Just came across this article. Not sure how much applies to the F150 batteries.

Tesla just shared a surprising revelation about how long the battery lasts in some of its most popular car models (msn.com)

 

They last a lot longer than the engines of any ICE vehicle sold today.

 

Here we go again...

 

12% degradation after 200,000 miles. Hmm. Ok well that does say a lot about that part of the vehicle, but what about the rest of it? Most cars start falling apart around that mileage or earlier depending how hard they've been driven.

I suppose you could strip the battery out of the beat down shell and use it for home back up power, that's all a Tesla power wall is after all.

 

In a couple of other threads, I mentioned an old friend of mine who has a 2019 Model 3 with over 200,000 miles. He still hasn’t had any mechanical failures to speak of, so I think they’re holding up just fine.

I think Tesla’s data will be generally applicable to all of the current-generation EVs that use liquid cooled battery packs. The big outlier has always been the first-gen Nissan Leaf with its air-cooled pack that degrades significantly as it ages. Batteries don’t like getting hot, so that’s always made sense to me. But everything else generally seems to last as long as the car its slung under, and I’d expect the Lightning to be similar.

 

I am not even going to bother responding to him.

Plenty of gas engines made by companies like Toyota and even some from Ford today are easily 400k mile engines.

 

As someone with no interest or plans to own an EV of any brand or "generation" I admit being amused how quite a few try making them out to be extremely long-lived without normal wear and tear maintenance issues as the ICE variants. Unless I'm completely mistaken a EV car/truck is just another car/truck with a different source type of power to move them along.

 

either EVs are the bees knees and makes ICE obsolete, or it’s not good enough business case yet such that the government has to give people money to help with their decision. At some point people have to pick one.

It’s like student loans, either the economy is doing so great like the White House says, or the economy is not good such that people with student loans are struggling and need the government to write off the loans. People need to decide if they believe the student loans are that hard to pay back if everyone is doing so great.

 

Yet invariably you make an appearance in these types of threads. Must be the amusement factor. 😁

 

Interests and plans change... I never had any interest or plans to own an SBR or a foam buffer tube, but here we are...

 

That's largely because batteries have been the bone of contention since EVs have come into existence. They seem to be holding up better than many of us expected, which removes a big reason why people were nervous to get them.

The bit about less wear and tear maintenance is accurate, though. What kinds of things do you service on your vans? For me, it's always been fluids, spark plugs, and anything that happens to break. EVs have a lot fewer things to break. The F150 Lightning has no transmission, clutches, turbochargers, emissions components, or the rest of the rats nest under the hood of any gas-powered car sold since the 1970s. There's no torque converter to shear down transmission fluid; no combustion byproducts to contaminate engine oil, and the coolant system operates over a much lower temperature range to kill the corrosion inhibitors. Brakes last almost forever because they're so rarely used.

The only maintenance items Tesla prescribes are wipers, washer fluid, tires, and cabin air filters. Ford recommends a bit more, but it's still a shadow of what you can expect to maintain a gas-powered truck. It's possible that the heavier weight will wear suspension components faster, but it's far too soon to tell if the upgraded suspension bits hold up as well or better than the gas trucks.

This one was making the rounds on Twitter over the last couple of days. My friend's experience is similar; no mechanical failures over 230K with his Model 3.

Twitter

There are ten Teslas on the road for every other brand of EV, so that's where most of the public experience comes from. We'll learn a lot in the coming years, but examples from other like powertrains look fantastic for cost of ownership and longevity.

 

EV's may not have transmissions, clutches or spark plugs, but they have seats, door handles and a crap ton of electronics that break just the same as an ICE. In my past 31 years of owning vehicles, I have kept all of them past 150,000 and most past 200,000 and some past 250,000 miles. None have needed a transmission, engine or anything other than regular maintenance and tires. The 2002 Mercury Sable that I ran to 255,000 miles hit a deer and had dented panels all up and down the passenger side. It was a highway burner to get to work though and people tend not to mess with you if you look like you just left a demolition derby.

The truck I drive now is 23.5 years old and has 266,000 miles on it and still tows 20,000 lbs GCVW up Teton, Eisenhower or Vail just fine. I have a total of $15,000 into that truck including purchase price, tires, etc after owning it for almost 10 years. My wife drove a 1993 Toyota Tercel around for 8 years after we bought it for $600. That little ******* lasted to 180,000 miles and it was a cheap car when it was brand new.

Things break, no matter what the badge on the front of the vehicle is.

 

Making it to 200k like Tom's friend's Tesla is like falling off a log...any modern ICE should achieve that and much more especially within the 4-5 year time span like Tom's friend. High mileage/short time frame generally means highway miles with little stop and go = easy miles. The cool part of the EV is making it that far and never having to crawl under it to change oil every 5 to 10 thousand miles...or any fluids for that matter. Man, I hate changing oil though I do it so it's done right.

Like Sous said...interests and plans change. I have no interest in brand new ICE cars or EV's as they stand today. Hoping the whole EV thing gets figured out for the day I need to replace the cars I have now.

Sidenote: Our truck is "new" compared to Sous ...2002 diesel. We dragged our fiver up Eisenhower in 2021...but then we're only around 18,000 gross combined weight.

 

Just did a quick Google search for "Tesla repair statistics" and this was the first blurb.



I did not verify the source, numerical values or what industry that average was compared to. It might be all vehicles, EV only or ICE including lawn mowers. I am not saying anyone is wrong and that I have proven that (well other than old man winter up there), just that ANYTHING made or designed by humans can and will break/fail whenever it pleases and it is least convenient for the owner.

Could not have said it better myself and I appreciate you putting my thoughts into a format to share with others.

Still wet behind the ears that one is... If you see us out and about, give us a wave! We live in GA, but have family in ID, so we travel out that way every couple of years with our 2000 and 2008 vehicles.

Gold 7.3L diesel hauling a Sundance 5th wheel with "Happy Camper" on the front cap. Travel safe sir and enjoy the ride!

 

Of course that's true. But nobody is saying that people shouldn't buy EVs because the door handle may break.

I've helped my mom with maintenance on her Toyota Sienna since she bought new in 2014. Over 120,000 mostly city miles, she's done brakes three times at a cost of $6-700 each. Her transmission failed during peak supply chain craziness and needed an $8K rebuild after a cheaper OEM reman had a months-long backlog. The rear differential clutch pack failed two years ago for another $2,000. None of those costs would occur on an EV because the parts don't exist. Motor/drive failures are rare as hen's teeth because there are no moving parts beyond a constantly connected gearset.

She'd still have gone through tires had that been a hypothetical Lightning that didn't exist in 2014. Maybe a coolant service and a brake clean/lube to keep the slide pins greased. Newer F150s have seen the occasional EPS failure, but balljoints and tie rod ends don't seem to be a common item.

And '65 Ford is right that high miles over a few short years is table stakes for any modern vehicle. But we've heard for years that fast charging, deep discharges, and high cycle counts kill EV batteries. That hasn't been demonstrated in the real world, and I think that's meaningful.