OT: EV Insurance Rates Soar!

[Fredxx]

Must be an exotic car with labour rates to suit.

Care to name the car? I know you can't.

[The Natural Philosopher]

How many lithium cars added to the blaze?

[GB]

This is getting silly. All those diesel and petrol cars had fuel in them.

[Bob Eager]

I replaced my car with an identical one, save that it was a hybrid instead of a diesel. Engine went from 2.0 to 2.5, performance is rather better (e.g. 0-60 is slightly better, 30-60 is markedly better).

Premium went down about £75 p.a.

[Theo]

We've done this article before:

Teslas have high insurance because:

1. They use 'innovative' major castings, rather than subframes, which save them a few dollars in the factory but are a PITA to repair
2. They run their own bodyshops and won't let independents have access to parts, so insurance companies hate them because they can't do repairs in their pet garages

That's not an EV problem, that's Tesla being an ass problem. Other EVs don't suffer from the Tesla-ass problem.

The other car in the article was easily insured by going to another insurance company, so that's a non-story. It's only the customer complaining that they couldn't get insurance from John Lewis, who are supposedly more cuddly consumer-friendly brand. In reality it's just a label glued to some underwriter's policy, just like the others. Underwriters change who they decide to cover from week to week, and that's their right - there's nothing specific to EVs in that. Had the customer just gone on a comparison site at renewal time like everybody else there would have been no story here.

Theo

[Robin]

Why don't you read the 2 reports from MFRS and learn for yourself what they do and don't say about EVs?

[The Natural Philosopher]

That is even sillier. I suppose you are a man whose tosses fireworks into a bonfire and blames the wood

[The Natural Philosopher]

How many reports have you read that say precisely what the government and big money want them to say and never touch on the truth...

[GB]

I haven't a clue what you are on about, but your question was "How many lithium cars added to the blaze?".

The answer is X number of lithium cars, plus twenty times that number of petrol and diesel cars, with fuel in their tanks.

I can't see that there's anything to argue with. A petrol car started the blaze. The odds are 20 to 1 that the neighbouring cars were also ICE. The petrol in those would easily catch fire, the diesel less easily.

Anyway, I'm pleased to have provided you with entertainment. :)

[The Natural Philosopher]

I have just realised that. Sorry to bother you. Ignorance is bliss...

>

[mm0fmf]

Especially when you are the source.

[Andy Burns]

Even if the EV isn't the cause of a fire, having every nth car in a car park will likely increase the total spread of damage if there happens to be a fire ...

[Theo]

When you have a shunt and your bumper snapped off, you have to weld the support back on to the brittle aluminium casting:

If you didn't manage to collect the pieces or it broke in a spot you can't weld, you have to replace the entire rear chassis of the car.

On a Rivian truck, the entire rear half of the vehicle is a single panel. So you get a dent, to swap the panel they have to take the vehicle to bits, including taking the battery out, the glass out - this one was quoted $41,000:

(actual repair cost via the dent puller method $3k-7k)

No wonder insurance companies hate 'startup' car companies.

Theo

[GB]

Just as long as you don't have an answer to the substantive point I was making ...

[John Rumm]

Watch some of the Rich Rebuilds videos on Teslas - gouging customers is not exactly out of character.

[John Rumm]

I would have thought that petrol vehicles probably don't perform that well once fully engulfed in an inferno!

[GB]

Sadly, there are several posters here who think that petrol doesn't burn.

[Robin]

ISTM you've no evidence and won't believe any evidence that contradicts your position. If so its an article of faith for you - on a par with the wide-eyed houris promised to certain faithful - and pointless to debate.

[John Rumm]

Different companies have different risk profiles - so you may never get a decent deal for one make/model of car with one, where as with another it might be significantly more reasonable.

Once when I changed my car to a (much) higher spec version of the same car, the original insurer wanted bump the policy from about 250 to 2k! The crucial difference was the new car was a JDM import. I switched to a firm that specialised more in that market and got back close to the original price.

[Andy Burns]

The same was true when I replaced my 6 y/o diesel with a more powerful petrol car ...