Does a Mach e really use 3000 chips????

[watchdoc]

Hey everyone, first post, been lurking for awhile. Hoping to buy a Mach e for X plan pricing once the car buying insanity dies down. Ran across this article and was floored by this paragraph.

"The reason why the chip shortage is such a problem for the auto makers is because new cars need more chips. For some perspective, a Ford Focus uses roughly 300 semiconductor chips, but a Mach-e utilizes almost 3,000 semiconductor chips. In other words, the EV boom is exasperating the global semiconductor chips shortage."

chip shortage article

https://investorplace.com/2021/09/how-the-global-chip-shortage-is-affecting-the-ev-industry/

If this is true, where are all the extra chips? If you would have told me EV's use LESS chips than ICE vehicles, I would not have been surprised but this kinda floored me.

Sponsored

 

[i8iridium]

I absolutely believe that. I forgot how many modules are in the car, but it's easily double that of my 2017 explorer. As as small example, there's a computer module in each door just to roll down the windows and lock the door (among other things). Not to mention the amount of bluetooth modules throughout the vehicle for PAAK.

 

[physib]

Everything needs a chip. Your windshield wiper needs one. Your blinkers need one.

 

[CompilerBreak]

Well, each door is a button now instead of a handle, so there's 4, probably 4 more for the actuators....

3000 does seem high, but then again there's also some redundancy built in too.

 

[JSeis]

Millions of transistors on those chips.

 

[ChasingCoral]

Millions of transistors on those chips.

Millions of transistors on major chips (think module CPUs). Far fewer transistors on sensor and component (small) chips. The high number is all the small chips.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

The attached image is a grab from the Munro Live team's tear-down of the (rear, if I remember correctly) motor on the Mach-E.

The top board is only one of several that helps to control the motor. And there are dozens of similar control boards with different purposes all over the vehicle.

Essentially every black object on this board is a "chip" in the sense being used by the press. I estimate that there are around 100-150 "chips" on this side of the board; the board has two sides with chips on both sides as does the one below it, and these aren't the only two control boards for the motor. There may be fewer "chips" on the other side; I didn't get a good look at it. My guess is that each of the motors has around 500 "chips" in them alone. Yes, some of the objects on the board are as simple as a transistor or a resistor, but their manufacture has to happen and the factories that build these things have been struggling to keep up with demand.

The automotive industry is a pretty small player in the world of electronics compared with consumer electronics and other industries. The small, general "chips" are the ones the automotive industry is struggling to get ahold of because they're common across almost all industries. You'll see in the press many automotive execs are complaining that a, "five cent part is stopping us from building a fifty thousand dollar vehicle." The "five cent parts" are needed in a thousand or two or more places on some of these vehicles.

 

[Motomax]

Half of those are probably in the battery pack and charging components.

 

[trutolife27]

Let's just say the chips the auto industry use, are not sold by weight and are half full of air like a bag of lays. Oh and yes they use a lot but there are different kinds of chips like coral said and certain ones are the shortage more than others.

 

[voxel]

If this is true, where are all the extra chips? If you would have told me EV's use LESS chips than ICE vehicles, I would not have been surprised but this kinda floored me.

I would have thought the complete opposite. To control these 3-phase DC motors you need complicated speed controllers (they fire magnets off and on causing the rotor to spin) and then you have electronics/chips for the battery control modules.

I'm amazed the electronics to handle the 400V @ ??? amps doesn't explode in a giant fireball. It's impressive engineering.

Sponsored