http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2012/03/mcblog-on-%E2%80%9Cbricks%E2%80%9D-and-hand-pumps-musings-on-new-technology/
Publisher answers DSM's comment:
Paul A. Eisenstein
says:
Hi, DSM,
The flip side is Tesla contending that buyers of conventional vehicles should already know that attention to the details in the manual are critical — pointing to instructions regarding regular oil changes. Barring someone completely letting the oil run out, ie through a leak or bad rings, I have yet to hear of a gas engine being “bricked” because the oil wasn’t changed at, say, 6,000 miles. Other than something catastrophic, complete failure just is not something buyers have been familiar with and despite what Tesla has done with its warnings they arguably do NOT go far enough to truly make it clear that the problem is as potentially fatal as things have proved to a handful of owners. It is a completely different mindset and one that probably requires even more dire warning than Tesla currently issues.I cannot speak to what happened in the dealer showroom but I would suggest that this is a critical issue that dealers should repeat on several occasions, especially during the hand-off after a sale.I happen to agree that Tesla has complicated matters by using virtually no pad at the low end of battery range. When the battery says “0″, that’s pretty much it. The folks at Nissan (and GM and Mitsubishi and Toyota) will tell you that they recognize the likelihood that consumers WON’T fully recognize the potential problem — which is one of several reasons why they opted for larger battery packs for a given range than Tesla. On the Volt, for example, I believe they’re currently using just 10 of the 16 kWh. Leaf isn’t accessing much more of its 24 kWh. Tesla seems to have taken the strategy of maximizing stated range and hoping that buyers will be more careful in battery maintenance. This strategy is in question. The fact is that should a Volt or Leaf owner hit zero, they’ll actually have a lower likelihood of bricking because of the pad.Meanwhile, I can think of numerous situations where a person might not have the option to immediately recharge, especially with so few public chargers available. I think very few people understand the SOC drop-off dilemma. I can’t recall that ever coming up in conversation, including serious discussions I have had with Elon Musk himself, unless I initiated the topic.What concerns me most is that Musk and Co. have chosen to aggressively resist the sort of customer-oriented strategy that would have prevented this from becoming an issue in the first place. I recall how both Saturn and Lexus handled technical issues in their early years…and I can personally attest to how some other makers have handled other matters that they might have dumped onto the consumer. Considering this is supposedly a limited issue that has affected only a handful of owners, a wise company would have made a lemon into lemonade by working with Drucker (and the others reported to have bricked Teslas). In the scheme of things the cost would’ve been moderate for the company, the good will massive. It could also have been turned into a good learning experience AND Tesla could have clearly stated something ala, “We recognize that in the early days, even tech-savvy early adopters might be on a learning curve, so we chose to replace the battery and plan to use this to reinforce to buyers the potential issues — and the relatively easy solution. We also want to stress that it will not be Tesla policy, going forward, to replace every bricked battery.”Wow, they’d look like heroes, they’d get the message out and they’d make it clear they were not going to just stand behind people endlessly for avoidable risks.Sadly, in recent weeks I have had a number of conversations with Tesla owners and others following them (emphasis: including enthusiasts) and the general consensus is that this is a company that does not get customer service. Ask about how they are addressing the used Tesla issue, BTW. That’s informative.Should buyers be well aware of the bricking issue, absolutely, but it does require a learning curve and one more serious than with burn-in on a plasma TV. (Which I experienced simply having a family emergency that required me to run out for a few hours with the set tuned to CNN. At least in that case I was able to initiate a repair. The TV didn’t fail catastrophically.)As to Drucker and DeGusta, yes, I — as was Denise — am well aware of their relationship. It would have been appropriate for DeGusta to reveal that relationship. The facts are still the facts, however, and in the end, the issues center, as much as anything, around Tesla’s battery strategy and their customer service policies — while also raising questions about owner responsibility.Looking forward, I find it worrisome that this can happen and think that if Tesla maintains the limited battery pad strategy when its vehicles go mainstream the bricking issue will become widespread. Be honest: do you think blaming the consumer — even if that’s accurate — will work to Tesla’s favor once Model S is out there? Hardly. Tesla owners clearly need to learn from this. So does Tesla. But the attitude I have seen from the maker suggests they may not be interested.Paul A. Eisenstein
Publisher, TheDetroitBureau.com
