Retrofitting kits, many of which are available on online marketplaces like Alibaba or MercadoLibre, often don’t guarantee a “minimum level of safety and quality for the retrofit unit,” Rojas said.
They’ve been telling us the same lying bullshit about computers and phones for 40 fucking years.
I have dealt with a massive number of Li-Ion batteries and never punctured one, always properly disposed of them.
Like, a lot of this shit isn’t hard, and a lot of the pooh-poohing about safety comes from often are industry plants who basically exist to gatekeep people from being able to be in full control of the things they purchase.
Since the practice is largely a DIY process, there are no official statistics on the retrofitting industry in Latin America. Many retrofitting jobs are done “by tinkerers who seek to extend the life of their petrol cars since they can’t afford a new electric one,” Adolfo Rojas, president of the Association of Entrepreneurs to Promote Electric Vehicles in Peru, told Rest of World.
Hmmm, let’s see if we can find more about this Rojas guy.
The creation of a national electromobility agency will be crucial to incorporate electric vehicles in Peru, according to local market executive Adolfo Rojas.
Rojas, advisory council president of the country’s electric vehicle business development and promotion association AEDiVE, made the comment during Prensa Grupo’s ElectroTransporte online event.
Agency participants would include public institutions, industry groups, associations, academia, and cooperation funds, he said.
A broader package of economic incentives will also be fundamental, from tax breaks to preferential insurance, added Rojas, who highlighted the opportunities from the build-out of electromobility for domestic industry, such as development of lithium batteries.
Another key driver will be the implementation of charging infrastructure, said Rojas, who announced that AEDiVE is drafting a related national expansion plan with highway concessionaires, power distributors and companies interested in installing such infrastructure that will be released in two months.
The energy and mines ministry recently released a draft decree to approve the regulation for the installation and operation of electromobility charging infrastructure.
No offense intended to Rojas, who I’m sure is a decent enough of a person, but the related article I found about him makes him certainly sound like he’s a traditional business guy bureaucrat and so that says to me that at least part of the reason he speaks against conversions is because conversions impact all the business plans and bureaucracy he is working on.
By his LinkedIn, he’s an executive of some type at Sustainablearth LATAM, a solar company.
Just personal opinion, Rojas is biased. Doesn’t make him a bad person, but people within the industry generally don’t like people fixing their own devices. That’s a service they want people to have to pay for.
And let’s not forget all the “professionally” built cars with lithium fires and explosions. The pros fuck up just as much as the hobbies, possibly more often.
Yeah, I’m debating getting a Chevy Bolt, but I’m a bit worried about them catching on fire.
I’d be a lot more comfortable buying from a local retrofit org, because they have a lot more to lose if things go sideways. Most of the issues are from shoddy work, meaning underpaid workers who don’t care enough to do a good job soldering leads or whatever. A local shop that needs sales in order to eat will care a lot more about making sure the battery packs and whatnot are high quality.
Right, but an ICE vehicle will catch fire only when overheated, which is probably driving up a mountain pass or something. I’m not going to be doing that (this is purely for commute, so I’ll be in city the whole time), so I can absolutely manage my risk on that.
The Bolts that catch fire do so when charging. I’ll be charging in my garage, which is attached to my house and there’s a lot of flammable stuff there (dry leaves, wood chips, shoes, paper, my other ICE car, etc).
So if my ICE catches fire, I’ll probably have advanced warning, but even if not, I’ll be awake and alert (I’m driving, after all). If my EV catches fire, it’ll probably happen in my garage, which has no smoke alarms (why would it?), and even if it did, it would be muffled by the insulation between it and the house (I sleep on the opposite side of the house from the garage). I could park it outside, but it gets cold here and I’d honestly rather fill up gas every other week than de-ice my car every morning before work.
I’m 100% fine doing level 1 charging exclusively with a low max charge if that eliminates the risk. I can WFH if it’s not sufficiently charged, and I have a backup vehicle as well in case of emergencies, so I’m okay with the slow charge. But I haven’t found anything conclusive that slow-charging eliminates the risk. If it does, I’ll probably get one this year.
One of the temporary fixes for the Chevy Bolt fires was to update the software to detect if the battery was about to go up and then honk the horn to warn everyone which I think is hilarious.
And all of the petro cars accidents caused by failing vehicles, which is what these are replacing.
I mean I’m sure 98% of these people would take a new car for the same price and maintenance schedule (not a subscription to a car…). I mean I would, despite also being a big fan of DIY and self reliance. That said they aren’t, so instead this option makes sense for people like us.
I had a Kia Rio. They sent out a safety recall warning that an ABS leak could cause a short and it could catch fire (this is after the big problem of them being easy to steal).
They’re was no fix at the time. The only advice on the recall was “avoid parking near structures” in case it set fire to buildings.
Months later the fix was available: a smaller fuse that would blow before the short got hot enough to burn.
They’ve been telling us the same lying bullshit about computers and phones for 40 fucking years.
I have dealt with a massive number of Li-Ion batteries and never punctured one, always properly disposed of them.
Like, a lot of this shit isn’t hard, and a lot of the pooh-poohing about safety comes from often are industry plants who basically exist to gatekeep people from being able to be in full control of the things they purchase.
Hmmm, let’s see if we can find more about this Rojas guy.
https://www.bnamericas.com/en/news/national-agency-pitched-to-advance-electromobility-in-peru
No offense intended to Rojas, who I’m sure is a decent enough of a person, but the related article I found about him makes him certainly sound like he’s a traditional business guy bureaucrat and so that says to me that at least part of the reason he speaks against conversions is because conversions impact all the business plans and bureaucracy he is working on.
By his LinkedIn, he’s an executive of some type at Sustainablearth LATAM, a solar company.
Just personal opinion, Rojas is biased. Doesn’t make him a bad person, but people within the industry generally don’t like people fixing their own devices. That’s a service they want people to have to pay for.
And let’s not forget all the “professionally” built cars with lithium fires and explosions. The pros fuck up just as much as the hobbies, possibly more often.
Yeah, I’m debating getting a Chevy Bolt, but I’m a bit worried about them catching on fire.
I’d be a lot more comfortable buying from a local retrofit org, because they have a lot more to lose if things go sideways. Most of the issues are from shoddy work, meaning underpaid workers who don’t care enough to do a good job soldering leads or whatever. A local shop that needs sales in order to eat will care a lot more about making sure the battery packs and whatnot are high quality.
You really shouldn’t be worried about Bolts specifically. Way more likely to have an ICE vehicle catch fire than an EV.
And that massive Bolt recall means the used affected ones all have newer batteries anyways
Right, but an ICE vehicle will catch fire only when overheated, which is probably driving up a mountain pass or something. I’m not going to be doing that (this is purely for commute, so I’ll be in city the whole time), so I can absolutely manage my risk on that.
The Bolts that catch fire do so when charging. I’ll be charging in my garage, which is attached to my house and there’s a lot of flammable stuff there (dry leaves, wood chips, shoes, paper, my other ICE car, etc).
So if my ICE catches fire, I’ll probably have advanced warning, but even if not, I’ll be awake and alert (I’m driving, after all). If my EV catches fire, it’ll probably happen in my garage, which has no smoke alarms (why would it?), and even if it did, it would be muffled by the insulation between it and the house (I sleep on the opposite side of the house from the garage). I could park it outside, but it gets cold here and I’d honestly rather fill up gas every other week than de-ice my car every morning before work.
I’m 100% fine doing level 1 charging exclusively with a low max charge if that eliminates the risk. I can WFH if it’s not sufficiently charged, and I have a backup vehicle as well in case of emergencies, so I’m okay with the slow charge. But I haven’t found anything conclusive that slow-charging eliminates the risk. If it does, I’ll probably get one this year.
One of the temporary fixes for the Chevy Bolt fires was to update the software to detect if the battery was about to go up and then honk the horn to warn everyone which I think is hilarious.
And all of the petro cars accidents caused by failing vehicles, which is what these are replacing.
I mean I’m sure 98% of these people would take a new car for the same price and maintenance schedule (not a subscription to a car…). I mean I would, despite also being a big fan of DIY and self reliance. That said they aren’t, so instead this option makes sense for people like us.
I had a Kia Rio. They sent out a safety recall warning that an ABS leak could cause a short and it could catch fire (this is after the big problem of them being easy to steal).
They’re was no fix at the time. The only advice on the recall was “avoid parking near structures” in case it set fire to buildings.
Months later the fix was available: a smaller fuse that would blow before the short got hot enough to burn.