Mercedes-Benz isn’t having a great time in South Korea right now. A few weeks ago, a Mercedes-Benz EQE electric sedan caught fire in an underground parking garage, and the fallout has grown so catastrophic that the local Mercedes-Benz CEO has been putting in work on the ground. Considering this is just one EV fire, the response seems disproportionate, but a disproportionate response is usually worth studying.
Moving away from the doom and gloom of an EV fire, Land Rover is bringing back the Freelander in a rather interesting way. Yep, the Freelander. Bet you never expected to hear that name again. Oh, and Polestar 3 production has started in South Carolina. For the brand, it couldn’t have come soon enough.
Lastly, we need to chat about connectivity, because BMW and Mattel have announced a new feature, and man, this just doesn’t seem like it. All this on today’s edition of The Morning Dump.
One Mercedes-Benz EV Fire, One National Incident
When an incident involving a single vehicle happens, you don’t typically expect the CEO of the local branch of that automaker to get involved directly. However, a Mercedes-Benz EQE in South Korea ignited while parked, burned intensely enough to damage or destroy a reported 140 cars, and stoke international fears around electric vehicle fire safety in densely populated areas. Now Reuters reports that the CEO of Mercedes-Benz Korea has met with residents of the affected apartment building, likely in an attempt to smooth things over.
Mathias Vaitl, the chief executive of Mercedes-Benz Korea, will hold a closed-door meeting with residents of the apartment in the city of Incheon to the west of Seoul, the company said, without providing more details.
That’s a pretty big step to take, but if you’ve been following the fire and its fallout, it does seem justified. In case you haven’t been aware of this thermal event, Reuters has a quick run-down on everything we know so far.
A fire on Aug. 1, which appeared to start spontaneously in a Mercedes-Benz (MBGn.DE) using Farasis Energy’s (688567.SS) batteries parked in the city of Incheon, took more than eight hours to put out, destroying or damaging about 140 cars and forcing some residents in the apartments above to move to shelters.
By now, electric vehicle proponents are repeating the line that EVs suffer fewer fires than combustion-powered vehicles, and while that’s absolutely true, not all fires are created equally. In the event of a combustion-powered vehicle fire, smaller fires like spitting flames and lighting up the rear bumper or a having bit of oil ignite on the exhaust manifold can be put out quickly, and if put out quickly enough, damage to the car can be repaired. Larger fires typically require a fire engine, but once they’re out, they’re out. In contrast, a thermal runaway event in an electric vehicle requires vast quantities of water and often isn’t extinguished in one go. Battery electric vehicles that have experienced a thermal event can re-ignite hours, or even days after first being extinguished. It’s a more severe challenge, and people are totally justified in their wariness as the infrastructure to treat these thermal events isn’t ubiquitous.
However, these challenges aren’t insurmountable. Equipment and techniques can be developed to better fight EV fires in parking garages and other densely-packed low-ceiling spaces where fire engines just can’t get to. In fact, Reuters reports that the Korean government has held a series of meetings with the goal of preventing an incident like this from ever happening again. Until then, consumers still have choices, and risks can still be mitigated.
Land Rover’s Bringing Back The Freelander, Sort-Of
If you’re going to revive a nameplate, a model that had a reputation for popping head gaskets in its first generation probably isn’t the move. That is, it probably isn’t the move in the West, but in China, produced through a joint venture and running on a platform from a Chinese automaker? Fine, why not? IP is IP, so you might as well recycle it where you can. Yes, Automotive News reports that the Land Rover Freelander is coming back as a made-in-China EV.
So, a Land Rover-ish series of BEVs and EREVs sold through a completely different dealer network and developed by a completely different company? While not unusual, you’d be forgiven for wondering just what Jaguar Land Rover’s end goal is here. It’s simple: Licensing.
The new Freelanders are “mainstream” and will not come under JLR’s luxury-focused House of Brands marketing and sales strategy, JLR said.
Under the deal, Chery licenses the Freelander name in return for JLR getting half of any profits.
To paraphrase Lt. Aldo Raine, I don’t blame them, damn good deal. Look, it’s debatable whether or not bringing back the Freelander name in the West would be branding suicide, but if it doesn’t fit with where a brand’s moving, has some sort of recognition, and can be a profit centre, license that thing. Sure, this arrangement will still require some work, but 50 percent of any profits just by doing design and branding work sounds a hell of a lot easier than developing a new car all the way through.
Maybe Polestar Isn’t Completely Screwed
As the trade war with China rages on, one of the big losers in the whole situation certainly seemed to be Polestar. After all, the Polestar 2 and Polestar 4 are both built in China, so production of the Carolinian-made Polestar 3 electric crossover simply couldn’t come soon enough. Well, it’s now officially happening, as Polestar’s announced the first examples have already rolled off the production line. Here’s what Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath said in a press release:
Manufacturing Polestar 3 in the USA is a crucial step for us. Now we offer customers in America an electric SUV that is built in America. Exporting the South Carolina produced Polestar 3 to Europe will strengthen our business on a broader scope.
Not only should building the Polestar 3 in America make it eligible for IRA tax credits, exporting U.S.-made vehicles may be a way to help offset tariffs on imported electric vehicles from China, extending a future for the Polestar 2 in America. Oh, and since the European Union now also has new tariffs on Chinese-built EVs, that line in South Carolina is even more critical. Add in plans to expand the Polestar retail network by 75 percent, and the brand’s future in America is looking brighter than it once did, although it’s not out of the woods yet.
Uno Comes To BMW, And It’s Just As Dumb As You’d Expect
With new technology comes new ways to fumble the bag. Look, I don’t want to say that BMW almost feels directionless as a brand, but with the current styling, um, experimentation, a desire to paywall all kinds of stuff from adaptive dampers (seriously) to driver assists, and in-car video games, we’ve strayed pretty far from the Ultimate Driving Machine mantra. The latest case? BMW is adding Uno, the card game, to its cars, but as a video game. It’ll be streamed to infotainment systems through the AirConsole app, and man, did anyone ask for this?
Mattel, AirConsole and BMW Group have transformed UNO into a playable connected game in a brand-new environment: the car. Whether a family is at rest during a road trip or a group of friends stop to figure out their next move, stationary drivers can use AirConsole’s unique game controller system to connect any passenger to the game using their personal devices. Up to four players can experience the game that brings people together through its simple, universal gameplay that transcends languages and cultures. Vehicles must be in park to enable gameplay.
Alright, so if you have a family of five or more, someone’s gonna have to sit this out, and you’ll only be able to play Uno while parked. Remind me how this is better than just throwing a deck in the center console storage compartment. Video games can be fun, especially while you’re parked and waiting for an EV to DC fast charge on a subpar charger. However, when the video game emulates a card game and requires all the safety lockouts of a video game, what’s the point?
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
It’s amazing how quickly an artist can go from a cool new artist to one of your favorite artists. I was hooked on Brevin Kim’s sound by the time the duo released “No Less Than Three” in 2020, but it’s been astonishing seeing how the brothers from Massachusetts have grown from hyperpop-esque roots to a wide range of sonic palettes. “Boys Night” feels more electronic than some of their prior releases, but it scratches a certain itch, with layered ambience, blade-sharp arpeggios, and the yearning for a night with the lads for both self-improvement and self-destruction. Sometimes, it’s just what we need.
The Big Question
What connectivity features do you actually want in a car? I reckon the bare minimum is having a way to play music from your phone, but what else could be actually helpful? Streaming services on rear seat entertainment screens for road trips with your children? What3words so you can always find where you parked? A cloud-connected dashcam? Only your imagination is the limit.
(Photo credits: Mercedes-Benz, Land Rover, Polestar, BMW)
Polestar is baffling, spinning off the brand which is all about safety and building a vehicle that is supposed to be a mainstream daily driver with no rear window…
Besides OBD II I don’t need any connectivity features in a new car.
Realistically I want the absolute minimum of not legally required electrical crap in my car. Parasitic drain, electrical gremlins, etc. they all suck and I don’t like dealing with them.
Hell, if I could buy a modern ICE car with a mechanical starter I would.
I don’t need my car to be connected to anything. I mean, I’m driving. So the only thing I need to be connected to is the road, the traffic, and pedestrians/animals/curve balls. If I want to look up the capitol of North Dakota or order up a tortilla soup from McAlister’s, I have a phone in my pocket that’s already connected to the Internet.
Can’t use both at the same time, right?
A cigarette lighter port and aux-in cover my connectivity needs.
I now have a car with its own wireless internet service, apple and android mirroring, an app on my phone that can show me where the thing is at any time (not creepy at all), satellite radio that is almost never playing anything I want to hear (and if I do want to hear it, the crap audio quality doesn’t hold up to higher volume) and a wireless charger in case I ever want to charge my phone more slowly than a cable can do it.
I will trade this vehicle in with most features entirely untested.
I’d like my car with wireless android auto on and a dash cam that maybe connects locally to my phone, but I’m fine with an SD card in something that’s only there for safety/legal reasons. I don’t want my car to connect to anything other than my personal devices, and I also don’t want it to tunnel through these devices to connect to a cloud or server.
The claim is that JLR sells cars in China because they sell premium cars elsewhere. And buyers of that market are wiling to pay more to make sure they get a real JLR, as opposed to a locally assembled China-spec model
JLR selling a made-in-China car, based on a (cheaper?) Chinese brand car, built by a local Chinese brand that won’t be sold elsewhere in the world will put that to the test.
It’ll be interesting, for sure.
And, no, I wouldn’t look down on the Freelander nameplate than I already do for JLR-built vehicles. Honestly, if it were made by Chery, maybe my opinion might even be higher.
Chery – this word is making my brain hurt a bit. Is it pronounced Cheery? Cherry? “Share-Uh” as in the name Cheryl without the L?
I have always pronounced it like the fruit, but now that you mention it, I really don’t know.
I believe it’s cherry, they left out an “r” for trademark purposes
Sheri, as in the Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons song.
I wish BMW put half the time they spend giving us stupid tech gimmicks into finding a way to make their steering less lifeless and putting all of their egregiously heavy lineup on a diet…but alas, we aren’t their target market anymore. They’re making much more money off of selling (or more accurately leasing) overpriced bullshit to the all flash/no substance influencer/conspicuous consumption crowd.
I don’t blame them for pandering to the money but it does bum me out. And I’ve seen headlines that the RWD version of the M cars might be on their way out, so the M2/3/4 are going to get even heavier. Complicate and add weight. Ze German way. I’ve always wanted an M car but I’m a little worried that by the time I can comfortably afford one there won’t be any new ones that are worth it anymore.
Anyway I don’t give a flying fuck about phone connectivity. I never use CarPlay. I’m stuck staring at screens and my phone all day anyway, why the hell would I want to stare at my phone while I’m driving? I have a fun car specifically because it makes the mundane a little more exciting. Sometimes driving is the only respite I get. I’d like to enjoy it and focus on it, not worry about my phone.
If it’s an emergency I’ll get a call and eventually a voicemail. If it’s not then I don’t care. Let me drive. I also rarely need navigation because I have a good sense of direction. I do like having a Bluetooth connection so I can choose the music when I want and be able to take the occasional call, but other than that? I don’t care. Hell take the entire screen out of my car. I don’t need it.
I’m with you, I stare at screens all day at work and the last thing I want is to get in my car and look at more of them. Honestly all I need is Bluetooth, that’s all I have in my Sportwagen and it’s perfect. For navigation , I have a phone mount. My parents have German SUVs (a standard Macan, a Macan GTS, and an X5) and when I have to drive one of those, I get a little overwhelmed by all the features and screens. Sometimes I’m lucky to figure out how to connect my phone to Bluetooth.
My dad has a 2024 X5 50e and the infotainment screen is a war crime. I remember it took me 5 minutes just to figure out which one of the dozens of individual apps could tell me the average fuel economy…and I probably couldn’t have done it in less than 5 minutes an hour later if you put a gun to my head. As soon as you click off the home screen it’s like looking at a 14 year old’s phone. Just piles upon piles of useless information, widgets, etc.
I genuinely don’t know who wants this shit. I get that manufacturers are still hopelessly chasing the Tesla dragon but the vast majority of people don’t want menus on menus on menus. Much like they’ve always done, the Germans over engineered ridiculously complex solutions to a problem that no body had.
That being said it’s a great car other that. It has one of the best interiors I’ve ever sat in, he’s averaging 40 MPG which is nuts for a 5,000 pound SUV, and it drives very well other than the numb steering. I’d consider a PHEV X3 if they sold one in the US but unfortunately they don’t anymore.
Their X5 is a 2019 so it’s not quite as much of a hellscape, but about all I know how to do on it is adjust the climate control. I’ve spent many hours behind the wheel of the thing and still have no clue how to connect my phone.
The Macans, I’m just as lost on. My dad likes having all the various readouts displayed, and probably uses the tech more than a lot of folks. My mom on the other hand, is happy if she can get Sirius XM, Bluetooth, and navigation. Beyond that she lets my dad set up and configure everything else. There’s just so many menus on top of menus, I never even know where to begin. I suppose you’d get used to them over time. I’m borrowing one of those cars for a week so I guess I’ll see how easy it is to live with.
Like you, I’m impressed by the X5’s interior, even though my parents have an older model. It’s a very nice place to be. Your dad averaging 40mpg is nuts though! I only hit 40mpg in my TDI on the highway so seeing those numbers on an SUV that weighs that much is impressive.
It’s a PHEV! That’s how he’s doing it lol. And bummer to hear about the Macans being so frustrating to interact with, a certified V6 one is definitely on my radar for next time.
The GTS is an absolute blast to drive, even the standard model is fun, but you definitely have to put your foot down more to motivate it. Everything the car journalists say about it somehow driving like a hot hatch is true. I do appreciate that they put some more common controls on the center console, around the shifter (which actually moves like an old mechanical linkage shifter does), though the buttons are capacitive touch. Think it’s things like drive mode settings, probably a bunch of stuff I’m forgetting, but I do know that a louder exhaust note gets its own special button.
Honestly, I complain a lot, but like a lot of these modern infotainment systems, it probably makes sense once you actually sit down to learn it and spend time interacting with it. It just seems incomprehensible to me because I spend most of my time driving my base model 2014 Sportwagen or my 1972 Super Beetle. You should definitely take a GTS out for a spin sometime!
They should let you play Battleship with the other parked EV’s.
That’s what the Mercedes EV did.
This is an underrated comment. To expand on it, it also shows why the strategy of clustering all your ships together in a bunch is a dangerous idea.
I’m not going down without a fight.
Proceeds to take out another 140 cars…
“FREEEEDOMMM!”
-that Mercedes as it burst into flames, probably.
That UNO game is going to be played maybe a handful of times in any one car and then quickly forgotten about.
Hey BMW, I’ve got an idea – put that game behind your subscription paywall and see how many people line up to pay for it. My guess is about as many people as times it would be played in any given car if it wasn’t behind the paywall.
Henry Ford supposedly once said if he’d asked people what they wanted, they’d have told him a faster horse, so he ignored the conventional wisdom and built the Model T. I just can’t see BMW being as successful with this endeavor though.
That Henry Ford quote gets trotted out by everyone with a bad idea who gets butthurt when someone tells them its a bad idea. The fact that Ford was right doesn’t mean anyone else is.
Exactly my point. BMW (and Mattel) dumped a lot of effort into this, and I just don’t see the return on investment. What I can’t figure out is why they thought this would be a good idea to start with.
But then again I feel the same way about the fee-based subscriptions for vehicle functionality – it’s a bad idea that I don’t see most people willing to pay for, but the entire industry seems to be enamored with the concept right now. I’d love to see the take rate on Onstar after the initial “free” trial period elapses. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’d be very surprised if it’s above low single digits.
I understand why companies want to make nonsense subscriptions happen though. I work for a company who makes most of its money on subscriptions, and that sweet, sweet recurring revenue makes our CFO very happy.
As a consumer I hate it because I can do the math on what it costs over the life of the car, but I see the benefit to the company. I don’t see the benefit to BMW here, unless Mattel paid them a nice, fat marketing fee to get their stuff in the car.
Just mirror my phone on the big screen to make it easier to do things. It doesn’t even need to be wireless if I can just plug it in and not touch the phone again until I park.
With that said, my current car just has bluetooth for music/phone and that really scratches 90% of the itch.
I could see this BMW gaming thing having some value if passengers in the back could play when you are on the road. Who just sits in the car and plays games? Disable it on the front screen if you are worried about the driver playing Uno while going 75 mph.
Hot take:
The Polestar 3 should also have tariffs.
tariffs are duties imposed on imports, it isn’t being imported, so it couldn’t have a tariff, by definition. Unless you mean some other special tax that would accomplish the same goal of making it prohibitively expensive so no one buys it
Basically, yes. Wrong word, but right concept.
Ooh, now I want a special tax on cars with insufficient physical controls. And a 200% tax if you use the word phygital in your marketing.
Connectivity that I actually use- an aux in audio jack to a 20ish year old ipod that people laugh at and call an antique. Years ago when the CD player in my old jeep died, I just replaced it with a motorcycle amplifier with an audio in cable, and usb charging ports, and that is perfect. I initially used the ipod over usb in the bolt, but quickly realized the car couldn’t play most of the songs, so hacked it back to a usb charging only adapter and an aux in cable to get it to work just like the jeep. Other than that, just usb charging ports that don’t need any data capability
After upgrading to an android auto vehicle it’s hard to see me going back at least in any vehicle I drove signficant distances and/or to unfamiliar areas.
One thing I would love to see added (and maybe it exists and I just don’t know) would be some weather information (radar, storm warning areas, etc) directly on the navigation map. Preferably in a way that it could be toggled off. seems like it would be easy enough for google or others to do, maybe they have a reason they don’t?
There are radar apps that you can use in AA, but they won’t display on the map. The CUE system in my old CTS would do it though and I thought it was rad.
Maybe a liability thing.
“The map didn’t say there would be black ice in my lane half way through the turn.”
Ford already brought back the Freelander, it’s called the Bronco Sport. I’m pretty certain Ford found the old panel molds laying around and just used them to design the Bronco Sport.
Using my fancy flashlight commonly referred to as a phone even though I almost never use it for such a thing as a music server is all. I’d rather go back to CDs than have anything more than that just like I’d go without airbags if having them means taking the rest of the “safety” crap they’re putting in, connected or not.
I think a limited and non-cloud-based connectivity would serve my needs best. Wireless phone mirroring (Carplay/Android Auto), and if an EV, the ability to connect to my home wifi for OTA updates and to enable bidirectional charging. Remote start shouldn’t have to involve the internet, either.
I really don’t want my car talking to anyone who isn’t me without my explicit permission.
If it doesn’t have Google Maps built in already, then I want CarPlay/AA. Being able to sign in with my Google account on the built in systems has been good and my phones turn to lava running CarPlay/AA anyway.
Sirius radio only.
UNO video card games? Come on. We got a pack of those as kids. Never even opened them…
We’ve got at least three different sets of Uno, all dog-eared, that get taken on nearly every holiday & camping trip.
It’s a simple game that we can play to pass the time together, and we do not care if the wind takes a few cards into the campfire/sea, someone spills their drinks on them, or get forgotten in a hotel room/airport/wherever.
Beyond charging a phone, I don’t need or want any connectivity.
For most, but not all, purposes I am in favor of the tires touching the road.
With all the cameras on cars they really should be used at a dash cam, and you can have local storage on a thumb drive in the gloved box. For electric I am fine with integrated streaming music, a couple of video options for when I am charging and sitting there on the rare occasion that happens. For ICE I just want Android Auto or Car Play and nothing else.
For EV fires. They burn longer and because many fire fighters are not trained to deal with them and how to attack them, they can be more of an issue. They take a lot of water but there are already alternatives to help. A giant blanket is one of those things. The other part is that battery chemistry is already changing, and you don’t see the same types of issues in other chemistries. Maybe the answer is to only allow those types? LFP has a much lower risk of thermal runaway.
Bluetooth for audio and phone calls obviously.
The other other feature I’d consider paying for is some kind of wireless diagnostic reader. Yes, I have the old school OBD2 connector, but I only have one for multiple cars. Far better if the car itself was able to send me both the code and its interpretation in plain English.
Taking this to the next level, it’d be nice for the car to just tell you the code it just popped, and possible reasons for why it did. They already know the answer, but hide it from you at the dealership.
You have to think the only reason we don’t have this is due to the dealers demanding that it is hidden. Yeah they can take it to Autozone for the code but nobody is going to do that.
I solved this with $12 obd2 bluetooth connectors from ebay. I use Torq pro on my phone and leave the obd connector in each car. I can connect my phone to any of them at my convenience.
The only vehicles that do this, at least I’ve ever experienced, are newer Indian bikes (and possibly Polaris ohv’s, as they use a similar system) that have the “Ride Command” infotainment system. You have to dig into the settings a bit, but if an error or check engine light is on, it will display standardized OBD codes right on the dash, with a plain English explanation of what it is. Of course, 99% of them the suggested fix is to “see dealer”, but apparently some benign ones it may suggest ensuring the gas cap is securely closed or a reminder that premium fuel is required if it thinks some minor user error is the issue.
I assume you realize there’s a very simple solution to that problem. 😛
I have one in each of my vehicles that can’t tell me the codes natively. It’s come in handy more than once, unfortunately.
Android Auto–it gives me good nav, hands-free calling, and music.
I like remote climate control, but can live without it.
I can see the benefit in a feature to locate the car, but I don’t use it.
That’s it. I don’t want to watch a movie in my car or play games. I don’t want my car suggesting where I go to buy things. And I definitely don’t want it tracking my driving for insurance purposes, even if my driving would give me better rates. It’s just not a trade I want to make.
Having google maps, PDR, and being able to stream music from my phone