Availability of a new battery in say six years ??

[RogerHalifax]

Again, thanks for your help in helping me make up my mind about an iMiev purchase.
As I understand it, the iMiev is discontinued and I presume battery manufacture. If I needed a new
battery in six or eight years, would one be available, and if they were manufactured now, sitting around
for six or eight years would reduce their capacity. How serious is this issue?

 

[FrostyCanada]

Hello Roger, our little iMiEV's may be in there final year of production, but that doesn't mean Mitsubishi is out of the battery car business.

The great success they've had with the iMiEV has translated to the Outlander PHEV (which uses the same rugged and reliable batteries as our iMiEV) and other battery model cars are being dreamed up by Mitsubishi for 2018, 2019 +.

I wouldn't worry about it.

Regards,
Brian

 

[PV1]

There has been no official announcement of a discontinuation. As far as I know, these were only rumors from the news articles. Last I checked, Mitsubishi still has a contract with PSA for 100,000 jellybeans, which hasn't been fulfilled yet.

As for the batteries, they are using the same cell in the Outlander PHEV, so cell availability should be good for quite some time.

 

[databeestje]

If the current battery progress keeps going, there could be 60 or 70 Ah cells in a similar format in a couple of years. The thing to keep in mind is that GS Yuasa isn't exactly in the lead on battery development.

To be fair, the Mitsu is pretty accessible, tech wise. If you replaced the current cells with something else in that format hooking into the existing BMS it would quite likely still work. Allthough that applies to quite a few other cars as well, the Leaf is another example where the battery is relatively low-tech (without cooling loops etc.).

I don't think that PSA will ever fulfil their contractual obligations. It's just very unlikely. Although this small a car, with the same price, but twice the battery, would be an entirely different sell.

Somehow the car manufacturers have this weird idea of how many miles we really travel. To make back the price difference between the purchase price and the monthly costs, you need to make miles, lots of them. Small batteries make that very uncomfortable. :/

 

[Barbagris]

There has been no official announcement of a discontinuation. As far as I know, these were only rumors from the news articles...

http://www.autoblog.com/2015/11/30/i-miev-doesnt-survive-mitsubishis-updated-ev-plan/

 

[databeestje]

And the actual interview, if you dig deep enough, the man comments that they will not develop a dedicated electric car like the i-Miev, which strikes me as odd, since the original i had a gas engine.

That same interview lists a new Kei car will be made that would be made in both electric and petrol. The chances of that ever leaving the island of Japan is very slim though.

So, yes, in that sense it's discontinued, but if the US and Euro emissions requirements keep going where they are going they'll end up making something electric.

 

[tigger19687]

The Mitsubishi Concept CA-MiEV is still listed on their site isn't that just a re-vamped 'i' ?
http://www.mitsubishicars.com/who-we-are/concept-cars

There are other PHEV and EV's on there too. I do not think they are not going the EV route.