Careful with this posting it is an antique. The guy had a paintless dent repair
We used a one-piece body side, and so that means if you damage like the rear fender, the repair operation, depending on the level of the damage, you can either do body work or you have to cut out a portion of the panel, re-weld the new panel on,
So, a problem of design that didn’t really think about repairability
There is no way a CEO talks like that. “We made like a one piece body”. Not a chance.
I like the rivian cars, but i have worked for years as a hardware engineer and i am 100 percent certain this was a known issue. I have seen design scrutinized on so much less and this is just such an obvious issue…
If you don’t scrutinize then you don’t find any issues?
Rivian and Tesla are trying to hit price points with lower volumes so they are 100% aiming to reduce manufacturing costs even if it creates scenarios like this.
The market is ripe for the equivalent of a wileys jeep ev. Cheap to buy, repair and capable with no frills.
Seriously, I need this bad. I’m about to get a rikshaw instead
Make the software foss too and i’m in
I would die for a FOSS car. The main barrier for that is airbags, people could just disable them, which wouldn’t be good or fair to their passengers or future owners. I also worry about other dumb stuff people would do with a foss car. Of course, I still want one.
Not gonna happen for multiple obvious reasons, but here’s one that would make you not want to buy one - it’d be a budget car for a price of a BMW.
And you’re not gonna want to buy it second-hand, because of the risk of unimaginable extent of software garbage the previous owners would leave you with.
Tinker cars are for tinkering, good luck untinkering it.
If it’s software, you could just reinstall it.
Hardware would be a different story. But I’m not sure how that’s different than today. My friend has a RAV4 that he’s added several hardware hacks to. For example, there is a module you can add that will give you actual numbers for each tire’s pressure instead of the usual warning light that a tire is low with no indication of which one. It even shows up as an extra screen on the normal interface between the gauges.
If it’s software, you could just reinstall it.
Exactly, right!
As a FOSS person you don’t buy a used PC from someone, find it still has an OS installed and just start using it.
No, you wipe that sucker clean and install your OS fresh.
An open-source car would be exactly the same.
I’m pretty sure I do that with EVERY piece of hardware I get. I don’t trust that shenanigans haven’t been done. Hell most times I update the BIOS too if I can.
You can already do that though. Basically any truck just has a control on the dash to disable the passenger side airbag in case you neet to put a car seat there. You can also just remove the airbags in any existing vehicle as is. It really isn’t hard to do. People are just hesitant to do so because if you screw up then you can set the airbag off.
More importantly though why would the software being foss effect the airbags? The airbags shouldn’t be interacting with the vehicle software at all.
People have been doing dumb things with their cars since the invention of cars. Making them harder to repair via locked down software isn’t the fix for that.
Airbags are definitely a part of the can bus these days, they trigger based off of a number of inputs like the gyro, speed, acceleration, etc. I suppose they could just put in a seperate, secure system for the airbags that cannot be tampered with.
If those sensors give the values thru a server port and the airbag reads them as a client there is no need for more interaction than what the 90s browsers had with the web servers.
Theoretically there are ways to deal with modifications in that scenario.
Prusa for instance had a trace on the PCB of the mk3 that you had to cut to be able to flash a unsigned binary iirc. You voided the warranty or at least the parts that were affected by modifications.
Imagine something like this for a car. Not a binary blob but something signed or otherwise secured through a chain of trust for components the law decides to regulate. Driving data recorder in case of crash and airbags and such. All the other non safety components can be changed and nobody but you controls your data and your ability to repair. And if you decide to change said components you loose some rights regarding insurance, not warranty for the car itself.
Yes please.
The mecedes g wagon was developed with easy repair ability in mind. At least regarding the outer shell and maybe the frame. Straight and rectangular sections that can easily be welded. As all good ideas it went to shit of course.
Germans will not save us with simple engineering. Everything in their cars is so fucking complicated to work on.
It’s like they have a division of how to make mechanics work hell
You read my comment, right?
Slate… though who knows if it will ever materialize in the real world.
I can’t wait to preorder mine! https://www.slate.auto/share/VYMIBC
Isn’t Slate a unibody design?
No idea, does it matter?
Yes, because unibody designs will all have this problem, where it’s extremely expensive to repair damage to the frame.
Body-on-frame is generally better for repairability because you don’t have this problem - you can just remove the damaged panel and replace it.
In both slate and rivian’s case (I think), they seem to use a hybrid of both. So, it’s probably around the same expense as repairing a Rivian in regard to labor (and possibly materials).
The point is that Slate might not resolve this problem either.
My understanding is the Slate is kind of body-around-frame.
Not exactly a ladder chassis but I don’t know if you can call it a unibody.
I corrected my first comment in the comment you just replied to:
In both slate and rivian’s case (I think), they seem to use a hybrid of both
Everywhere I’ve found calls it a hybrid or mix of both options. This is how Rivian does their bodies as well, which means Slate may not fully fix this “more expensive to repair than standard body-on-frame” problem. At least, Rivian calls it a “unique” body on frame.
Here’s an R1T, for example and to compare:
I do see that the Slate’s bed body is less of a unibody compared to the R1T, however it otherwise is very similar. I’m betting that the Slate will be cheaper to repair in the rear, from a labor and material sense, however I think it will suffer from similar problems elsewhere.
Don’t get me wrong, I’d love to have a Slate regardless. R2 is a full unibody, which will almost definitely make repairs more costly, as well.
Cool idea.
Dacia Spring (but that’s probably not exported to the US which I guess you’re from)
Canada, so no. :(
The price is nice. I doubt it is easy to repair.
shouldn’t be too difficult for most body shops…
and there’s plenty of them: so plenty of parts available e.g. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/157804119428
TL:DR: Poor scale and awareness due to being a niche brand, overly large aluminum body panels requiring either massive replacements or complicated welding, small shops guessing that it must be even more exotic and expensive than the CEO claims, and insurers shrugging and moving on because the volumes aren’t hitting their financials hard enough for them to care.
welding aluminum requires TIG. It’s harder and more specialized.
welding mild steel body panels are simple with equipment any body shop will have.
Hell any home 120v wire welder can do mild steel. It is the cutting and shaping part that is hard.
No, that’s easy as well. It’s the not breaking to pieces and looking like shit part that is hard.
Well hell, I’ve never welded anything and I struggle with those things in my daily life anyway.
I got into a fender bender with my Buick and they totalled it because the fender was worth half as much as the car. They’re doing something very wrong in car design.
I used to drive an Isuzu Trooper. I got rear-ended which totaled my car. Theoretically it was repairable, but when your car is old enough to vote it doesn’t take much damage for it to get totaled.
There was other damage, but one thing that still pisses me off is that a few hundred bucks of that calculation was my spare tire cover, which had some cracks after the accident, and the insurance company would not let that drop.
It was a plastic shell that is mostly just decorative that covered the spare bolted to the back of my vehicle. I didn’t care that it was cracked, it in no way affected the safety of my vehicle, I would have happily driven that car for another decade with it being cracked, if they slapped 5¢ worth of epoxy on it I would have been more than satisfied, or hurry they could have just thrown the damn thing away and I guess my spare would get a little dirtier that it would if it was covered.
But they had to include that in the repair cost estimate, and since it was kind of an uncommon older car, replacement spare tire covers were scarce and pricey and added a few hundred bucks onto the estimate.
I don’t know if that was the thing that pushed me over the edge to a total loss but it certainly didn’t help
I had a perfectly mechanically sound vehicle that was paid off, and could possibly still be on the road today, and instead I got stuck with a couple years of car payments on a car I liked less than that one.
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Wrong for who?
Slate’ service partner blurb at least has some sound bites related to ease of repair. But aren’t they also a ‘our car only has 3 parts’ company?
Slate is the car for me.
No radio. No screens. A gas pedal, brakes, steering wheel, and manual windows.
I want to be hype for it so bad, but I can’t get behind buying a Bezosmobile. I really wish somebody else was behind it.
He was an early investor, it is not his idea. He is not the majority owner.
Oh really? Damn, then I’ve been misinformed. I’ll have to take another look.
Is it still a gas pedal when the truck is electric :P
I refuse to call it a “go pedal” like Tesla tried to create, lol. I guess it’s like “footage” for film, or “rewind.”
Maybe we can call it an accelerator?
technically, it’s an accelerator, but I’ve taken to calling it the “go pedal”
“Go pedal” was Tesla’s thing, it was part of their branding.
Well, fuck; now it’s ruined…
How about “Vroom” and “Skrrch”?
Fast Footy?
According to an old video by Doug Demuro, an early Volkswagen EV had the “play” and “stop” buttons on the accelerator and brake pedals, respectively.
Yea, just like the save icon is still a floppy disk.
What do you mean? I save all my files to floppy.
(I actually have a floppy drive yjat I sometimes use to remember yo sounds)
That’s a Buick thing. Was it a CTS? I’ve seen two year old CTS total from small accidents because there were no parts available for it.
Envision. The car was worth like $18k but with labor the fender was about $7.5k and since that’s over 40% of the value, it automatically totaled. I argued to no avail and almost kept it but the damage title wasn’t worth it.
Totaling a car over 40% is wild to me, is this a normal thing in the US? A bus drove into my grandma’s car last year and the damage was something like 11k Euros on a 16k car. The bus insurance paid for the full repair.
A GMC Hummer EV taillight costs an eye-watering $6,100 to replace, plus labor. The idea of having to replace one of Audi’s new adaptive Matrix LED headlight setups is something most people probably don’t want to stomach.
Audi made these adaptive light strips to fix the artificial problem of newer headlights being too bright compared to older ones.
Meanwhile, only 30 years ago when we had sealed-beams in standardized shapes, you could replace a headlight for like $10. And the lens was actually glass instead of plastic prone to yellowing and abrasion.
Yeah and if you hit someone that glass shatters and stabs them. The plastic is shatter resistant.
Did you know shatter resistant glass exists? Like your windshield for example. The issue is plastic is cheap and easy to manufacture and nothing else.
Tempered glass is very hard to mold into a complex shape. Those plastic headlights shrouds are much cheaper to replace, it’s the internals that are expensive.
Also that plastic you can just polish and they’re like new.
They burned out and needed to be replaced. New ones should never burn out
So… put LEDs in the same form factor. Now you have lights that don’t burn out and can be repaired. You can even use PWM to dim them.
You say that as if saving $10 on a bulb once every few years is worth the risk of spending $100s or apparently even $1000s if they get damaged.
There are reasons cars have been getting ever more unaffordable (above and beyond inflation), and stuff like bespoke model-specific headlights requiring complicated tooling to manufacture is one of them.
Cost wise, no it’s not worth it.
But you now have an item that
- never needs to be maintained
- is brighter
- works better
The adaptive headlights in my car are truly amazing, and every time I’m blinded by oNcoming headlight glare I wish everyone had them
Brighter is a negative trait in my opinion.
They’re nice until you need to replace them.
Unfortunately that’s the fifth owner’s problem so nobody really considers it
Those lights were absolute garbage though and the vehicles that used them got half the gas mileage compared to new ones due to their blocky shape and lack of aerodynamics.
Somehow, people could still see in the dark.
Never a good argument. We could transport goods with horses too. Never needed that fancy cart wheel.
And the ones who couldn’t see crashed.
Just don’t drive if you can’t see adequately. Fuck.
Aerodynamic headlights should never ever cost $6k under any circumstances.
Greedy corporate executives ran out of ideas to grow their revenue so we have to deal with absurdity inflated prices.
Most dont cost $6k just these ones because they’re adaptive lights
They’re also only 6k in the US because y’all pay extra for everything German and somehow also get worse reliability.
New matrix LED headlight for A6 C8 from Hella is 1700 EUR. Used one from a wrecker could be as low as 300. Parts catalog also shows individual LEDs for repairs.
Toyota Avalon 2011 headlight housing (which usually gets damaged) with auto leveling costs $150 each from the dealer ship. I still run the factory blasts and leveling motor and I just replace HID bulbs for ~$180 every 5 years or so.
Compare it with 2022 Toyota Avalon with unserviceable headlights without auto leveling which cost ~$2000
So a fender bender would cost $10k easy just for a pair of headlights and a bumper.
Here they are for $470 each with a CAPA certification for body shop repairs:
OEM parts are always going to be ridiculously priced because the OEM has a monopoly on OEM parts. Your 2011 headlamp assembly also has removable bulbs while the newer Avalon uses built-in LED lights with all the circuitry to drive them.
My Miata with pop-up sealed beams gets ~30 MPG. Any aerodynamic problems it has are due to being a convertible, not the headlights.
By “artificial problem” you mean the problem that they created… Right?
… Right?
He actually does mean that I think.
Just hammer it out bro
Hit the front with a hair dryer for a minute, then use a mallet from the inside
This is an aluminum panel, not likely to work here
Can you reach the inside though? Thought that was part of the problem.
Just drive it as is. When other road warriors see your battle scars, they’ll know not to mess with you.
literally the only reasonable solution
I imagine a rough looking dent that is flirting with the clean sheet metal of the other car at a red light.
“You want some of this? Come here and I’ll take you on a wild ride. Come over to the dent side. Insert some sexual innuendo here.”
