[Harry's Garage] Ferrari 296 GTS review. Brilliant in so many ways but I won't be buying one

Harry comparing the 296 ui to the RR ui was quite curious.

I wonder how he felt about the BB and then iPhone when he first used them.

 

This is the cost for Porsche batteries (link below) in their all electric cars. Hybrid batteries are much smaller and theoretically less expensive. Of course individual cells typically fail first on the all electric batteries and can be replaced for a fraction of the cost of the full battery.

Technology advances and prices fall. You have 7 years from the in service date for the technology to advance or get cheaper. And then there are extended warranties. If you amortize the cost over the life of the car it will likely be relatively irrelevant.

Ferrari knows that if they want their cars to retain strong resale values in the future the battery replacement cost cannot be prohibitive for a regular production car.

Mark my words on this.

https://www.topspeed.com/how-much-costs-replace-porsche-ev-battery/

 

I hope you're right

The LaF, 918, P1 battery issues are scary as fk

If the battery replacements are only ~15-20k then it really isn't a deal at all given replacement dampers on a 458 are a 10k usd job.

 

They can over charge for their hyper cars. Everything is much more expensive because of the limited quantity made. Ferrari knows every original buyer is way, way ahead financially so the cost of maintenance and repairs is essentially irrelevant from a total cost perspective.

The dynamics are completely different for regular production cars.

 

TYPO: The hybrid battery warranty is 8 years in the USA.

So if the battery fails in the latter years you get a free replacement toking you out that much further before you have an out of pocket expense. If one amortizes the cost it will not be significant.

Looking out 10 years the cost should be much lower and there will probably be third party alternatives.

 

Overcharging would be one thing but it's more like battery tech moves so fast that OEM replacements aren't something that you can take for granted.

Tavarish when trying to rebuilt the flood P1 just found that NOS/OEM batteries were simply unavailable.

On the other hand keeping this stuff "OEM" is just silly, again given how fast battery tech has (and likely will) advanced.

I would assume that there would be a strong business case for the aftermarket to service these things if and when the dealers/factory abandon support, now with that said, it's still additional "thing" that can and will go wrong with time.

We're already kinda seeing effects of the type "factory parts no longer available" in the 360/430 models and soon the 458 era cars will be in this bucket too. I tremble with fear for what I'll do in another 10-20 years with my 458 (it's my forever car so "selling it" really isn't a solution for me, I want to keep it until I can't drive anymore). I'm actually LESS scared about the engine than I am with the DCT or E-diff.

 

They have already announced a new battery replacement with new, modern batteries for the LaFerrari. I saw it witth my own eyes. And I know a bit about batteries as my partners and I were original investors in a battery startup that was acquired by A123,

Agree with you about your point on replacement costs. Nothing is cheap on parts replacement for a Ferrari.

Some people on this thread are suggesting that the price of battery replacement price will track what is written about Tesla, Porsche, etc. Ferrrari is using a battery system tthat is sized for 15 miles. Tesla, Porsche, etc are using battery systems sized for 300-400 miles! Thats 20x-25x larger...ummm....so there is way more cost for batteries in consumer road car EVs. An order+ of magnitude larger.

As a plus, consumer road car EVs, testing has already indicated that EV road car batteries of today will go 200K - 500K miles. So the small 15 mile battery for Ferrari is even in better shape. Will someone be very upset that there 15 mile battery has dropped off to 13 miles after 50K miles of Ferrari driving?

Like every new powertrain, there are new learnings. Battery systems are no longer rocket science.