Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs

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Fri 21 May 2021 09:56
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Steveieb

Rip off Britain featured two owners who were quoted £7k and £6k by main dealers to fix their EVs.

Citroen has its technical centre in Romania and diagnosed over the phone as the bill went up to change part after part to fix the non start.

Eventually the owners withdrew their vehicles from the dealers and took them to an EV specialist in Cheltenham which I believe is Cleevely EVs and got them fixed for £1200.

Renault commented that this was because second hand parts had been used to fix the refusal to charge overnight.

I know where I would go in the same position!

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Fri 21 May 2021 10:17
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Lee Power

Main dealers workshops would rather change complete components.

I cant see a main dealer replacing AC traction motor bearings OR fault finding on a charger down to a component level.

A lot of them play parts bingo now with ICE faults, nothing will change with EV faults apart from the repair bills will be a lot higher.

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Fri 21 May 2021 10:55
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Sofa Spud

I don't see why repair bills would be a lot higher. Would a new traction motor cost more than, say, a new automatic gearbox for an i.c. car?

EVs are generally believed to be more reliable than i.c. cars and they certainly need less maintenance and have fewer consumable components that need regular replacement.

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Fri 21 May 2021 11:04
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Steveieb

Sure but appears from the stories that the main dealers hadnt a clue what to do to fix the faults and continued swapping major parts e.g inverters at£9 k a time without knowing it would fix the problem.

Surprised about the Zoe as it’s been around a long time time !

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Fri 21 May 2021 11:55
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Terry W

As with existing premium brands (Audi, BMW, Merc etc) I would expect a parallel independent network of specialists to evolve to exploit a market created by the greed or incompetence of the main EV dealers.

Only question is when?

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Fri 21 May 2021 12:27
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Rerepo

A friend of mine has a 2011 Nissan Leaf. Last year it just stopped moving. Powered up but wouldn't move an inch. It was recovered to the Nissan dealer who confirmed that the motor controller had burnt out. New part almost £6k. He had it trailered miles to a specialist in Luton who fitted a used part for about £1200. He still has the car. Its only done about 45k miles. Max range is down to about 35 miles. He uses it for a 7 mile commute. Not worth buying new batteries.

Edited by Rerepo on 21/05/2021 at 12:28

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Fri 21 May 2021 14:56
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - barney100

With ICE engines you have some idea how long they last but what mileage can you expect from an EV engine?

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Fri 21 May 2021 14:57
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - SLO76

A friend of mine has a 2011 Nissan Leaf. Last year it just stopped moving. Powered up but wouldn't move an inch. It was recovered to the Nissan dealer who confirmed that the motor controller had burnt out. New part almost £6k. He had it trailered miles to a specialist in Luton who fitted a used part for about £1200. He still has the car. Its only done about 45k miles. Max range is down to about 35 miles. He uses it for a 7 mile commute. Not worth buying new batteries.

Horror stories like this serve only to remind us that electric cars aren’t ready and they won’t be the long term solution unless we can find a less environmentally damaging and cripplingly costly way to manufacture batteries. The depreciation on most of them is horrendous, usually wiping out any fuel saving as the potential write-off cost of a new battery at 7/8yrs means dealers are offering peanuts for them at year 5/6 and they expect big margins to offset the potential cost. A lot of ordinary working people are going to be forced off the roads but on the upside I fully expect my Stagecoach shares to soar.

Edited by SLO76 on 21/05/2021 at 14:58

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Fri 21 May 2021 17:05
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - pd

The depreciation on some of the early ones is certainly pretty high, but then again the residuals on Teslas are incredible. Way, way above equivalent ICEs so I guess it depends on the reputation of the car just like the used market always have.

Leafs tend to be very reliable and got much better from about 2014 on. They don't seem to like fast charging though as the battery isn't cooled. Examples which are trickle charged over night often seem to have a big bulk of their range at 100k miles but others are toast at 30k after a lot of short, sharp top ups.

Time will tell how current new cars stack up long term. The second generation Leaf seems to be holding its price better, probably because it is a more useful car.

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Fri 21 May 2021 20:28
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Terry W

It is absolutely no surprise that for a rapidly evolving technology, spares availability and cost for an 8 year old vehicle are limited and expensive. They are wholly obselete.

No company would want to remanufacture them in the unbeliveably low volumes actually required. Those that were would carry a very high unit price.

The real question is what happens in a few years as sales of new vehicles increase, and the technology starts to stabilise. Components in an EV will start to be re-used across a range and in sufficient numbers to bring costs down.

This may be no different to ECUs in an ICE - 15-20 years ago replacement cost of a failed unit were horrendous and the only economic way to get an older vehicle going was to use a s/h item. It probably still is!

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Sun 23 May 2021 09:20
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - movilogo

Examples which are trickle charged over night often seem to have a big bulk of their range at 100k miles but others are toast at 30k after a lot of short, sharp top ups.

Is it a generic statement that cars with fast charging have reduced battery life compared to those with trickle charging only?

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Sun 23 May 2021 17:38
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - pd

Examples which are trickle charged over night often seem to have a big bulk of their range at 100k miles but others are toast at 30k after a lot of short, sharp top ups.

Is it a generic statement that cars with fast charging have reduced battery life compared to those with trickle charging only?

It seems more a Leaf "thing". The batteries on them are not actively cooled in any way and how you use the car, plus whether you live in a cold climate or not, seems to have a bearing on how much the battery degrades more than other EVs most (all?) of which have some sort of battery temperature cooling/heating system.

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Sun 23 May 2021 09:46
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - John F

A lot of ordinary working people are going to be forced off the roads but on the upside I fully expect my Stagecoach shares to soar.

Yep...my First Group shares have already doubled.

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Sun 23 May 2021 06:19
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - edlithgow

A lot of them play parts bingo now with ICE faults, nothing will change with EV faults apart from the repair bills will be a lot higher.

I think it's only just occurred to me to be surprised that they get away with "parts bingo", probably because I have never ever dealt with the garage trade (still less main dealers) apart from in the context of an MOT or getting specific things like exhausts supplied and fitted.

But, now I think on't, Is it even legal?

Surely if a dealer contracts to diagnose and fix a car, and they mis-diagnose, and fit a part that fails to fix it, they should eat that cost, and hope that the owner lets them continue to fanny around until they do something they can legitimately charge for?

That'd be the way I would see it.

"Didn't work? OK, I don't want it then. You can have it back if you want to take it off."

" Are you sure you know what you're doing?"

Yet I read accounts of people being dragged through the parts catalogue by dealers. Hasn't anyone tried dragging the dealer right back through the courts?

Probably just as well I've not had much to do with dealers. I doubt either of us would enjoy the experience.

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Sun 23 May 2021 09:46
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Steveieb

You are right Edithglow it’s a parts bingo. In the days when an ecu cost in the hundreds a wrong diagnosis could be subsumed in the final bill but as in this case an investor costing £9k the technician has got to be certain before he fits it if the part is non returnable.

That’s why my local MB indie takes a part off a similar vehicle before ordering a new part and main dealers swap infotainmemt systems-heads with demo cars before confirming the diagnosis.

ideally the head office should have a test bed for returned major components which dealers could employ before ordering a new part

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Sun 23 May 2021 19:09
Renault Zoe and Citroen - Expensive EV repairs - Engineer Andy

Main dealers workshops would rather change complete components.

I cant see a main dealer replacing AC traction motor bearings OR fault finding on a charger down to a component level.

A lot of them play parts bingo now with ICE faults, nothing will change with EV faults apart from the repair bills will be a lot higher.

I've seen and heard stories to that effect for ICE cars as well. Rarely will a dealership 'fix' a problem - in my case, my power steering was getting firmer (Mazda strangely don't have a 'maintenance' schedule item for it), so I wanted the fluid completely drained (out the bottom, not the top as they often do by suction), flushed/treated with a special cleaning fluid (to get rid of any crud/deposits) and then refilled.

The said how about we change the pump and lines for £900+ or just suction 'drain' and refil for £100. I managed to do the 2nd and put in the special cleaning fluid (which did the job), including hand pump, for about £25.

Similarly when I wanted to clean my car's MAF, EGR and throttle body flap due to a sticky throttle response at low speeds (I also wanted to improve mpg), and I found that it was a lot tougher to do this DIY for the 1.6 petrol than the 1.4/2.0/2.3L engined cars, so again I asked at the dealer.

They again replied about having to replace the parts, nothing about cleaning, which amounts to removing a section of the air intake and spraying the cleaner over the throttle body in bursts (TB and EGR cleaning) or temporarily removing the MAF sensor section and cleaning it using a similar methodology/cleaner. They never even entertained using a cleaner, even those designed for the job from well-known makes like Wynns.

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If you cover no more than 100 miles per day and have easy access to a charging point at home or work, then an EV is ideal for you.

Is an electric car right for me?