Battery Longevity

[Rocinante]

Does anyone have worries over the battery longevity ?

Came across this article, of an 8 year old Hybrid Merc requiring a new battery.

"Mercedes owner horrified after £15,000 quote for battery - more than the car is worth
Retired driver Ranjit Singh was left stunned after he was quoted £15,000 for a new battery for the Mercedes Benz he bought second-hand just four years ago for £27,000"

Mercedes owner horrified after being quoted £15,000 for new car battery

Retried driver Ranjit Singh was left stunned after he was quoted £15,000 for a new battery for the Mercedes Benz he bought second-hand just four years ago for £27,000

www.mirror.co.uk

Article states he also took it to a specialist who couldn't offer him a different solution.
Appreciate it's comparing apples and oranges, but the MG hasn't been out long enough to know.

 

[biffo]

Does anyone have worries over the battery longevity ?

Came across this article, of an 8 year old Hybrid Merc requiring a new battery.

"Mercedes owner horrified after £15,000 quote for battery - more than the car is worth
Retired driver Ranjit Singh was left stunned after he was quoted £15,000 for a new battery for the Mercedes Benz he bought second-hand just four years ago for £27,000"

Mercedes owner horrified after being quoted £15,000 for new car battery

Retried driver Ranjit Singh was left stunned after he was quoted £15,000 for a new battery for the Mercedes Benz he bought second-hand just four years ago for £27,000

www.mirror.co.uk

Article states he also took it to a specialist who couldn't offer him a different solution.
Appreciate it's comparing apples and oranges, but the MG hasn't been out long enough to know.

Nope - not worried at all.

There are lots of stories about battery longevity - most of which are completely out of date and not relevant to modern EVs with active battery cooling and heating.

 

[JCFlippen]

Nope - not remotely worried.
A 7 year warranty gave me peace of mind when I bought my ZS EV Gen 1.

 

[Rocinante]

Nope - not remotely worried.
A 7 year warranty gave me peace of mind when I bought my ZS EV Gen 1.

The car in the article failed at 8 years old. So outside of your 7 year warranty. You may not plan to keep yours that long, but only being able to keep cars as long as there is a warranty without fearing a £15,000 repair bill is not a good place to be.

I appreciate that this may be isolated case or not relevant any more as biffo has suggested, but stating it's fine as long as it's in warranty isn't really a solution, even if you don't plan to keep it that long it would surely affect second hand values if they regularly failed at 8 years old.

 

[biffo]

The car in the article failed at 8 years old. So outside of your 7 year warranty. You may not plan to keep yours that long, but only being able to keep cars as long as there is a warranty without fearing a £15,000 repair bill is not a good place to be.

I appreciate that this may be isolated case or not relevant any more as biffo has suggested, but stating it's fine as long as it's in warranty isn't really a solution, even if you don't plan to keep it that long it would surely affect second hand values if they regularly failed at 8 years old.

This sounds like sensationalist nonsense - it's a 'mild hybrid', not even a PHEV, so what size of battery has it got? Must be pretty small surely? I don't see this is related to BEV longevity in the slightest. It is a good story for those who like to perpetuate the myths about EVs though - as can be seen from all the social media comments related to this.

 

[jamesie]

This sounds like sensationalist nonsense - it's a 'mild hybrid', not even a PHEV, so what size of battery has it got? Must be pretty small surely? I don't see this is related to BEV longevity in the slightest. It is a good story for those who like to perpetuate the myths about EVs though - as can be seen from all the social media comments related to this.

Also, there is no mention of the mileage on the car.....it could be 200,000 or more.

 

[Hairyfool]

The clue is in the brand of vehicle

Mercedes = £££££

 

[lebelinconnu]

I upgraded to my MG5 after 2.5 years owning a 30kw Nissan Leaf. The Leaf was 7 years old and had done nearly 80,000 miles. I had noticed a bit of battery degradation but nothing horrendous and the car was still completely usable for my weekly milage (about 150 - 200 miles). I think battery technology has moved on considerably since then- that version of the Leaf has no active battery cooling system- so if that battery has held up so well I am not worried at all about my MG5.

 

[JCFlippen]

The clue is in the brand of vehicle

Mercedes = £££££

Yes. I had a Mercedes Vito van that was out of warranty when the engine blew up - it cost just short of £9k to sort. Owning an aging Merc is not cheap.
Back to MG and I see the battery whether Gen1, SR or LR being usable for a long time after the warranty runs out. Anyway by then Cleevely will probably have a replacement solution available.

 

[Kithmo]

SWMBO's 2006 Prius went for 15 years before showing a battery fault warning light on the dash, even then it still functioned. The dealer could have fixed it for £4,000, slightly more than the car was worth. I decided to take a look and found two cell modules that were low. I replaced them with two better second hand ones off Ebay at £18 each, sorted.
That guy's "specialist" sounds like he didn't want the job, over inflating the cost is a typical ploy to avoid taking a job they don't want, either that or he was a poor specialist.

 

[Petriix]

I imagine it would cost about £5k to swap out an MG5 battery with a reconditioned one in 10 years time. More likely would be to swap just a couple of modules for a few hundred £. Not a big deal really.

 

[MickH]

This looks to me like the usual bunkum from the anti EV brigade. While I have no worries about the longevity of my MG5’s battery, I suspect that by the time it does start to degrade it will be possible to just replace any faulty modules as required. As already mentioned, someone like Cleevely Motors would be my choice. Just out of interest, if you look at the Thai MG site, they actually boast module battery repairs although I doubt any UK dealers would be up for the job.

MG EP รถไฟฟ้า STATION WAGON ที่ครบทุกฟังก์ชันรถ EV เพื่อทุกการใช้งาน

MG EP 2023 รถยนต์ไฟฟ้า ที่ตอบโจทย์ทุกฟังก์ชันของ EV เหมาะกับทุกการใช้งาน ให้ขับเคลื่อนได้ไกลกว่า พร้อมต้นทุนที่คุ้มค่า ประหยัดกว่าในทุกโมเมนต์ด้วย MG EP ราคาเริ่มต้น 771,000 บาท

www.mgcars.com

 

[BarryH]

Yes. I had a Mercedes Vito van that was out of warranty when the engine blew up - it cost just short of £9k to sort. Owning an aging Merc is not cheap.
Back to MG and I see the battery whether Gen1, SR or LR being usable for a long time after the warranty runs out. Anyway by then Cleevely will probably have a replacement solution available.

I'm not worried about the MG Battery as modern EV Batteries are expected to outlast the cars they are installed in unless the car is written off for some other reason. The batteries are then expected to be recycled and have a second life.

The MG battery will be nothing like that in an 8-year-old Merc Hybrid. The MG has a modular design of battery pack and my dealer told me that the workshop schedule said an hours labour to remove and then any faulty modules can easily be replaced. Current EV batteries use in most cases a pretty standard cell and there are lots of makers now of cells of this size (although the chemistry may vary). I don't know what type of cell chemistry or form factor Merc used in their hybrids back then, but the charge-discharge cycle of the battery in a Hybrid is quite different from that of a BEV and in fact Toyota until relatively recently only used NiCad rather than Lion batteries in its hybrids such as Prius as they believed the duty cycle more suited to NiCad. 3rd party batteries and reconditioned batteries have been around for years for Prius as individual cells can be replaced if required.

Incidentally, Cleevely has currently suspended battery replacements and upgrades for the LEAF.

 

[Hairyfool]

Nissan have found the batteries lasting far longer than expected hence their 80% warranty is now 8 years. They also plan to replace duff cells where possible if a warranty claim with reclaimed cells from other vehicles.

I will lay odds that scrap vehicle dealers will be climbing over each other to get older EVs but claiming the "elevated costs" of disposing of the batteries mean the car is worthless.

The value of the pack is also going to be a major complication with the insurance write off process.

 

[mj224]

I don't think battery replacement is a realistic option. The rest of the car will probably be only good for the scrap heap then, and most likely well out of date technically.

My first EV was the little Citroen Zero. 10 years old when I sold it, still with a workable battery. I reckoned it would suit a young mother on the school run. It was never much good for long journeys. The longest trip I ever did was 51 miles non stop.

As I tell my wife, "Don't worry about something that will never happen"

 

[Lovemyev]

I don't think battery replacement is a realistic option. The rest of the car will probably be only good for the scrap heap then, and most likely well out of date technically.

This is fair comment, but Bobby T. from "Fully Charged" fame, has recently upgraded his 2011 Nissan Leaf with over 60,000 miles on the clock, for a larger 40 Kwh pack.
It was done by a company based in Holland.
For anybody interested, here is a link to the video.
Oh ...... No mention of the cost of the work though !.

 

[Hairyfool]

It was the cost of a replacement battery that put me off going EV in the 1st place.

Once I had found a price for a new battery (VERY hard to find) and based on the 5 year life often quoted I worked out that I would have to put away just over what I was spending on fuel in savings to afford a new battery. Ignoring the carbon footprint benefit (not a huge concern I must admit) going EV just did not make sense.

Even the battery lease option on the Renault Zoe was more than the fuel I put in my Freelander 2 SD4

 

[Lovemyev]

It was the cost of a replacement battery that put me off going EV in the 1st place.

Once I had found a price for a new battery (VERY hard to find) and based on the 5 year life often quoted I worked out that I would have to put away just over what I was spending on fuel in savings to afford a new battery. Ignoring the carbon footprint benefit (not a huge concern I must admit) going EV just did not make sense.

Even the battery lease option on the Renault Zoe was more than the fuel I put in my Freelander 2 SD4

In the video from Bobby T. he makes it perfectly clear, that modern EV will NOT require a COMPLETE replacement pack.
If an EV does encounter a problem with it's pack, then the pack can be removed and then the necessary cells be replaced, to resolve the problem.
Many EV's can have there packs completely removed in about 1 - 2 hours.
.

 

[Hairyfool]

Absolutely agree, but he also recognised that that was the common misconception when EVs 1st came out even within the industry. It was the reason companies like Renault ONLY offered battery leasing, a way to combat the problem of future battery failures putting people off.

Engineers can often accelerate work loading on systems to replicate years of use in a matter of months. Trying to do the same with batteries when you don't really know what that work is going to be is much harder. With lead acid batteries 50 full discharges can kill a battery but 100 half discharges won't.

Now they have real world data they can be more confident, Renault no longer even offer battery lease.

I'm more than a little surprised that the form factor of the 40kW battery is exactly the same. I also wonder about his optimism about another 10 years without considering rust being its downfall rather than the mechanicals. That scrape on the wing needs attention ASAP.

 

[BarryH]

This is fair comment, but Bobby T. from "Fully Charged" fame, has recently upgraded his 2011 Nissan Leaf with over 60,000 miles on the clock, for a larger 40 Kwh pack.
It was done by a company based in Holland.
For anybody interested, here is a link to the video.
Oh ...... No mention of the cost of the work though !.

Significantly for those that care Bobby's LEAF was the 1st Gen Japanese built car from 2012. You can normally spot 1st Gen Leaf from the pale interior popular in Japan and US plus if I recall there was just one trim level. The battery chemistry in the 1st Gen LEAF was notoriously bad and degraded quickly but when the LEAF production moved to the UK the 2nd Gen cars (2nd Gen is not the restyled new shape 2.0) were introduced it had very much improved battery chemistry which was much more stable although still only 24 kWh. 2nd Gen interior trim became the more toned down dark colours which seem to be preferred in the UK and European market. You may find occasionally on eBay a Japanese spec grey import LEAF with a light interior and personally, I think light interiors look better. A big advantage of the LEAF battery IMO is that as they upgraded from 24 kWh to 30 kWh they kept the external dimensions the same and with a little tweaking a 10-year-old car can get a new lease of life and extended range to be better than when new with a battery upgrade and even the later 40 kWh battery can be used. I'm not too sure about the 64 kWh battery because as the battery capacity increased to 40 kWh the passive cooling of the battery became an issue when Rapid charging and I think the LEAF 3.0 had forced-air cooling which would make it overly complicated to retrofit into an older car.