Chevy Bolt battery fire recall
Sep. 25th, 2021 01:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elizillaIn other news, I got a recall notice on my car. It could catch fire during/after charging. Out of an “abundance of caution” I should set it to stop charging at 90%, park it outside the garage, and avoid running the battery down too far. Root cause? There are two possible battery defects and if you have both of them, it is vulnerable when charged high or run low. Remedy? None yet. They have to figure out how to make sure the batteries are correctly manufactured, and then they will start replacing defective ones, and give us a warranty reboot. In the meantime GM has issued a stop sale order for new Bolts on dealer lots.
At first this did not seem too disturbing. 141,000 Bolts have been sold. There have been about two dozen fires and almost all were in the first gen batteries manufactured in South Korea. I have a second gen battery manufactured in the USA. So the odds of a fire in my car are minuscule. Also, I already had my charging limited to 90%, for battery health reasons and because regen does not work when the battery is at 100%. And I rarely run it low. So it hardly affects me; the most annoying part will be parking outside the garage in winter. And a new battery and warranty reboot would be gravy! Optimally they would procrastinate a while before giving it to me, so I can get maximum use before the reset.
Besides, lots of gas cars have been recalled for fire risk. Gas is flammable after all! Statistically the Bolt is not an outlier here. People are just freaking out because it is unfamiliar tech.
The main thing that bothers me, is being on the defensive, like a Corvair owner. I love this car and would like to burble about how great it is, instead of defending it.
Anyways that is how I saw it, at first.
But then some doofus GM spokecritter told the media that Bolts should park at least 50 feet from other cars. WTF? Hardly anyone can do that. My home is on a lot that is 99 feet square, and my house is in the middle of it. Parking lots don’t often have that much empty space and when they do, even if you park at the far edge someone could still park next to you. Not to mention that no handicap parking has a 50 foot buffer and if it did, it would be too far away for me to walk. So this is advice I would have to ignore. But once this story hit the wires, people started posting pics to the Bolt forum, of signs in parking lots saying “NO BOLTS ALLOWED”. The last thing I need is a bunch of parking lot security guards and random Karens hassling me.
So I decided to prepare for the possibility of needing a new car. I am committed to electric and every car I would want, has a queue these days. Time to get in some of those queues just in case. So far I have checked out the Mustang Mach-E and the Volkswagen ID.4.
I liked the ID.4 best, except one thing. Absolutely atrocious switchgear! Capacitive switches and touch screen stuff for things that should be mechanical. And clumsy software. If I bought that car I would have to spend some hours reading the fiiiiine manual just so I could drive without a huge distracting struggle every time I need to turn the window defroster on. I actually had more success with the voice commands than the touch screen. Which is not saying much, it’s like Alexa’s brain damaged sibling. On the plus side, the ID.4 had great seats with more electric adjustments than any car I ever drove, the panoramic roof had a nice sunshade so you could enjoy the open feeling when you like without having to suffer beating sun on bright days. The larger size would be nice when we need to take my trike somewhere, and you can get it with a trailer hitch. Some reviewers claim it is a slug, but I didn’t find that to be true. Maybe by the standards of electric cars, but it had way more acceleration than a comparable gas car. Plus, the one we drove was the rear wheel drive version, but if I bought one I would get the all wheel drive, which adds 100hp, so I am not worried about losing my race car driver fantasies.
The Mach-E was very plush and very fast. Fun to drive, performance was the best. And the ride was the most comfortable. But it was hard to get in and out of, the door sills were a challenge to my idiot feet. And, y’know how some cars have a combination of smaller windows and window tint that just make you feel like no one can see you in there? It’s not a quality I like, whether I am in the car, or the car is driving past me. I think that feeling of invisibility brings out the driver’s inner asshole. Still it would be a fun car. I could see my dad buying one and I think he would enjoy it.
I could learn to like either of these cars. I mean, the Bolt isn’t perfect either. Apart from the fire recall, it has some seriously clunky mechanical seats, the cabin is pretty spartan, and the stereo is lousy. If I bought a Mach-E or an ID.4, it would be a big step up in interior comfort. Every car has strengths and weaknesses.
But I was relieved when GM walked back this crazy 50 foot thing, and said that owners can park where we like. They also announced they had restarted battery production and will start doing battery replacements in mid October. They are going to have a software diagnostic within 60 days, to detect bad batteries and prioritize replacements. So I probably won’t need to switch cars.
I have a refundable deposit in on an ID.4. It will be months before I have to decide, so I will let it ride. But at this point I would just as soon keep the Bolt.
Oh! And one other thing. A customer service rep from GM has been calling me. I never had to call them myself. She says she will be calling to check in with me, every week until this is resolved. Near as I can tell she doesn’t know anything beyond what is in the letters and press releases, so it’s not really very useful. But I suppose that if I want to yell at someone, at least I won’t have to wait on hold to do it. Lol!
At first this did not seem too disturbing. 141,000 Bolts have been sold. There have been about two dozen fires and almost all were in the first gen batteries manufactured in South Korea. I have a second gen battery manufactured in the USA. So the odds of a fire in my car are minuscule. Also, I already had my charging limited to 90%, for battery health reasons and because regen does not work when the battery is at 100%. And I rarely run it low. So it hardly affects me; the most annoying part will be parking outside the garage in winter. And a new battery and warranty reboot would be gravy! Optimally they would procrastinate a while before giving it to me, so I can get maximum use before the reset.
Besides, lots of gas cars have been recalled for fire risk. Gas is flammable after all! Statistically the Bolt is not an outlier here. People are just freaking out because it is unfamiliar tech.
The main thing that bothers me, is being on the defensive, like a Corvair owner. I love this car and would like to burble about how great it is, instead of defending it.
Anyways that is how I saw it, at first.
But then some doofus GM spokecritter told the media that Bolts should park at least 50 feet from other cars. WTF? Hardly anyone can do that. My home is on a lot that is 99 feet square, and my house is in the middle of it. Parking lots don’t often have that much empty space and when they do, even if you park at the far edge someone could still park next to you. Not to mention that no handicap parking has a 50 foot buffer and if it did, it would be too far away for me to walk. So this is advice I would have to ignore. But once this story hit the wires, people started posting pics to the Bolt forum, of signs in parking lots saying “NO BOLTS ALLOWED”. The last thing I need is a bunch of parking lot security guards and random Karens hassling me.
So I decided to prepare for the possibility of needing a new car. I am committed to electric and every car I would want, has a queue these days. Time to get in some of those queues just in case. So far I have checked out the Mustang Mach-E and the Volkswagen ID.4.
I liked the ID.4 best, except one thing. Absolutely atrocious switchgear! Capacitive switches and touch screen stuff for things that should be mechanical. And clumsy software. If I bought that car I would have to spend some hours reading the fiiiiine manual just so I could drive without a huge distracting struggle every time I need to turn the window defroster on. I actually had more success with the voice commands than the touch screen. Which is not saying much, it’s like Alexa’s brain damaged sibling. On the plus side, the ID.4 had great seats with more electric adjustments than any car I ever drove, the panoramic roof had a nice sunshade so you could enjoy the open feeling when you like without having to suffer beating sun on bright days. The larger size would be nice when we need to take my trike somewhere, and you can get it with a trailer hitch. Some reviewers claim it is a slug, but I didn’t find that to be true. Maybe by the standards of electric cars, but it had way more acceleration than a comparable gas car. Plus, the one we drove was the rear wheel drive version, but if I bought one I would get the all wheel drive, which adds 100hp, so I am not worried about losing my race car driver fantasies.
The Mach-E was very plush and very fast. Fun to drive, performance was the best. And the ride was the most comfortable. But it was hard to get in and out of, the door sills were a challenge to my idiot feet. And, y’know how some cars have a combination of smaller windows and window tint that just make you feel like no one can see you in there? It’s not a quality I like, whether I am in the car, or the car is driving past me. I think that feeling of invisibility brings out the driver’s inner asshole. Still it would be a fun car. I could see my dad buying one and I think he would enjoy it.
I could learn to like either of these cars. I mean, the Bolt isn’t perfect either. Apart from the fire recall, it has some seriously clunky mechanical seats, the cabin is pretty spartan, and the stereo is lousy. If I bought a Mach-E or an ID.4, it would be a big step up in interior comfort. Every car has strengths and weaknesses.
But I was relieved when GM walked back this crazy 50 foot thing, and said that owners can park where we like. They also announced they had restarted battery production and will start doing battery replacements in mid October. They are going to have a software diagnostic within 60 days, to detect bad batteries and prioritize replacements. So I probably won’t need to switch cars.
I have a refundable deposit in on an ID.4. It will be months before I have to decide, so I will let it ride. But at this point I would just as soon keep the Bolt.
Oh! And one other thing. A customer service rep from GM has been calling me. I never had to call them myself. She says she will be calling to check in with me, every week until this is resolved. Near as I can tell she doesn’t know anything beyond what is in the letters and press releases, so it’s not really very useful. But I suppose that if I want to yell at someone, at least I won’t have to wait on hold to do it. Lol!
Mach-E
Date: 2021-10-03 11:19 am (UTC)-R
(yeah, I said it)
Re: Mach-E
Date: 2021-10-03 03:23 pm (UTC)Re: Mach-E
Date: 2021-10-04 09:54 pm (UTC)Mustangs are fastbacked things of beauty, IMO, and the Mach-E is most definitely not.
-R
(YMMV, o'course...)