RECALL

[theothertom]

Why all the Buy-Backs going on if there is a solution coming this month? Does GM believe in the solution at this point in time?

i think GM is going out of their way to keep customers happy

[charge]

i think GM is going out of their way to keep customers happy

Sounds good. About the time you wrote that, I caught this from Electrek: "A pivotal point for GM ......
GM is at a very fragile point in its history right now. The company just announced its refreshed Bolt EV, and brand new Bolt EUV. GM has committed to going all electric by 2035, with 30 new vehicles expected by 2025. They simply can’t afford any mistakes right now without losing billions in the future." Full article has other details that are interesting. https://electrek.co/2021/02/18/bolt-ev- ... -in-april/

GM must be hitting Quality Control hard (with the battery manufacturer). Quickest way to devalue their future EVs is battery fires. Very serious consumer nightmare. https://spectrum.ieee.org/transportatio ... -batteries

Strategy, apparently, is to try out a Battery Management System (BMS) algorithm solution for fault detection & fire mitigation.
If that doesn't prove to work over the next year or so, then they would need to go in & replace all batteries. Costly if that happens. Maybe the software fix will work & they avoid disaster in the competitive market.

While doing all that now, they STILL are willing to Buy Back many Bolts when the customer is irate & calls in.

I've never seen this scenario, where a recall solution is imminent, & they are buying back the whole car in some cases. Anybody else know of any precedent for this? Anything roughly similar?

[marspilgrim]

Many of the buybacks are likely due to certain state laws that require it, and make it easier for the consumers in those states. But overall I agree that GM needs to keep Bolt owners happy, and show the general public they're on our side, for the future good will they will need to sell their upcoming models.

[PackardV8]

But overall I agree that GM needs to . . . . show the general public they're on our side,

My experience over many years is corporations are never, ever "on our side." Short term profits and long-term survival are the only decision points which get serious discussion in high level meetings.

FWIW, 80,000 Bolt owners are ant-shite in the greater GM volume thinking, but again, my experience in other corporations, one of the holdups is the lawyers are advising not to set precedents which might have to be extended to the high volume lines and in future years.

jack vines

[charge]

Lemon Laws have nothing to do with the Buy-Backs. A Lemon Law needs to have a bunch of repair attempts with no solution. That's not happening here. ..... When a Bolt is on fire, it simply gets replaced under warranty, & any other burned structures handled by GM in a settlement. Only 5 (1 in 10,000) have caught fire. Both the temporary recall fix (90% range), and the permanent fix coming,, exists under the customary recall rules.

A corporation cares about it's reputation which helps them meet sales goals. Buy-backs do something for that. I think people shopping for a future EV might remember the Bolt fire recall and avoid GM. The damage isn't too bad though.

[theothertom]

Lemon Laws have nothing to do with the Buy-Backs. A Lemon Law needs to have a bunch of repair attempts with no solution. That's not happening here. ..... When a Bolt is on fire, it simply gets replaced under warranty, & any other burned structures handled by GM in a settlement. Only 5 (1 in 10,000) have caught fire. Both the temporary recall fix (90% range), and the permanent fix coming,, exists under the customary recall rules.

A corporation cares about it's reputation which helps them meet sales goals. Buy-backs do something for that. I think people shopping for a future EV might remember the Bolt fire recall and avoid GM. The damage isn't too bad though.

For some reason the buybacks vary from state to state. People have speculated it's because of lemon laws, even though no one has made a claim under a lemon law AFAIK. It seems that Chevy is using each state's lemon laws to determine how much to pay for the buy back. My state has weak lemon laws and buy backs aren't that much. California has strong lemon laws and buy backs are good. So there's some criteria they're using to determine buy back price.

[charge]

For some reason the buybacks vary from state to state. People have speculated it's because of lemon laws, even though no one has made a claim under a lemon law AFAIK. It seems that Chevy is using each state's lemon laws to determine how much to pay for the buy back. My state has weak lemon laws and buy backs aren't that much. California has strong lemon laws and buy backs are good. So there's some criteria they're using to determine buy back price.

I've seen some internet discussion that I think identifies GM's tactics in this bizarre safety-engineering-legal-marketing problem:

GM uses Lemon Law buy back values, different in each state as you point out, as a way to squash lawsuits (there's at least 2 class action lawsuits bubbling up now). GM can save some money by following some state's cheapskate buy-back formulas, and they still look "OK" in the eyes of a judge thinking about the civil product liability claims. Some states have pretty valuable buy-back formulas so GM is stuck with those particular ones! If GM chose to apply, say, a universal purely linear depreciation based on a formula for age and miles, then it would look bad in some states and too good in the weak Lemon Law states.

If I were a judge hearing arguments for going forward with the current lawsuits brewing now, I might decide that GM is already buying back some vehicles, according to who complains loudly, & according to weak or strong state LemonLaws, which is a valid state-by-state template to follow, and the NHTSA is handling this as a normal safety recall.

I'd tell the lawyers attacking GM now to wait a year and find out if more Bolts are catching fire with the upcoming "fix" & the NHTSA isn't already insisting the cars be taken off the road for battery replacements.
But I'm an engineer, not a lawyer or judge, so a legal-eagle chiming in here could correct my understanding.

Buying back does score some points in Customer Satisfaction too.
That benefit to GM probably came up in secret GM exec meetings on this. They are trying to sell lots of Ultium vehicles soon! The Bolt problem could reduce sales by an unknown amount.

GM's goals, offering buy-backs to some, appear to me to be:

1. Thwart current civil lawsuits.

2. Please as many complainers as possible who don't like 1-in-10k odds of having an impromptu BBQ party in their garage happen at 3am.

3. Hedge the risk of the final recall software-only fix not working by taking some Bolts off the road.

They may ship buy-back Bolts out of the country, to places like Jordan who have been known to scoop up Ford's recent problem having so many Ford Focus Electric lease-returns breaking down with age & design weakness, & reducing Ford's reliability reputation here in the N. American market just as the MachE comes out.

[theothertom]

thanks for your insight, @charge.
I'm wasn't aware of problems with Ford Focus elec. I did a quick search and see that they had some issues with the pinion shaft. Did they have other issues ?

[charge]

thanks for your insight, @charge.
I wasn't aware of problems with Ford Focus elec. I did a quick search and see that they had some issues with the pinion shaft. Did they have other issues ?

The Focus had no big battery issues for the most part (LG Chem). ...........The pinion shaft recall wasn't too bad. It was a mechanical metallurgy problem where somebody forgot to surface-harden (carbonitride) that part in the differential, kind of a freak quality control issue, no big deal as it just needed new differentials.

The liquid cooling to the batteries leaked in some cars, and more are expected to leak as they age. Several TSBs on that issue. Other than that, just a few annoying software issues. Magna International did the powertrain for Ford, a compliance car, with LG Chem providing reliable batteries.

https://ford.oemdtc.com/6375/stop-safel ... ford-focus
shows Ford's TSB concerns about warranty repairs due to ethylene glycol & H2O coolant flooding the 350v-battery compartment.
Hope the Bolt doesn't have any coolant leak vulnerabilities. It can't happen in Nissan Leafs (air cooled batteries).

[theothertom]

Thanks