Text/Figure Yangcheng Evening News, Guangdong Jingshi "Jingshi Frontline" joint reporting team
Go to the brand side to authorize the 4S store for maintenance and upgrading, and the endurance of new energy vehicles is greatly reduced? Recently, the joint reporting team of Yangcheng Evening News and Guangdong Economic Vision News Center "Economic Vision Frontline" received feedback on the same problem from several new energy vehicle consumers. Car owners suspect that the vehicle battery or through professional means is manipulated, there is a situation of secretly "locking the electricity".
The owner of A WM new energy vehicle reported that his vehicle was suspected of being remotely controlled "locked"
Owner's feedback: Vehicle maintenance upgrade follow-up voyage decline
Mr. Zheng, the owner of the Guangzhou WM EX5, told reporters that on April 25, 2021, his car mileage reached 30,000 kilometers, and then drove the car to the brand side authorized 4S shop for maintenance.
"Unexpectedly, after the maintenance of the follow-up voyage, it will immediately 'shrink'." Mr. Zheng said that at that time, he thought that the frequent use of car air conditioning or his own driving habits led to increased energy consumption, but after many times of charging, he found that the actual endurance of his car would still drop from 320 kilometers before maintenance to about 230 kilometers. "The endurance of many new energy vehicles will generally be 'false', which is slightly higher than the actual capability." For many buyers of new energy vehicles, they need to be mentally prepared. But it's usually a 78% discount. Today, this car, which claims to have a range of 400 kilometers, has a cruising range of only more than 200 kilometers, which is too outrageous. Mr. Zheng said that the current situation of a sharp decline in endurance performance made him unacceptable.
Also suffering from this is Mr. Chen, the owner of the Guangzhou WM EX5. He said his car upgraded and followed up by a full 100 kilometers less.
Mr. Zhou, the owner of the Beijing WM EX5, also expressed anger when he talked about his experience: "At that time, the after-sales called me to say that I could maintain it for free, but immediately after the maintenance, I felt that something was wrong. A car with a range of 400 kilometers can only run about 180 kilometers. ”
The owner of the car reported to the joint reporting team that the vehicle's endurance was declining
WM after-sales: there is no official statement on the power lock situation of the manufacturer
"Fast charge takes 2-3 hours to fill up." Before the 'upgrade', it only takes about 1 hour and 15 minutes. Mr. Zhang said that after the maintenance upgrade of his car, not only did the battery life "shrink", but the charging speed was also much slower.
The reporter's investigation found that there are not many owners who complain that WM aftermarket stores secretly "lock the electricity" when maintaining vehicles. A video provided to reporters by the owner shows that at two or three o'clock in the morning, the owner's vehicle is suspected of being upgraded through the OTA remote upgrade system to upgrade the "lock power" operation. During the entire upgrade process, the user did not take any action and was not informed in advance. "It was very strange, my car turned on its own lights." One of the car owners involved said.
For the situation reflected by the owners, an after-sales staff of the Guangzhou Panyu Weima 4S store said: "The manufacturer locks the electricity here without an official standard, and we dare not say." But he said that he did receive feedback from the owners of WM Motors that the mileage of the vehicle upgrade and maintenance was significantly reduced.
Third-party detection: There is a possibility that the battery capacity may be deliberately reduced
Does WM secretly "lock the electricity"? After the consent of the owner, the reporter sent three of the suspected "locked" vehicles to a third-party testing agency for testing.
Wang Xudong, president of the Testing and Evaluator Branch of the China Automobile Dealers Association and a testing engineer, introduced that the battery capacity of the vehicle may be deliberately reduced. "Comparing the vehicles sent for inspection with the cars with normal battery life, they found that their SOC (remaining power) minimum value was 20% different. From the actual charging amount on the charging pile, the maximum difference between the car and the machine display value is about 6-7kwh, and the charging pile shows that the full charge is 100%, but the actual amount of electricity we read with the decoder is 89%, of which the difference is 11%-12%. ”
Wang Xudong introduced: "The term 'lock electricity' is the consumer's statement, from a professional and technical point of view, it is the car manufacturer that has made some restrictions, and these restrictions may have several motivations: one is to prevent spontaneous combustion, and the other is to protect the battery warranty period to reduce the loss rate as much as possible." ”
According to reports, in the past two years, WM Motors has had a number of spontaneous combustion incidents, in October 2020, WM Motors recalled 1282 ex5 models of the EX5 car series on the grounds that the battery has a safety hazard. Several of the car owners interviewed said that the cars they purchased were not included in the recall batch and did not receive relevant recall information.
Some car owners speculate that car manufacturers can block the maximum amount of power that the battery can reach by tampering with the key data in the BMS (new energy vehicle battery management system) to achieve the locking of the battery soc (system level chip) window, that is, artificially jamming the maximum amount of power that the battery can achieve, limiting the amount of charge and power consumption of the battery.
WM's official customer service said that WM will not lock the user's vehicle. If the owner feels that the battery life is reduced, the official customer service of WM recommends that the owner go to the after-sales store to do a professional test to see if it is an interface or other problems that cause the vehicle to have a lower endurance.
In this regard, the owner of the Wei carriage said that if there is really a product quality problem, then in accordance with the provisions of the state and the after-sales service commitment, the battery replacement for the owner. The owner also said that the manufacturer did not grasp the quality problem in the early stage, and the manufacturer's business cannot be borne by the user.
The reporter tried to contact the WM automobile manufacturer by telephone and email on the problems reflected by the owner, and was responsible for the contact person of the external news media. But no response has been received until the deadline.
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Source | Yangcheng Evening News, Yangcheng Faction, Guangdong Jingshi "Jingshi Frontline" joint reporting team
Editor-in-charge | Yang Chuying