You don't need manufacturer support to repair most cars. Several car makers have left the industry, and their cars are still drivable and repairable. You can generally buy and repair cars with flood or wrecked title and repair them if you've got the time and patience; manufacturers will probably think you're crazy, but you can get service parts.
It's absolutely true that engine parts can be made in a machine shop by a suitably talented artisan, so there remains a third party parts market for those things where there isn't for e.g. 20nm digital logic fabrication, NMC battery cells, etc...
But that's because one of those things is century old technology and the other isn't. It's not a business model thing, at all.
Audi instrument clusters, for 2021 models [1] — Audi appear to be willing to sell these to me, even though I don't own a car.
[2] seems to be a third party retailer.
[1] https://parts.audiusa.com/productSearch.aspx?&ukey_make=5792...
GP didn’t say that Audi doesn’t sell it, but that you can’t “second source” it:
> You can't get a dash display replacement for a 2021 Audi or whatever from anyone but Audi, etc...
The difference here is the dealer will sell you the parts most of the time no questions asked, no proof of ownership needed, no need to have the dealer install the part, etc etc. My understanding is that not even Tesla will sell you the parts, you have to bring the car in, they have the look it over, tell you what parts you need, and then you pay them to install it.
this is VERY VERY different than your Audi example
The display went out in my wife's 2018 Toyota, I went online and bought the part through a dealer and installed it myself.
That's not very possible to do with Tesla, and I think that's the point here.
The Tesla screen is available from Tesla's parts departments. You don't even need to own a car to buy it.
The fact that filling up a car at a charging/fueling station requires manufacturer support highlights how coupled everything is together.
More to the point: could you have build those same projects in the 70's/90's when those were new vehicles? I rather doubt it, too. Parts markets are real, but they take time to mature.
I mean... where do you think the parts would even come from? Tesla's factories are at capacity building new vehicles (in the case of the model S and X, they're actually almost a year behind orders!). Who's going to make the stuff you'd expect to buy anyway?
I do not expect to be able to buy replacement parts for a car that isn't yet on sale...
I do expect that I will be able to buy replacement parts for it once the car is on sale, as is the case with all of BMW's other vehicles.
Here’s the whole battery pack assembly for my Honda. https://www.hondapartsonline.net/oem-parts/honda-pack-assemb...
There's no network of BMW gas stations that you need to pay a license fee to use, though. Otherwise I generally agree.
Tesla attempting to turn cars in iPhone Walled Garden where you need approval to fix them and only allow to use Manufacture Approved Repair Centers likely will be the down fall of this, as people will not stand for this long term like they have with Cell phones, ironically this type of Automotive lock down (which Tesla is far from the only offender) will likely be the cause of Right to Repair laws being passed in most states very soon that will extend to all manner of electronics including Cell Phones
This is a little disingenuous. It was a wreck, literally. It was a flooded car that the insurance had written off and sold as scrap. You'd never get manufacturer support for a BMW in the same circumstance either. Scrap is scrap.
That you can buy a car body and do a cool hack isn't a moral lesson about the business model attached to the car the part was taken from.