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Originally Posted by California98Civic
Imagine how cheaply a really simple and efficient motor could be built with current technologies.
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But isn't this thinking a major factor in why US automakers haven't been able to make & sell small cars successfully? They think small car has to mean cheap car (because obviously everyone really wants as big a car as they can afford, no?), so they skimp on everything possible, including quality control, producing a cheap piece of junk that nobody wants, not because it's small, but because it's a cheap piece of junk.
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The hybrid thing sometimes looks to me as if we are being sold little test vehicles, being recruited as test pilots who pay rather than get paid.
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Well, the test pilot thing was true of the Insight, which was sold for less than what it cost to build. But considering you could get an aluminum-bodied sports car for $20K new, and get over 70 mpg from it for (in my case, though I bought it used) 11 years and 150K miles since new with only minor repairs needed... Well, I'll gladly sign up to test pilot their next similar model :-)
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A friend with a five or six year old Prius has just woken up to the $5,000 battery replacement costs coming at her soon.
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She's still dreaming, or else being conned. It's highly unlikely that a Prius would need a new battery after only 5-6 years. If it did need one, it should still be under warranty (IIRC 10 years/150K miles in California, 8 years, 100K miles elsewhere). If it isn't under warranty, the cost of a salvage replacement is closer to $500 than $5000.