Electric cars driving mechanics out of business ?

[AleNod]

Verifying Device

Okay, its not a motoring press report so disregard the source, but here's an angle I hadn't thought of . . .

Electric cars dont have ICE and exhaust systems, but still have motors, wiring, wheel bearings and brake systems. Thoughts / comments ?

 

[Zephyr]

I am an ignorant peasant but “if they break, it’s very expensive to fix them” does not compute in my mind.
Batteries, are expensive, but the rest of the parts are just like a normal vehicles parts.
wheels, struts, wishbones, cables, lights and in most cases they share the same parts.
regarding the rotors, I am pretty sure that they last “for a lifetime” so what is all this fuss about?

 

[motco]

There's a good deal of electronic systems specific to EVs/PHEVs, but as already said, the running gear/ suspension/ lighting and brakes are pretty standard. What might be making life difficult for mechanics is the general increases in cost of living, and the inevitable rise in the hourly labour rates charged by garages. Like most problems there is more than one cause.

 

[Pingu]

I suspect it will be an age thing. If you are under 40, it would make sense to invest the time and money into training and tools. If you are 40-50, it would be touch and go. If you are over 50, it's probably not worth the expense, so your market share will drop, and possibly disappear.

The real impact will come if they say that MOTs have to be conducted by mechanics who have been trained to work on electric vehicles. As there is only one MOT register, that will mean ALL MOT testers will have to be trained and equipped. Backstreet MOTs will not be available until those trained by Halfords, KwikFit, BMW, etc have had their expensive training and they branch out to work for themselves.

 

[Fender2004]

I was talking to my local garage owner when I had the MoT done on the Z3, and he told me that he has been trained to work on electric cars. Having done the training allowing him to be able to disconnect the main power cables etc. He is just a one man band garage, so you will have small garages to fix electric cars as well as the big companies.

 

[Andybpowell]

As has already been stated 99% of the suspension and brakes are standard equipment shared with their ICE versions the brakes may last a bit longer due to regenerative braking the gearboxes are generally extremely simple most with just a single gear no clutches the motors usually only have a single moving part so again very reliable it's the batteries and generally more complex electronic components where the reliability issues come in so the new car mechanic will have a much greater electrical knowledge I can't see them swapping out battery modules and repaiing electronic components any time soon but times change move with them or fall by the wayside I'm afraid

 

[D R Oldfield]

I think this could become a very interesting topic i guess there are no standard communication protocols used to control the various control modules , and what happened when a fault occurs on a inverter or control board , also some of the systems are high voltage /high currents would this come under the remit of the institute of electrical engineers regulations (IEE regs ) or not ?

 

[Andybpowell]

You're really reliant on the manufacturer's diagnostics very very very few people would be able to look at canbus data and determine what's at fault and as for the HV issue that's just a big can of worms I'm avoiding
But when my first battery pack arrived for my EV conversion the HV cable had been cut through and there is no way they knew it wasn't live if the contactors had fused which I've had a set of them do then that would have been a very bad day for some one

 

[D R Oldfield]

In a previous life ( I am know retired ) I have had experience of high current Dc at 1000v and it will do a lot off damage and needs to treated with the upmost respect, it does concern me unless you really know what your doing it will seriously hurt you so the correct tools and test equiptment are a must

 

[Andybpowell]

Seems there's a lot of retired z owners here or maybe or maybe we're the only ones with the time to post