Stellantis Faces Legal Battle Over Jeep® Wrangler 4xe Fires

Stellantis, the parent company of FCA US, LLC, finds itself embroiled in a legal tussle concerning safety issues with its Jeep® Wrangler Unlimited 4xe (JL) in the U.S. District Court in Detroit. The matter revolves around accusations that the company failed to adequately address a potential fire hazard linked to the vehicle’s lithium-ion battery packs. This lawsuit, initiated as a class action proposal, involves nine plaintiffs from seven states, all of whom are Wrangler 4xe owners. The core contention of the lawsuit is that there’s a fire risk associated with the vehicle’s battery packs. The plaintiffs claim that Stellantis did … (read full article...)

 

[bill burke]

One more hole in the electrification wall promigated by extremist environmentalists in and out of governments, pseudo intellectuals doing bogus self serving research at universities and “think tanks” and gullible journalists eager for a woke story line. Poor tree hugging suckers that have been lulled into buying these dangerous vehicles. Still feeling good about your purchase?
The rouse is about over and companies like Stellantis, that rushed to invest in this nonsense, will be losing billions that could have gone into cleaner gasoline engines and fuels. Still feeling good about your investments?
Those electric chickens are coming home to roost and the auto industry is quietly rushing to save their company and their jobs. Major mistake guys. Shocking. !

 

[AlexB]

One more hole in the electrification wall promigated by extremist environmentalists in and out of governments, pseudo intellectuals doing bogus self serving research at universities and “think tanks” and gullible journalists eager for a woke story line. Poor tree hugging suckers that have been lulled into buying these dangerous vehicles. Still feeling good about your purchase?
The rouse is about over and companies like Stellantis, that rushed to invest in this nonsense, will be losing billions that could have gone into cleaner gasoline engines and fuels. Still feeling good about your investments?
Those electric chickens are coming home to roost and the auto industry is quietly rushing to save their company and their jobs. Major mistake guys. Shocking. !

Motion to Dismiss .
Not shocking at all.

 

[patfromigh]

Still feeling good about your investments?

In a matter of a few months, the Gray Court, SC production line building the ZF next-generation 8-speed automatic transmissions will be fully operational. Up to that point Stellantis has been importing the previous generation PHEV system from Germany, in limited quantities for the Wrangler and Grand Cherokee 4Xe models. The Wrangler 4Xe models in question are plugin hybrids. They are not fully electric.

These next-gen transmissions will also be built in the Kokomo, Indiana transmission production facilities as well. Built in middle America flyover country for the states which get a choice of ICE power or not. However, pure ICE power is going to be very rare. Most vehicles will have some sort of battery pack, so it will be just a question how large that battery pack will be. Stellantis has invested big money into mild hybrids, as well as high voltage plugin hybrid and full battery electric vehicles. The 48V mild hybrids are becoming quite sophisticated, offering the performance of high voltage hybrids from earlier generations.

Toyota has discovered and published a rule for batteries. I believe it is 1:6:90. The amount of batteries used for one BEV may be used in 6 plugin hybrids or 90 hybrids. Ford is learning this rule the hard way after they used up a years worth of battery production on battery electric vehicles now sitting in various lots around the country. This is while consumers are demanding hybrids, leaving Ford with bare shelves for hybrid batteries.

I have no idea what the rule for the amount of batteries for the 3-ton lump of the new Charger EV is to the future mild hybrids now in the pipeline.