This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
We used a one-piece body side, and so that means if you damage like the rear fender, the repair operation, depending on the level of the damage, you can either do body work or you have to cut out a portion of the panel, re-weld the new panel on,
So, a problem of design that didn't really think about repairability
I'm not even a mechanic and I can tell you that no car company thinks about repairability.
Hell, just replacing a consumable like the battery can be a major chore that requires far more disassembly than anyone with a functional braincell would consider appropriate on some cars.
You'd think cars, at least, will be built under the assumption they'll typically have to be repaired rather than replaced.
They used to be. Go back far enough in time and you could climb up under the hood into the engine bay to work on it. All that went by the wayside to get smaller packaging, lighter weight, and better fuel efficiency.
Now you need special tools or special code readers to solve/diagnose all vehicle problems. The large scale farmers are dealing with this now with the large combines and harvesters needing a tech with special equipment to read all the codes where the older tractors from the 70s and 80s can be repaired.
I'm getting annoyed at hearing this "they made them better in the old days" trope.
Modern cars are pushing 200-300,000 miles of life. They don't rust like they used to, and complex, efficient engines can be diagnosed with a read from a computer screen, as can the entire car electric system. Sure, older vehicles had more room to do repairs, but they always needed repairs. Lots of rose colored glasses being worn here.
Vehicles like giga cast Teslas are almost like hot wheels cars, one large casting of aluminum, which is often too expensive to fix so the car gets written off. Rivian and Tesla didn't give a shit about collision repair...until sales are being choked when people get insurance quotes. Tesla setup their own insurance and it's losing money. Poor design means Teslas crash more than any other brands, and get written off more than any other brand, which sets actuarial tables on fire.
Now Rivian CEO cares because bad design is affecting sales.
Yeah, I'd agree engineering and material quality is up, but the problem is that enshittification is up at a higher amount.
So funny story, I hit the back of my husband's Rivian on accident and we need to file a claim. I'm fucking terrified now.
I mean if it's just a fender bender, who cares? Bumpers are meant to bend. Do you think it was hit hard enough to cause actual structural damage?
What's a bumper. Vehicles all have integrated crash structures now behind plastic facias tucked close to the body.
This is why it is such a shame that all the major auto manufacturers could not be bothered to produce a decent cheap EV. They have repairability figured out from the start. They already have dealers, parts, crash safety, etc all worked out.
The first two generations of the Nissan Leaf and the Chevy Bolt are the closest to what you're describing.
The current Leaf and Bolt are under $30K. The first generations of leaf were garbage due to lack of battery temp control, the Bolt had major battery safety issues.
they had spent money last adminstration to put 100% tariffs on foreign evs.
