> Were I them, I would worry a lot about battery wear-and-tear, undeclared damage, and even internal component substitution.
A car battery can definitely carry its own anti tamper mechanism and an LTE modem to report issues. Besides... a car battery isn't actually worth 15k$ to a thief. Not much to part out (PCBs are custom, casing ain't gonna fetch much in terms of scrap metal, and there's not much of a market for used li-ion 18650's with the exception of ecig hobbyists so swapping them out for lower quality isn't worth the effort), if it's an exclusively rent model there is no market for a stolen pack.
Wear and tear also isn't that much of an issue as Tesla proved.
Have you seen how much they go for on ebay? Buying tesla battery packs is pretty big in the off-grid solar market since they're 24v and store a lot of juice.
People steal manhole covers for the scrap value of 40$ and you think a battery pack that can be disassembled and turned into an off-grid system would be safe? I give it a year before people start swapping cells for bricks of equal weights in part of the pack or sell firmware flashing kits on AliExpress.
This always fascinates me. The fact that a manhole cover has a scrap value means that there is someone actually buying manhole covers and melting them for metal.
Scrap metal merchants. They buy scrap cars, girders from old buildings, household metal waste, manufacturing offcuts, and any other waste metal. They sell it on to a steelworks.
They usually weigh your truck, unload it, weigh it again and pay you the difference. They often won't see what they're buying, as long as it's magnetic.
A car battery can definitely carry its own anti tamper mechanism and an LTE modem to report issues. Besides... a car battery isn't actually worth 15k$ to a thief. Not much to part out (PCBs are custom, casing ain't gonna fetch much in terms of scrap metal, and there's not much of a market for used li-ion 18650's with the exception of ecig hobbyists so swapping them out for lower quality isn't worth the effort), if it's an exclusively rent model there is no market for a stolen pack.
Wear and tear also isn't that much of an issue as Tesla proved.