There's a middle ground between "no right to repair" and "you can legally modify volatile Lithium battery packs in a multi-tenant building".
NYC has had over a dozen e-bike related fire deaths year to date, almost entirely killing bystanders. One guy was modifying battery packs in his kitchen, ran out the front door with his arms on fire and his whole family burned to death. A shop in Chinatown was letting dozens of customers charger their batteries overnight in the store and the fire killed tenants upstairs.
So we obviously need right to repair on electronics, but people questioning if we need carve outs for things like battery packs are not Unabomber luddites.
I have some home power tools that use lithium battery packs and they are extremely rugged and overpackaged for safety reasons compared to what I see on these e-bikes. That may be another avenue of regulation is simple minimum standards to thermal runaway resistance and containment in consumer grade lithium battery packs.
> A shop in Chinatown was letting dozens of customers charger their batteries overnight in the store and the fire killed tenants upstairs.
And this bit even has nothing to do with right to repair! People will do stupid shit that puts innocent bystanders at risk. That's just life. We should put into place measures that disincentivize that sort of behavior, of course. But giving companies a pass to make hermetically-sealed, unrepairable garbage is not how to do that. Ensuring that customers have detailed documentation and access to affordable, well-made parts so they have the ability and understanding of how to safely do repairs would be a good start.
NYC has had over a dozen e-bike related fire deaths year to date, almost entirely killing bystanders. One guy was modifying battery packs in his kitchen, ran out the front door with his arms on fire and his whole family burned to death. A shop in Chinatown was letting dozens of customers charger their batteries overnight in the store and the fire killed tenants upstairs.
So we obviously need right to repair on electronics, but people questioning if we need carve outs for things like battery packs are not Unabomber luddites.
I have some home power tools that use lithium battery packs and they are extremely rugged and overpackaged for safety reasons compared to what I see on these e-bikes. That may be another avenue of regulation is simple minimum standards to thermal runaway resistance and containment in consumer grade lithium battery packs.