Poll on how many Ranger visits to repair your Roadster

[bonnie]

Engineers building to specs and requirements becomes problematic when they ONLY build to specs and requirements. That's why it's important to have people with previous auto design experience.

It's necessary to instill the discipline to define requirements and the specifications to meet those requirements (you wouldn't build a house without house plans ... well you might, but you'd have a bit of a mess at the end ... 'hey everyone! just figure out where you think stuff will go and we'll work it out as we go!!'). But requirements and specs are often incomplete. Someone tried to argue with me about a product fix I was requiring by confidently stating that there was no requirement for my requested fix. My reply is now used frequently in other meetings ... 'well there is no requirement that it not smell like a dead fish either, but we both know that would also be unacceptable'.

Without that previous experience, we have engineers thinking they are improving on quality and sometimes it just has the opposite effect. Tightening the manufacturing process for headlights until they will predictably fail at an exact point, plus or minus 20 minutes, sounds good. But when you're on a dark road at night, and a headlight goes out, you rely on the other headlight NOT failing so you can get home. In that case, the perceived quality improvement actually puts someone in danger. So experience counts for a LOT in a variety of areas.

I have faith that the S will exceed our expectations ... and am looking forward to seeing the first one roll off the production line. The Roadster engineers have learned a lot & now we have people with auto design on board.

 

[TEG]

Does anyone know Makes & Models?

It was discussed elsewhere but I recall Masterflux then Eberspacher...

 

[S-2000 Roadster]

Tightening the manufacturing process for headlights until they will predictably fail at an exact point, plus or minus 20 minutes, sounds good. But when you're on a dark road at night, and a headlight goes out, you rely on the other headlight NOT failing so you can get home. In that case, the perceived quality improvement actually puts someone in danger. So experience counts for a LOT in a variety of areas.

Good point. Whenever one of my ICE car headlight bulbs would burn out, the salesman would try to convince me to buy two and replace both because the other bulb would certainly be failing soon. I refused, explaining that statistics don't prove that the second bulb will burn out with any correlation to the first, and I'd rather get the most use out of that older bulb. Besides, when it does fail, I'll have a much never bulb on the other side that should be much less likely to fail. I figure that staggering the timing of the installation of each bulb would make it more likely that at least one bulb would have several months of life left whenever the other bulb died.

 

[vfx]

Without that previous experience, we have engineers thinking they are improving on quality and sometimes it just has the opposite effect....

Martin had a story on this. He was talking about gold contacts being the standard best but the car guys said it was poor.

Speaking of headlights. our Prius bulbs both went out (could drive with brights on) I checked the internets and the local dealer. $500 for replacement on our model year. I found and replaced them in 15 minutes for $11 dollars. Treated ourselves to a nice dinner.

 

[TEG]

Martin had a story on this. He was talking about gold contacts being the standard best but the car guys said it was poor.

Yeah, I remember that but can't find the reference now.
It was back in the "early days" with discussion of "what can silicon valley computer engineers learn from auto engineers?", and something like "tin contacts are better than gold contacts in automotive applications, and not just for the cost savings". I think it may have had to do with long term operation in an environment with a lot of vibrations.
The point was that automotive application have some additional "requirements" that aren't found in something like a desktop PC.
Putting filters on cooling fan was another lesson that probably should have been learned.

 

[doug]

The point was that automotive application have some additional "requirements" that aren't found in something like a desktop PC.
Putting filters on cooling fan was another lesson that probably should have been learned.

I put filters on the input fans of all the PCs I build.

 

[smoothoperator]

I would be really interested in having a poll like this set up. Is that possible? I know how many times I have needed repairs/upgrades and wonder if it is the same for others. Thanks.

or is that giving too much fuel for the anti-ev ppl.

Kevin

6 for the same problem!