3G internet connection drops on Model S

[scottm]

Check your energy saving mode under 'displays', and the always connected button.

energy saving off
always connected on

..gives best results for staying connected

When I put energy savings on, I don't get internet for the first 10 minutes of every drive.

I resist the instinct to reboot while internet is not happening, that seems to just prolong lack of connectivity.

Visualize this: the 3G connection system is run by an old man sitting in a room with a rolodex who has to find out if you're a good paying customer first, each time you try to connect. If you're good he flicks on the internet switch for you at AT&T. If you're in Canada, like me, there's another old man at mission command center of the roaming partner network who makes a long distance phone call (yes, black rotary dial phone) to the man in USA with the rolodex. IF they agree, they make a border connection for internet. And only then do my maps start to fill in the checker board pattern of missing tiles. Sometimes, the old men chat for a while and forget to flick on the switches until after they hang up.

Also, they keep 3G speeds down on purpose, so a fleet of people with good vision sitting at mission command can watch what is flowing to each and every car to make sure it's on the up and up. It's an early form of deep packet inspection.

I'm happy to be providing this employment to several people, who would otherwise be out of a job.

 

[pimp-boy]

@Seattle / Yea.. rebooted maybe 5-6 times in hopes that is all it takes, but no go unfortunately.

@bigdomer / Did you have intermittent connections or was it never able to really connect and work? My end of the warranty is coming up and concerned I need to get it done if this is the case.

@pimp-boy (kind of hate to write that) have you rebooted the console computer since your updates? That's about all you can do easily.

 

[0Q991]

I just picked up my 70D on Friday. Now i have no 3G connection. Can anyone instruct me how to "reboot?" Or should I go to the SC?

Btw, I do have an ATT Microcell at home.

 

[ualdriver]

I just picked up my 70D on Friday. Now i have no 3G connection. Can anyone instruct me how to "reboot?" Or should I go to the SC?

Btw, I do have an ATT Microcell at home.

Just hold the wheels in on both sides of the steering wheel at the same time until the screens start to reboot.

 

[0Q991]

Just hold the wheels in on both sides of the steering wheel at the same time until the screens start to reboot.

Thanks--worked perfectly. I have an ATT Microcell at home and I read that might create a weird tethering issue when the car is in the garage. Turned BT on phone off approaching the house and then on again leaving the house and have had no issues since. Hoping this bug is fixed, so won't have to remember to do that...

 

[ualdriver]

Thanks--worked perfectly. I have an ATT Microcell at home and I read that might create a weird tethering issue when the car is in the garage. Turned BT on phone off approaching the house and then on again leaving the house and have had no issues since. Hoping this bug is fixed, so won't have to remember to do that...

Good. Whenever something "weird" is going on with your car, that's your first step. That reboot fixes almost everything.....except flat tires : )

 

[0Q991]

Good. Whenever something "weird" is going on with your car, that's your first step. That reboot fixes almost everything.....except flat tires : )

Good to know! I'm less than a week into Tesla ownership, so a newbie by all standards...

I also spoke with Tech Support to inform them of the issue and a potential relationship to the microcells.

 

[WinterDragoness]

I seemed to experience a problem like this and it may be related to energy saving mode. I was driving from Mojave supercharger to Bakersfield and back using a minimum charge (distance * 1.1 + 20 margin of safety). On the way there we listened to a comedy station the whole way so internet was working pretty close to 100% of the time (if it cuts out for more than 3-5 minutes we wouldn't get the next comedy bit). On the way back, I noticed after 10 mins of driving we didn't have internet through the same route. I'm not sure if we had net when we started but at this point the 3G icon was gone. I gave it some more time and eventually decided to reboot. 3-5 minutes after reboot finished, 3G came back. It happened the moment I touched the icon to see if touching it would do anything which I think was coincidence. It didn't stay on long, then disappeared.

At this point I was more worried about getting back to the supercharger than fixing the 3G. There was a 2500' mountain between us and the charger which I hadn't realized when I was planning the trip and I was worried we wouldn't make it to the top. I kept the car at 60mph and switched the AC to fan-only mode which worked fine since it was 62 out. Would be nice if the car were smart enough to do that itself (instead it was stuck on using recycled air and the AC). Despite the lack of 3G, I got the warning that we were leaving the range of the nearest charger. I didn't know it at the time but the warning supposedly takes into account temperature, wind speed, and elevation changes to decide if you can make it to a charger so I should have been able to tell it we were going to Mojave to verify we could make it. Instead I cancelled the warning and kept going, estimating that it takes 10 miles of range to go up 1000 feet and deciding it looked like we should make it. In the end we had enough range to make it + 8 miles at the top of the pass and +17 miles when we hit the charger which meant the trip was pretty close to the distance * 1.1 estimate I usually use.

At the top of the hill I decided to reboot again to see if 3G would return again. It did not. Touching its icon would bring up a list of wifi signals but no option to connect 3G. I theorize that when the range got low enough the car disabled 3G to save power, or maybe set it to intermittent connection just long enough to keep the map and distance to charger info going. Yet even plugged in to the supercharger we had no 3G. We went to get ice cream and 3G was back when we returned. Unfortunately it disappeared again not long after we started moving again. We switched to listening to podcasts on my phone so I stopped paying attention to it but traffic never disappeared on the map so maybe it kept working. I haven't noticed it failing in the few days since but we haven't gone much of anywhere.

So I can't be sure if this is the start of a modem failure, an intermittent AT&T network failure, or a purposeful symptom of setting it to energy saver mode, but I'm hoping it's the last one.

 

[Joncab]

HELP. My 3G never works for the first 5-10 minutes once car is turned on. It is in area where AT&T has great coverage.

It has been in the shop twice and they don't know how to fix it. It only does this when the car has been cold for several hours. Car Not set on energy savings mode.

My 85 was made May 2015.

I am am wondering if I pay Tesla $500 to upgrade to LTE would that fix m problem.

Getting frustated.

 

[jerry33]

HELP. My 3G never works for the first 5-10 minutes once car is turned on. It is in area where AT&T has great coverage.

It has been in the shop twice and they don't know how to fix it. It only does this when the car has been cold for several hours. Car Not set on energy savings mode.

My 85 was made May 2015.

I am am wondering if I pay Tesla $500 to upgrade to LTE would that fix m problem.

Getting frustated.

Even if you didn't have the problem, the LTE upgrade is actually a good idea. You get a new antenna with LTE, so it could very well solve the problem.

 

[Merrill]

I have had a similar problem since 7.0 the map starts out good and then once the 3G goes to 1 bar we lose the map and the screen goes completely gray and stays that way for 10 to 15 minutes and eventually comes back. This problem persists even with 5 bars, so for some reason when you lose the signal it is slow to recover. Did a screen shot and bug report and waiting for engineering to get back to me.

 

[jerry33]

I have had a similar problem since 7.0 the map starts out good and then once the 3G goes to 1 bar we lose the map and the screen goes completely gray and stays that way for 10 to 15 minutes and eventually comes back. This problem persists even with 5 bars, so for some reason when you lose the signal it is slow to recover. Did a screen shot and bug report and waiting for engineering to get back to me.

That happens. Interestingly, it only happens when the signal degrades slowly (driving into an area of poor/no coverage). It doesn't happen when the signal cuts off quickly (underground garage).

Note that you can get the signal back quickly with a reboot.

 

[bmanke]

While I don't have a solution, I too am experiencing this problem. My scenario is we do not have AT&T coverage at all at home. With a mile or two from our house coverage starts. For the first 3 months or so of Tesla ownership it performed flawlessly. Always connecting to 3G by the time we reached the end of our neighborhood. About 1.5 months ago it stopped connecting randomly and then sometimes several days in a row. A reboot always fixes the problem. A call to Tesla had it fixed for a week but alas on Friday it failed to connect again. Look forward to a solution as it is relatively annoying to always reboot your car.

 

[WinterDragoness]

I have had a similar problem since 7.0 the map starts out good and then once the 3G goes to 1 bar we lose the map and the screen goes completely gray and stays that way for 10 to 15 minutes and eventually comes back. This problem persists even with 5 bars, so for some reason when you lose the signal it is slow to recover. Did a screen shot and bug report and waiting for engineering to get back to me.

I noticed something like this a couple days ago. We were stopped looking at a view and I wanted to know what this lake in the distance was. So I zoomed the map out but it wouldn't load tiles for the larger view area. We sat for over 5 minutes waiting and a couple tiles loaded but not the ones we needed. Meanwhile the radio kept playing and downloading new content. I forget what our signal level was but I think 3 bars, maybe 4. We finally gave up and drove on and the map updated 5 or 10 minutes later.

 

[akwiom]

3G and internet

I am experiencing this to about the same degree. Happened yesterday. The Slacker music doesn't pick up the next track and the maps stop refreshing. Reboot fixes it. I've done this about once every 2 weeks and yesterday did happen after being in a cell dead-zone for a few minutes.

Out and about - 3G mostly not working despite iPhone in my pocket in the car works well. Car position does not update properly on Google Maps unless in reach of house wifi. Installed my Garmin to answer the question 'where am I now?' The route does work on the small display when you have put in a destination, but 'where am I now?' not working. Seemed to work for 30 minutes yesterday but back to the problem today.

Parked on drive within 16 feet of a wifi unifi repeater- internet just works with very low signal strength indicated, whereas iPhone and iPad showing much better strength on wifi, even inside the vehicle.

Hope there is a fix coming along

 

[DFiveK2]

3G and internet



Out and about - 3G mostly not working despite iPhone in my pocket in the car works well. Car position does not update properly on Google Maps unless in reach of house wifi. Installed my Garmin to answer the question 'where am I now?' The route does work on the small display when you have put in a destination, but 'where am I now?' not working. Seemed to work for 30 minutes yesterday but back to the problem today.

Parked on drive within 16 feet of a wifi unifi repeater- internet just works with very low signal strength indicated, whereas iPhone and iPad showing much better strength on wifi, even inside the vehicle.

Hope there is a fix coming along

I think the only real fix is to get the 4g upgrade. This problem is super annoying... Every time I switch from wifi to 3G I get nothing. Half the time it comes back and the other half reboot is required.

 

[davidGR]

I picked my Tesla model 7 up 9 days ago....I still have not completed a single journey with continued connectivity...it just drops ....and doesnt come back....resetting makes no difference

 

[Curly2457]

Hey guys
I have similar issues in the uk but mine is saying no IP address and Tesla says it’s showing up as a 3G security issue