Since 2011, I've not spend a dime on my Karma maintenance. I bought it from Frank Kent in Ft. Worth, Texas and they have honored the warranty all along. I've had a free loaner car when it's been in for service. I've been one lucky dude.
@ebaybrad: The common problem areas (Battery modules, RDM, Motors, ECU) are fairly well known and understood and the cost for repairing them is well quantified at this point. The only real issue is availability of the parts and proximity to qualified repair facilities. With your proximity to @FiskerPhilly, you have the best chance of getting parts and skilled labor. The cost of repairing the major stuff generally ranges from a couple of thousand to $25K for a new battery. I am not sure if that ranks as huge, but it is pretty significant. By having the car properly inspected before buying, you can significantly reduce the likelihood of a major issue popping up, but there is no 100% assurance, so there is always some risk. The best you can do is to mitigate the risk by a proper pre-purchase inspection, including a review of what has already been done.This car is not for the faint of heart. If you're a nervous type or a worry wart then just buy a new Honda.
Thank You for the reply. I am assuming by your comment that you mean this despite the car having had all of the upgrades and already the RDM/motors/battery/ etc. as well?
The inconvienience of the dealer, I can deal with. It is not going to be my primary car. I am in Metro New York, so I would be using the Philadelphia center. However, parts unavailablility would be quite annoying if they were unavailable completely. I have owned many exotics and am used to having to wait sometimes.
I really love the car... I am just trying to see if it will be a bottomless pit despite all the upgrades. I am also aware of the niggly problems and fit and finish comparatively to other high end exotics. I really just don;t like getting HUGE repair bills. I am making that statement after owning several F cars, which I consider big bills, but not huge.
thanks for the input
I have my car run out both keep driver it (on highway can't find the gas station)I feel when I stop by the gas station in last second the car was crawl .but after I put gas in and drove a while itself charge up to 15% battery nothing wrong is that danger can cause problem ?Run out of gas and keep going or ICE misfire and shutdown and keep going. Either case switched back to EV indefinitely until car literally creeps to a slow crawl and out of energy msg.
then it sat for 6 months in his driveway cause he couldn't find anyone to fix it (he obviously wasn't aware of buzz)![]()
I thought the chattering/crawl noise was just a normal part of the car and as such Fisker said it didn't need to be addressed?Oh wow! I've won the distinction of being the owner who has paid the most to repair their Karma. Lucky me!!
I have a very late production Laguna. I bought it new, off the showroom floor in October 2012. I had a few, small repairs made by the dealer at no cost to me before Fisker Santa Monica basically told all their customers to piss off because Fisker Automotive had abandoned them.
Shortly afterward, I met Lormax. He came over to give my car an inspection. We decided to go ahead and loctite the RDM to prevent the infamous chattering/creaking noise when at a crawl in traffic. That cost about $3,000 as I recall.
It was a few months later, with no support from Fisker Automotive or my dealer, Fisker Santa Monica (owned by Mike Sullivan, aka 'LA Car Guy', who refused to honor the warranty they'd promised when selling the car), when my Check Engine Light suddenly illuminated. I happened to have an appointment with Lormax to check out some minor issues, so I asked him to diagnose the problem. He hooked his computer up to my Karma and went to work. Then, with a look on his face akin to that of a doctor giving a patient a diagnosis of a terminal illness, Lormax looked at me and said "This is about as bad as it gets." I had a bad module in my battery.
Lormax was able to find a new battery, owned by another member of this board, that had never been removed from the original shipping crate. I bought it for, as I recall, $22,500. After Lormax removed the bad battery and installed the new battery, I was out of pocket (just for battery issues) about $26,000.
Since then, the car has been rock solid. No repairs except for an oil change at 5,000 miles. At 10,000 miles today, I have still have the original tires, though I'm considering replacing them soon.
Total spent to date on repairs to my Karma comes to about $30,000.
Would I do it again? You bet I would. I love the Karma. But I'd drive a much, much, much, much, MUCH harder bargain with the dealer. In other words, if you can pick up a new or low mileage Karma in the '60s, I think you'd be getting a good deal.
I think what other people in this thread have written is a fair assessment of the fit and finish of the car. The interior of my Karma has numerous squeaks and rattles that never plagued my BMW 3 or 5 series cars. That's inexcusable in a car of this class. However, I have the 'vegan' Eco Chic interior with the Alcantara Eco Suede fabric. That upholstery makes it--by far--the most comfortable car I've ever driven.
I notice you say you are in Metro New York. I assume that means you live outside Manhattan? I ask because I would never, *ever* want to drive a Karma in Manhattan--certainly not as a daily driver. The car is so wide, the wheelbase so long, those fenders so swoopy that it is all too often difficult to gauge where your Karma ends and where the car in the next lane begins. Maneuvering through tight spots or negotiating a sharp turn is really just one great big exercise in controlling your anxiety. If you live in the 'burbs or a sprawling car friendly city like LA (where I live), the Karma makes sense. If you live in an older, crowded, urban city with narrow streets and not built with cars in mind, such as Manhattan, San Francisco, DC, Boston(?), etc...,I'd tell you to be really, really sure you want the car before you commit. It's a beast to drive. But it's also among the most beautiful cars on the road.
I think the theory is that the noise must be capable of causing damage, therefore it makes sense to do the repair, but I don't know if anyone knows for sure that the noise would cause mechanical problems. I went ahead with the repair simply because the noise was so annoying that it drove me up the freaking wall.I thought the chattering/crawl noise was just a normal part of the car and as such Fisker said it didn't need to be addressed?
Does the crawl noise really mean anything? saw in another thread an owner had this noise at 500 miles and still has it without repair at 20000 miles
Confused as to what the loctite does if anything other than stopping the chattering noise does it stop the RDM or motors from going bad?
I 've had this noise for quite awhile now and it only seems to happen when pulling up the slight hill in my driveway and at no other time. I'm not really concerned about it for that reason.