service

  • Rich Benoit and Chris Salvo, founders of the Electric Garage

    Without dealerships, service has been a regular challenge for Tesla and its owners. Reports are so rampant about months-long wait times for Tesla service that CEO Elon Musk has acknowledged that addressing service complaints is his No. 1 priority for 2019, especially after the company's sales exploded as Model 3 production ramped up. Now the company is about to get some "coopetition" for that business from a famous YouTuber, Rich Benoit of the YouTube channel Rich Rebuilds. DON'T MISS: Tesla aims to make service quicker, roadside assistance automatic Benoit, an electrical engineer by day...

  • Honda Clarity Fuel Cell on lift at dealership
    Dealers start to worry about ebbing repair income from electric cars

    The average vehicle on U.S. roads these days is more than 10 years old, despite three successive years of record new-vehicle sales. That's a result not only of the 2008-2010 recession but also vastly more durable and reliable vehicles compared to those of previous decades. All of those vehicles...

  • 2013 Tesla Model S, in July 2017   [photo: David Noland]
    Life with Tesla Model S: beware Extended Service Agreement fine print

    A couple of years ago, as my 2013 Tesla Model S approached the end of its 50,000-mile warranty, I debated long and hard whether to opt for Tesla’s extended warranty, which they call an Extended Service Agreement (ESA). At $4,000, it wasn’t cheap. It provided four years and an additional...

  • Service technician working on Honda Clarity Fuel Cell at dealership
    How do you service a hydrogen fuel-cell car at a dealer?

    Over the past century, gasoline-powered vehicles have gotten simultaneously more complex and more reliable. Service intervals have lengthened, drivers no longer check a car's fluids daily or weekly, and many new-car owners will never once open the hood. Reliability data shows that some of them...

  • Map of Tesla service center locations in the U.S., December 2016
    Waits for Tesla service get longer as more electric cars are sold

    My 2013 Tesla Model S is now approaching 75,000 miles on the odometer. That happens to be the mileage benchmark for my next scheduled Tesla service. So I called my local Tesla service center, in Paramus, New Jersey, to set up the appointment. No problem, the service rep said. The first available...

  • 2017 Lincoln Continental, 2016 Detroit Auto Show
    Lincoln to offer pickup, delivery for service; is it copying Tesla?

    Lincoln will offer free pickup and delivery service for 2017 models.

  • 2013 Tesla Model S owned by David Noland, Catskill Mountains, NY, Oct 2015

    Our recent article on the reliability implications of a Plug-In America survey of early Tesla Model S owners was met with skepticism from the company's supporters, and support from its skeptics. But in a counter-intuitive Freakonomics-style twist, it's the firm's fans who should hope the results were accurate--and its foes who should hope they were overblown. Lies, damned lies, statistics The earlier article outlined a Weibull analysis on Tesla Model S owner data collected by pioneering plug-in electric vehicle advocates Plug-In America. Based on responses from 327 owners of vehicles built in...

  • 2008 Ford Escape Hybrid
    Dead Hybrid Battery: What Should I Do? (Owner Question)

    Every once in a while, other media outlets will ask for advice from Green Car Reports on various fuel economy or car technology questions. We recently received one concerning a 2008 Ford Escape Hybrid, which the owner had left unused for several months. The car wouldn't start after that, and when...

  • Onsite service by Tesla Motor technicians on 2013 Tesla Model S, upstate NY [photo: David Noland]
    Life With Tesla Model S: Service Centers Get Crowded, Cost More

    One of the coolest things about owning a Tesla Model S for almost three years now has been the service. When first revealed back in the spring of 2013—a few months after I had taken delivery of my car—the Tesla service model sounded almost too good to be true. If a problem occurred, CEO...

  • 2015 Tesla Model S P85D door handle, captured from Consumer Reports video, May 2015
    Tesla Model S Door-Handle Failures Still Plague Electric Car, Consumer Reports Learns: UPDATE

    It is one of the more remarkable features of the Tesla Model S electric luxury sedan: door handles that retract flush with the body until needed. But the retracting door handles proved tricky in practice; owner of early Model S cars reported that quite a lot of them had to be replaced under...

  • 2012 Fisker Karma from the Rogers' Classic Car Museum collection
    The New Fisker Is Live: Original Karma Owners Get Most Support

    A new Fisker website offers parts support for current owners.

  • Tesla Supercharger site with photovoltaic solar panels, Rocklin, California, Feb 2015
    UPDATE: Tesla's First Solar-Powered Supercharger-Store-Service Center Now Open

    Electric-car maker Tesla Motors has rapidly been opening Supercharger DC fast-charging stations throughout the U.S. and outside the country. But despite its goal of providing solar-generated electricity at those sites, Superchargers thus far have drawn on electricity from the conventional power...

  • 2015 Nissan Leaf

    One of the benefits of battery-electric cars is that they have far fewer moving parts than gasoline vehicles, so they require less servicing. Or as the old saying goes, "Nothing but tires and wiper blades"--which is a bit reductive, but pretty close to the truth if you add in occasional brake-fluid checks. DON'T MISS: Life With Tesla Model S: At Last, Some Maintenance Needed (New Tires) So imagine the surprise of one Nissan Leaf owner in the U.K. who found he'd paid £8.94 (about $13.60) for a new oil filter and £17.50 ($26.60) for a new air filter during his very first annual...

  • Tesla Model S 85D, 2015 Detroit Auto Show
    Consumer Reports Rates Tesla Service Tops Among Carmakers

    Tesla service was ranked top among carmakers in Consumer Reports' annual survey.

  • Nissan Leaf electric car at Crater Lake, Oregon  [image: C. Bonville Photography]
    Why Electric Car Owners Don't Want Gasoline Loaners From Their Dealers

    It's often said by electric-car owners and advocates that once you start driving electric, you never want to go back. Now it appears that at least a handful of car dealers are learning that the principle extends even to loaner cars from the dealership. A recent Facebook thread on the BMW i3 Owners...

  • 2012 Fisker Karma during road test, Los Angeles, Feb 2012
    Fisker Karma Owners Can Soon Buy Spare Parts, Wanxiang Says

    Owners of the 2012 Fisker Karma range-extended electric luxury car got some good news last week: The company that now owns the carmaker has promised that supplies of spare parts will soon become available. Fisker stopped producing its striking sedan in July 2012 after it had built roughly 3,000 of...

  • 2011 Nissan Leaf prototype
    Nissan Leaf New Battery Cost: $5,500 For Replacement With Heat-Resistant Chemistry

    Three and a half years after the first Nissan Leaf went on sale, Nissan has announced the cost of a replacement lithium-ion battery pack for its electric car. It's a surprisingly low $5,499 (after a $1,000 credit for turning in the old pack, which is required), plus installation fees and tax. The...

  • 2012 Chevrolet Volt
    GM Offers Free Fix For 2012-13 Chevrolet Volt Battery Coolant Issue

    General Motors will perform free servicing to fix potentially low battery coolant in certain Chevy Volts.

  • 2012 Toyota RAV4 EV, Newport Beach, California, July 2012

    There are now more than a dozen plug-in electric cars for sale in the U.S., but not all electric cars are created equal. And a pair of recent articles about service challenges experienced by owners of the Toyota RAV4 EV underscores that buyers should be fully aware of the context in which their electric car is sold. Only five plug-in cars have sold more than 10,000 units in the U.S. since launch: the Chevrolet Volt, Ford C-Max Energi, Nissan Leaf, Tesla Model S, and Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid. MORE: Electric Cars: Some Are Real, Most Are Only 'Compliance Cars'--We Name Names The Ford Fusion...

  • Onsite service by Tesla Motor technicians on 2013 Tesla Model S, upstate NY [photo: David Noland]
    Life With Tesla Model S: Electric-Draw Vampire Slain, At Last

    This started out as a feel-good article about another great experience I had with Tesla's extraordinary service program. But it morphed into a detective story that apparently solves the mystery of why my 60-kWh 2013 Tesla Model S still suffered a significant "vampire" power drain, even after...

  • 2013 Tesla Model S P85 service loaner vehicle [photo: David Noland]
    Life With Tesla Model S: Three Days Of Service Nirvana

    A few months ago, some minor glitches in my 2013 Tesla Model S were fixed at the Tesla service center in White Plains, New York. It was a perfectly satisfactory experience, pretty much like any other service visit: Drive to the shop, read magazines for a couple of hours, get the car back, drive...

  • 2013 Tesla Model S in Queens, NY, service center, awaiting delivery to buyer David Noland, Feb 2013
    Life With Tesla Model S: Trying Out The Service Program

    Tesla's announcement last month of its new service program sounded almost too good to be true. If anything went wrong with my 2013 Tesla Model S, promised CEO Elon Musk, instead of schlepping to the nearest service center, I would simply await the arrival in my driveway of the Tesla service tech...

  • 2012 Fisker Karma during road test, Los Angeles, Feb 2012
    Orphaned Fisker Owners Offered $4K/Year Service Contract By...Whom?

    Fisker Karma owners are probably feeling a little abandoned right now. As investors pick over the company like vultures around a corpse in the desert, many owners might be wondering just how they'll get their expensive, luxury plug-in sedan serviced. That's where a company called Hybrid Support...

  • 2013 Tesla Model S before DC-to-Boston road trip, Feb 2013 [photo: Aaron Schildkraut]
    Tesla Tunes Up Model S Warranty, Loaner Cars, Service Plan

    On Friday, Tesla held a media call to reveal another in the series of announcements touted in tweets by CEO Elon Musk. This time, the news covered enhancements to the warranty and service experience on its Tesla Model S electric luxury sport sedan. Tesla Motors [NSDQ:TSLA] is now delivering several...

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