Responsible owners do not let the battery charge reach zero. The consequences are serious enough that owners with unusual usage patterns that make this difficult will go out of their way to make sure it doesn't happen. There is a strong negative financial incentive for owners to do a simple thing like plugging in the car.
Modifying the warranty means Tesla accepts financial accountability for owners' (in)actions that are beyond Tesla's control. That's a bad deal for Tesla. It could mean financial ruin if there are too many irresponsible owners.
This thing is so blown out of proportion. When I first read the blog article I was thinking it was pretty bad. Once I had some time to think about it I realized there isn't anything unreasonable about this except the price of a new battery, but that's the cost of being an early adopter.
If you let a high end sports car sit in a garage for months with a tank full of gas and then go drive it fast you are going to wreck it. It's going to be expensive to fix. That's if you can even get it to start in the first place. A responsible owner starts the car every couple weeks or has someone else do it while they are out of town. What's the difference in effort between that and plugging in a Tesla? The only difference with the Tesla is the cost of the repair.
I think this is a case of some people being ignorant of their responsibilities as owners and failing to properly maintain their cars.
On the contrary, if there are too many irresponsible owners then Tesla is ruined if they DON'T cover it. Imagine what "too many Tesla bricked cars" would do to their product image.
Look, this is very simple. Warranty systems are underwritten like insurance policies. It's little risk to Tesla -- the question is the underwriter's risk assessment. If the underwriter won't cover it on affordable terms, it suggests the risk is too high and the product is poorly designed. At that point, the path of failure is chosen (expensive underwriting policy vs expensive PR debacle) is irrelevant. The only issue is whether the risk assessment is accurate -- it becomes a gamble.
You're absolutely right. Nonetheless, it's Tesla's problem. Why? Because electric cars are new. After 100 years of internal combustion, there's a common understanding that cars need their oil replaced if it all leaks out. No one would gain any traction with a story about ruining their engine by running it with no oil. But a story about a driver who left his car at the airport for a month and bricked it will gain traction, and will cost Tesla money by spreading FUD in the market. More money than simply covering that case in its warranty, which I predict is exactly where they're going to end up if this story gets picked up by the mainstream media. They're just taking the long way around to get there.
If, after you ran out of gas, you didn't fill your gas tank for weeks and ignored the car's insistent complaints that it should be filled with gas, then you would have a point. But I doubt you've ever done that.
Everyone seems to think that Tesla owners are housebound in these threads.
To fix this problem you need your car in a garage, a replacement pack of 6000 high-tech niche market batteries shipped from wherever they are made, mechanics skilled on a niche sportscar, and responsible disposal of of the old battery pack.
To 'fix' your problem, you need to pour easily available cheap liquid into an empty container. There's no comparison and it's not a Tesla design flaw, it's a battery technology limitation which applies to other li-ion cars, laptops, etc. too, if left long enough to drain past the controller reporting 'empty'.
If you buy and wear a $20k watch, and you irresponsibly destroy it or lose it, it'll probably cost you $20k to replace it. And the obvious lesson for people considering buying $20k watches is you shouldn't buy one if you couldn't afford to lose it or pay to replace it. "If you have to ask the price, you can't afford it."
If we were talking about a regular gas car - many families have cars worth $60k and we'd still be asking serious questions if, by inaction, we ended up with a $24k repair bill.
R < B and R (is proportional to) B
The pattern being that sometimes things which are expensive to buy are also expensive to repair. In a gas-powered car, the engine+transmission is probably the most expensive component to brick and replace. In an electric car, it seems to be the battery system.
Neglected maintenance on a $500k house can easily create situations requiring $100k in repairs or liability.
Even if you didn't change the engine and transmission oil for 18 months that wouldn't happen. I bet it wouldn't happen if you didn't change it for 24 months.
Compare and contrast with not plugging in a car for < 4 weeks.
Which the author of the original article discussed, along with Tesla's obfuscations and downplayng of the issue.
Instead manufacturer could make it very clear in on webpages, in owner manuals, PR materials etc. the importance of keeping batteries charged. Make it common knowledge. Then they would be morally right to treat bricked batteries same as running with no oil or with flat tires.
I am sure you have heard of prorated battery warranties and are familiar with them, aren't you? Granted that, why would you make such an intentionally misleading post suggesting that warranties are prone to abuse when this is a solved problem?
It wouldn't really be free; the car would be out of service for some time. And Tesla could charge some kind of nominal-but-not-insignificant service fee. I doubt that the bricking rate would be sensitive to the actual dollar cost: as Tesla points out, it isn't that easy to do. Just being careless isn't sufficient, there would have to be other circumstances like a long trip away from the car where the cost of repair wouldn't have any impact.
I'm not. I've never heard of any such thing. Perhaps it is you being misleading?
There are definitely car owners who have never dealt with battery warranties.
http://s.shld.net/is/image/Sears/02833023000-2
Sears has a nationwide network of car maintenance shops called Sears Auto Center that has been quite popular for tire, battery, and alignment work for decades.
http://www.sears.com/automotive-services/c-1023947
Information about its warranty are printed in large letters on the side. It would be quite difficult to purchase this battery without understanding it has a warranty. This is not atypical. It is extremely common for batteries to have such information printed legibly on the side. Furthermore, car batteries typically have a punch out on the top designating the month and year of purchase. These are punched out at time of purchase and enable the warranty can be honored even in the event of losing one's receipt.
Battery displays in stores nearly always contain comparative information about the warranty periods, with premium batteries highlighted for having longer warranty periods.
I find it astonishing that people can buy batteries and never notice any of this, and some of these people are here claiming that owners whose Teslas become bricked are at fault because the manual obliquely suggests in an obscure section that bricking is possible, a possibility that is at the same time denied by the same group.
My BMW, for example, has its battery in a very obscure location (behind the seats) and there are mere terminals in the hood for jumping.
If you don't want to be challenged on your assertions, you should probably find somewhere other than HN to make them. It's kind of what we do here.