Teslas are bursting into flames in Florida after being flooded during Hurricane Idalia | Saltwater and lithium-ion batteries are a bad combination::undefined
I’m all for bashing Tesla. It’s good fun. But this applies to all EVs and lithium ion batteries that came into contact with salt water.
Bad TechSpot! Bad!
I wonder if a laptop would blow up, too. Probably, right?
Classic click baiting. If it was about laptops the title would contain ‘Apple’. Popular brands work well in titles.
This warning applies not only to electric sedans, trucks, and SUVs but also to smaller and lighter electric vehicles like golf carts, scooters, and bicycles that also have rechargeable lithium-ion batteries.
It’s in the article.
The title is still clickbait.
Blame the author https://www.techspot.com/community/staff/dragonslayer101.498521/
Titles often get set by the editor. Writers often only suggest them.
Seems like editors are a problem
They are a big problem ya.
yes they’ve been lol. always @ tesla with this shit
Yeah definitely, I remember sailing in the ocean when I was in Sea Scouts and one of our leaders had his battery let out the magic smoke on his phone, no lithium fire luckily
Side note - people need to be super careful buying used cars for the next several months because of scammers cleaning up flooded cars and brining them north to sell. Check under the carpets and so on, etc. Avoid Florida cars.
Idalia brined them, not the scammers. Just to be clear.
right, the scam is taking a flood car north and not disclosing flood damage to an unsuspecting northerner.
It seems like it always happens every time there’s a bad flood/hurricane etc.
I remember used lots in Oklahoma getting flooded (heh) with Katrina cars back in 2005-2006.
I remember that happened after a huge Mississippi flood in the 90s. Definitely be careful
katrina. was not that long ago and tons of those cars got drug all over.
No, this was before that.
Lol. I meant it’s happened before. Katrina cars poped up all over with clean titles. And huge issues. But history like repeating since we never fixed the hole in the damn dam and there’s no little dutch boy around to save everyone.
Didn’t The Dipshit say that Teslas can be used as boats at one point?
Only the cybertruck I think, but in the end neither will be able to so it doesnt matter. I work with tesla and will never even consider buying one, even apart from all the stuff muskrat is doing.
I figured people would have stopped considering one when it came out that Tesla employees made memes out of Tesla drivers as apparently they’ve been spying on people via the cameras on the car. Which isn’t enough that they did that, but they were encouraged to share the memes around the office.
Idk man, and the fact people suggest tweeting (or x-ing) Elon if you run into difficulties with the Tesla stores (such as warranty). I find it insane. That’s if you separate Elon from the brand Tesla, but if you don’t it’s all the more. He is a highly vindictive, self-centred ego fuelled bag of lies which is a personal reason I don’t like Tesla.
Were the cars good before he bought the company?
I dont know, but i would probably say yes. I only started working with them ~3 years ago. My big issue with them is that they seem to have no idea what they want or what theyre doing. Constantly changing plans, requirements, shipment dates, shipment locations, color specs, etc. All of their engineers ive talked to are super young, they must be new hires. But such overarching disorganization must come from the top.
At least two Teslas caught fire
Wow, what a huge issue!
Couldn’t have spent the extra ten dollars potting the battery casing with conformal resin Elon?
Saltwater and basically anything is a bad combination
Not to sea fishes.
Fact: 100% of fish that come in to contact with saltwater at any point in their lives, end up dying.
sad truth
And the truth that eye doctors rarely ever go into is that this is also true for sea birds and baby dingos.
Oh no! anyway…
Tesla CEO is considering lawsuit against saltwater.
I assumed he was going to blame the Jews.
I was under the impression that battery packs are watertight so where is the fire starting?
They are likely IP rated in some form or fashion, that means they are rated for protection for a period of time at a certain depth. Deeper water or longer time in water means you still get water past the seals.
It could also be a control fault or short on the electrical side allowing the other components to catch fire or overloading the batteries causing them to overheat and catch fire.
Also, IP rating is not valid for salt water or any other fluids such as alcohol, only fresh water
I doubt their designs are hurricane + flood proofed.
Also the high voltage disconnect/fuse is under the seats. Flood that and you’ve got a problem.
I truly doubt anybody at Tesla thinks that far ahead. A prime example of this was that magnificent cyber truck showcase.
If manufactured properly, they should be.
Water ingress can happen where cables plug into places - literally like a straw that draws water towards the battery pack. Again, if properly sealed, this should not be an issue.
But I can’t imagine any modern vehicle surviving being flooded by saltwater. If not the battery then any other electrical component, or even the motor, would corrode over the coming days, weeks, months.
Yeah. I don’t know if teslas are particularly worse on the design side (but we can make an educated guess…) but I would not expect any EV to hold up for an extended period of submersion.
But also… people should realize how heinous all the water anywhere near an ICE car is when it is submerged. Or, you know, all the sewers that are flooded too.
Like, flood water is some of the vilest shit in existence. You are LUCKY if you only get hepatitis from swimming around in it.
Well tesla has been publicised in multiple places as having bad quality control.
So maybe I could also guess that they cut out some design costs, which may include battery protection which would in most cases not get in contact with water.
I have zero doubts the teslas are worse (hence the “educated guess” snark).
But also? This is not just holding up against water. It isn’t even holding up against salt water. It is holding up against battery acid, human feces, cleaning chemicals, oil, gasoline, etc. A car that has been caught in a flood is totaled and a biohazard. I don’t expect EVs to be particularly better.
I WOULD expect reasonable precautions to be taken. But if you are looking at standing water floods from hurricanes and the like? A few fires that are surrounded by water are the least of your worries. And there will be plenty of other fires for the disaster crews to deal with when they can.
If previous incidents are anything to go by, most batteries that actually react that way are physically damaged during the Hurricane part. Usually the teslas are fine even completely submerged.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/SUNw8-rHHV4
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
Seems like the NHTSA needs to expedite regulations around protecting batteries from salt water.
I’d be surprised if there weren’t some kind of guidelines already but once we see EVs on the road 25-30 years old held together with duct tape things might get interesting.
Let’s keep pretending like Teslas and EVs are horribly dangerous compared to ICE cars.
https://www.torquenews.com/14335/tesla-and-other-evs-catch-fire-19x-less-often-gas-cars
deleted by creator
Does this have anything to worry consumers about in cold climates where cars could accumulate snow and road salt on them, and then say - park the car in the garage where it all melts into salt water?
Did any other makes of electric vehicles also burst into flames in Florida?
You’re not going to have frozen salt water on the underside of a car. That’s kind of what the salt is for. You will get salt water eating at the metal.
Ever seen a 30 year old car from where it snows a lot? They have rust holes that eat clean through the floor. We don’t have EVs that old yet but I seriously wonder how big of a problem that might be, as the salt will eat through the battery tray at a certain point. Especially for some of the budget EVs like the Bolt.
deleted by creator
Does insurance cover this?
B-b-b-b-but we need to save the planet. Just like how we need to switch from plastic straws to chemical paper straws, to save the planet.
