Technology

There's a lot of problems with this. Just some include that it's a blog and doesn't link to the actual study so it's impossible to see what's going on with the this report. They also never explain what this "reliability score" even means or what's included in that. Then they start doing things like using a percent to compare the scores saying this is percent more reliable. But we still don't even know what this score is, and comparing as a percent may not make any sense to say depending on what the scores are and how they're calculated. Unfortunately you can't really draw any conclusions from what's in this article.

Here is the actual report by CR

https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-reliability-owner-satisfaction/electric-vehicles-are-less-reliable-than-conventional-cars-a1047214174/

There reasoning for this

“Most electric cars today are being manufactured by either legacy automakers that are new to EV technology, or by companies like Rivian that are new to making cars,” says Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing at Consumer Reports. “It’s not surprising that they’re having growing pains and need some time to work out the bugs.” Fisher says some of the most common problems EV owners report are issues with electric drive motors, charging, and EV batteries.

gasp you mean electric vehicles that have been on the market for 7-ish years now are less reliable than the ICE vehicles that have had nearly a hundred years of development and refinement behind them? Color me surprised!

TLDR: A study by Consumer Reports found that found that across the industry EVs tended to have higer rates of reported reliability issues compared to conventional gas cars. The authors contribute this to the large number of new EVs models that have come out in the last few years as well as new car companies, and doubt that it has much to do with the drivetrain technology itself.

Interesting they also found that hybrids were 26% more reliable than conventional gas cars dispite the addition of an electric drive train. Even more oddly with that information they found that plug in hybrids were the worst, at 146% worse than conventional gas, though note that the Rav4 plug in version was one of the most reliable vehicles surveyed.

“Most electric cars today are being manufactured by either legacy automakers that are new to EV technology, or by companies like Rivian that are new to making cars,” says Jake Fisher, senior director of auto testing at Consumer Reports. “It’s not surprising that they’re having growing pains and need some time to work out the bugs.”

“While Tesla’s EV components are generally reliable, the company continues to struggle with the build quality of its vehicles,” says Steven Elek, who leads the auto data analytics program at CR. “Tesla powertrains are now pretty solid for the most part, but Tesla owners report a lot of build quality issues including irregular paint, broken trim, door handles that don’t work, and trunks that don’t close. All of these pull down the brand’s reliability score.”-

So TLDR of the TLDR, expect manufacturers new models to have teething issues, especially if not owned by Toyoda, Hyundai, or Kia.

why though?

technically they are much simpler, with less moving parts. if anything they should be MORE reliable

47% of all Electric Car "news" have a 82% chance of being 99% "bullshit".

I drive an older leaf, cannot confirm 😂

Did I miss the part where they differentiate between minor issues such as paint problems or YouTube crashing on the middle screen, and actual breakdowns where the car doesn't move when it should? According to the original article, they've included reliability issues such as drivetrain problems, irregular paint and broken trim in their ranking.

Losing in-car entertainment or comfort functions is still undesirable, but if given the choice I'd rather have a car that runs without music than a stationary car that lets me stream movies until roadside assistance arrives.
And concerning the former, the infotainment systems in most ICE cars are just as cutting-edge as those in BEVs. I would expect differences in quality/reliability between different manufacturers, but not within the same brand and model family where the only relevant difference is the engine.

(Edited for clarification.)

A while ago, there was something that showed the higher failure rate of various components on EVs because of the lack of routine service that has cars have. Basically, gas cars get a service and inspection every 5-10k miles when the oil is changed and any worn bearings, bushings, etc. are found. EVs don't have that so things go unnoticed until they fail. Could this be the same? Could the "reliability" concerns just be normal wear that isn't getting caught since there are no routing inspections?

Seems like there are a number of issues with this.

1. Not defining "reliability challenge" in a meaningful way. (How many of these are problems that are expensive or time-consuming to repair? How expensive and how time-consuming? Are these problems that prevent the car from driving safely, or are they inconveniences that can be put off?)

2. Not controlling for manufacturer. (Toyota has long-been regarded as a reliable manufacturer, but they make 2 plug-in hybrids and 1 EV, all of which are new this year. Meanwhile, they offer about a dozen different traditional hybrids. I can believe that the Tesla Model 3 is less reliable than the Toyota Camry, but is a full-electric Hyundai Ioniq less reliable than a Hyundai Sonata?)

3. Including plug-in hybrids and full electric vehicles as one category. (Plug-in hybrids combine the old breakable parts such as transmissions with the new breakable parts such as lithium batteries. This is the trade-off that buyers make to get the efficiency of an electric vehicle at short ranges and the convenience of an ICE at long ranges.)

Yeah, if we're talking bugie cars like Tesla's, engineered from top to bottom to be a propriety machine, with jerry rigged electric systems that would make Apple blush, where you have no control, no ownership and have no control?

Say it ain't so!

Pease, let's return to the gas cars, engineered from top to bottom to be a propriety machine, with jerry rigged electric systems that would make Apple blush, where you have no control, no ownership and have no control.

It's the only way.

A broader context given at https://cleantechnica.com/2023/12/03/adding-context-to-that-consumer-reports-electric-car-reliability-report/

Consumer Reports also grouped powertrains together when discussing reliability, which is where some issues start to appear. Apparently, EVs suffered 79% more problems than gas-powered vehicles. That will undoubtedly lead to shock headlines, but it’s also misleading, Autoblog says. Most EVs are new to the market, which goes back to the cliché mentioned earlier. There are also a lot fewer make/models availability, meaning that simply averaging all models together will result in a few bad apples skewing the results.

Except for the one I bought it turns out...

https://www.centennialkia.ca/en/news/view/what-s-the-most-reliable-electric-vehicle-you-can-buy-consumer-reports-says-it-s-the-kia-niro-ev/103654

I assume this is used for this article https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-reliability-owner-satisfaction/who-makes-the-most-reliable-cars-a7824554938/ and maybe I overlooked it but I did not see it linked.

But overall, it seems like a weird study. There is so much variation between each car I have a hard time understanding what comparing reliability by type means or what value it has.

Anybody else getting a TOS violation error page