TL:DR: Poor scale and awareness due to being a niche brand, overly large aluminum body panels requiring either massive replacements or complicated welding, small shops guessing that it must be even more exotic and expensive than the CEO claims, and insurers shrugging and moving on because the volumes aren’t hitting their financials hard enough for them to care.
welding aluminum requires TIG. It’s harder and more specialized.
welding mild steel body panels are simple with equipment any body shop will have.
Hell any home 120v wire welder can do mild steel. It is the cutting and shaping part that is hard.
I got into a fender bender with my Buick and they totalled it because the fender was worth half as much as the car. They’re doing something very wrong in car design.
I used to drive an Isuzu Trooper. I got rear-ended which totaled my car. Theoretically it was repairable, but when your car is old enough to vote it doesn’t take much damage for it to get totaled.
There was other damage, but one thing that still pisses me off is that a few hundred bucks of that calculation was my spare tire cover, which had some cracks after the accident, and the insurance company would not let that drop.
It was a plastic shell that is mostly just decorative that covered the spare bolted to the back of my vehicle. I didn’t care that it was cracked, it in no way affected the safety of my vehicle, I would have happily driven that car for another decade with it being cracked, if they slapped 5¢ worth of epoxy on it I would have been more than satisfied, or hurry they could have just thrown the damn thing away and I guess my spare would get a little dirtier that it would if it was covered.
But they had to include that in the repair cost estimate, and since it was kind of an uncommon older car, replacement spare tire covers were scarce and pricey and added a few hundred bucks onto the estimate.
I don’t know if that was the thing that pushed me over the edge to a total loss but it certainly didn’t help
I had a perfectly mechanically sound vehicle that was paid off, and could possibly still be on the road today, and instead I got stuck with a couple years of car payments on a car I liked less than that one.
Isuzu Trooper mentioned! Consumer Reports did them dirty with the rollover test rigging. Really hurt the sales. Glad to see them on the decline as a reputable information source.
Yeah the spare parts are an issue for less common vehicles. I was getting some Trooper parts from Australia before the tariffs messed that up for awhile. Really a shame how many cars are scrapped by insurance. Cash for clunkers not allowing parts to be sold also didn’t help much.
That’s a Buick thing. Was it a CTS? I’ve seen two year old CTS total from small accidents because there were no parts available for it.
Envision. The car was worth like $18k but with labor the fender was about $7.5k and since that’s over 40% of the value, it automatically totaled. I argued to no avail and almost kept it but the damage title wasn’t worth it.
The market is ripe for the equivalent of a wileys jeep ev. Cheap to buy, repair and capable with no frills.
Make the software foss too and i’m in
Slate… though who knows if it will ever materialize in the real world.
I can’t wait to preorder mine! https://www.slate.auto/share/VYMIBC
Cool idea.
Dacia Spring (but that’s probably not exported to the US which I guess you’re from)
Canada, so no. :(
The price is nice. I doubt it is easy to repair.
shouldn’t be too difficult for most body shops…
and there’s plenty of them: so plenty of parts available e.g. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/157804119428
Seriously, I need this bad. I’m about to get a rikshaw instead
Closest to that is a base trim Bolt. Considering inflation since COVID, 29k is pretty decent for the US market.
Yeah, but all the manufacturers don’t want to lower their profit margins.
That means room for new manufacturers.
The mecedes g wagon was developed with easy repair ability in mind. At least regarding the outer shell and maybe the frame. Straight and rectangular sections that can easily be welded. As all good ideas it went to shit of course.
So funny story, I hit the back of my husband’s Rivian on accident and we need to file a claim. I’m fucking terrified now.
I mean if it’s just a fender bender, who cares? Bumpers are meant to bend. Do you think it was hit hard enough to cause actual structural damage?
No but I didn’t think the bill could be that high for bumper damage. It’s full coverage, it would just suck if they totaled it.
I like the rivian cars, but i have worked for years as a hardware engineer and i am 100 percent certain this was a known issue. I have seen design scrutinized on so much less and this is just such an obvious issue…
Rivian and Tesla are trying to hit price points with lower volumes so they are 100% aiming to reduce manufacturing costs even if it creates scenarios like this.
This is why it is such a shame that all the major auto manufacturers could not be bothered to produce a decent cheap EV. They have repairability figured out from the start. They already have dealers, parts, crash safety, etc all worked out.
they had spent money last adminstration to put 100% tariffs on foreign evs.
The first two generations of the Nissan Leaf and the Chevy Bolt are the closest to what you’re describing.
Whatever, fuck cars.
Its CEO is only disappointed that the repair costs are so low. This is by design.
There is no way a CEO talks like that. “We made like a one piece body”. Not a chance.
Just because they are a CEO doesn’t mean they are smart. Money does not equal intelligence
He has a bachelor in Mechanical Engineering and a PHD in Automotive Mechanical Engineering. He’s no dummy.
I’m sure he appreciates you standing up for him.
You would think with a PhD he would have had his company look at how other cars have been built for over 100 years and learn from that.
I’m just saying someone that educated doesn’t typically speak like that. I think (like, an opinion) the story misquoted him.
Someone can be educated and still be a blithering moron.
intelligence does not equal wisdom.
