SUV - so it's going to cost more than a car. I bought it because I really wanted an old 4Runner, not because I wanted the cheapest car.
  - benj111 7y ago
    Car is a general word for 4 wheeled motorised personal transport? SUV is hardly more specific. A 2 wheel drive with slightly increased ride height is classed as an SUV these days. Your mention of costs seemed to imply that it was cheap which didn't seem to me to be the case.
    - brandonmenc 7y ago
      Wow, OK, you win - you got a cheaper car than me. Congrats. However, anecdote vs data: "Used car payments hit record $400 per month as prices top $20,000" [0] So I still think I've done pretty good with my purchase. [0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2018/11/08/used-car-prices/1928840002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2018/11/08/used-ca...
      - 7y ago

dsfyu404ed 7y ago

EEC-IV and EEC-V (Ford) ECUs haven't yet found the "late" stage of the bathtub curve and they're 15-35yo give or take. I'm not familiar with other brands of ECU but I suspect that they tend to be similar. If you look at all brands there's probably some that don't last because they were subject to the capacitor plague but they're clearly so few and far between that no brand has developed a reputation for ECUs crapping out. I wouldn't personally be worried about electronics failures. Physical failures of the electronic systems are far more likely. Because this is a decently upscale crowd on HN everyone is going to tell you Toyota/Honda. I'm not going to write the mini-novel it takes to explain why but it suffices to say that is one filter bubble's opinion and other bubbles will have other opinions. As someone who has fairly extensive experience with vehicles that most here would consider far beyond end of life I assure you the badge on the grill matters far far less than what you use the vehicle for and how you treat it. Anything will "last" 25yr if you're willing to baby it there, put a bunch of money into it or just deal with it having all sorts of NVH issues in years 20-25. Trying to predict what vehicle and configuration will last 25yr with the least work (the unstated assumption in these discussions) is a complete and total fools errand because the equation is dominated by variables outside, or mostly outside your control.

crooked-v 7y ago

If you like niche cars, the Mini Cooper line has dealerships with replacement parts going back to at least the 2001 models (and probably can custom-order stuff for earlier models), and an endearingly nutty online fanbase that sells both custom aftermarket parts/upgrades and original OEM parts for both the 'modern' BMW-made line and for the classic cars. The word online is that these cars take a lot of maintenance, but I haven't had any trouble with mine (2012 model, 90K miles, original electronics) aside from needing a new fan belt and a new battery. And of course the Countryman line is basically just a BMW SUV with the Mini branding and dealership network. If you want a vehicle that's less 'will the parts be available' and more 'will it just last forever', though, you can't go wrong with a Toyota Hilux.

rodgerd 7y ago

Toyota commit to 20 years of parts. (I can probably still get new mechanical parts for my 23 year old Ipsum, but I doubt the in-car electronics are replaceable except from the second-hand market)

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

Animats 7y ago

That's a problem. The design life for the Ford EEC IV, used in 1980s Ford vehicles, was 30 years. My 35 year old Ford Bronco is still using the original electronics.

perl4ever 7y ago

I thought there were laws and regulations requiring automakers to reserve a certain number of spare parts for everything they make and support it for a period of time.