I have owned an EV for the past 5 years (50k mi mostly commute to work) and here's what I've paid for maintenance:<p>Wiper fluid, replace 12v battery (due to COVID and not driving).<p>That's it.<p>I did go to the tire shop but they pulled a screw from the tire, patched it up and told me there's plenty of tread. They also inspected the brake pads and they were years away from replacement (due to regen braking).<p>None of the following I had to do for my first 5 years owning an ICE car:<p>* fuel, oil, air filter replacement
* replace oil, brake pads.
* (if you're unlucky) transmission/engine repair<p>Never having to visit a gas station (unless I'm low on tire pressure) is zen.
How about when the battery goes bad. Currently only ice owners keep their cars for a r-e-a-l-l-y long time, in general. If ev's ever come down in price, and more 'regular' people buy them, i'd expect the battery cost is going to crush people. Let's see what happens when people routinely try to keep 20 yr old evs.
There's surivivership bias built into this sort of analysis: If a repair costs more than the residual value of the car (e.g., like a battery pack or electric motor) or if it's impossible to get replacement parts, then it won't be reported as a cost since the work isn't done.
I don't really doubt the numbers...in fact, I thought them a bit low. My feeling is that this will really change the automotive landscape for the overall lifecycle of a car. Seems to me that the dealership currently doesn't worry too much about immediate margin on a new car. They know that that car will come back to them for in-warranty service (which the dealer bills back to the manufacturer) and after-warranty service (loyal customers afraid to go to a less expensive garage). In a nutshell, all the real money is the recurring revenue for service. EVs will require less service...so I'm thinking the dealer will just keep their margin higher up front to make sure they don't lose after the sale. I would bet the dealers would rather sell some sort of EV that needs frequent/predictable/reasonable service...thus supporting the annuity model that has existed for decades. What to do? Build super high quality EVs that need almost no maintenance? Then you don't need that expensive dealer network. But consumers want that dealer to visit and complain to when things don't work...and that costs money. In the end, I think consumers will need to realize that their overall experience and expectations of car ownership are in for a big shake up over the next few years.
I’ve serviced my poor Corolla once in 10 years.
That service was NZ$1500.<p>It’s hard to believe my maintenance costs could fall. But it would be really nice if they do.
Is there any link to the study/data backing up these claims? I spent a while googling and trying to find it myself and all I found was a bunch of copy+paste articles all giving the same summary.
Have owned a Mazda3 for the past fifteen years. Maintenance costs have been negligible. 22% less than negligible is… negligible.<p>Saving a few hundred dollars over the course of fifteen years by buying a car that’s tens of thousands of dollars more expensive doesn’t make sense.<p>The fuel savings might make up the difference, though. Silly to highlight maintenance expenses when fuel costs are an order of magnitude greater.
For battery electric vehicles there's also the hidden savings of having the technician coming to your home, which I believe is far more prevalent for BEV than ICE.
That’s disappointing, I was hoping it would be 50% or even better. Initially it’s going to be just the oil changes that you save on, but over say 10 years I’d expect not having to change cam belts etc would bring the advantage further to EVs. On the other hand, after 10 years the higher cost of EV tires will probably bring the cost balance back (although not usually considered a service cost)
Just a few observations<p>> <i>It also uncovered that the parts component of a BEV job is typically 28% cheaper than an ICE car due to them having fewer working parts, with brake wear far lower</i><p>Not sure if comparing <i>850,000 fleet cars and vans</i> with high end EVs (a majority of EVs in UK are still high end cars) it's a fair comparison.<p>Of course brake wear on vans is going to be an order of magnitude worse than a Tesla or a Porsche Taycan, with their oversized braking systems.<p>> <i>But Fleet Assist, which has provided the analysis, warns that the SMR price reductions are not guaranteed in the longer term due to the rising operating costs of garages.</i><p>it's not clear why that should make a difference between ICE and EV.<p>> <i>“Garages are already starting to come to terms with how EVs will impact their servicing revenues and workshop traffic in the longer term. We may see more garages looking at ways to address how the paradigm shift of BEV aftersales is going to challenge their service provision and fees they charge,”</i><p>So basically, sounds like there is still more "fluff work" that garages can do nowadays on ICE cars to make more money and are not ready to do the same for EVs yet.<p>But the day when they'll invent the (unnecessary) "you absolutely need a change of oil" or "break pads are gone, we have to change them" for EVs is just around the corner.