Best to wait for the technical report on this BYD Atto3 issue before creating viral brand attacks
Electric cars have been the ‘darling’ of the new car purchase experience for many Malaysians. Being fully tax-free was the biggest incentive and then you have the amazing technology inside the cabin.
Next, is the commuter experience. Quiet, fuss free and of course emissions free, new electric car sales have steadily moved upwards and in recent months it has been accelerated by the dozens of shiny new models being introduced at hard to resist selling prices.
However, there will be issues …… problems ……. technical glitches …… and software issues. Yes, after all an electric vehicle is equipped with new high technology features and software and this like with anything tech heavy can and might fail sometime during ownership.
Just like a laptop computer, tablet, smartphone, gaming console and smart watch, there could be a ‘glitch’ in the operating system or even a failure of a component, chip or operating system.
So, right now we have viral news about a BYD Atto3 owner having a near miss accident on the Cheras-Kajang highway when their white Atto3 suddenly had all its wheels locked (like emergency braking) which almost caused an accident. This incident happened without any warning.
Yesterday (on the 5th May), the Atto3 owner informed that the vehicle’s 12V battery had to be replaced because it ha low voltage and the replacement costs was RM418.00.
Now, we (www.dsf.my) can relate to this issue as we before had a very similar problem with a new electric vehicle test drive unit and lucky for us the wheels locked while driving in our housing area and late at night when there was very little traffic around us. We were not in danger. At the time, when a tow truck arrived, they could not tow the EV as all wheels were locked. They needed to get a smaller ‘dolly trailer’ for the rear wheels and the front wheel were dragged up the flat bed. (this means the front tires had to be replaced).
Just like with the Atto3 owner who mentioned that the highway tow truck arrived and they could not move the vehicle as the wheels had locked.
This means, the EV will have to be dragged up the the flat-bed or use a ‘dolly’ on the rear wheels and pull the EV up to the flatbed.
We cannot share the brand and model of the EV that stalled in our hands as we have signed an agreement with the automotive brand. In fact, FYI, we have had 3 very different electric vehicles from 3 different manufacturers (YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!) fail in our hands for various reasons over the past 5 years.
So, lets wait for the final technical report from the automotive company on this incident before making any presumptions.
We are sure Wang Chuanfu will get his team in Shenzen to look into this issue.
