I have been warning about battery pack prices and how difficult it will be for battery-electric cars to age, for quite some time. Their main component is so expensive that its failure will render the vehicle useless – even if everything else in it is still ok. ST (John) experienced that in the worst way possible: losing almost all the money he spent on a used 2013 Tesla Model S Performance. He had a reckoning that may help other customers, EV advocates, and carmakers.
If you are not aware of the story, John had just bought his Model S when he took it to a Tesla Service Center. He had to fix some stuff and obtain the safety certificate that would allow him to register the car as his property. Tesla performed the MCUv1 recall in his vehicle and an update that made the BMS_u029 error emerge. This code tells the owners they will have to replace their battery packs, which costs around $20,000. That broke one of ST’s strongest beliefs when it comes to owning a vehicle.
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