What to do?!?!? 2013 Model S 60 Battery fail

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

To OP: think of it this way: you can replace your broken car with a great refurbished 2013 Model S for $11,000. And it comes with a 4-year, 50,000-mile warranty on the battery! That's an awesome deal.
The fact that you owe money on the car is irrelevant.

But by all means don’t finance that battery or you’ll never become a billionaire.

 

[SSedan]

To OP: think of it this way: you can replace your broken car with a great refurbished 2013 Model S for $11,000. And it comes with a 4-year, 50,000-mile warranty on the battery! That's an awesome deal.
The fact that you owe money on the car is irrelevant.

Thank you for proving my point about how delusional many here are about what may need repair or maintenance.
There is a LOT MORE to a car than a battery. Replacing one major component doesn't refurb a whole car.

 

[Ostrichsak]

I will stand my ground. I don't buy used. Kudos to those who do. I financed my S for two and and a half years 1. something %. Think I made somewhere around 40% by investing the funds. Paid off loan.

Investment or financial advise on a forum is often only applicable to those that it fits or those who care to listen. For me it's neither.

Feel for OP. Is here talking about batteries yet gets financial advice.

Yeah, sure ya did. I believe you. I'm also SO impressed with your random internet claims.

Listen, you're welcome to make whatever risky/stupid financial decisions you want. Just don't act like it's a wise investment if you get lucky.

It turned into a financial conversation because the OP is in a really crappy financial situation because people like you talk about how your idea is such a good one and right now somewhere there's someone reading a post just like yours that will likely be in the same mess a few years from now.

I didn't bring up the financial aspect but it just happens to be a little something I know a thing or two about so I'm happy to offer safe/smart advice that will get you financial independence long-term.

People like you who are financing and leveraging their debt as much as their credit score will let them are the first to file BK when the market/economy corrects. People like me are the ones who will swoop in with cash and buy the stuff you "owned" for pennies on the dollar.

 

[PWlakewood]

@Ostrichsak

Could you loan me 100k at 1.5% for 84 months? Thanks.

Some of us are more fortunate than others and some of us cant resist the temptation when you want something and the bank says ok to a lopsided loan that favors them in every way. In my younger days I was quilty of using my 800 plus credit score to take "advantage" of zero or low interest rates and no money down loans. As I've gotten older and wiser (lol) I can see the benefits of paying cash but unfortunately not everyone is in a situation or ever will be in a situation to be able to hand over 50k or more for a car. The op may have been in a tough financial situation and the bank took advantage of him. Banks are in the business of making money and anytime you get a loan for an auto they love to take as much as possible.

.....now about that 100k loan @Ostrichsak

 

[Ostrichsak]

To OP, it does suck. I myself have been trying to learn what to expect if the battery on my car decides to die. I don't think I would have purchased my car if the 8 year and "unlimited" mileage warranty was not still in place. Gives me a few years to enjoy the car and see what it's all about - as well as see how the early adopters fair if/when their batteries fail.

I do have to make one other point though. I have a cousin that recently bought an Audi and had an Head gasket issue. An engine out repair was needed. It cost him a little less than a refurbished 60Kw battery from Tesla, but the job took 2.5 months to complete. It is amazing to me that in contrast this battery swap just takes a couple of hours to complete.

This is also why I say to save up what you can, pay cash for your car. Then, once you have that car, keep putting money away at that same pace and by the time you need repairs you'll have cash socked away for it. Had the OP not leveraged themselves so heavily to buy this car in the first place they'd be in a much better financial position should something catastrophic like this happen.

Not trying to beat a dead horse here but it amazes me that some folks want to continue arguing this point on a thread like this of all places. I mean, we're not in some thread where someone asks about financial advice but instead a thread where the OP basically took this other guy's tips years ago and ended up where he is when something bad happened. Oh the irony.

To your second point and to get the train back on the tracks here...

To be fair, I've done engine swaps in an afternoon and I'm not a professional certified mechanic with all the resources they have either. I've also seen basic Tesla repair parts take months to receive. Not saying your situation isn't true just saying that it may not be the most accurate conclusion to make blanket points based on isolated incidents.

 

[outdoors]

Yeah, sure ya did. I believe you. I'm also SO impressed with your random internet claims.

Listen, you're welcome to make whatever risky/stupid financial decisions you want. Just don't act like it's a wise investment if you get lucky.

It turned into a financial conversation because the OP is in a really crappy financial situation because people like you talk about how your idea is such a good one and right now somewhere there's someone reading a post just like yours that will likely be in the same mess a few years from now.

I didn't bring up the financial aspect but it just happens to be a little something I know a thing or two about so I'm happy to offer safe/smart advice that will get you financial independence long-term.

People like you who are financing and leveraging their debt as much as their credit score will let them are the first to file BK when the market/economy corrects. People like me are the ones who will swoop in with cash and buy the stuff you "owned" for pennies on the dollar.

While I generally enjoy you comments. These are the ones I didn't enjoy being called or the insinuation.

Risky
Stupid
Lucky
Essentially calling me a liar
People like me
When the economy crashes you're going to buy my stuff for pennies on the dollar.

I let my son read your post so he would understand what can happen when you make assumptions about people you don't know or never met.

His words. Dad he doesn't even know you and he thinks he knows more about your financial decisions and how you live your life and he's trying to tell you how to do it.

You might know a lot about finance. You got a lot to learn about people. Assuming that all people that use finance or leverage as a tool are incorrect. That might be your personal feeling feeling but that is not correct. It also might be your personal feeling that I am contributing to the downfall of the economy.

Wow. It's only Wednesday.

 

[Ostrichsak]

Thank you for proving my point about how delusional many here are about what may need repair or maintenance.
There is a LOT MORE to a car than a battery. Replacing one major component doesn't refurb a whole car.

I agree but there are also WAY fewer parts that can fail on a Tesla than an ICE car so we need to take that into consideration. Once the battery pack is replaced you've got a motor or two which are far less expensive, the MCU and maybe a handful of other parts that are in the thousand dollar range should they fail. Dozens of moving parts. ICE cars have hundreds of moving parts and any one of which that fail could render the car useless. While I'm not saying the OP will have a brand new car again with a new battery pack but they will have replaced the single largest potential failure point. All of this needs to be taken into consideration when deciding what to do.

As an exercise, say the OP instead buys an $11k used car. What are the odds it will need work & will they even be able to know what these parts are before they fail? At least with their car they know what's been done and what could potentially fail plus I'm sure the OP likes their car and would rather not buy some other car.

If it were me I'd take when I can get for the car is it sits and pay off the loan. Cut my losses. Then, with whatever is left and whatever I can save buy another used car and pay 100% cash for it. Start saving your money to upgrade down the road. All this financing talk is crazy and the OP will look back someday at what they're already out for all of the loans they took out and money the gave to banks.

@Ostrichsak

Could you loan me 100k at 1.5% for 84 months? Thanks.

Some of us are more fortunate than others and some of us cant resist the temptation when you want something and the bank says ok to a lopsided loan that favors them in every way. In my younger days I was quilty of using my 800 plus credit score to take "advantage" of zero or low interest rates and no money down loans. As I've gotten older and wiser (lol) I can see the benefits of paying cash but unfortunately not everyone is in a situation or ever will be in a situation to be able to hand over 50k or more for a car. The op may have been in a tough financial situation and the bank took advantage of him. Banks are in the business of making money and anytime you get a loan for an auto they love to take as much as possible.

.....now about that 100k loan @Ostrichsak

Hard pass.

 

[mongo]

Hell yes I would turn down a loan with a 1% or 2% interest rate since it means I'm probably going to buy a $100k car that I don't need and can't afford.

It makes 100% financial sense over time and is how I'm able to buy multiple Teslas today with cash.

Buy a new Tesla (or any car) for $100k at 0% and guess what... you're going to lose about $10k per year on depreciation and that's even at 0% interest. Once you sell/trade that car and realize that loss it's going to be steep and the market is littered with great used cars at amazing prices by people who made exactly that poor decision.

I think you may be conflating a car as an investment and a car vs an investment. The car depreciates regardless of whether it is financed. Your net worth has the same change due to the depreciation whether it is financed it or not. New cars typically lose value, period.

This is also why I say to save up what you can, pay cash for your car. Then, once you have that car, keep putting money away at that same pace and by the time you need repairs you'll have cash socked away for it. Had the OP not leveraged themselves so heavily to buy this car in the first place they'd be in a much better financial position should something catastrophic like this happen.

Leveraging to buy what you can't afford is a separate concept from financing vs paying cash.

Say you save 100k for a car. You can either
A: pay cash, and have nothing in the bank in the event of a life change and make no interest.
B: finance the car and put the cash into an appreciating asset, thus improving your net worth at the difference in rates.
C: Not buy the car at all and put your money in an appreciating asset.

I could pay off the loans on my tractor and wife's SUV, but they are at 0%. There is no good reason to reduce my cash on hand to do so.

 

[SSedan]

I agree but there are also WAY fewer parts that can fail on a Tesla than an ICE car so we need to take that into consideration. Once the battery pack is replaced you've got a motor or two which are far less expensive, the MCU and maybe a handful of other parts that are in the thousand dollar range should they fail. Dozens of moving parts. ICE cars have hundreds of moving parts and any one of which that fail could render the car useless. While I'm not saying the OP will have a brand new car again with a new battery pack but they will have replaced the single largest potential failure point. All of this needs to be taken into consideration when deciding what to do

You are still painting an overly rosey picture.
Yes an electric motor is much more simple than ICE.
An EV has 3 major expensive components, battery and motor are obvious, but the charger is expensive too, my car is dual charger equipped one of them had a fault, quote was $2200. Being heavy a bunch of us have had to spend money on suspension repairs too.
DC-DC and heater are known to be expensive.

If a pack is $11k charger $2200 and I might be pulling this out of my ear but thought I saw $6000 for a motor that all adds up to pretty high end engine and transmission for an ICE.

Rest of it is just a car.

 

[ArizonaP85]

Wow! Way, way too many comments about loans, etc. Back to the “battery fail” topic from the OP:

I’m no expert but enjoy reading explanations from wk057 and others which all say that, absent something like salt water flood damage, entire batteries do not fail; rather, a small component in a single module fails which shuts down the whole pack.

I can vouch for ce2078’s excellent work repairing packs, upgrading to larger packs, fixing eMMC, etc. I have seen his cars and others he has worked on and have been impressed, especially because his charge (sorry, couldn’t resist the pun) for pack repair is only a tiny fraction of Tesla’s estimate. Even if you add in the cost of transporting your car to him, it would only increase from a tiny fraction to a small fraction.

You might also have him proactively fix your eMMC as long as your car is there since you are out of warranty on that part as well.

Please let us know what you choose to do and how things turn out. Good luck!

 

[⚡️ELECTROMAN⚡️]

Wow! Way, way too many comments about loans, etc. Back to the “battery fail” topic from the OP:

I’m no expert but enjoy reading explanations from wk057 and others which all say that, absent something like salt water flood damage, entire batteries do not fail; rather, a small component in a single module fails which shuts down the whole pack.

I can vouch for ce2078’s excellent work repairing packs, upgrading to larger packs, fixing eMMC, etc. I have seen his cars and others he has worked on and have been impressed, especially because his charge (sorry, couldn’t resist the pun) for pack repair is only a tiny fraction of Tesla’s estimate. Even if you add in the cost of transporting your car to him, it would only increase from a tiny fraction to a small fraction.

You might also have him proactively fix your eMMC as long as your car is there since you are out of warranty on that part as well.

Please let us know what you choose to do and how things turn out. Good luck!

Tesla really needs to start working with independent 3rd party mechanics to get repairs done outside of the warranty period. Any thoughts on how to put some pressure on Tesla to end the service monopoly?

 

[Mjsais]

I’m really sorry for the OP. Can we discuss what a “refurbished battery” means? If these batteries aren’t serviced by Tesla, How are they refurbished? Are all the cells replaced or just bad ones? Do you get full capacity or “somewhat” degraded capacity, as described in the battery warranty? I just what to understand what Tesla is selling for 11k and/or what a we would get in a warranty replacement. Thank you.

 

[brkaus]

Tesla really needs to start working with independent 3rd party mechanics to get repairs done outside of the warranty period. Any thoughts on how to put some pressure on Tesla to end the service monopoly?

I’d guess more shops will open as more vehicles come off warranty. With or without Tesla direct support.

 

[whitex]

You 100% sure about this? I owned a 2013 Model S 60 and don't recall ever reading a 120k mile limit on the powertrain. I'm pretty sure that it was 8-year unlimited mile just like the other packs. I think that the only one that didn't have that was the original 40 because it was made prior to the warranty being extended to 8-years and unlimited mile powertrain and later it was extended to that car too.

It really wasn't hidden, or hard to spot, here is what it looked like in the Design Studio. This picture is from March 2015, but I actually bought one in 2013 and it was pretty clear then too (60 battery had no supercharging and limited mileage on the warranty, as compared to 85).

 

[Ostrichsak]

You are still painting an overly rosey picture.
Yes an electric motor is much more simple than ICE.
An EV has 3 major expensive components, battery and motor are obvious, but the charger is expensive too, my car is dual charger equipped one of them had a fault, quote was $2200. Being heavy a bunch of us have had to spend money on suspension repairs too.
DC-DC and heater are known to be expensive.

If a pack is $11k charger $2200 and I might be pulling this out of my ear but thought I saw $6000 for a motor that all adds up to pretty high end engine and transmission for an ICE.

Rest of it is just a car.

Again, dozens of moving parts versus hundreds of moving parts. You can't deny that. You're over complicating things in an effort to argue your point when I never disagreed with you.

It really wasn't hidden, or hard to spot, here is what it looked like in the Design Studio. This picture is from March 2015, but I actually bought one in 2013 and it was pretty clear then too (60 battery had no supercharging and limited mileage on the warranty, as compared to 85).

This has already been covered and I even corrected myself.

 

[OrbiterTI4]

...
It turned into a financial conversation because the OP is in a really crappy financial situation...

The OP mentioned how much was left on the loan for the vehicle, but did he ever specify that this put him in a poor financial spot? It's obviously not positive to spend another $11k on the car, but I don't remember a post of him saying he couldn't afford it.

 

[SO16]

Financing a depreciating liability (read: vehicle) is a poor financial consideration regardless of what "rate" you're getting. Anyone who claims to be a financial adviser who makes such statements should be avoided entirely. You'll never produce figures that will convince me otherwise. New cars depreciate at an absurd rate and no netting one or two points difference between investments and interest rate will never make up for that loss. You're also on the hook for monthly payments and making profit for banks... exactly why their minions market it as a "good" investment to unsuspecting marks.

I stand by my previous statement that if you can't afford to pay cash for a car you can't afford it. If this means you drive a $2,500 then it means you drive a $2,500 car. I bet you can get a terrific, efficient and safe vehicle for that price tag that will get you years of service with minimal maintenance and repairs. Day two whatever money you were saving on a daily/weekly/monthly basis to buy said car can be split in half with half going to savings for repairs and/or upgrading your car down the road and the other half going directly into investments if that's your thing.

Doing this never goes wrong. There is no risk and your in the most powerful financial situation long-term that you can be in. No market fluctuations will affect you and no down-turn in the economy can touch you because you have NO monthly payments if you do this properly. Imaging being able to invest nearly 100% of your income on investments& retirement and you start to get an idea of that what I speak.

I regret paying cash for my Model S. Had I left the money in TSLA at the time, I could have purchased 2 Model s performance. Of course hindsight is always 20/20 and there’s something about peace of mind for no bills too. But peace of mind comes at a cost. I sometimes wonder if I’m the fool to always pay off my cars and house vs mortgage to the max and really enjoy life.

 

[ce2078]

I’m really sorry for the OP. Can we discuss what a “refurbished battery” means? If these batteries aren’t serviced by Tesla, How are they refurbished? Are all the cells replaced or just bad ones? Do you get full capacity or “somewhat” degraded capacity, as described in the battery warranty? I just what to understand what Tesla is selling for 11k and/or what a we would get in a warranty replacement. Thank you.

When I refurbish/repair a battery, you are keeping the same pack and modules as long as its fixed before the failing blocks voltage drops too low. The repairs I have done resulted in only a 4 to 5 mile loss of range. Not bad since my repair cost is considerably less than what the OP was quoted by Tesla.

My 2 oldest repairs are from 2017 and both packs are still working fine.

 

[marlonjm2k]

Have decided to bite the bullet, and move forward with the $11k repair. If logistics were a bit easier to get the battery repaired (towing car out of SS, travel, time etc...), I would have gone ahead and given that a go. I've asked for the diagnostics from Tesla, they finally agreed, but it will cost me $97. Curious to see what they will say more than anything (if they say anything at all). I asked if I could keep the battery, and they said I could for another $10k. At that price, don't think I would make much back repairing it, and don't have that cash to throw around, so will pass. I'll let y'all know what the range, etc... is like when I get it back. Although they said it was another 60, I'm crossing my fingers it's an unlocked 75 to make up a bit for this whole process. The service center has had a terrible attitude and have been quite rude.

 

[BPeter]

Good luck OP. Stuff like this is definitely scary and will probably make the used price of these cars plummet soon. That's an expensive repair!