Comments by "Mikko Rantalainen" (@MikkoRantalainen) on "Munro Live" channel.

19:00 The car/truck has basically one wear item that's worth 30K–40K USD and you can only hope that there isn't any unexpected fault in that part because it cannot be repaired, only replaced!
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@TheConnor12500 If we assume that one cell has probability of 1 in million to fail, then a battery with 7104 cells (like in Tesla Model S P85) will work with probability of (999999/1000000)^7104 or about 0.993 or about 99 times out of 100. In practice, that tells us that 1 car out of 100 will have a failed battery pack if a single cell has failure rate 1 in million. Create a battery pack with more cells and you'll soon have a lot more failed battery packs. And I'm pretty sure that in real world a single cell has more than 1 in million probability to fail. Luckily, the cell manufacturer does some automated testing for each cell to try to remove the broken ones but this kind of filtering/testing can never catch all the failures.
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@Freakyguy666 Yeah, but you should assume that the truck has baseline cost of $30K/150000 miles or $0.2 per mile to run for the battery wear alone. Electricity and the cost of the car goes on top of that. (The above assumes you keep the car longer than the warranty. If you sell it near the end of warranty, expect the value to be reduced by $30K because next owner is expected to take the risk from that point forward.) And I don't know how you feel it, but $0.2 per mile seems a lot more than the cost of gasoline for a gasoline truck is.
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@Freakyguy666 Cheapest Cybertruck costs about $82K today. If you're willing to spend that much on truck and fully accept that its value will dimish fast, go for it. My point is that you shouldn't pretend that driving around in Cybertruck or any other EV is "cheaper than ICE cars" if you conclude that using calculations that ignore the battery wear. Also note that Tesla Model S was introduced 12 years ago. The battery for Tesla Model S used to cost $20K in 2014 (including labor and parts) and today it would cost $13K–$20K (bottom of the range will not get you close to 100 kWh battery). If you take this fact as an example of "replacement batteries getting cheaper", I'm not seeing it.
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@Freakyguy666 I added further explanation to my older comment. I still think you should evaluate the battery wear to $0.2 per mile because if you sell the car near the end of warranty period, the next owner is going to take full risk for the battery at the end of warranty period and the battery is now $30K liability for the next owner! As a result, the resale value of the car is going to be $30K worse if the warranty is over or near over. If somebody is willing to pay more for your used truck, consider yourself lucky for finding a fool to take too much risk to allow you to benefit monetarily.
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@Freakyguy666 I don't have any agenda. I'm just pointing that most people pretend that EV cars are cheaper to drive than ICE cars while totally ignoring battery wear. If you include the battery wear to TCO calculations and end up EV being cheaper, totally go with the EV. I'm still running with old ICE car that I maintain by myself because that has been much cheaper per mile this far.
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@theyutzinator I guess you mean replacing cells because repairing individual cell would make very little sense. Replacing individual cells is somewhat doable with Tesla Model S style battery, pretty easy in something like Toyota Prius and next to impossible to do with something like Tesla Cybertruck.
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@Freakyguy666 Yes, I was talking about long term ownership costs. If you accept that the resale price at 145000 miles is pretty low, you can definitely simply get rid of the car before 150000 and somebody else will take the risk. My point is that once the warranty is over, you should assume that the car costs $0.2 per mile to run for the battery wear alone. If you're lucky, it will last a lot more but you shouldn't count on it.
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@Freakyguy666 Which one of us is writing these comments with our given name? If you argument is that Cybertruck actually sells for double the sticker price, do you think that's an argument for EV driving to be cheaper or more expensive?
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@Freakyguy666 Please, point to reputable sources for your claims.
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@AntonioDiNunnoEVS Yes, the cells alone for Tesla Model S battery cost around $10k–$12k but obviously the whole battery is going to be much more expensive. And try to look up the worldwide postage fees for a package that weights 500–700 kg. And then you need somebody to replace that really heavy battery because you cannot swap that heavy parts by yourself. And by the way, if the manufacturer is going to give any warranty for the battery, that will be factored in the costs, too.
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@Freakyguy666 Battery (cell) cost did come down for a decade but if you look at the cell prices per kWh for the couple of last years, the price drop has stopped. We're still nowhere close to $100/kWh for a complete battery pack.
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7:36 The tolerances for an over a meter long part: 7 µm, 15 µm, 26 µm, ... That's insane and I sure hope this kind of accuracy becomes commonplace for all laser cut sheet metal. To get this kind of accuracy, you need to consider the temperature of the room, the temperature of laser optics and the temperatures of different parts of the metal sheet during the cut among many other things.
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@imzjustplayin People are already voting with their wallets that they are happy with the current offers. Hopefully the don't be too disappointed when they face the actual costs.
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@AntonioDiNunnoEVS Where you can get e.g. new Telsa Model S battery installed for $10k? That might be enough to get an old battery that has been taken out of service for being too broken (warranty replacement). That battery may not have totally failed yet but is it really worth $10k?
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@dinamiteblaa If you re-read my comment, you'll notice that I was calculating the probability for a working battery. You calculated (assuming "*" means exponent) the probability of failure.
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The only problem is that the Tesla connector doesn't support 3-phase AC charging. It isn't used in the USA because the grid support is so poor but here in Europe, 3-phase AC charging is the most cost effective way to implement pretty fast charging at home. Other than that, the Tesla connector wins hands down. That said, I think Tesla missed their opportunity. If they had allowed this plug to be used worldwide by other manufacturers, too, it would have won. Now there's too much existing infrastructure built with CCS that we are already locked to it here in Europe.
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6:50 The full Austin Powers experience...
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@AntonioDiNunnoEVS As I wrote earlier, my whole point is that once the car gets out of warranty, the then-current owner takes a huge risk with the battery because he or she will be paying for the full cost. And if you are selling a car that has e.g. 2 months remaining warranty, it's resale value should already reflect this increased risk. In worst case, the full cost of battery + shipping + installation will fall to the new owner if the battery fails 3 months after purchasing the second hand car. If you plant to recycle the car to raw materials immediately after the warranty period expires then it's even easier to compute cost per month or per mile.
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@killcat1971 Yes, random single cell failing will only fail that bank (group) of cells in worst case. I think most Teslas have 8–10 cell banks. However, the warranty doesn't cover 100% of the cell banks working. Instead, you only have guarantee that at least 80% of the advertised capacity is still available at the end of the warranty. Also note that the max power will be limited if you lose full banks because total voltage is defined by having the cell banks in series. And available voltage heavily limits the max power you can use.
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@allangibson8494 I think 2.5 kWh battery for $1000 is pretty expensive. The drive battery for Tesla Model S has 100 kWh and costs about $15000 installed. If you built similar battery from those commercial 2.5 kWh battery modules, the total cost for 100 kWh battery would cost $40000!
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@themonsterunderyourbed9408 It really depends on design. Search for images of Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV Battery Cell and you'll find box-shaped cells with bolted terminals. How hard do you think replacing such cells could be? Sure, if you accept Tesla or Porsche design where every cell is glued or welded in place, it's next to impossible to replace cells. And you can combine cells with different ages but it puts more strain for BMS and reduces usable capacity. Group of cells are always limited by the worst cell so it would be nice to be able to replace the worst cell easily, hence the Mitsubishi-like design would be preferable.
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@themonsterunderyourbed9408 Did you miss the "$0.2 per mile seems a lot more than the cost of gasoline for a gasoline truck is" And maintenance per mile is a lot less than fuel cost unless you drive some exotic supercar.
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@themonsterunderyourbed9408 How much does new battery replacement cost? Can you get warranty from insurance company over the guaranteed miles for the battery? For a ballpark figure, Tesla 100 kWh battery costs around $20K to replace with a new one and is warrantied for 100K miles. That means the battery aging costs 0.2$ per mile and that's why electricity costs do not matter at all in practice! If you can find an insurance for the battery once the manufacturer warranty ends, things might be different but without such insurance, you're constantly gambling for $20K extra cost if the battery fails or the car is written off.
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@themonsterunderyourbed9408 Sure, if you think F150 a reasonable comparision. I live in Europe and I think F150 is probably the most stupid thing ever for 99% of all the people.
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