wiztecy
Active Member
You have to be stuck in this 'wedged' VMS state to experience it. I do recall my alarm became active and beeping somewhere between the VMS crashing and the reboot.
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12v dead? Can't start car.
- Thread starter MileHighMotoring
- Start date
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- Tags
- Roadster
You have to be stuck in this 'wedged' VMS state to experience it. I do recall my alarm became active and beeping somewhere between the VMS crashing and the reboot.
I was caught with a similar communication error (communication error - contact service center) today in my 2.0. Car was charged, disconnected charger, started car, after communication error was posted, VDS was blank as was all visible electronics. The only items functioning were the circulating pump and the gear selector button back-lights. VDS was unresponsive. I have been reading TMC for a couple of years, so I went to charge port door reset first. Three or four charge port door open-close cycles enabled a reset. In my particular case I didn't need the VMS reset, thankfully. The first start afterwards put the headlights on although the switch was off. Then the headlights went off automatically. Very strange experience. If it wasn't for this forum, I would be at the service center. Great community!
Hi, I'm new here, and discovered this thread while preparing for a meeting with a Tesla Service centre in Belgium.
Here's the story:
I use my Roadster 2.5 as daily driver and covered about 95000 km (approx 60k miles) by now, and I have always been very pleased with it.I was one of the first 10-15 to buy a Tesla in Belgium.
Every night when I come home I plug it in, so by the morning the battery is always full. The on-board computer still gave me 280 km "ideal range", so I've lost not even 10% in 5 years, which is pretty good I think. (was 305 km when it was new)
That day I've only done 30-40 km, so when I left it in the garage that night, it still must have had 45-50kW charge in the battery.
The following morning however I could not get in the car with the key, not even by putting the key in the hole below the door. However the interior light was lit (even with the doors closed) and fans were running.
After a few phone calls to Tesla, where I got some useless advise (wiggle the key, it must be dirty...), they proposed to have it towed to Tesla.
For that I needed to get in, which I managed through the roof. Inside on the board computer was the message "VMS VDS comms fault".
The car itself did not do anything. No sound, no lights, instruments down, nothing. I coudn't get in in "Tow mode" so that would getting it to the service centre difficult.
It took some organising, since the car was in my garage which can only be reached through a narrow corridor, so it could not be towed out the normal way. I am a member of a recovery service, and I used them rather than Tesla recovery, since beïng a member it's free.(Tesla did propose to tow it for 500 Euro (approx $600) for a 40km distance (approx 25 miles) + extra cost for getting it out of my garage).
Anyway the car finally got to Tesla.
I did not hear much from them, except for a mail that the car had been arrived in the workshop and after 2 weeks a phonecall that they were waiting for "tooling to come from Holland".
After 5 weeks (I am a rather patient man and do not want to disturb people unnecessary) however I decided to send an e-mail asking how it was going.
I sent the mail at night on the 26th of April, and got a reply on the 27th in the morning that the diagnosis was completed the day before (....).
Anyway, the diagnosis was that the battery was completely discharged and discharged to that extend that it can not be recharged again and needs to be replaced.That was the diagnosis of Tesla after 5 weeks and 15hrs of labour charged (??!!). I contacted my insurance company (since disputes with garages are covered by my insurace). The inspector of the insurance contacted Tesla but and was told: "Battery is gone ("something internally went wrong"), car is no longer under warranty and customer does not want to pay for a new battery". He came back with that message to me and wanted to close the case as far as he was concerned. I contacted him with my objections and open questions (see below) that no one at Tesla Belgium had answered yet. I'm not unsportive and accept that if the battery was indeed dead, I have had bad luck and would just "swallow it through", but things don't add up in my mind. So he continued his work and now has set up a meeting with the service centre (for which I'm now preparing).
Now I am not completely unaware of mechanics and electrics (I have a mechanics degree, and I own a company building race-cars), therefor I have some difficulties getting my head around this:
1. I am very sure that before it stopped the battery was 85-90% full. Now that's a lot of energy in the battery, and before 45-50 kw discharges itself that would surely take more than 1 night (and more than 5 weeks for that matter). If it would discharge in such a short amount of time a lot of energy would need to go into another form, like heat (fire).
2. The battery has been performing perfectly untill the car "died on me". It does not seem logic that it suddenly "goes" without any warning nor damage e.g. by a rock, or so. Wouldn't one expect it to fade away, then just stop?
3. The communication on the computer did not say "battery empty" or something of that nature, but it said something of a communication fault. When I asked about the meaning of "VMS VDS comms fault" no one at Tesla could give me an answe. If they knew, they could have advised me to open en close the charger lid, as I have read here (unfortunately only now)
4. I think LiPo batteries are guarded by the BMS, which does not allow discharge under a certain voltage.
5. If the diagnosis would be correct (battery discharged) I would immagine this could be measured in a few minutes time without special "Tooling from Holland" If I work out how many hours it took to check the battery, deducting from the invoice they have send me for the work, it works out 15 hours (for checking the battery charge??)
At this point I'm not going to speculate at what may have happened during the 5 weeks the car was in the workshop, but for all of the above reasons, I think that some answers need to be give before the battery would be replaced.
PS1: I wrote Tesla technical department in the US. They replayed (automated) the would get back to me within 24h. They never did...
PS2: Please note the car is in the workshop since March 2016!!
Can you please share your thoughts with me on this?
Thanks,
Eric
Here's the story:
I use my Roadster 2.5 as daily driver and covered about 95000 km (approx 60k miles) by now, and I have always been very pleased with it.I was one of the first 10-15 to buy a Tesla in Belgium.
Every night when I come home I plug it in, so by the morning the battery is always full. The on-board computer still gave me 280 km "ideal range", so I've lost not even 10% in 5 years, which is pretty good I think. (was 305 km when it was new)
That day I've only done 30-40 km, so when I left it in the garage that night, it still must have had 45-50kW charge in the battery.
The following morning however I could not get in the car with the key, not even by putting the key in the hole below the door. However the interior light was lit (even with the doors closed) and fans were running.
After a few phone calls to Tesla, where I got some useless advise (wiggle the key, it must be dirty...), they proposed to have it towed to Tesla.
For that I needed to get in, which I managed through the roof. Inside on the board computer was the message "VMS VDS comms fault".
The car itself did not do anything. No sound, no lights, instruments down, nothing. I coudn't get in in "Tow mode" so that would getting it to the service centre difficult.
It took some organising, since the car was in my garage which can only be reached through a narrow corridor, so it could not be towed out the normal way. I am a member of a recovery service, and I used them rather than Tesla recovery, since beïng a member it's free.(Tesla did propose to tow it for 500 Euro (approx $600) for a 40km distance (approx 25 miles) + extra cost for getting it out of my garage).
Anyway the car finally got to Tesla.
I did not hear much from them, except for a mail that the car had been arrived in the workshop and after 2 weeks a phonecall that they were waiting for "tooling to come from Holland".
After 5 weeks (I am a rather patient man and do not want to disturb people unnecessary) however I decided to send an e-mail asking how it was going.
I sent the mail at night on the 26th of April, and got a reply on the 27th in the morning that the diagnosis was completed the day before (....).
Anyway, the diagnosis was that the battery was completely discharged and discharged to that extend that it can not be recharged again and needs to be replaced.That was the diagnosis of Tesla after 5 weeks and 15hrs of labour charged (??!!). I contacted my insurance company (since disputes with garages are covered by my insurace). The inspector of the insurance contacted Tesla but and was told: "Battery is gone ("something internally went wrong"), car is no longer under warranty and customer does not want to pay for a new battery". He came back with that message to me and wanted to close the case as far as he was concerned. I contacted him with my objections and open questions (see below) that no one at Tesla Belgium had answered yet. I'm not unsportive and accept that if the battery was indeed dead, I have had bad luck and would just "swallow it through", but things don't add up in my mind. So he continued his work and now has set up a meeting with the service centre (for which I'm now preparing).
Now I am not completely unaware of mechanics and electrics (I have a mechanics degree, and I own a company building race-cars), therefor I have some difficulties getting my head around this:
1. I am very sure that before it stopped the battery was 85-90% full. Now that's a lot of energy in the battery, and before 45-50 kw discharges itself that would surely take more than 1 night (and more than 5 weeks for that matter). If it would discharge in such a short amount of time a lot of energy would need to go into another form, like heat (fire).
2. The battery has been performing perfectly untill the car "died on me". It does not seem logic that it suddenly "goes" without any warning nor damage e.g. by a rock, or so. Wouldn't one expect it to fade away, then just stop?
3. The communication on the computer did not say "battery empty" or something of that nature, but it said something of a communication fault. When I asked about the meaning of "VMS VDS comms fault" no one at Tesla could give me an answe. If they knew, they could have advised me to open en close the charger lid, as I have read here (unfortunately only now)
4. I think LiPo batteries are guarded by the BMS, which does not allow discharge under a certain voltage.
5. If the diagnosis would be correct (battery discharged) I would immagine this could be measured in a few minutes time without special "Tooling from Holland" If I work out how many hours it took to check the battery, deducting from the invoice they have send me for the work, it works out 15 hours (for checking the battery charge??)
At this point I'm not going to speculate at what may have happened during the 5 weeks the car was in the workshop, but for all of the above reasons, I think that some answers need to be give before the battery would be replaced.
PS1: I wrote Tesla technical department in the US. They replayed (automated) the would get back to me within 24h. They never did...
PS2: Please note the car is in the workshop since March 2016!!
Can you please share your thoughts with me on this?
Thanks,
Eric
It sounds like an internal ESS (battery) problem, either a fuse or board inside. The cells themselves were probably still charged and OK back in April, but after sitting 9 months they are probably too low to charge, unless the service disconnect plug was removed. Tesla only replaces the entire ESS, even if it is only a blown fuse inside, so that would be their only solution.
I would check the underside of the ESS for damage just to be sure you didn't run over something that would actually cause a discharged ESS. I assume Tesla would have checked the wiring to the ESS for damage (mice?) and also the inertia switch status before determining the ESS is bad, but it sounds like they are not very familiar with the Roadster.
At this point, you are probably stuck with getting a new ESS, or trying to find someone other than Tesla that can remove the ESS to repair and recharge it.
I would check the underside of the ESS for damage just to be sure you didn't run over something that would actually cause a discharged ESS. I assume Tesla would have checked the wiring to the ESS for damage (mice?) and also the inertia switch status before determining the ESS is bad, but it sounds like they are not very familiar with the Roadster.
At this point, you are probably stuck with getting a new ESS, or trying to find someone other than Tesla that can remove the ESS to repair and recharge it.
So, another thought on what might have happened (just throwing this out there...). Perhaps the VDS or main CPU simply crashed or got stuck in a loop, leaving the pump and other stuff running. If so, the "fix" would have been to simply reboot the works (I think either flipping the charge port door a bunch of times, or maybe you'd need to unplug and re-plug the computer cable). I would have hoped that the Service guys would have taken action to protect it, but perhaps with all the delays getting their act together, the constant drain drew the pack down to where it got bricked. A reasonably charged ESS would have easily lasted for day or days in this situation, but certainly not weeks / months. So, perhaps the ESS was just fine when it got to the SC, but by the time they got to it, it was too late?
Starting point: You need the logs from the car. That would show battery state before the event, and what was done. Perhaps the insurance inspector can work with you to get that.
The timeline you provided is certainly suspicious. I think you need to be able to prove the battery level when you gave the car to Tesla service. The logs will tell you that.
The timeline you provided is certainly suspicious. I think you need to be able to prove the battery level when you gave the car to Tesla service. The logs will tell you that.
ElectricLove
Member
I can probably help you, I'll PM you and see if I can teach you how to fix this yourself! And we should be able to figure out a solution to tesla giving you the run around... But honestly, nearly everyone in their service network is completely clueless about these vehicles... They know how to replace parts, so that's what they are advising, they just assume nobody cares enough to question that philosophy and we will all just suck it up and pay $30K when a fuse blows or a comm connection comes loose...
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