Coolant Change, 2020 Niro EV

Same here, we have a '22 Niro EV has about 13000 miles and this issue bothers me. Our other EV, '23 Tesla Model 3 does not require coolant flush at all!

 

I bought my car ('22) with a replaced battery @15k miles. Do you think that pushes back my 37k service or should it still be done at that time?

 

Both Tesla and Hyundai/Kia make EVs that run coolant in close proximity to battery internal wiring. Both companies understand that if coolant were allowed to contact that wiring there could theoretically be risk of partial shorting, overheating and perhaps a fire. In 2018-2019 Hyundai/Kia had around 10 Konas burst into flames with no idea as to why. They also knew that some of their R&D crash-tested EVs had a propensity to catch fire some hours later due to coolant spillage internal to the damaged pack. Around that time they moved to the "low-conductivity" coolant. That may have been a coincidence but I suspect it wasn't.

It's all a matter of risk management in engineering. Tesla and Hyundai/Kia would have both approached this problem as they saw fit with the latter being under the gun to find the reason for the fires. Tesla may have decided that their unique fully-potted pack was at lower risk of this mode of failure and didn't need to specifically avoid conventional coolants. They may have also considered that after a serious accident there are many ways a battery fire can initiate.

At this stage we know the Kona fires were due to an unfortunate manufacturing shortcut isolated to certain LG Energy E63 cells, same as the Bolt fires. But nonetheless partially-conductive coolant still poses a remote risk in an EV battery. But the short life of low-conductivity coolant is also an expensive maintenance headache for owners and so likely as a response Hyundai/Kia have recently moved the battery cooling system to the outside of the pack, confirmed on the 2023 Niro and upcoming new Kona, and reverted to a conventional (pink) coolant. Tesla are reported to have a new (outsourced) pack for the upcoming revised Model 3 (and presumably the Y) which has a design closer to what everyone else has already been using (not potted) and I suspect that it includes a similar feature, yet to be confirmed.

The fact is that we are still early adopters to some extent and EV makers are still finding their way to better designs. Hyundai/Kia are not only moving in the right direction but by some measures are in the lead.

 

Aside from this concern, how do you feel about the Model 3 in comparison to your Niro?

 

There is a very good discussion here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/KiaNiroEV/comments/14p620j/niro_ev_vs_model_3/

Overall, DCFC, software and driving dynamics are much better than the Niro however, I miss physical buttons and Apple CarPlay.