Sometimes it’s easy to forget that we’re still in the Wild West era of electric vehicles. The charging infrastructure isn’t what it needs to be, charging standards and systems are all over the place (including where the damn plugs are located) and automakers and repair businesses alike are still figuring out the ecosystem around making fixes. Case in point: if you scratch your EV’s battery pack, you may be screwed, even if it still works.
That’s our lead story today in today’s morning roundup, and we’re also talking about buttons (good), hydrogen (I dunno, man) and what General Motors’ buyouts may have to do with an upcoming labor negotiation (interesting.) Happy Monday, let’s get things started.
Battery Damage Woes
Look, nobody wants to deal with a lithium-ion battery pack fire. That stuff ruins your whole day. Remember when Chevrolet told everyone to park their fire-prone Bolts away from other cars, houses, pets, small children or really anything at all, as if that’s realistic for most people? It’s not great.
But mild damage to the battery, even after minor collisions or damage, are resulting in entire EVs being totaled out because of the cost to repair or replace the pack, Reuters reports today.
This is an important thing for prospective EV owners to know about, but I think it’s less the fault of the vehicle and more an issue with the lack of a repair ecosystem around Li-Ion car battery packs right now. From that story:
For many electric vehicles, there is no way to repair or assess even slightly damaged battery packs after accidents, forcing insurance companies to write off cars with few miles – leading to higher premiums and undercutting gains from going electric.
And now those battery packs are piling up in scrapyards in some countries, a previously unreported and expensive gap in what was supposed to be a “circular economy.”
“We’re buying electric cars for sustainability reasons,” said Matthew Avery, research director at automotive risk intelligence company Thatcham Research. “But an EV isn’t very sustainable if you’ve got to throw the battery away after a minor collision.”
Battery packs can cost tens of thousands of dollars and represent up to 50% of an EV’s price tag, often making it uneconomical to replace them.
The story notes Ford and GM are working on making pack repairs easier, but that’s less true of Tesla; our pal Sandy Munro even told the outlet the latest Model Y batteries have “zero repairability.” Battery cells glued into a pack that forms the very car’s structure, as you see above.
Part of the problem is automakers are unwilling to hand over any battery data to third parties, including repair shops, which can make fixes difficult if not impossible.
Here’s the other problem: the plan to make EVs more carbon-neutral rides on battery recycling and repurposing. But if packs are sitting in junkyards even after minor wrecks because nobody knows how to fix them, it torpedoes the whole deal:
EV battery problems also expose a hole in the green “circular economy” touted by carmakers.
At Synetiq, the UK’s largest salvage company, head of operations Michael Hill said over the last 12 months the number of EVs in the isolation bay – where they must be checked to avoid fire risk – at the firm’s Doncaster yard has soared, from perhaps a dozen every three days to up to 20 per day.
“We’ve seen a really big shift and it’s across all manufacturers,” Hill said.
The UK currently has no EV battery recycling facilities, so Synetiq has to remove the batteries from written-off cars and store them in containers. Hill estimated at least 95% of the cells in the hundreds of EV battery packs – and thousands of hybrid battery packs – Synetiq has stored at Doncaster are undamaged and should be reused.
Like the charging infrastructure, this will, presumably, get better over time as EVs proliferate. But somebody had better get on it. (In fact, it’s probably a great industry for green entrepreneurs to invest in right now.)
Buttons Are Good, Buttons Are Right
Touchscreens in cars have certainly gotten better and faster over the years, but I don’t think they’re any easier to use—particularly when the car is actually moving. It’s just not a user experience that tracks with your ability to safely operate a vehicle at speed while still minding the road.
Some automakers get this more than others. One of them, now, is Hyundai. The Korean automaker’s head of design, Sang Yup Lee, told Australia’s Cars Guide that even in the digitized era of cars, they’re gonna stick with buttons:
[The new Hyundai Kona] deliberately uses physical buttons and dials for many of the controls, specifically air-conditioning and the sound system. Lee said this is because the move to digital screens is often more dangerous, as it often requires multiple steps and means drivers have to take their eyes off the road to see where they need to press.
“We have used the physical buttons quite significantly the last few years,” Lee said. “For me, the safety-related buttons have to be a hard key.”
He added: “When you’re driving it’s hard to control it, this is why when it’s a hard key it’s easy to sense and feel it.”
Yeah, man! No shit. It’s such an obvious thing to admit, but such a true one. Hyundai says it may move away from such switches when it gets to Level 4 autonomous driving (which is actual, real self-driving, unlike what we have today) but for now, this is the better, safer choice.
Do Not Think Toyota’s New Boss Is Giving Up On Hydrogen
Toyota’s incoming new CEO Koji Sato has pledged to be more EV-forward than his skeptical predecessor was, in part because Toyota’s not one to lose a competitive advantage over anyone else—especially in the manufacturing realm. But this should not be taken as an indication that it’s giving up on hydrogen fuel cells.
Toyota has been easily the biggest and most visible proponent of this power source and it’s invested a ton of money into development. Unfortunately, this hasn’t yielded car sales or a more robust hydrogen fueling infrastructure; the one we have in America is basically nonexistent. But there’s still a path here, Toyota thinks. This is from Automotive News:
In contrast to the emboldened ramp up on the full-electric front, Toyota has been more circumspect in talking about hydrogen. The company that helped pioneer fuel cell technology with its Mirai water-vapor-emitting hydrogen-powered car doesn’t even have a concrete sales target.
Indeed, as that story notes, Toyota has the capacity to make 30,000 Mirai sedans a year, but in seven years it’s only sold 21,700 of them. I’m surprised it’s that high. Outside of auto shows, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen one on the road in this country, though I don’t spend as much time in California (where most of the hydrogen stations are) as I’d like. Probably most of those went to Japan. [Editor’s Note: I see them all the time here in LA. -DT].
(Speaking of: You can level plenty of valid criticism at Tesla, but at least it had the stones to build out the Supercharger network. I think Toyota could’ve done more to put its money where its mouth is if it believed in hydrogen so much. It’s hard to say hydrogen’s the future when there are no cars and no filling stations on the road. Anyway.)
Automotive News also spoke to Kawasaki Heavy President Yasuhiko Hashimoto, who says he sees much more of a use case for hydrogen in heavy trucks, buses, construction equipment and other industrial applications. That seems to be the growing industry consensus these days.
GM’s Upcoming Union Fight
You remember how GM made a ton of profits last year, but now it’s offering buyouts to white-collar workers — a move that’s often preparation for layoffs? In one last item from Automotive News, that publication’s EIC speculates the buyouts could be a move to cut off the United Auto Workers union from asking for more money in upcoming negotiations.
The UAW will also be looking to save jobs in the EV transition, which could in theory mean less labor to build cars; that’s a hot-button issue in Europe right now. From that column:
In case you don’t know, “salaried employees” and the UAW-affiliated workers are a different class of folks, and GM actually has more of the former. But this could be some signal to union workers that it’s not about to hand out a big payday anytime soon.
Your Turn
Let’s talk car controls! Who does it the best right now? Who’s bad at it?
So there’s plenty of really knowledgeable folks commenting here, as well as those who don’t recognize that they’re not that bright. Me I’m an idiot, but I got my own 2 cents.
I’m the proud owner of a high mileage (150K) PHEV. And there seems to be a recurring theme to these EV shortcomings.
It’s an engineering issue! These problems could be mitigated if the products were engineered for service. (Think Toyota Land Cruiser) If battery packs could be diagnosed and replaced with just a couple hours in the service bay, and a network of replacement parts existed, we’d have timely and cost effective repairs. And cars back on the road, instead of parked. That sounds sustainable to me.
But no, automakers engineer for cost. Standardizing parts, and designing for repair access, that’s gonna cost more. Not to mention the huge egos involved that insure unique processes and configurations exist, just to prove their way is the best way.
It’s quite possible that we are doomed if we can’t learn to work together better…
I work in Total Loss for an insurance company. Which party would you like to be Here is a scenario: An EV with *potential* battery damage.
1. You could be the owner who is making large monthy payments on a car and needs a rental while it’s in the shop. You get 30 days of rental and a battery replacement will take 3+ months while they order a new pack to be built. So you have no car, make payments but also run out of rental.
2. You are the repair shop that has the EV sitting taking up valuable work/storage space while waiting on parts delays. The damaged pack is a fire hazard and the car is not earning the shop much money either. Once the frustrated customer gets their car back, there will likely be complications they have to return for which may also be due to the EV parts supplier. Guess who gets the blame: The repair shop. They face the music even if it’s not their tune.
3. You are the insurer who is liable to repair the car to 100% pre loss condition by law. You have to make sure the car is returned to the customer working just like it was pre-accident, which may mean replacing a pack if it throws faults related to the loss even if it is after the initial repairs are completed. If you repair the vehicle, the customer runs out of rental and is upset, it also will take longer than a gas vehicle repair in many cases. If you pay for the repairs, rental car and pay the shop for storage and all the parts and repairs over many months, you would likely enter that math bracket that makes a total loss the more financially sensible option. Every state has different laws on the percentage of cost in relation to vehicle value, but if it’s 75%, a battery pack plus some other damage will easily exceed that.
No winners here, so the quick band aid solution is to total potential problems out to avoid frustration for all 3 parties involved. Body shops get less work which sucks, and customers may not get their equity out, which sucks too. The insurance pays bigger costs for something that potentially should have cost FAR less (but comes with risk).
Anybody have a good solution?
I’m really surprised someone is complaining about unusable battery packs. The last few times i looked they were selling extremely well to the off grid crowd.
Guessing the off-grid nuts are more of an American phenomenon, whereas the person in the article is in the UK.
we really need regulation to step up over battery repair, these are consumables no matter how long it takes, it will degrade so there should be a way to cheaply and safely rebuild most, we can’t just ground down to the bare material anytime these packs gets deprecated
I had to replace the HV battery in my ’06 Prius. I tried a Dorman aftermarket battery, supposed just as good. NOT. First one failed on day two, the second after 6k miles. Returned it for refund. Installed a year old Toyota replacement and it had better performance and was great in comparison to the Dorman. Replacing the HV battery in a Prius is rather easy and not difficult, you just have to follow directions to the letter. EV batteries should be just as easy to replace.
I learned long ago never to use Dorman anything-and that was when I had time & energy to swap bad parts back out.
I was also making ten bucks an hour, so I will never give someone grief for using them. Just saying, if you can, step up a bit, and/or definitely check your car’s forum about how well that part works or lasts.
Sermon closes
Dorman is what you use when there absolutely isn’t any practical alternative, and that’s it
Do automakers even want anyone repairing cars? I figured they’d want us to treat them like any other LiIon device (phone, laptop, tablet) and just discard them and get a new one whenever they launch a new model with 3% better performance at a price only 25% more than the old one.
I haven’t been in a vehicle with an “ideal” mix of buttons and screens yet.
I think the “ideal” would be something like: all climate controls, safety, etc. are buttons, but infotainment is touchscreen. Maybe a separate volume knob that also serves as the audio on/off button.
My 2012 Prius v (correctly) has the climate controls separate from the screen, but loses points because the direction, speed, and temperature controls are a spinning wheel you can nudge to the sides to change which of those three you’re controlling. You have to look at a small separate screen to see what’s set to what.
Really, the system only has a couple more functions than my ’97 Econoline did, but the Econoline had the dead-simple “three rotary knobs, mechanically connected to those components”.
On the other hand, the Prius heater hasn’t let me down yet. The van’s blend door did, once. Surprised my fingers didn’t fall off.
Ultimately though, the “car settings” menu with things like the headlamp delay after turning it off, or locking on shifting from park–that’s definitely best included in the touchscreen, because how else would you access those? It’d be a designer’s nightmare to have to make and label buttons just for those features.
By far, though, I think one little controls detail I HATE on the Prius (and most cars these days, maybe?) is the windshield wipers.
On the van, it was a single wheel on a stalk. Off –> long delay –> shorter delay –> continuous –> continuous fast.
The Prius has a knob where you move it down a notch for intermittent, then rotate for delay/speed, but then it has two more of the *notches* to move down for continuous and continuous fast. Why separate them? It can just be treated in operation as a single scale of intensity. It leads to weird things like “oh, the rain just slowed down enough to switch back to intermittent, but I had turned that wheel to the slowest setting when I went to continuous mode because I’d rather the intermittent starts slow the NEXT time I need it.”
I never thought of it that way with the wiper stalk, but it is usually the norm on most cars. I can see it maybe having made more sense when variable intermittent speeds were more of a “luxury” on Japanese makes and wipers were just two-speed or with a single fixed intermittent setting, and they’ve stuck with that setting and the 3-4 detents since. Even though the US automakers were already doing the single wheel on the stalk at that point.
Also, I always found it counterintuitive that the Japanese/Korean automakers make you move the wiper stalk down to increase the speed.
The current-gen Ram 1500 with the 8 inch screen is the perfect combination of buttons and screen IMHO. There are buttons and knobs for all radio and climate functions and a screen that is more than sufficient for anything you should be doing in a vehicle.
Completely agreed on the wiper controls. I also hate the way the Prius ones work. A continuous knob is soooo much less confusing.
This diagram (produced by VW) illustrates why hydrogen fuel cell vehicles are by far the inferior choice (for cars, trucks, anything else they may be intended to replace):
https://www.volkswagenag.com/content/dam/online-kommunikation/brands/corporate/world/presence/stories/2019/08/wasserstoff-oder-batterie/Website_Wasserstoff_vs_Batterie_Vergleich_EN_1163.png
Take out the liquifaction and transportation element for Hydrogen and add in the transportation and mining of the high capacitance battery and this changes drastically.
Umm, how do you intend to eliminate liquefaction and transportation for hydrogen? Just handwave it away because it doesn’t accomodate your wishful thinking?
Also, transportation and mining for the battery happens once. They aren’t including manufacturing costs for the hydrogen drivetrain either. While there are certainly other aspects that need to be considered, this seems to be a pretty good apples-to-apples comparison of the efficiency of EV versus hydrogen.
“But mild damage to the battery, even after minor collisions or damage, are resulting in entire EVs being totaled out because of the cost to repair or replace the pack, Reuters reports today.”
Because that’s what the MANUFACTURERS tell them to do. Framing this as the fault of insurance companies is utterly misleading at best. Claiming “mild damage to the battery” is an overreaction on the part of insurers is just flat out lying.
Insurers are not engineers. They must follow the guidance and rules of the manufacturer, including the specification that the battery pack is a safety part and must be OEM. Period. I was trained on this shit by a 40+ year body shop veteran, which is why I can recite it forward and backward. Insurers don’t specify a thing other than “do it as cheaply as possible” and “do it exactly to manufacturer specifications with equivalent parts.”
So when a 1/2″ dent means your $20,000 Bolt needs a new $26,000 battery pack which is NLA ‘according to the insurer’? No. It doesn’t. It means GM said that’s sufficient damage to require battery pack replacement, and that GM has specified the battery pack is an OE only collision part.
This is not a new thing. Torch wrote a story about how ‘small’ structural damage can easily total out cars nearly five years back now. And how it’s the MANUFACTURER that deems an item irreparable, NOT the insurer. The insurer only totaled it when they determined the frame was completely unavailable and the manufacturer told them that any weld would compromise structural integrity and void all warranties.
https://jalopnik.com/heres-how-a-corvette-was-totaled-because-of-one-inch-of-1806727930
There are two conditions under which an insurer can total a car out of their own choice. One, the cost to repair the damage exceeds 40% of the fair market value of the car (or whatever the locally legislated limit is.) Two, they determine that a part acceptable to the manufacturer and consumer is either completely unavailable or if the part will not be available in a reasonable period of time. Which is why they are not going to install a junkyard traction battery; they have no way of knowing if it’s good or not, whether it’s been abused, any of that.
Insurers will not permit use of substandard parts, ‘horseshoes and hand grenades,’ or ‘my cousin Jimmy can weld that right up.’ Because one, it massively devalues the car on the spot. Two, if that substandard part fails, they have to cover it, as well as any resulting damage or injuries – they’re liable. And three, substandard parts and work result in comebacks and having to do the work again. That’s why they’d rather repaint an undamaged junkyard bumper cover, they won’t save a few bucks with eBay headlights, and they come down hard on shops that do such things.
“Hill estimated at least 95% of the cells in the hundreds of EV battery packs – and thousands of hybrid battery packs – Synetiq has stored at Doncaster are undamaged and should be reused.”
Which may or may not be true. See above. They have no way whatsoever of knowing if the battery was overcharged or excessively discharged, or abused. Sure, the battery out of a car that had a tree fall on it at 1500 miles is almost certainly pristine and shouldn’t give anyone any concern. If it’s been properly maintained in storage then it’s probably ready to go into a repair.
Then you get into say a Tesla that was in a bad wreck. You have absolutely no way of knowing how hard that hit was. Without knowing that, you can’t know if the battery cell was damaged. Visual inspections do not tell you the whole story. It could’ve suffered momentary twist in the hit and broken a weld, and you’d never see it. And that broken weld could lead to the car burning down or catastrophic failure in a wreck.
Or the 35,000 mile Hyundai that was a vandalism total. Obviously the drivetrain’s untouched (and the owner’s a “coch,” whatever that is.) But what life has that battery actually had? Nevermind that batteries are, as a point of fact, a consumable. They burn off the chemicals inside over time. So you can’t put a 35k mile battery into a 25k mile car as a collision repair, and you don’t want to put it into a 50k mile car because the more used up battery should be significantly cheaper.
And remember, whatever battery goes in – even on collision – the manufacturer is required by law to warranty for 8/80k or 10/150k. If the used 35k battery craps out because of hidden damage at 36k, they’re the ones that have to replace it if they approved the repair method.
“Part of the problem is automakers are unwilling to hand over any battery data to third parties, including repair shops, which can make fixes difficult if not impossible.”
And now I put on my very real semi-qualified structural engineering and metallurgy hat.
I don’t give a shit if you hand over the battery data. That does not make it safe. When it is a crash component, there are very specific performance requirements in the metal deformation and stretch, as well as fracture and tensile strength. Once you crack the casing, you are changing these things. (This is why we have torque specifications on things. FOLLOW THEM.) If the casing is welded, it is now permanently compromised by opening it.
Not only that, but what happens when that third-party case which is supposed to be made of SAE 4140 (AISI 4140) is instead made of 1020 to make it cheaper? You’re talking fractional strength compared to original. Or say they treat the 4140 incorrectly resulting in cold cracked welds. Now it’s just outright unsafe.
Because remember, the whole point of ‘third party’ is ‘cheaper.’ It’s a race to the bottom, and everyone is well aware of it.
“Oh well, that’s on them!” One, no it’s not. Good luck enforcing any laws against an Indonesian foundry or a Chinese assembly line. Two, it’s not THEIR name on the car. Three, manufacturers are very well aware that some Facebook-certified jeenius will promptly come up with some incredibly dangerous modification to show ‘how they’re keeping the 100MPG water carburetor secret’ like a bypass to charge a 400V system at 600V, or removing a thermal control, or take your pick. Oh, and four, no they are not giving you the proprietary code to the microcontrollers. (I wouldn’t either.)
““We have used the physical buttons quite significantly the last few years,” Lee said. “For me, the safety-related buttons have to be a hard key.””
Put this man in charge of writing the regulations. Seriously. He gets it. He understands it.
Haptic shit and touchscreens are cheaper. It’s also less safe. Simple as that.
Yeah. What he said ^
if it makes anyone feel better, the Insurance companies seem to prefer to total out almost all cars since the Copart thing became more publicly noticed. they don’t have to insure a Repaired car that is worth less after the repair, they don’t have to pay the entire repair bill since they recoup 75% or more of the totalled car payout from the copart sales generally. And honestly they almost never give you full book value or even really replacement value. It is a massive money racket in the end.
Why are you so angry all the time man
I’ve read a handful of reviews / long-term writeups of the Mirai, and I’m bit surprised that Hydrogen hasn’t caught on more. Infrastructure seems like an issue even in CA, and it’s nonexistent every where else – I get that.
But for semi’s & commercial trucks, it totally seems like a no-brainer compared to the amount of battery power required to get enough range.
Hydrogen cars are fine. Hyrdogen production, storage, and transport are terrible. That’s why I’m not even sure it will be viable for large vehicles – the larger the vehicle the larger the amount of hydrogen you need. Hydrogen just doesn’t scale unless something drastic happens with our electricity production (like going all-in on nuclear).
Turnkey generation systems that can fit in the same place as say rural gas tanks at convenience stores would likely be the key. the issue really isn’t infrastructure it is demand for infrastructure to be implemented. https://www.silpac.net/containerized-hydrogen-systems.html#1
That’s getting there, but you notice they don’t mention cost. I ran a small C-store for years, and we cleared 1.7 to 2.3 CENTS per gallon after financing our two 15k gallon(iirc) tanks. The larger chains can probably afford it if demand is there, but certainly not Mom&Pop stores.
It will be viable but it’s going to take a while, for example the Netherlands are building a big hydrogen production facility next to a wind farm but that’s only supposed to start production in 2031.
You pretty much covered this in the article, but:
There is absolutely no way Toyota will ever sell significant numbers of hydrogen cars because they will never put their money where their mouth is. There is no widespread hydrogen infrastructure to refill the things. (according to a Department of Energy website, they don’t exist outside CA)
This was the same problem with electrics, but Tesla’s best idea ever was to create the supercharger network. And this was for a product you could refill at home! I’d be willing to bet there’s not a single person in the world – Akio Toyoda included – who has hydrogen refueling capability at their house.
Japanese companies keep developing hydrogen EVs because they’re viable in Japan. Its part of the Japanese government’s energy plan. Its just baffling why they try to sell those overseas when there are no real infrastructure to support them.
because less weight without a Battery and far more range, Fuel Cell cars have been automobile design discussion points since the early 80’s, and ultimately if we are going to start with batteries connected to electric motors a swap to a fuel cell with a decent sized capacitor seems like a potentially viable option compared to another 20 thousand dollar one ton battery. the output of a fuel cell is H20 as well, so that sells well to the Greenies.
Except most greenies have a brain and know that wasting 80% of the energy during the various phases of the product, and the volatility of the product, and the way it’s produced, make the produce a big piece of shit.
Do they Prefer Brine Mining Lithium?
eh, there is really no widespread Electrical Infrastructure either, but little mobile Hydrogen generators seems simpler to implement in some ways.
I’m so far behind the times that I’m still getting used to buttons, let alone screens. My daily driver Mazdaspeed 3 has dedicated buttons for each HVAC mode, i.e. windshield vs face vs floor or combination of those, which I like. It’s just a fancy version of a mode knob. Conversely, my newly purchased ’04 Toyota Sequoia has automatic temperature control which has a single Mode button to cycle through modes which means I actually have to take my eyes off the road to view the display screen and sometimes press the button multiple times to get to the mode I want. Really wish every vehicle just had three knobs for HVAC – temp, fan speed, and mode – so I can adjust them without having to actually focus on them.
Sam Schmidt FTW.
https://assistivetechnologyblog.com/2017/08/quadriplegic-drives-car-sip-puff-voice.html
I’m sure the battery pack issue is part of the reason that insurance rates are quite a bit higher for EV’s as well. I know from when I had my 2014 Volt, if you got hit in the passenger side ahead of the front wheel, it usually totaled the car because the on-board charging electronics where sitting there behind the bumper and the connectors were very expensive to replace.
I know it’s been an issue for some of the manufacturers that are getting more into crash testing these cars. They are developing individual exterior storage buildings with fire alarm systems to store the crashed vehicles, as well as burn pads far away from other buildings in case they catch on fire. Seems like Copart is doing similar things…storing EV flood vehicles and crashed vehicles far away from others.
Much to Torch’s dismay, I’ll go ahead and nominate the Mazda family for the best controls, mainly because they still use entirely hard buttons on most of their line-up.
Mazda’s theory is that the screens are high up so you don’t have to move your eyes too far from the road. I’ve had my ’22 CX-30 (a Ferrari if I’ve ever seen one…) for about 7 months. Between the HUD and the high center screen, it all does make sense. I never thought it would, but when swapping to The Wife’s ’20 Kia Soul, trying to find the infotainment screen is really foreign all of a sudden. Add to the screen the fact that I can still find buttons for what I need – be it on the steering wheel or the center console – and I’m thrilled with the experience. I love technology, and love cars, but touch screens just haven’t hit for me in a practical sense when driving, so this set-up, while not perfect, is better than many.
Ive got a ’23 Mazda 3, and I agree they got it right for sure. It’s got a HUD (every car should have a HUD), all the HVAC is actual buttons, the volume knob is down by the infotainment commander knob so you dont have to reach for anything to adjust the level, it’s all right where your hand naturally rests when your arm is on the center console. I can even change all the front/rear/360 camera views with a physical button AND ACTIVATE THE CAMERA AT ANY TIME not just while parking which is amazing. Heated seats and steering wheel are technically a button, but they engage automatically at certain temps at different intensities depending on the temps.
I think cars were very over buttoned prior to the screen trend. I think the pendulum is now swinging to far into the no buttons realm. I think in the coming years we will see the compromise. To be honest a lot of functions in modern cars are settings that are on by default and never turned off. Parking sensors for example, or lane keep assist. You dont need a button always at the ready for that.
This is kind of my thought on it too.
The incessant complaining about touchscreens makes me think people either don’t remember how cluttered interiors were 20-30 years ago, or aren’t old enough to have experienced it.
My basic rule of thumb….anything that’s reasonably expected to be used every time you drive should be a button or knob. Temp, fan speed, locks/windows, seat heaters, and basic audio controls. Put everything else on the touchscreen.
I would add to that anything that might be important to enable, disable, or change while the car is moving. TC, cruise control, lighting, etc., just because it’s safer to have a control you can use by feel alone.
Temp and fan speed? You really touch those every time? Maybe I’m spoiled with automatic climate control, but I almost never fiddle with the temp the fan is always on auto (unless I use the defrost setting, but there again that’s a single dedicated button). I don’t disagree that the climate controls should be their own controls, but I barely ever use them.
The ones that get me are the heated/cooled seat buttons. Those I use ALL THE TIME, although every time I do a small eye roll about how it should just be frickin’ automatic every time I start the car below 40 degrees F that the seat heater kicks on (or the cooler above 80F), but since those functions aren’t automatic I have to stab the buttons. If those were hidden in some dumb climate menu I would be 10x annoyed. How is it that heated seats were not an automatic setting based on ambient like 20 years ago? Probably some annoying patent or something, because the feature is like blindingly obvious.
I change my climate control settings all the time. I hate the noise of pretty much any fan, so I adjust it to get warm or cool, then turn it back down. Back and forth, depending on which is bothering me more at the moment: fan noise or temperature discomfort.
What I’d really like to see is a car with about 8 different blower motors mounted around the cabin, so that even when they were blowing lots of air, you wouldn’t hear the motors running at all.
I’m always surprised when I sit in a so-called luxury car and I can actually hear the HVAC system. This should be a solved problem by now.
I’m with you (I work in HVAC: boy am I with you!), but the reality is that moving air makes noise any time it changes direction or velocity (caveats I won’t bore you with). Even the Lexus es300 from last century with that cool hydraulic cooling fan made noise when running.
I have toyed with the idea of using computer fans and a ~2:1 transformer wired before the alternator’s bridge to add volume to defrost my front windows. I kinda hate taking dashboards apart, so never went farther than powering a fan that way for proof of concept
Another perk from BMW – the fan speed is automatic -up to an adjustable max which you can set using a dash button, so you can avoid the roar. A corresponding perk is that the heater essentially stays shut off until the engine has heat to provide, so you don’t get the chilly air from a cold heater. It’s pretty nice.
Of course if you choose max recirc or defrost, all German Hell breaks loose.
So, the vent only opens when the coolant is warm, even if the HVAC is set to outside air? I noticed my GR86 sometimes starts on recirculate, which I almost never select unless I’m behind some scumbag smoking weed in traffic. Now I’m wondering if it’s a cold weather thing and it’s keeping out outside air until it’s warm (or until I set it to vent, which I usually do). I’ll have to pay attention to when it comes on.
I disable auto climate control and do it manually. Call it a bias from my younger days when that was the only option.
But if it’s cold outside, I want either hot air blowing, or nothing. Similarly, freezing AC or nothing in summer. The car trying to find a stable temperature and blowing lukewarm is the worst IMO.
Some vehicles have the seat heaters connected to the remote start systems, so they do turn on when you remote start it. Nissan is one that did so. Wonder if there is some safety reg out there preventing it coming on with the ignition though otherwise.
Ironically the ambient temp sensor was originally how heated seats worked when they first started going into cars. Cadillac was first in the ’60s and would activate it when the temp was below 50F (also had a manual switch), and then Saab a few years later, theirs being when the interior temp was below 58F.
See, i hate heating seats, i’m not a pancake, would never turn this on, never use a button.
But, my bidy needs different airflows an temperature, sometimes it’s cold outside, i’m chilly and want full blast, than 5min later sun pop out and the light is enough, i’m touching them allllllll the time.
My 2022 BMW has temp actuated heated seats and steering wheel. The actuating temperature is adjustable, albeit buried deep in a sub menu. I really like this feature. Enough that I would pay a subscription fee to keep it in a couple years? Hmmmmm.
Complete opposite—never use HVAC in auto, use the temp setting as if it were the old blue-to-red spectrum selector knob. I get in the car, the car and I are at different temps and I want that adjusted quickly, I drive for a bit, I need it to settle down. I’m often different temps in different areas. Auto HVAC, like almost everything I ever encounter that has an auto setting is frustrating. If I even go on a killing spree it will because of automatic “convenience” or “safety” annoyances driving me over the edge. As for heated seats, I can wait the 3 minutes for the coolant to warm up and I have never had the desire for swamp ass. I’m probably just weird in that my extremities are what tend to get cold. Do people walk around with heated underwear?
Audi interiors from 10-15 years ago, with all the buttons, scared me out of buying one. No joke. I want a wagon badly but Audi wagons are off the table.
+ turn signals, wipers and horn (should be physical user interface, not via touch screen)
You do, if it defaults to on every time you start the car.
Lane keep assist and other adas bullshit need buttons.
Batteries – seems like modular batteries and industry wide standardization would be the answer… but perhaps not yet as during the “wild west era” we want lots of ideas being developed in parallel to get to the best ones. Gonna have to go through some bad ones to get there, though. That’s just the way it is.
At some point, this is where some government oversight could help – funding to support the development of a modular standard and credits to encourage adoption. The standard could account for post-vehicle repurposing although my vote would be for rebuildable battery tech.
This x1000
By the time you hit the battery you’ve already screwed up the frame which for most insurance companies is a totaling event.
Extremely incorrect.
Where I wrenched, we did a LOT of structural work. Because guess what? There ain’t much on a unibody that ISN’T structural. And guess what? Frame damage doesn’t total a car. Period. Irreparable damage does.
As to button controls: I prefer my 1932 Chevrolet. It has zero haptic feed back controls and oddly enough zero buttons. I have an ignition switch, a pull device for the throttle and choke. The only button is the horn button which does a fine job of activating the town and country blasters mounted on the headlight bar. The whole car is simple to operate and a joy to travel around town. I highly recommend 30’s era technology for all vehicles today!
Bring back knobs and levers!
And fiery death and dismemberment during accidents!
I don’t know. At the very least I would have to have a rear defroster.
I’ve seen & heard people propose that the Model A was the pinnacle of automotive technology. I’m not going that far-we live in great gearhead times-but I was nodding as I read your comment. I want control.
Alas, I’ve grown old & soft, and really appreciate actual defrost and headlights which enable me to see that stupid deer before it can run at me
Hence my defroster request. I want to know if whatever I hit is worth going back for and claiming for dinner or if I should start running from the law. And NO, I don’t want to subscribed to some service to supply me that information!
I’d love to see those battery packs get repurposed for grid level energy storage systems. An industrial ESS is a much more controlled environment than an EV, and systems can be configured to charge and discharge the batteries much more gently than is possible in a car. Both of those things lower the safety risk of using potentially-compromised battery packs.
There must be a large fraction of those packs that could be tested, evaluated, and put on a rack in a warehouse somewhere, where they can turn generation from intermittent sources like solar and wind into a energy source that can be drawn upon as needed in response to demand. This is a technology that is being actively developed, and one that I think is well worth pursuing.
There’s a company called B2U in California doing exactly this: installing huge racks of used-up Nissan Leaf batteries at grid-scale backup facilities. Recycling EV batteries (e.g. harvesting the raw materials to manufacture more batteries) is obscenely expensive and wasteful compared to reusing them in lower-demand (e.g. non-transport) applications. Especially if you can reuse whole EV packs, BMS and casing included, rather than harvesting individual modules and cells.
On cost, performance, and reliability, a used-up EV battery is still a screaming deal compared to a new house or grid backup battery: the performance demands of an EV are order-of-magnitude higher than those on a stationary storage battery, so a no-longer-useful EV battery is still a useful-as-hell grid backup battery.
What do they do to safely dispose of the fully used up lumps they get, or eventually end up with over time?
This. This is very pertinent
My ’14 FRS is great. 5 in touch screen for the entertainment system, dials and buttons for everything else. I hope the gen 2 ’86 is the same. Anyone got one?
I do. It’s the best implementation I’ve seen. Most stereo commands and all HVAC can be controlled with buttons. Pretty much anything you’d use the touchscreen for is not important to select while driving or is very minimal input. Only annoying thing is apple car play disconnecting for about 10 seconds every once in a while before reestablishing connection. I despise touchscreens and I’m very satisfied with this one.
the nasty truth, at least currently is that the cost of recycled lithium is five times that of virgin lithium from brine-mining. Brine Mining in itself being of similar controversy as Fracking for Oil. But add in the fossil fuels used currently to get recycled(very Heavy) BEV batteries to the few recyclers willing to do it and it is not cost effective and adds tot he Negative optics of how green the process of making these batteries really is.
“Today’s main lithium-ion battery recycling processes are also not particularly efficient. A process used by many recyclers, pyrometallurgy, involves melting down the batteries and burning off plastic separators to extract the coveted metals. Pyrometallurgy is energy-intensive, emits toxic gases and can’t recover some valuable minerals, including lithium, at all.”
As a geologist who works in the mining industry, that example copypasta you quoted is one of the stupidest things I have read in a while. It shows that whoever wrote it not only has no understanding of neither the engineering nor the science of materials processing, but also has no desire to educate themselves to improve their understanding.
An example would be if I wrote “Tesla manufacturers it’s electric vehicles using a process called automotive engineering. Automotive engineering is energy intensive, requires the use of many rare earth elements, and produces toxic chemicals as a byproduct.”
What a long-ass way to say “ur dumb”.
With giving an alternative answer either….
Are you saying that recycling the batteries using flame does not produce toxic gases and does not destroy much of the Lithium they are trying to recycle in the first place?
The mix of screen and buttons on my second gen Volt is excellent. I never need to interface the screen for anything to actually drive the car.
Though I’m still waiting for delivery, my 23 Sierra seems to have the same concept applied.
GM seems to have a good recipe.
Agreed – I like the buttons in my Bolt.
My Hyundai Tuscon Hybrid has almost the exact right mix of buttons and touchscreen, whereby most “traditional” controls are right where they’ve always been on the center console, steering wheel, and driver’s door. The touchscreen is limited to Nav and infotainment features. My only slight issue is with cruise control, which is handled a little differently than in every other car I’ve ever used. It’s fine, just not familiar.
Our VW ID.4, on the other hand, gets it pretty much exactly wrong. Most things are on the touchscreen, which means simple things like changing where the air blows are a complicated, time-consuming, multi-press activity. Even using the windows is weird, because there’s only two buttons to control all four windows, and it’s super easy to get it wrong. Even just adjusting the temperature is weird, because it involves swiping a narrow strip on the dash that’s not lit (so hard to find at night) and next to a volume control that has the same interface. So you could want to raise the temperature, but accidentally turn the radio way up. Or try to turn the volume down, but accidentally kick on the AC. I can’t wait to be done with the ID.4…which is a weird thing to say for what is, otherwise, probably the best car we’ve ever owned.
Couldn’t agree more. Pretty much every control in the ID.4 requires taking your eyes off the road, sometimes for quite a while when it’s a multi-step process (back windows, everything on the touchscreen).
By contrast, I could operate just about all the controls in my 2013 GTI without looking. Selling it was a mistake.
“[UAW] workers are upset”
Didn’t they just get a 5 figure profit sharing bonus?
I’m obviously temperamentally inclined to side with the salaried white collar employees, but it really is bad optics to be “agitated” and “upset” cashing your big checks while your fellow employees are looking nervously at the layoff line.
“[UAW] workers are upset”
Also, water is wet, sky is blue.