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With Burning Teslas In the News Ford Recalls Almost 140,000 Escapes
An anonymous reader writes "Tesla received a lot of attention over the Model S fires recently, but they're not the only car company having issues with spontaneous combustion. Ford has issued a recall on almost 140,000 Ford Escapes for potential engine fires. With little media attention on the recall, Musk might have a point about the unfair treatment Tesla gets in the news."
Tesla's fires have not been caused by collisions but by intrusions from below
TIL hitting a trailer hitch on the highway is an "intrusion from below". Also Tesla's fire risk is so low because there haven't been any fires, just "excess heat discharges".
Guess what, in reality instead of euphemism fantasy land, Tesla Model S's collision fire risk based on the data is ten times more than 10 year old gas cars. Deal with it.
The article is about a Ford Escape being recalled for engine fires ... which statistically ... is has done FAR lower than Tesla.
12 in about 150k for ford - 0.008%
VERSUS
3 in about 20k for Tesla - 0.015%
The Ford fire rate is HALF that of Tesla.
And Ford is actually addressing the issue. Musk is denying the issue exists.
Don't let facts get in the way or anything. The media and populace aren't fanboys. The numbers show Tesla in a pretty shitty light compared to the competition. So while Musk can run around being an arrogant prick talking about how their cars are so safe, statistics paint the opposite picture. This isn't a pinto issue. This isn't the media or big-auto making him look bad.
This is Musk making himself look bad and losing credibility.
His cars are catching fire twice as fast as a competitors car. The competitor is fixing the problem. Musk is refusing to acknowledge the problem, certainly isn't fixing it, and worse continually lying about how this isn't a big deal compared to other cars when in fact its twice as bad as other cars.
Why do you trust anything that comes out of his mouth? He's just as biased and selfish as any other CEO.
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Maybe there wouldn't have been a fire with the gasoline cars in these situation, but in terms of hazard or financial damage
lol wat.
"If you ignore the fire, Teslas are safer..."
You're right, they shouldn't. And no Tesla has caught fire as a result of a minor collision. All the Tesla fires have been the result of major collisions that would catastrophically damage any car.
Ah, okay, you're equivocating. Let me be very specific: no car should catch fire as a result of running over debris in the road as happened wih the Teslas in question. The reason the fires started is that the "fuel tank" is sitting right underneath your ass, so a large surface area of the "tank" close to the road.
Yes, and it appears Tesla have very much succeeded in these aims. In all three major accidents, the fire was contained and nobody was hurt from it.
Which is great, but not putting your fuel tank under your ass would be a good step towards minimisation of consequences like, say, fires, don't you think?
What sort of mental fault causes a person to argue that a fire which could have been avoided is okay because, well, at least nobody got hurt?
In the two cases where the cars weren't damaged by crashing into a wall and tree, the drivers were able to safely pull over.
Eh, which stats are we looking at? You're implying at least 4 accidents...
In the same circumstances, a traditional car would not have fared so well.
Evidence?
The NHTSA has already reviewed one case and found that the car was not at fault.
Of course it wasn't the car's fault that it encountered debris.
It's not. The failure rate of a car spontaneously catching fire under normal operation and the "failure rate" of a car catching fire after being involved in a major accident are two entirely different things. You aren't comparing like with like.
Of course they're different things: the Ford problem is likely to happen when nobody is in the car (if the engine overheating which eventually leads to the problem occurs during driving, the owner will be warned to pull over and/or seek service, at least for current models); the Tesla problem is likely to happen during driving and without warning. So, the Tesla problem is more dangerous.
"Oh but what I meant is that the Tesla problem only happens after an accident!!!" So what? Accidents happen. Your distinction artificially created to confirm your bias doesn't actually help anyone.
Yeah. That's a good point. That should be fixed in the majority of dino-burning cars. e.g. Buses should not catch fire after running over mattresses [abc.net.au]
Except that had to do with a whole mattress entering the engine bay and igniting, and not ignition of the car's own equipment. Anyway, perhaps there is a problem with the bus design? Remember, "Teslas are imperfect," is not synonymous with, "Every other vehicle except Teslas are perfect."
], Ambulances should not catch fire while sitting in the station house [ems1.com] (most Ambulances are Fords, BTW)
Clutch at straws much? The article no information on the fire's cause beyond that it likely originated in the ambulance. And then you say "most ambulances are Fords" to slip in a bit of FUD. If this is the sort of reasoning Tesla fanboys demonstrate, it's no wonder so many people laugh at them.
and trucks which run over tree branches [artsa.com.au] should also not catch fire.
You've given me a document summarising many sorts of accident. Please tell me which specific incident you want me to look at.
The fuel tank is under the ass of the people in the back seat in any car designed worth a fuck. Or at least, right behind their ass, and below it.
Compare and contrast the surface areas close to the road - there's a chap.
You are being a disingenuous asshole specifically because the Tesla problem did not happen without warning. A major collision is in fact warning.
Ah yes, the "warning" of a few seconds after a major collision before the car is on fire. Sorry, how disingenuous of me not to make an equivalence between that and the long period of time it would take between an initial engine overheating report and the Ford fires.
Also, so far there has been warning. In the last case, there were even alert messages. If that's not warning, then fuck you.
Well, I for one am glad that there was a polite warning telling the person to stop driving. Almost Apple-like in its minimalism: "Oh, something might have happened and you car might not be able to start - fancy taking it in for service?" Don't panic. It's probably your fault anyway.
Look, if that number of LiOn batteries can be crammed together without a safety mechanism to at least WARN the user to stop immediately in the event of puncture, the car is so badly engineered that I'm not even going to think about buying it. And I'm not denying that the 20+ year old cars I enjoy are probably less safe, but they're not sold with Musk's stream of bullshit. My problem here is with the lies.
Also, the Ford problem is equally likely to happen any time the brakes are not depressed.
Evidence, please?
It is probably more likely to happen while the vehicle is running, because of heat and vibration,
and infinitesimally more likely to happen also because of the increased voltage output from the alternator while the vehicle is in operation (charging voltage.)
Except that all the empirical evidence points to this not being the case. Nice try, though. So much clutching at straws.
Right, I got that. The problem is that your suggestion is false. It's not easy. It actually takes major impact.
I am not sure why you're fighting the evidence in front of you. It clearly doesn't take major impact, so either it needs to be better built, or the battery needs to be moved. Your retort will likely be, "Oh, but that was TOO major to take," in which case - to reiterate - it's in the wrong place. If it can't be moved because it's too heavy then, well, there's another reminder of why EVs aren't there yet.
(N.B. I have no doubt that EVs are the future, but they won't get far as long as douches like Musk respond to criticism with misdirection.)
Well actually, I don't see how. I assume you have some statistics which show that?
You countered the debris-hitting-Tesla scenario with a bus-sucking-up-mattress scenario. If you really believe that large vehicles sucking up large spongy objects is significant in a discussion about cars running over random debris, YOU need to show this.
To be clear: mounting a fuel tank with large surface area flush against the road is a generic road vehicle manufacturing fubar. Protecting the fuel tank, and protecting the humans from the fuel tank, are (obviously) old problems.
Yes, yes you do. Cars are expected not to behave nicely if you abuse them. They are only expected to function if you do not run them into anything, or over anything inappropriate.
Disagree. Modern cars are expected to fail gracefully during an accident, whether that's with seat belts, air bags, crumple zones, side impact panels, whatever. They may no longer "function" AFTER the accident, but their final duty is to behave as nicely as possible in preventing people from being seriously injured/killed.
As someone who enjoys older cars, I am acutely aware of this, because the main sacrifice I make is with safety features in the event of a crash. (And, to reiterate, I do think EVs are the future - I just think Musk is a dick.)
Tesla has issued a firmware update [teslamotorsclub.com] which mitigates the issue, stopping the vehicle from decreasing its ride height automatically. This underscores the fact that it is the driver's responsibility to drive the car.
What does that last sentence mean? It's the manufacturer's problem to fix an unsafe car. Automatic (or even easily manually configurable) unsafe ride height is a manufacturing fault. By issuing the firmware update, they've implicitly acknowledged a hazard, but merely appeared to decrease the associated risk rather than actually tackled the hazard.
For getting around regularly, I prefer public transport anyway. And I understand that it's harder to have your batteries mounted higher up in an EV. I don't think we have enough evidence that a Tesla is safer than a comparably built ICE car with similar usage profiles. The Tesla doesn't strike me as "unsafe", to be clear, just immature - and it is rather held back by an egomaniacal spokesperson with a penchant for misleading propaganda and control freakery. In particular, nobody should want a car to dominate where everything from manufacturing through dealership through servicing is monopolised.
BTW, ta for the civil discussion. Lots of angry car nuts here on both sides, lol. It's just a car and this is just Slashdot.