Dependencies; How off grid can an EV be?

S

Stephan Schwab

New Member
Currently I have a 2021 Jeep Wrangler with a Diesel engine in Europe. I learned two times the bad way that I do not have an off-grid vehicle despite its abilities and prior experience with earlier models.

I've done the oil change elsewhere and not in the Jeep shop and was unable to reset the oil change counter. The car's computer refused me the full power of my fully serviced engine due to not having reset that counter. I had to limb 120 km to the Jeep dealership and did the oil change again due to policy and then reset the counter.

Latest is that a rat chewed a sensor cable and now the car's computer thinks the AdBlue tank were empty. In 700 km it will refuse to start the engine in order to avoid violating emission regulations.

Now I am wondering what kind of dependencies I will have with a 100% electric vehicle. I am aware of all the ideas around "mobility as a service". However, I am NOT living in the city. I am off grid and the nearest place with car dealerships is far away. Cell phone coverage is also spotty but for Internet I have Starlink and it works great. I also don't want to buy mobility but OWN a vehicle to go where and when I want to.
 
All modern cars are complicated computerized systems. As you've experienced, diesels have extra failure modes due to the emissions control systems. A really old car would be the most maintainable as well as most unreliable.
 
My main concern is any potential dependency on the manufacturer that might not be a hassle but even a benefit in the city but a huge issue when without cellphone signal or otherwise disconnected.

The point is want to OWN my car and not be effectively renting it for the purchase price. The moment I have to use an app on my phone which uses "cloud services", I also need to haven Internet connection. If the car were using a wireless connection to the phone, then the phone would be ok as a control device. But it's not, if the Internet is required. I have an Anova oven and without Internet it degrades to a dumb oven. I don't want that to happen to something as a car which might become a safety issue in eg. case of an emergency.

So to rephrase: can I use any of the electric cars available today offgrid? Offgrid means here be away from any communication or service infrastructure put up by the manufacturer for eg. 6 months. There will be power to charge, I can change an air filter and do all the maintenance that the manufacturer does not restrict me from doing.

Simply said: I don't want to depend on the dealership or any service unless something is clearly broken as in a long piece has separated into two shorter pieces.

I should probably add that I am an IT guy with +40 years of experience. But I have no interest in hacking into my car. I rather buy one without the need for that.
 
Stephan Schwab said:
Now I am wondering what kind of dependencies I will have with a 100% electric vehicle.
Click to expand...
I'm beyond warranty so I'm into a mix of self maintenance and service shop as needed with my 2019 Tesla Model 3 Std Rng Plus. As for the BMW i3-REx that is out of production, other than OBD coding and Apps, I really don't have the types of shop manuals I would prefer.

Stephan Schwab said:
... Cell phone coverage is also spotty but for Internet I have Starlink and it works great. ...
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Can you make cell phone calls using WiFi over the Starlink internet ... possibly some delay?

Bob Wilson
 
Paul K said:
I'm surprised you just didn't do an internet search. I did and this is one of many that came up
https://jeeprunner.com/jeep-wrangler-oil-change-reset/
Click to expand...

It is actually not that simple with the European models. Does not work.

But my question is about EVs. I want to know what I'm getting into. Like I said: what are any dependencies on the manufacturer's services while the vehicle is not damaged that can lead to it being unavailable.

Totally fine is updating the car's software via its internal cellphone modem over the Internet. However, as long as I can operate anything myself I don't mind a convenience function on the phone to do it from afar like before leaving the house.

Absolutely not fine is anything that stops me from using the car for no real technical reason. I want to buy and own a car and not lease any mobility service that involves a car.

If I were living in a city, there I would be more than happy to just call an autonomous vehicle and not own one at all. I guess that's the future. But out in the woods the car has to function properly with no restrictions off-grid.
 
My suggestions:
  • Two, an EV and PHEV - with two vehicles, one can be down and you're still able to fetch tools, parts, and necessities of life.
  • Start used with "new" technology - best case, end of lease, because it will have residual warranty and been maintained. If the new technology doesn't work, you don't lose the new car depreciation. Your second "new technology" can be new since you've already learned the lessons.
Bob Wilson
 
Bob, I see where you're going but then I am not worried about something breaking. I am worried about something that is working and in perfect conditions being turned off because of "X".

I am worried about vital car functions not being available when there is no Internet available or also because of a missing monthly payment after the car has been paid for in full.

In other words: which EVs would not work in the middle of the Sahara desert after 6 months with no talking back to the manufacturer despite having plenty of electricity via solar panels available?

There might be nothing strange and I am just worried about something that might not exist. Great and I hope that's the case.

So: anyone has a car that's tethered to the manufacturer? That's the one I am not gonna buy :-)

Currently I am looking into a Jeep Avenger for the ground clearance it has and further down the line moving towards a Ford Lightning once it is available in Europa besides Norway. I am in Spain and I've made good experience for my use case with a gasoline powered F-150. I don't bring kids to school but I go on a big shopping trip once a month into the city which is 240km roundtrip. I buy material and food etc. It's not regular grocery shopping ;-)
 
I have a F150 Lightning which I have owned for 9 months and like you live in the country. There are no requirements that the Lightning be connected in order for the vehicle to operate. In fact if you desired you can turn off connectivity any time you want.

Once you decided on a vehicle you are considering you might consider asking the same ques ton on a forum for that specific vehicle.
 
Thank you. That is good news. It will be a while for it to show up in Europe but I do like the model and also the new move towards using Tesla's superchargers.
 
Then don’t get a Tesla. Mine has been paid off since 2019 and I’m still getting updated software every two months.

At 115,000 mi (+170,000 km) it is a much better car than when I bought it. But every now and then a favorite control is relocated or in one case deleted.

Do not get any Tesla as there are others available.

Bob Wilson
 
Software updates are fine. I'm an IT guy. That's a good thing.

Bad is to turn the car off like I mentioned in the beginning. There is a line and when crossed it becomes an issue.
 
I also had a 2019 Hyundai kona electric that I drove through a 100 mile area with know wifi or cell service. I had no issue with it either. My Kona did not have over the air up dates or navigation so it really was not connected. I also know someone on the forum who completely removed the modem from his Kona and he had no issues over the years that he drove it.
 
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EV's I have owned:
2021 Ford Mustang Mach E (California Route 1 and Select): Like the Ford F-150 Lighting mentioned by @Fastnf , the Mach E connected vehicle functions in SYNC can be turned off (though I am not sure how much that really disconnects, I do have that enabled hoping that future OTA updates use that in safety features). That said, I am not sure if all functionality would be maintained if the vehicle were off-grid. If I choose in the future not to subscribe (I will if the price is reasonable) to software features like Bluecruise and navigation I am not sure what other functionality is affected.
2017 Ford Focus Electric: Linking to home wifi was optional and I even with that I never noticed a difference. I could install but not connect the Ford app (then called MyFordMobile) to the vehicle (despite trying multiple times) so I gave up on that and we drove four years without it. Also as a fun fact the nav was stuck in the past (speed limits, road geometry etc.) until I bought an update and installed it from a USB drive. The car did occasionally give traffic alerts so I guess it had some level of connection through the 3G modem. Still I feel like this one could go off-grid.
2017 (we still have this) and 2018 Smart fortwo Electric Drive: No modem in the car. No internet connection was possible. Navigation was optional and not on either vehicle. The closest to that was an optional connection to my cellphone (basically for calls and music) by wire or Bluetooth. This one could definitely go off-grid.
 
Maybe it's because it's a retrofit into the ICE model, but the MINI Cooper SE works without any connection. It does have maintenance alerts (as do all MINIs even pre-EV) but they can be cleared or ignored outside of dealer service. Some things are remotely-controlled (shortly after getting my SE there was a server-side glitch that deactivated CarPlay in my car for a week), but not the car operation itself.

I expect the new MINI EVs coming as early as next month to be a lot "smarter", for better or worse.
 
Worrying about a car 'turning off' because of a perceived software issue is kind of silly. I would say being "off-grid" would prevent the car from being remotely disabled. I'm lucky if mine check in or take a remote command. I mean what are you going to do if you are in the middle of the Sahara and you break an axle or some other mundane occurrence, like oh I dunno, a flat tire?

And I'm not buying this story as percieved. If I took my car to a dealer for an oil change, and they did not reset some counter that had me limping back to them, and then they charged me again for another oil change I think my ink pen would get happy. First they would be giving me my next two oil changes for free. Next they would be showing me how to work around it if it happened again.
 
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