They do, and it's available in some parts of Europe too (Nio is the brand). However, the battery is rented rather than owned, and it's expensive. 169 Euro per month to rent the 75 kWh battery ($200/month), or 289 Euro per month to rent the 100 kWh battery ($335/month).
Interesting. I wondered who owned all the batteries. Even if the vehicle owner owned 1 battery, someone would have to own the pool of spares so that there could be a freshly charged battery to swap in to your car. I suspect this set-up had a lot more appeal when DC fast charging was 50 kWh. Now that the slower DC fast charging stations are 250 kWh I suspect faster trip times would be had with cars that have to be charged versus cars that had battery swaps. You would only have a 100 second swap in the case of no line.
$335 is around 3,300 miles in a 30 MPG ICEV.
Battery packs are rebuildable/replaceable. "Non-serviceable" and language to that ilk are only there to say its not easy for the average consumer or cost efficient for the original company that makes the product. Or its designed in such a way as to discourage servicing. How do I know? Because I can build/rebuild them. Its just chemistry and electrical circuits, not magic.
Not so true. That ECU I just rebuilt was from my 2008 Corolla and they released an updated ROM image for the 1ZZ-FE motor to address the running and shifting issues they developed as the miles racked up. Ive got a similar story for my Mercedes and BMW vehicles (those get fairly regular updates). Since cars got brains they've been getting updates to improve their performance. Ask any VW/Audi Diesel owner about software if you want to open a can of worms.
Ducati regularly uses the engine as an "integral part of the chassis [frame]" and its still "replaceable"; you just remove the rest of the motorcycle from it and then work on it.
