jules wrote:

Andy131 wrote:

So physical electrical items are many times better than they were, but the growth of electrical items has been exponential...

So are you saying that despite the improved reliability of individual mechanical and electrical components, the "exponential " rise in electrical complexity has to an extent outweighed the improvements and made electrical failures more likely than mechanical one and also harder to solve ?

IanMetro: I agree entirely. It also was relatively easy to carry out problem diagnosing and repairing in those days.

I suppose my underlying concern is that as cars continue to become more reliable (an EV has far fewer parts to wear out) then electrical faults will increase in relative frequency but as has been stated they can be notoriously difficult to diagnose and the expense of this plus the repair may shorten the viable lifespan of the car which in turn sort of goes against the ethos of EVs to my mind.

Time will tell. Jules

Last edited by jules on 14th Jan 2019 3:39 pm. Edited 1 time in total

One of the main problems is, and has already been touched on, the lack properly skilled people around to make the correct diagnosis when something goes wrong.

I, in my working days was a licensed user for the Volvo commercial diagnostic tool VECADS and the Cummins Engine tool INSITE with full dealer access except speed limiters. Neither of these tools make the diagnosis for you, they just allow you to see data and real time information. you still need the underpinning knowledge and skills to intemperate what the diagnostic tool is telling you to arrive at a diagnosis.

Couple this with the lack of product specific training that most technicians don't have access to and the watering down we now have of what used to be a 4 year apprenticeship like I served and you can see why we now have this culture of parts shelf diagnosis, starting with the cheapest part. Then when something really challenging presents itself most of these people are out there depth.

The next thing will be an even bigger lack of properly skilled technicians who are capable of repairing Hybrid & Full Electric vehicles. Then there is the safety aspect. Myself and others at work had to study and gain a BTec qualification before we were allowed to work on hybrids in our fleet. The BTec qualified us to work on systems up to 1000DCV . I cant see many independent garages forking out money to get they staff trained in this way. 2007 TD4 XS The work horse that earns its up keep
2013 SD4 HSE The posh one for towing the caravan
1973 Triumph Stag I bought in 2009 and restored.

Here's a good example of what I mean from my own past experiences.

I had a FL1 2.5V6 that started putting up a fault light for the HDC soon after we bought the car, went back to the dealer many times and had various parts changed under warranty but the intermittent fault persisted.

I was getting feed up with the situation so decided to read up about it and learnt how the system operated and set about curing it myself. within an hour I had worked out that there was not enough slack on the throttle cable which meant every now and again the system did not get a signal from the throttle pedal idle validation switch when the pedal was at rest. I adjusted the cable and it never happened again. But the dealer technicians were unable to suss it

I did enjoy telling them what I had found myself.

Then more recently with my SD4 whilst it was being serviced (its under a service contract) I got them to change the 12N & 12s towing electrics to a 13 pin euro socket. The dealer phoned me and asked if I just wanted the black socket changed and to keep the Grey/white one I then had to explain over the phone why this was not an option and the fact the LR kit has a dedicated plug and loom so it was also not possible and a pointless question form their there so called technician.  2007 TD4 XS The work horse that earns its up keep
2013 SD4 HSE The posh one for towing the caravan
1973 Triumph Stag I bought in 2009 and restored.

Milothedog
I agree with you in principle, but I'm afraid cost (what you can charge the customer) comes into it.

I read many times on this forum that people are unhappy about the hourly costs of repairs at the main dealers. So even they are trying to cut the cost of repair of their cars.

As an example, my employer (Royal Air Force), were willing to give me 3 years full time at a military college to learn to fault find in electronics to component level.
A few years later this training was drastically cut back, as the world of avionics changed, and technicians were only required to fault find to sub-unit level using automatic test equipment.

Click image to enlarge

As an aside, in the 1970s, when I first joined the computer world, customers leased the large 'room sized' computers, and they came with full software support and an engineer and the spares in a cupboard next to it.

What do you mean "Room Size"? Most were in their own building! and with several engineers, software guys and rooms full of spares. There was even a job title of "Dump Cracker" for the guys who would pour over the memory printouts to find the reason for failure. One big one that put in had to have a mean time between failures of better than 8 hours - which was difficult. Then we got involved with the Japanese and their new kit never failed! 3 x FL1 2 manual + 1 auto
5 x FL2 4 manual + 1 auto
Now Discovery Sport P250 MHEV SE

As an aside, in the 1970s, when I first joined the computer world, customers leased the large 'room sized' computers, and they came with full software support and an engineer and the spares in a cupboard next to it.

You can't get away with keeping an engineer in a cupboard these days - health and safety.

J

Jimboland
I can confirm that you did get an on-site engineer provided and on the smaller sites that the accommodation provided was a medium sized cupboard.
Also, the reliability of the early office computers was such that you spent most of your time working on it, rather than being confined in your cupboard. So some good news.

To put modern day servicing periods into perspective, early computers needed a half day off line, every week, to allow servicing and checks.

And as Dorsetfreelander says, the realiabity standard needed for acceptance on commisioning, was 4 individual periods of serviceabilty lasting some 4 hrs or so each. FL2 XS SD4 Auto 2010 2012-2017 (21k - 91k miles) (MY2011)
FL2 Metropolis SD4 Auto 2014 2017- (16k - 79k+ miles) (MY2015)
Metro in its 11th Year of (Extended) LR Warranty / Full LR Service History
(Expensive, but Trouble/Worry free - hopefully?)

My 0.02...

Working in academic domain, I've seen that the students are less and less willing to learn and anxious to get their diploma, trying all the available shortcuts.
This will translate in less and less competent people working in all domains.

Electronics, in this moment, are evolved way beyond the average Joe mechanic has learned about them and able to handle them.
Anybody can learn how to tighten a bolt and replace a defective tie rod, but few are able to diagnose and replace a MOSFET driver inside an ECU.

And the comfort we are used to will demand more and more electronics/artificial intelligence in the near future.
Electronics that will be difficult to handle, if they break, and the device and/or car's end user will only see longer repair times and will say (falsely): it is less reliable.

So, bottom line (like Milothedog also concluded): not the cars/electronics are less reliable, but the people who handle/repair them.

So its looking like cars of the future will be scrapped earlier than now because they will be unrepairable sooner because the skills to do the job will be absent or the job will be just too expensive.

I suppose manufacturers just cant wait then to get us into EVs, or am I being too cynical. Jules

Last edited by jules on 17th Jan 2019 6:26 pm. Edited 1 time in total

We've become too complacent... Sadly.

It's always been the case, if you find a good mechanic who is reliable and understands your vehicle, treat him like your best friend, he is a rare beast, they do exist, and are not necessarily the most expensive. Tangiers Orange - gone, missing her
Replaced by Ewok what a mistake - now a happy Disco Sport owner

I have been reading this article about how the Boeing 737 MAX came to have the LETHAL safety software feature.

If I am reading it right, it seems that an initially reliable feature to correct 'angle of attack' issues in extreme manoeuvres, was modified to act as a more aggressive 'anti stall' device. I seems that no-one fully understood the seriousness of the un-expected consequences. Any explanation was even removed from the pilot's notes.

I have, for quite a while, wondered about the modern tendency for cars to 'correct' driver errors. I have experienced the FL2 increasing understeer (by applying rear brake) in response to me being a bit quick around a large motorway roundabout.

My worry is that as these 'electronic assisted' cars get older they will end up being maintained by garages and people who do not know the consequence of bodging a repair or disconnecting a sensor. Even worse still could be making unauthorised changes to the cars software (or hardware), perhaps as a cheap way 'work around' of a fault.

Is it about time that all work on a car has to be carried out by a suitably trained fitter, and checked / signed off by a supervisor. It is what happens on aircraft, and I haven't heard too many complaints from the passengers.

Food for thought --- think about it next time you are doing 70mph down the motorway. - that is in excess of 100ft/sec

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/manufa...-1.3912491 FL2 XS SD4 Auto 2010 2012-2017 (21k - 91k miles) (MY2011)
FL2 Metropolis SD4 Auto 2014 2017- (16k - 79k+ miles) (MY2015)
Metro in its 11th Year of (Extended) LR Warranty / Full LR Service History
(Expensive, but Trouble/Worry free - hopefully?)

"Is it about time that all work on a car has to be carried out by a suitably trained fitter, and checked / signed off by a supervisor. It is what happens on aircraft, and I haven't heard too many complaints from the passengers."

Unfortunately the passengers who would like to voice a complaint about aircraft safety and quality assurance around servicing etc are usually dead.

There will always be people breaking the rules and using "work arounds" to solve a problem rather than mend it properly. The problem will be in the checking and signing off - its been hard enough to do it properly in the confines of the aircraft industry. Jules

I just keep thinking there are thousands of electric forklifts in the UK, all being serviced by technicians without the fancy dealership ramps and special tools.

OK they are generally limited to around 80VDC, but an awful lot of current that can do a serious amount of damage. These are driven a lot less sympathetically than your average car and still manage to work reliably for years. So why are electric cars going to be any more difficult?

OK they tend not to have air-con, electric windows, or sat-nav, but that technology stays the same as in a ICE vehicle Tangiers Orange - gone, missing her
Replaced by Ewok what a mistake - now a happy Disco Sport owner