[william-nacey]

As a message to Aptera – as well as an early Tesla owner – I believe Aptera should consider that Tesla offered an 8 year unlimited mileage warranty on all powertrain and battery components. This eliminated any concerns that these critical and expensive items would become prohibitively expensive with the early cars. Later, once Tesla had established the reliability of their platforms, they were able to reduce the warranties to the more standard multi-year 100,000 mile terms.

Given that Aptera will be using new and, as yet, unproven in-wheel motors but proven battery technologies, I suspect that Aptera’s warranty “calculus” may need to be different from Tesla’s early offering. As a potential Aptera owner (with a reservation), I am concerned mostly with the motor technology and somewhat less with the batteries – so I would want to see a long and comprehensive warranty against all motor issues. I would be somewhat less concerned but would expect a competitive battery warranty.

Also Aptera will need to keep in mind that Tesla (and others) are a fast moving target. Tesla has indicated that the 4680 batteries may last considerably longer than earlier technologies. Aptera will need to be competitive with Tesla on all levels- especially as Tesla gets closer to offering their ~$25k car.

BTW, my old 2013 Tesla MS has over 130,000 miles on it, has been across the US four times, all over the US West Coast and show no signs of wear. I have seen 2012 MS’s with over 400,000 miles and all still on the original batteries and motors. This is the standard I hope for from Aptera with their 1,000 mile product.