Tesla Recalls Roughly 135,000 Vehicles Over Touchscreen Failures (cnn.com) 36
After being asked by the NHTSA, Tesla is recalling 135,000 Model S and Model X vehicles because their large center touchscreens can fail. "The recall applies to some 2012 through 2018 Model S and 2016 through 2018 Model X vehicles," notes CNN. From the report: Under the recall, which will begin on March 30, Tesla must notify owners of cars with the failure-prone touchscreens and replace a computer chip that controls the screen. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) considers this a safety issue because without a functioning center screen, drivers lose the display for the car's backup camera and controls for the window defroster and defogger. Even in its correspondence with NHTSA agreeing to the recall, Tesla noted that it was aware of no crashes related to the problem and said the vehicles could still be safely operated without the screen.
Thus far, Tesla has been charging customers to upgrade or replace the screens, but the costs of official recall repairs are supposed to be absorbed by the vehicle manufacturer. Tesla said in its letter to NHTSA that it will make the recall repairs for free and will offer a discount on upgraded screen hardware. Tesla is also required to regularly report to NHTSA on its progress in repairing all 135,000 touchscreens. Automakers face fines for not repairing recalled vehicles quickly enough.
Thus far, Tesla has been charging customers to upgrade or replace the screens, but the costs of official recall repairs are supposed to be absorbed by the vehicle manufacturer. Tesla said in its letter to NHTSA that it will make the recall repairs for free and will offer a discount on upgraded screen hardware. Tesla is also required to regularly report to NHTSA on its progress in repairing all 135,000 touchscreens. Automakers face fines for not repairing recalled vehicles quickly enough.
If Elon wasn't such a knob (Score:5, Funny)
he would give us knobs.
Or at it (Score:2)
> Better not look under the shiny paint.
Or look *at* the paint.
Elon wasn't kidding when he said trying to scale to significant production numbers has been quality control "hell" for Tesla. Building a major automaker from nothing ain't easy.
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What Tesla has achieved is nothing short of incredible.
Everyone said making a decent electric car was impossible and nobody wanted one. So they made the Roadster. It was amazing. Everyone wanted one.
Everyone said you couldn't make a higher volume car. So they made the Model S
Everyone said that'll never work without chargers. So they build superchargers all over the world.
Everyone said you couldn't make another one that would sell. So they made the Model Y
Everyone said you couldn't make a really high volume
Re: Or at it (Score:1)
How many times did you cum, while writing that?
More or less times than when you gobbled ALL the Kool-Aid?
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The fact that they've built a small car maker from nothing is amazing indeed. Here's an interview published yesterday in which Elon talks about all the quality control problems they've been having, including shipping out cars before the paint is dry, so it ends up with a really crappy paint job:
https://jalopnik.com/in-epical... [jalopnik.com]
Re:Or at it (Score:4, Informative)
And here's the actual interview [youtube.com], rather than Jalopnik's take. And no, it was not "shipping cars out" before the paint is dry; it was that during an increase in line speed at one point near the end of last year, cars moved through the paint shop 1-2 minutes faster (and onto GA, paint is not the last step before shipping), and it turned out that that increased the likelihood of the new paint being damaged in GA. The problem was fixed in December (Musk didn't state how, but I assume they now stage the cars for 1-2 minutes before moving into GA).
Also in terms of bad reporting:
The number of cars that have experienced flash errors has been very low. There would be a lot more right now, except that Tesla reduced the logging rate on the flash by an order of magnitude via an OTA update after the issue came out (it was mostly useless OS logs), and there have been few flash failures since then.
All flash devices will fail eventually, but the goal is to extend that time to well beyond the useful life of the product. Past damage can't be undone, of course, so some people who already happened to be right near their write limits before the OTA update might eventually still go over them (the car monitors for and reports flash errors). The issue has never been related to MCU2, which has a far larger, longer-write-life eMMC (MCU2 was introduced in 2017 in Model 3 and spring of 2018 in S/X).
eMMC flash, not "a computer chip that controls the screen". It should be noted that eMMC memory is quite common in automotive components in general today. The problem was that the design constraints for how much data would be written to it turned out to be very different from how much data was being written in the real world.
Tesla has never charged anyone who has had a flash failure. If you want to go from the old MCU (MCU1) to the newer MCU (MCU2) with a faster processor and better graphics (something that many owners had been wanting to do and which Tesla finally started offering as a service in... early 2020 if I remember right), without an eMMC failure, yes you could get that as a paid upgrade. But if you've actually had a eMMC failure, Tesla replaces it (with another MCU1, unless unavailable) for free.
Note that Tesla is now moving on to MCU3. It's unknown how much storage it has, but given that it can play modern games like Witcher 3, it's clearly not small.
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Tesla has never charged anyone who has had a flash failure. If you want to go from the old MCU (MCU1) to the newer MCU (MCU2) with a faster processor and better graphics (something that many owners had been wanting to do and which Tesla finally started offering as a service in... early 2020 if I remember right), without an eMMC failure, yes you could get that as a paid upgrade. But if you've actually had a eMMC failure, Tesla replaces it (with another MCU1, unless unavailable) for free.
And if they don't have another MCU1, your options are to wait until future notice for them to get one and have it repaired, or pay for a MCU2.
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Reference to anyone being made to wait for anything more than a "typical wait for spare parts delay"?
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I think Tesla hacker Jason Hughes would take issue with how you characterize the eMMC flash failures.
TBH the fact that this ever happened should be embarrassing for Tesla and they should *NOT* be allowed to claim this is a VOLUNTARY recall
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Not only do they do not have the batteries but they're all fighting for the same limited supply that Panasonic, Samsung and others are producing.
Which means that soon, Tesla's major income could be from selling their 4680 batteries to other carmakers.
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Not only do they do not have the batteries but they're all fighting for the same limited supply that Panasonic, Samsung and others are producing.
Which means that soon, Tesla's major income could be from selling their 4680 batteries to other carmakers.
Tesla put themselves in a trap years ago, by going with a single format for all their products and just 2 chemistries with tweaks. It means they're and for quite some time will be, forced to choose which products get batteries on what schedule.
Despite their revenue and stratospheric stock price, they need more, more, more cash and having to split 2170 batteries between Model 3 / Y, PowerWall, PowerPack & MegaPack, means there's always energy storage customers waiting when Tesla has their quarterly mad r
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costs of official recall repairs are supposed? (Score:2)
costs of official recall repairs are supposed? but not forced by law??
Just wait for the apple car
Recall repair with apple care $299 without $999
Re:costs of official recall repairs are supposed? (Score:5, Funny)
> Just wait for the apple car
> Recall repair with apple care $299 without $999
Here you go, buddy, you dropped these: 0 0
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People forget the early days of Tesla cars, when repairs to the Model S and Model X for bodywork damage amounted to tens of thousands of dollars.
There were several issues compounding the problem. Parts availability was poor, few places could work on Teslas even for bodywork, parts were expensive and customers expected the repairs to be better than factory due to the factory not being able to properly align panels or fit trim.
That all caused massive delays too, which meant large rental fees for people who ex
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...Practically new cars were being written off as beyond economical repair.
Underneath that fancy painted shell is still a viable car. A nice electric car.
If I smashed up a Tesla and my insurance company did that, I'd rip all the body panels off, forget about lane sensor shit, and convert it to an off-road buggy or something. Would make a hell of a fun golf cart.
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People do repair write-offs, problem is Tesla cripples them remotely. Disables all the optional features, and most importantly disables all rapid charging. Not just on Tesla chargers, on all chargers.
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People do repair write-offs, problem is Tesla cripples them remotely. Disables all the optional features, and most importantly disables all rapid charging. Not just on Tesla chargers, on all chargers.
Quite frankly, unless Tesla is taking ownership and responsibility for completely recycling the car they just bricked, this kind of shit should probably be illegal for environmental reasons alone.
So let me get this right... (Score:1)
The recall is because Tesla used unfit flash memory components that fail too quickly and then cause safety issues because the rear view cameras and other safety-related devices can no longer function. Somehow they think that their customers should be paying for the replacement hardware to fix all of the problems? And "oh, it's ok, we charge them a discounted rate" is acceptable?
Geez, Louise, I hope the government sues the crap out of them for this kind of behavior. This should not be a precedent for all aut
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I'd like to point out to all Tesla owners: if your vehicle is affected by this problem then it's no longer roadworthy and you're not allowed to be driving it on public roads. Doesn't matter whether it causes an accident or not, there are minimum functional requirements for a roadworthy certification.
Yes, and in most states, it's pass a smog test; a standard Tesla will have no problem meeting.
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I'd like to point out to all Tesla owners: if your vehicle is affected by this problem then it's no longer roadworthy and you're not allowed to be driving it on public roads. Doesn't matter whether it causes an accident or not, there are minimum functional requirements for a roadworthy certification.
Yes, but they don't include "rear facing camera works" in the USA.
Recall Logistics? (Score:1)
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Tesla's gimmick is low maintenance, so they can sell 1 million vehicles without needing a large servicing network. But what happens when 1000 owners all send their car back to the one dealer in their state all at the same time?
They discover putting a deposit down and waiting a year to get your car was simply an ongoing part of the Tesla experience.
Wow.. What a terrible article. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Wow.. What a terrible article. (Score:4, Informative)
It's close enough. The flash memory chip belongs to the computer that drives the touchscren. It contains the software that the computer runs, and thus is a computer chip that controls the screen.
When the flash wears out, it generally destroys the other data on the same chip (wear leveling behavior, as well as general frailties of NAND memory). When we were designing equipment, if we stored media data, it would go on a separate chip for that reason - so we wouldn't wear out the main chip which would render the entire unit useless.
And the real problem is that several safety elements are tied to that touch screen - the front and rear defoggers, for example. If the windshield or rear window fogs up, that's a safety problem if you can't see where you're going. That's why the NHTSA was forcing a recall - screen failure was impacting safety functions.
One could also argue failure of the screen means you lose the speedometer as well, but that's less of a safety issue - you don't need to know your exact speed - other than speeding tickets.
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It's just a shame that Tesla had to be forced to do this, kicking and screaming. There are lots of less serious faults that they won't address either, like the screen yellowing.
They sure are failures! (Score:2)
Touchscreens, I mean.
In general.
All of them.
seriously? (Score:1)