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Regarding your confounding over R&D -- Yes it is. I am on board with you that the specialized Tesla mechanics are gonna charge more per hour, $200-$350 sounds r

Regarding your confounding over R&D -- Yes it is. I am on board with you that the specialized Tesla mechanics are gonna charge more per hour, $200-$350 sounds reasonable for a car you can buy and sell for %30 more than you paid for it -- But its R&D for this reason: The worthiness of Tesla repairs are totally unknown. These technicians are taking a chance (and I'll bet they offer a warranty, standard practice among reputable practitioners in the industry) that they can tap the brass fitting into the Tesla plastic which has an unknown composition to me and you and it will be a more or less permanent fix. Just because it looks like 2 hours of labor doesn't mean there aren't other risks involved as well as servicing the battery cooling system properly. Such risks include: fire, poisoning, accidental damage, environmental disposal and cleanup, future warranty service, or even an unfortunate death caused by the repair failure causing the batteries to ignite. If you get the Monroe to spend 2 hours on it, it won't work and I can guarantee that. >You do realize that all the usual pipe fitting shapes come in materials besides brass, right? Yes I do. The materials are designed to be compatible with the components in the system. This is why Japanese aluminum motors typically use EPDM rubber parts and HOAT coolant without silicates, to prevent oxidization of the channels and water pump. Throw some ethylene glycol or silicate/borates and natural rubber in there and suffer the consequences. What will PVC do with the (speculating) polycarbonate body of the battery packs or the coolant(Another commenter claims it is the pretty expensive Zerex G48[0] wich will dissolve some plastics)? Brass is a good guess for compatibility, but why they chose that will cost you $700 to find out -- a bargain! I'm betting it's because available plastic fittings aren't going to have the strength to last in the reduced tolerances caused by the repaired threads in the plastic housing. Quite a bit of experience is really required to know if and how to do this right. >> Lastly, road hazard insurance didn't cover any repair. >Yes, this is reflected in my comment. >[...] >...For Tesla to charge an insurance company $16k with the justification of replacing the whole pack... Edit: I see your point here, Tesla dumbery = costly repairs. Definitely agree. Hopefully Right To Repair will free this proprietary information up to Alldata so anybody can pay a subscription fee and learn of the specifications and repair data. Also, it will standardize labor book time... [0] - https://www.valvoline.com/our-products/heavy-duty/zerex-g-48 https://www.valvoline.com/our-products/heavy-duty/zerex-g-48

mindslight 5y ago
Maybe I didn't state my original point well, but I'm only trying to point out that this type of repair done as well-known problem on a popular car would be a few hundred dollars. I don't think you could find a Tesla-focused shop that would do the repair for much less, and the customer here is definitely happy with the price. I'm not putting down Electric Garage for charging "too much", but rather pointing out how lucrative it is to go into the third party repair business for Teslas. Anyone into Right to Repair should appreciate encouraging a more vibrant repair market. My point about the material of the fitting is that you can run into trouble when you use a stronger/heavier material to tie into an existing lighter piece. For example, the next hit to that area will end up breaking the newly-threaded part as the brass acts as a lever and stress point, necessitating a much deeper repair. In general, plastic would be a better starting point. Given that there are no less than 3 types of plastic visible in the area of a repair, surely there is some commonly-available plastic that will work. A sibling comment says it's using Zerex G48 antifreeze. It looks like that is compatible with nylon. Five minutes of web research isn't a way to be sure though, and obviously you'd want to be very sure before actually using it. But a mechanic can figure that out once and then they'll know. Just like the mechanic in the video says they've used brass before and know it's compatible. > The insurance didn't cover road debris, 16K is what Tesla charges for the parts and R&R of the battery pack to customers Yes, I understand Tesla's policies here. The point is the policies themselves are patently ridiculous. If my car window were to get smashed and the dealer told me the only way they could fix that window was to sell me a new car, any insurance company would rightly balk - because insurance companies understand that windows can be replaced independently. Here Tesla is disingenuously claiming that the battery pack is some indivisible unit, and insurance companies just don't know any better yet. If you watch the video, you can hear the customer explain that Tesla pushed back hard on him wanting to keep his old battery pack. That's because they don't throw bad packs into the trash, but rather they recover most of their value by rebuilding them. Yet the customer/insurer is paying as if there is no residual value in the broken pack ("core charge"). Fraud is a strong word, but I feel it appropriately describes what Tesla is doing to insurance companies with these policies.
- cartoonworld 5y ago
  Oh for sure, once these things have been around and there exists an aftermarket, there's going to be all kind of fixes and repair kits available once people figure out how these fixes work. I feel a lot more in accord with your comments. I don't think its disingenuous or crazy unreasonable for Tesla to not support a repair like this, I kind of think they can't wrap their heads around it. Their service network is still very underdeveloped and they don't have the benefit of real-world repair data like everybody else. Their solution to everything seems to be "Replace the unit." It does indeed seem crazy that Tesla does service this way and has such a weak cooling port on such a critical component though. I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that broken Tesla windows come only as the whole door, too. The thing about the plastic repair is for real though, brass is the way to go. Nothing will make it less susceptible to this kind of damage aside from protecting and anchoring the cooling line in a much less dumb way.

mindslight 5y ago

Maybe I didn't state my original point well, but I'm only trying to point out that this type of repair done as well-known problem on a popular car would be a few hundred dollars. I don't think you could find a Tesla-focused shop that would do the repair for much less, and the customer here is definitely happy with the price. I'm not putting down Electric Garage for charging "too much", but rather pointing out how lucrative it is to go into the third party repair business for Teslas. Anyone into Right to Repair should appreciate encouraging a more vibrant repair market. My point about the material of the fitting is that you can run into trouble when you use a stronger/heavier material to tie into an existing lighter piece. For example, the next hit to that area will end up breaking the newly-threaded part as the brass acts as a lever and stress point, necessitating a much deeper repair. In general, plastic would be a better starting point. Given that there are no less than 3 types of plastic visible in the area of a repair, surely there is some commonly-available plastic that will work. A sibling comment says it's using Zerex G48 antifreeze. It looks like that is compatible with nylon. Five minutes of web research isn't a way to be sure though, and obviously you'd want to be very sure before actually using it. But a mechanic can figure that out once and then they'll know. Just like the mechanic in the video says they've used brass before and know it's compatible. > The insurance didn't cover road debris, 16K is what Tesla charges for the parts and R&R of the battery pack to customers Yes, I understand Tesla's policies here. The point is the policies themselves are patently ridiculous. If my car window were to get smashed and the dealer told me the only way they could fix that window was to sell me a new car, any insurance company would rightly balk - because insurance companies understand that windows can be replaced independently. Here Tesla is disingenuously claiming that the battery pack is some indivisible unit, and insurance companies just don't know any better yet. If you watch the video, you can hear the customer explain that Tesla pushed back hard on him wanting to keep his old battery pack. That's because they don't throw bad packs into the trash, but rather they recover most of their value by rebuilding them. Yet the customer/insurer is paying as if there is no residual value in the broken pack ("core charge"). Fraud is a strong word, but I feel it appropriately describes what Tesla is doing to insurance companies with these policies.

cartoonworld 5y ago
Oh for sure, once these things have been around and there exists an aftermarket, there's going to be all kind of fixes and repair kits available once people figure out how these fixes work. I feel a lot more in accord with your comments. I don't think its disingenuous or crazy unreasonable for Tesla to not support a repair like this, I kind of think they can't wrap their heads around it. Their service network is still very underdeveloped and they don't have the benefit of real-world repair data like everybody else. Their solution to everything seems to be "Replace the unit." It does indeed seem crazy that Tesla does service this way and has such a weak cooling port on such a critical component though. I wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that broken Tesla windows come only as the whole door, too. The thing about the plastic repair is for real though, brass is the way to go. Nothing will make it less susceptible to this kind of damage aside from protecting and anchoring the cooling line in a much less dumb way.