A Sad Day

[Smartshot]

My companies returning all the old EV Rav 4's back to toyota to be scraped. We have the largest fleet of these toyota's today. They are upgrading to the leaf, volt, and focus (when it comes out). So the good news is that i'll be able to drive all these later on. But sad to see the rav's go............ I would like to have one. Just doesn't make sense too.

 

[Smartshot]

We have like 100 total now I think.

 

[Devin]

Such a shame that Toyota will scrap them instead of selling them as used like any lease returned vehicle. Then again, they are fairly impractical given their inductive charging. Still, if I had a bunch of extra cash I'd love to own a RAV4-EV as a vehicle of historical interest.

 

[adric22]

Such a shame that Toyota will scrap them instead of selling them as used like any lease returned vehicle. Then again, they are fairly impractical given their inductive charging. Still, if I had a bunch of extra cash I'd love to own a RAV4-EV as a vehicle of historical interest.

No kidding.. I can't see the harm in selling them. As for the inductive charging, as long as you have a charger at home, I guess it doesn't matter since the charging infrastructure for J1772 is pretty thin to non-existent in places right now.

Still, I feel less saddened that they are being scraped at least knowing that other EV's are now on the market to take their place.

 

[TonyWilliams]

What is the company that owns these?

 

[abasile]

It must be Southern California Edison, since they have had the largest fleet of RAV4 EVs.

 

[Smartshot]

It must be Southern California Edison, since they have had the largest fleet of RAV4 EVs.

nope LADWP has the largest that I know of. These are DWP's EV's soon to be replaced with leafs and other ev's hitting the market.

 

[mitch672]

I'm surprised Toyota is not offering them the new replacement Rav4 EV being released "soon". Those will be Tesla done conversions...

 

[johnr]

Smartshot, why not propose to your company that they sell them? I see RAV4EVs on eBay every now and then, and they tend to sell at a high price. It shouldn't be hard for someone to retrofit the vehicle with a plugin charger or a J1772 port. It's really a shame for these historical EVs to head to the scrap yard.

 

[GaslessInSeattle]

Just saw a Rav 4 EV today at an alternative energy development open house. Considering how excited people get who own these vehicles it sure seems they wouldn't have any trouble selling them all.

 

[mitch672]

It could very well be that the large format NiMH Batteries are showing their age, and not working well any more. These are nearly 10 years old or more.. They are also no longer manufactured, so it may not be practical to "rebuild" them, a lot of electrical work would have to be done to adapt them to batteries availble today. They could also be having mechanical issues, just due to the age of the vehicles. That's my guess, and I'm sticking to it

 

[TEG]

It could very well be that the large format NiMH Batteries are showing their age, and not working well any more. These are nearly 10 years old or more.. They are also no longer manufactured, so it may not be practical to "rebuild" them, a lot of electrical work would have to be done to adapt them to batteries availble today. They could also be having mechanical issues, just due to the age of the vehicles. That's my guess, and I'm sticking to it

Well, I have run into plenty of RAV4EVs, some with over 100K miles on them, that are still running fine.
They are very reliable. And the batteries in them might be the most reliable EV batteries ever made.
Someone recently emailed out that they took their new Leaf and their 10 year old RAV4EV (with over 100K miles) out for a long drive and the RAV4EV still had more range capability than the Leaf (both were rated at ~100mile range when new). Also, given the lack of CHAdeMO, the RAV4EV still recharges faster than the Leaf.

It is a shame if they crush them - they are still useful vehicles.