martinwinlow
Member
I don't uderstand, why you would want to drive model S 30-40 years. Of course, if you take it as a hobby, I can understand. But there is not any financial rationale to do so. All costs considered, it will be cheaper to buy a new car at some point, than keep repairing the old car.
Also, as some have pointed out, I believe it becomes almost impossible to get some spare parts in 30 years from now. Propably a lot sooner. Legacy electronics is difficult to repair if something gets broken. Lets think IBM PC from year 1981. From where would you get e.g. memory or processor for that?
I think just about every reply to the OP post has been expressed from the POV of a ICEV. There are already people reverse engineering the Mitsubishi i-MiEV and Nissan LEAFs. Why should we imagine that the same won't happen for the MS? With 3D printing progress, in 30 years you won't send an actual 30 year old design of a metal part through the post, you'll just get one printed for you locally. There is absolutely no reason to suppose the MS' 85kWh pack won't keep going for ever even if it only has half the original capacity. The OP is clearly 'hands-on' and given the relative mechanical simplicity of the MS I can't see why he wouldn't be able to keep that side going for that length of time. The main issues for me would be repairs to broken glass and the issue that Tesla have with being so restrictive on non-Tesla approved repairs. The latter could be overcome by reverse engineering the OS perhaps but it is very much an unknown issue...
I, too, plan to keep my MS for a very long time - at least as long as it takes for the financial aspect of owning it equating to that of owning an equivalent ICEV. But it will certainly be very interesting to see how it all pans out.