Phev drive battery .

[englishman]

popped into the dealers today arranging my car to be delivered next Wednesday, wont be able to drive it for maybe 12 weeks afterwards but that's another story .

Anyway the Salesman had just returned from a PHEV course run by Mitsubishi, and while asking some questions regarding the power plant etc he gave me the following information .

If in the future you need to replace the battery pack, the cost would be £2000.00 Mitsubishi expect this cost to fall over time.
This in no way effects battery replacement under warranty.

Also I was aware that the battery pack consists of eighty cells, and asked if or when the battery pack degrades to 80% what would be the cost of single cell replacement. He replied £240:00 per cell and again Mitsubishi expect this cost to fall over time.

Just thought I would pass this information on as this is what this forum is about .
PS I think forums like these are extremely helpful and the combined knowledge can only help all users.

 

[greendwarf]

popped into the dealers today arranging my car to be delivered next Wednesday, wont be able to drive it for maybe 12 weeks afterwards but that's another story .

Anyway the Salesman had just returned from a PHEV course run by Mitsubishi, and while asking some questions regarding the power plant etc he gave me the following information .

If in the future you need to replace the battery pack, the cost would be £2000.00 Mitsubishi expect this cost to fall over time.
This in no way effects battery replacement under warranty.

Also I was aware that the battery pack consists of eighty cells, and asked if or when the battery pack degrades to 80% what would be the cost of single cell replacement. He replied £240:00 per cell and again Mitsubishi expect this cost to fall over time.

Just thought I would pass this information on as this is what this forum is about .
PS I think forums like these are extremely helpful and the combined knowledge can only help all users.

Don't understand how one cell at £240 can become only £2000 for all 80 or are we talking about the labour only?

 

[Tyke]

Why would you only replace one cell?

The performance drop to 80% will be across all cells.

The £2000 figure suggests that it is heavily subsidised by Mitsubishi (which is fine by me )

 

[Hypermiler]

The battery is designed to degrade one (or a certain group of) cells at a time to make replacement less costly...
£2k sounds darn good value!
H

 

[greendwarf]

The battery is designed to degrade one (or a certain group of) cells at a time to make replacement less costly...
£2k sounds darn good value!
H

As they say, if it sounds too good to be true then it probably isn't! I can't believe Mitsubishi are planning to subsidise battery replacement in five years now so we can keep our old cars rather than buy new ones. I suspect this is a wild guestimate by the salesman who doesn't know the answer. I got similar vague guesses from mine.

You only have to look at the price difference between cars such as the PHEV with outright battery sale and those where it.s leased - around £8k. Which is the sort of figure quoted elsewhere for the Leaf battery replacement insurance.

The only other possibility is that Mitsubishi really hope that costs will fall dramatically over the next few years - but we've had this sort of promise before so I won't hold my breath :roll:

 

[PolishPilot]

...
£2k sounds darn good value!
H

I think the same.

If it is going to even go down, and all other components (IC engine, brakes, no transmission)
are going to hold much longer than standard car, the PHEV is going to hold well it's value in the future.

 

[gwatpe]

The battery is designed to degrade one (or a certain group of) cells at a time to make replacement less costly...H

The Battery Maintenance System I designed for the Lithium Battery on my house inverter power supply has individual cell monitoring and cell equalization circuitry. Lithium batteries do not fare well if cell voltages are allowed to exceed specific upper and lower voltages. My house battery cells operate between 3.1V and 3.65V/cell. The electronics regulate the cell voltages to within 0.1V in a dynamic charge/discharge regime. The battery manufacturer limit given for the battery cells is 2.5V-4.2V.

The most cost effective solution is not to have individual cell failure at all. Better to have all the cells achieve the same life cycle and change all at once.

Hopefully Mitsubishi has conservative battery voltage limits as well and the individual cells do not become out of balance, so the PHEV battery will have a long life.

 

[Posty]

Even at £2k, that's a lot of miles you'd have to cover before it became economically viable to replace an 80% effective battery. Remember that the car will still work, just that the ice will kick in sooner and use more petrol.

I'm sure someone far cleverer than me can do the maths to demonstrate.

Andy

 

[ian4x4]

Even at £2k, that's a lot of miles you'd have to cover before it became economically viable to replace an 80% effective battery. Remember that the car will still work, just that the ice will kick in sooner and use more petrol.

I'm sure someone far cleverer than me can do the maths to demonstrate.

Andy

I agree with posty, as with all other cars, the PHEV will gradually deteriorate over time. I believe unless the battery fails completely then it is probably most economic to live with the gradual wear as you will with the rest of the components.

Also I note that we have a knowledgeable battery expert in gwatpe and he hopefully will give better technical advice to us that the local Mitsubishi salesmen.

 

[ian4x4]

This is Mitsubishi's official reply to Battery Cost from their website

'Should the battery need replacement during PHEV’s warranty period the cost is nil and therefore of no cost to you. As part of the ongoing development cycle, battery prices are expected to reduce dramatically in the near future (example Plasma TV cost of $20K 10 years ago) this makes it impossible to predict exact replacement costs (should it be necessary) in years to come'

 

[maddogsetc]

Coincidence maybe, but the OP's figures agree pretty much with what my dealer told me...

 

[gwatpe]

The replacement of the battery within the warranty period is a safe bet for Mitsubishi. I suspect that only a manufacturer defect would render a battery un servicable, even though leaving a battery in a discharged state for an extended period of time will reduce the battery life. Parking a car in extended storage would not be a good idea for a long battery life.

I would guess that even if the battery was never recharged from a power point and the car was driven like a typical hybrid, that the battery would still be serviceable after 5 years.

A test for an unserviceable battery would need to be objective, based on kWh available. A typical secondary cell battery [rechargeable] is still considered serviceable at 60% of its rated capacity.

 

[maby]

I would think that there is plenty of scope for cost reductions as the production volumes ramp up - Lithium is not a particularly scarce or expensive substance.

 

[ian4x4]

Below is a link to a official site which describes the construction of battery in a reasonably way.

You will see that the lowest number of replaceable cells (for complete failure) is likely to be 8 at a time as battery is made up of 10 of these 8 cell modules.

I would expect that realistically the local dealer would swap out the whole battery. (on a part exchange basis if you are lucky)

Any refurbishment or replacement of modules would be done at a 2nd line servicing facility.

http://www.mitsubishi-motors.com/en/production_phev/

 

[PolishPilot]

Even at £2k, that's a lot of miles you'd have to cover before it became economically viable to replace an 80% effective battery. Remember that the car will still work, just that the ice will kick in sooner and use more petrol.

I'm sure someone far cleverer than me can do the maths to demonstrate.

Andy

There might be another argument to replace the battery, even if it still keeps the 80% capacity.
In the future there might be not only improvement in lover price, but also some progress
in capacity vs. volume and mass.

It means it is quite possible, within 5 years there will be available replacement/upgrade option
for, say £4k, to get a 24kWh battery and a software update giving you an electric range of 100km.

If this would be ever available, I would certainly opt for that, instead of replacing the whole car.

As I mentioned above, I expect the rest of the machine to deteriorate much slower
than a conventional car.
(Mine is also going to use a garage all the time, so the corrosion shouldn't be an issue even in 10 years.)

 

[greendwarf]

This is Mitsubishi's official reply to Battery Cost from their website

' As part of the ongoing development cycle, battery prices are expected to reduce dramatically in the near future (example Plasma TV cost of $20K 10 years ago) this makes it impossible to predict exact replacement costs (should it be necessary) in years to come'

This be one of the worst pieces of marketing bullshit I've seen in a long time. To try to compare consumer electronics - where the price over time curve is driven by manufacturing volumes - to batteries where the costs are relatively fixed by the available technology, is ridiculous. :evil: It looks as though Mitsubishi are gambling on there being some kind of breakthrough in the science to get them out of trouble. :shock:

 

[maby]

This is Mitsubishi's official reply to Battery Cost from their website

' As part of the ongoing development cycle, battery prices are expected to reduce dramatically in the near future (example Plasma TV cost of $20K 10 years ago) this makes it impossible to predict exact replacement costs (should it be necessary) in years to come'

This be one of the worst pieces of marketing bullshit I've seen in a long time. To try to compare consumer electronics - where the price over time curve is driven by manufacturing volumes - to batteries where the costs are relatively fixed by the available technology, is ridiculous. :evil: It looks as though Mitsubishi are gambling on there being some kind of breakthrough in the science to get them out of trouble. :shock:

I'm not sure they are in any kind of trouble, are they? They are giving a five year guarantee - after that, it is the owner's problem. If they are anything like Toyota in the Prius, they will have overspecified the battery to the point where the majority hold up for ten years.

 

[Ozukus]

Suppose that is the benefit of doing a four year lease. Will hand it back while still under warranty.

 

[Hypermiler]

Our Prius is 8 years old 140k miles and not noticed any battery degradation
H

 

[greendwarf]

This is Mitsubishi's official reply to Battery Cost from their website

' As part of the ongoing development cycle, battery prices are expected to reduce dramatically in the near future (example Plasma TV cost of $20K 10 years ago) this makes it impossible to predict exact replacement costs (should it be necessary) in years to come'

This be one of the worst pieces of marketing bullshit I've seen in a long time. To try to compare consumer electronics - where the price over time curve is driven by manufacturing volumes - to batteries where the costs are relatively fixed by the available technology, is ridiculous. :evil: It looks as though Mitsubishi are gambling on there being some kind of breakthrough in the science to get them out of trouble. :shock:

I'm not sure they are in any kind of trouble, are they? They are giving a five year guarantee - after that, it is the owner's problem. If they are anything like Toyota in the Prius, they will have overspecified the battery to the point where the majority hold up for ten years.

The trouble is, the effect on future sales if battery prices don't drop leaving thousands of customers with mechanically sound cars that are potentially unusable/unsaleable without a very expensive battery replacement once the warrantee expires. You can see this with the early EVs (e.g. Fluence). They have very low re-sale values because of lack of current battery guarantees - hence the switch to battery leases by most EV manufacturers.

The PHEV and similar cars risk the same problem because we wouldn't pay for a battery lease for a car running a lot of the time on petrol but, of course, it can't be used if the battery fails.