Weird placement of car parts. Why?

MarkH said:
The old Chrysler Sebrings had the battery in the driver side front tire well.


It was truly insane, I still haven't seen a battery location that I thought was worse. (Un)Fortunately, those engines were so bad that the batteries generally didn't have to be replaced more than once.
Click to expand...
Plenty of Corvettes have had them in the cabin behind the seats, or in the case of the C4, in a compartment behind the front wheel well. Nothing quite so difficult to remove as the Chrysler products though.
 
Ashara Keliyn said:
Just an hour ago the neighbor asked me to help her replace the battery on her Ford SUV (Escape I think). So to reach the battery you remove:
A. Both windshield wipers.
B. 7 clips to remove the cover #1
C. The brake fluid reservoir
D. 4 bolts to remove cover #2
Even after all that the battery is not fully exposed and you have to tilt it to remove it.
Had to use:
14mm socket, 10mm socket, 12mm socket, flathead screwdriver, torx bit. 45 minutes.
I am wondering at what point does the design engineer say "man, I did a good job"?
Why do that? What are some others you encountered.
On my 4runner I need only 10mm socket and 3-5 minutes.
Click to expand...
Dunning Kruger comes to mind when I read stuff like that.... but it's not very uncommon. For certain ford models (mondeo) here in order to change the bulb of the headlights you had to:
- Remove the engine cooler (for that you needed to remove the bumper... mind you)
- Remove the light
- Replace the bulb
- Re-install everything. Replacing a bulb (what should have been a 5-min job) became a 5-hour ordeal.

Tobias
 
Dana said:
Italian cars... I owned a string of Fiat Spiders (the later ones had the battery in the trunk, too, to make room for added smog stuff). Many aspects were beautifully engineered but there were some things that must've been designed on a Friday afternoon after a few bottles of vino at lunchtime.
Click to expand...
I’ll give sports car manufacturers who put the batteries in the trunk a pass.

That’s usually not a cost savings measure, those long cables are expensive.

It’s done to improve handling and get closer to a 50/50 weight balance on the front and rear axles.
 
ElPaso Pilot said:
I’ll give sports car manufacturers who put the batteries in the trunk a pass.

That’s usually not a cost savings measure, those long cables are expensive.

It’s done to improve handling and get closer to a 50/50 weight balance on the front and rear axles.
Click to expand...

I have a frunk battery in an old 911. Fold carpet back, access battery. I have no issue with that. Actually a better place than stuffing it in the engine compartment.
 
ElPaso Pilot said:
I’ll give sports car manufacturers who put the batteries in the trunk a pass.

That’s usually not a cost savings measure, those long cables are expensive.

It’s done to improve handling and get closer to a 50/50 weight balance on the front and rear axles.
Click to expand...
On my Lancair the batteries are in the trunk, or empennage, for the same reason and it's still nose heavy.
 
Part of the way I made beer and food money in college was tuning up friends cars. Points, plugs, timing, etc...

One time I tackled a car (I forget the make) and try as I could I could not get spark plug #8 out. I had a flex head socket wrench with an extension and a universal so I could get in some really tight places, but I couldn't get that plug out. No Youtube back in 1970.

I was able to loosen the plug but that was it. And it took me an hour to tighten it back up so he could drive to a real mechanic.
Turns out that car needed do be raised up, a jack put under the engine block and the car lowered slightly to make enough room to get that plug out.
 
weilke said:
I have a frunk battery in an old 911. Fold carpet back, access battery. I have no issue with that. Actually a better place than stuffing it in the engine compartment.
Click to expand...
At least there is a lot less heat and fewer large temperature swings there. That should be better for the battery.
 
weilke said:
The recent Escape is famous for that.

The answer is: Because Ford could save $0.52 per unit during production by doing it that way.
Click to expand...
$0.52 is a huge savings.

I work for a company that makes, among other things, parts for cars (we also have aerospace divisions). The bulk of our auto business is small check valves used in the fuel or braking systems, and cost a buck or two (I design the automatic machinery that makes those parts). Our customers routinely beat us up over fractions of a cent per valve. I was appalled by this until I did the math: A modern car has around 30,000 parts. If they save just 1/10 of one cent on each part and make a million cars per year (some automakers make more, some less), that's a savings of 30 MILLION dollars per year.

Serviceability is secondary. Modern car reliability has gotten so good that they don't care... the new car buyer will likely never have to fix it, and they don't care about the people buying them used after the warranty has expired.

By coincidence, I had to change the starters in both my 1979 Jeep and my wife's 1990ish Ford Taurus. The Jeep was, well, a Jeep, while the Taurus was hailed in the industry for many innovative features to speed automated production. The Jeep starter took about 15 minutes from start to finishing cleanup. The Ford took over three hours. That was over 20 years ago, on [then] 10 and 20 year old cars. It's only gotten worse since then.
 
ElPaso Pilot said:
I’ll give sports car manufacturers who put the batteries in the trunk a pass.
Click to expand...
Sunbeam Alpine - under the space behind the seats.
Front engine, mid battery, rear drive.

But you had to remove part of the exhaust system to replace the starter. But it was a Lucas starter so you had it off frequently enough that the nuts on the exhaust manifold never had a chance to rust in place.
 
@Dana

Good point on the numbers. I was involved a building automation project doing some of the software a number of years ago.
They wanted the per device costs down to $20 each, since there would be one device per tenant or per large room (one unified system for large office complexes plus retail areas usually on the first level or two). The initial proposals by some of the vendors were close to $1000, and most vendors did not understand why they did not win the pilot project.
And the pilot project was going to install close to 250 devices, with the expectation if successful it would expand to hundreds of thousands of devices for just this one customer and they had multiple customers with interest who were providing some of the verification funding.

Tim
 
You also have to keep in mind that sometimes the engine design may have never been intended for a particular automobile. Plenty of V6 engines get shoe-horned into other models, especially if mounted traverse and turned into FWD platforms. The oil filter/pan/starter/etc. then have to occupy space around suspension and exhaust components they weren't originally designed around. Now, that's still no excuse for not designing a remote oil filter housing or a new oil pan plug location that doesn't drop oil all over the frame, but I can sort-of excuse difficult spark plug removal in those instances.

Poor design for geadlight bulb difficulty is just inexcusable no matter what. My 07 GMC had to have the windshield washer bottle removed (which requires pulling back the wheel well liner) in order to change the driver's side bulb. They could have put the neck of the washer bottle ANYWHERE else in that area as it was completely unoccupied, but they chose to slap it right in front of the only maintenance item in the area of the engine bay. I'd kick that design engineer square in the nuts if I ever met him.
 
My wife's '13 Subaru Outback is due a tune up.

To R&R the plugs, Subaru suggest loosening the motor mounts and raising the engine a few inches to get to the rear plugs.

Anyone want to buy a '13 Subaru.??

I did tell her that if another head light burns out on it we will get her a new car instead.
 
Zeldman said:
My wife's '13 Subaru Outback is due a tune up.

To R&R the plugs, Subaru suggest loosening the motor mounts and raising the engine a few inches to get to the rear plugs.

Anyone want to buy a '13 Subaru.??

I did tell her that if another head light burns out on it we will get her a new car instead.
Click to expand...
A number of years ago (when I was in the auto parts biz) my wife was looking at a Subaru to buy. I did a bit of research and found that the engine had to be unbolted and lifted up (or removed) to change the timing belts (IIRC they were to be changed every 60K). She bought a Honda instead ...
 
Zeldman said:
My wife's '13 Subaru Outback is due a tune up.

To R&R the plugs, Subaru suggest loosening the motor mounts and raising the engine a few inches to get to the rear plugs.

Anyone want to buy a '13 Subaru.??

I did tell her that if another head light burns out on it we will get her a new car instead.
Click to expand...
Not necessary; I've changed the plugs in our 2011 3.6 OB without much trouble.
 
Daleandee said:
A number of years ago (when I was in the auto parts biz) my wife was looking at a Subaru to buy. I did a bit of research and found that the engine had to be unbolted and lifted up (or removed) to change the timing belts (IIRC they were to be changed every 60K). She bought a Honda instead ...
Click to expand...
The 6 cylinder versions have always been timing chain without recommended replacement interval. The 6 cylinder also has been the higher trim nicer models. I will only buy 2010-2014 though as in 2015 they went to CVT.
 
bbchien said:
THIS!

You should see the look on the salesman's face when i open the hood on the showroom floor, and then slide under the front bumper (to find the coolant drain plug).

Not reachable? "Not intertested in the car. Have a nice day".
Click to expand...

One big selling point on my 1985 Dodge Daytona Turbo Z was that I opened the hood and right there, easily accessible with good room were the 4 spark plugs, oil filter, and air filter. I could change the plugs and both filters in less time than it took to drain the oil.

My Dad was high up in USN Research and Development in the 70s. When companies would try to sell the Navy some new fancy thing, he would ask the engineers if they tuned up their own cars. If they said no, he told him he was not interested in what they were selling. When they asked why, he told them that if they did not even tune up their own cars, there was no way that they could design and build a product that could be repaired by an 18 year old seaman, in the South China Sea during a typhoon. And it couldn't be repaired it wouldn't be working and therefore worthless.
 
tspear said:
I know in aviation we make a big deal about the wear and tear on the engine when staring/stopping. However, I took an Uber Black a few weeks ago. It was in a few years old MB sedan, I did not pay attention to the model. But I did talk to the driver, he owned the car, did all the service work himself, and had over 200K miles on the car, and still had the start/stop active. I remember thinking that is more miles than I usually kept the car (maintenance items increase, and I used to not be able to afford the downtime).

So, is there any recent data on the start/stop causing engine wear in automotive vehicles?

Tim
Click to expand...

There is a BIG difference between starting after a minute and starting after a week or a month.
 
We have the 3.6R Outback, powerful and smooth. Now that Subaru is back to 4cyl only, the next one probably wont be Subaru.
 
Pinecone said:
There is a BIG difference between starting after a minute and starting after a week or a month.
Click to expand...
Earlier in the thread there was comments about starting/stopping being bad for the car engine. I am saying, prove it.

Tim
 
kmacht said:
Realistically, how often is a battery changed on a car over its lifetime? Why use up valuable engine compartment space just to put a component that gets touched maybe 3-4 times over a 16 year lifespan. It’s still serviceable but maybe takes an extra half hour to do. There really isn’t a need to put a battery someplace that it can be changed out in 5 minutes.
Click to expand...
My 2001 Mercedes W210 (E-320 wagon) has the battery under the back seat. It's actually pretty easy to get to. Had to replace it the year after I bought the car (2009?). Didn't need
to repeat the exercise until a couple of years ago. I am used to car batteries lasting about four years - five if you are lucky. For one to go more than twice that is unbelieveable.
The battery in question was nothing special - just a parts store house brand.

Dave
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top