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from the random-and-intermittent-failures dept.
https://qz.com/1066966/how-many-cars-were-destroyed-by-hurricane-harvey/ and also at other news outlets.
For Harvey victims, it's going to be rough if they lost their car, Houston is a very car-dependent city. Like many states, Texas only requires liability insurance — only those that bought comprehensive coverage will be able to claim the loss on insurance.
Ideally most of these flooded cars will be scrapped, as it's very likely water damage to electrical systems and other parts are not cost effective to repair professionally. However, there will be "new" and used cars on the market that have been underwater (to a greater or lesser extent). Many will be sold "as is" and some of them will be cleaned up and sold fraudulently as if they were not damaged. Buyer beware, these cars will be shipped all over in search of buyers (marks?)
After Katrina, friends of mine with time on their hands bought several new-flooded Honda Civics (which they were familiar with from building "street stock" race cars). They pulled out the interior and then the full wiring harness. Bought new harness from Honda and replaced everything, and had perfectly good near-new cars for pennies on the dollar (and a few days of hard labor).
(Score: 4, Insightful) by frojack on Sunday September 03 2017, @08:03PM (2 children)
Its mostly a energy waste.
Cars recycle almost entirely, And its probably better than mining the earth for new metals.
You yank the engine and transmission, which mostly just need to be flushed, and can be sold into the repair market world wide for decades to come. (So can the windshields). Motor and transmission designs are already decades old, and will continue to be around for as long as we run ICE automobiles. Nobody is spending a lot of money these days coming up with new ICE designs.
The wheels and axles battery are the last heavy parts. Not much demand for those or the rest of the body. Spend the energy and melt them down. Seats, interior and electronics you trash. Wiring harness you send for separate recycle. The efficiency of this, done on large scale is really not that bad.
We are basically trashing upholstery here.
Recycle them all, I say. When they come back, maybe it will be as an electric car.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Monday September 04 2017, @02:11AM
Oh, but they do. See VW diesel, higher efficiency, more NOx, Bosch software.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday September 04 2017, @01:36PM
Huh? A lot of this is totally wrong. Carmakers are still making all-new engine designs; the "SkyActiv" engines in Mazdas are only a few years old or so, and they're supposed to be introducing a HCCI engine in a year or two. Other automakers are much the same; no one's still using shitty old engines from the 90s now.
Wheels are completely recyclable. What do you think people do when they damage an OEM wheel? There's a healthy industry for used OEM wheels, since the brand-new ones cost a fortune, and aluminum wheels do crack once in a while (like from hitting a large pothole, or being curbed too many times). Axles are also recycled; where do you think AutoZone gets those "remanufactured" axles they sell? The rubber boots on axles don't last forever, and it's generally much easier to just replace the entire axles than to take it apart to replace the boot. Most axle remanufacturing probably amounts to little more than just taking it apart, replacing the boots, checking the CV joints are still within spec, and calling it done.
With electronics, electronic modules under the hood (plus the harnesses) are usually waterproof, so unless they got electrically damaged somehow, they're probably OK, and will likely be resold on the used market.