A/C loss followed by vehicle may not restart

[Marcvonamsberg]

On March 30 my vehicle had a high pressure temperature sensor replaced to correct a lack of A/C. Prior error message was vehicle performance has been reduced. Refrigerant recovery and recharge was also done. The A/C has since worked flawlessly. On April 24 I got the error Vehicle may not restart. Service required. After getting it home after a short drive, the next day I was unable to access the cabin, and no access to additional messages. Using the app, I tried unsuccessfully to open door, start vehicle, frunk, trunk, and unable to charge. Other than that I'm feeling pretty good 9-). My SC appointment isn't until May 11, so I have time to work on it. I manually opened the frunk, the 12v battery was down to ~5v, got a trickle charger on it now. Last reading it was up to 11v, and I have a replacement battery.

Is there a way to power up, given I can't get inside my vehicle? How best to diagnose my problem, with no access to the screen?

 

[ATPMSD]

Make sure you plug in the HV battery and remove the trickle charger. Next jump the Tesla battery with a proper 12v battery, this will allow you to open the doors and “wake up” the car. Once the car is awake remove the jumper and let the car charge the 12v battery.

 

[Marcvonamsberg]

This is an excellent start to solving my problem. I was able to gain entry to the cabin (!) once battery charge read 12+v, so I pushed the 2 scroll wheels after depressing the brake, and oh so briefly, got the center console working. Enough time to engage TOW mode!

As an aside my date of getting the vehicle may not start warning was April 10, not April 24 as previously written.

Also, here's a photo of errors. Sure, nothing serious going on here, folks, just keep moving along.....needless to say these aren't minor. What is your opinion about my next steps?

 

[Lasttoy]

R u sure your 12volt car battery has full charge of 14 volts. My car died. All kinds of errors. Draper said car battery was dead. Draper said to get a really big truck with output of 14+ volts . Jump battery, mine came alive after 20 minutes. Left it jumped till 14.5 volts, super charged, car fine. They never figured out why my 12 volt battery went dead on interstate. I ordered one. Took 3 months. I changed it, never had it happen again.

 

[Marcvonamsberg]

R u sure your 12volt car battery has full charge of 14 volts. My car died. All kinds of errors. Draper said car battery was dead. Draper said to get a really big truck with output of 14+ volts . Jump battery, mine came alive after 20 minutes. Left it jumped till 14.5 volts, super charged, car fine. They never figured out why my 12 volt battery went dead on interstate. I ordered one. Took 3 months. I changed it, never had it happen again.

To make sure my 12v wasn't an issue, I got a new one that when installed read 12+v. I installed that 3 days ago, and I've been checking my messages since. I'm at 13.2v, still have the trickle charger on there. The good news is with the help of the app, the center console comes to life, and I can briefly display status. I bypass the open frunk message to get the display. Fewer error is encouraging.Pressing the brake for 30 seconds resulted in an unable to start message, and I also pressed both scroll wheels while depressing the brake. That didn't seem to elicit any response. My alert sound comes on, the one when you open the door if you're still in drive, and it will stop if I exit the vehicle by opening and closing the driver door.

Interesting yours happened suddenly. I had no prior errors, other than the A/C service mesages I mentioned above, which was serviced and acting fine when I got the recent errors. I literally was driving for about 1 minute when the "may not restart" and related ones appeared. They're definitely the equivalent of the check engine light on an ICE vehicle. Maybe nothing with a CEL, but it doesn't tell you anything until some real diagnostics are done. In my case, the messages are vague, but ominous and serious sounding.

Here's a shot of the center console today.

 

[Marcvonamsberg]

I'm logging my progress and additional symptoms here, in an attempt to resuscitate my Model S. Yesterday I removed the trickle charger to see how the vehicle system managed the 12v battery. I was pleased to see today a number of items:

• vehicle range is holding steady at 199 miles, despite a lack of charging for 3 weeks+, this is roughly where it was when my first "may not restart" message came my way
• 12v battery voltage holding steady at 13.3v
• access to the owner's manual lets me see all the things as they're supposed to work

My daily routine consists of attempting to start the vehicle, review the error log, and see if there are any changes. Here's what happened:

• Almost daily, with every attempt to start the vehicle, as I exit through the driver door, the window vents without pressing the button. On the first day of installing a new 12v, after I was finally able to access the passenger cabin, the fully closed window moved to vent position. The next day, it moved down this additional "vent" increment. Now after about a week, my window is fully open. None of the window switches is responsive
• The app seems to still be "connected", but every start command has failed. No automatic trunk opening, but I can open it manually
• The driver door opening produces a chime, one of the few normal functions still working
• Pushing the brake and scroll wheels gets me to a working center console screen. There's a steady state on the error messages, although I may have heard an (encouraging) new chime, it shut off quickly, though. Here's how it looked today

 

[Marcvonamsberg]

Yesterday I prepared for a tow to the service center.12v battery steady at 13.0v, but unable to roll up driver window. All console function gone. Luckily since my window was down I could still access the cabin. But unable to use any functionality of the app-inability to open frunk, trunk or start vehicle.

It's been a frustrating month wait to get my vehicle to the service center. The upside is that I was able to learn a ton about all the issues that affect my car and a lot of the ways that folks are going about repairing them. I also did learn through the app that an embedded multimedia card that should be replaced under warranty causing my issues. I hope this is the only thing going on...

 

[Marcvonamsberg]

My progress with the Charlotte service center has been slow. After the tow to the SC, I've learned the embedded multimedia card was covered by the recall, but the unable to start/service is required is a different and not covered issue. As of May 11 my invoice showed the VCM cost fully covered, but the high voltage rapid splitter vehicle side wasn't. The SC has had my vehicle over 1 month, and still no high voltage rapid splitter part is available. I've found used parts online, and am wondering:

• Will the service center use pre-owned parts?
• If yes, are there warranty issues?
• Are there aftermarket sources for a 2016 model s high voltage rapid splitter?
• Does Tesla have a warranty policy regarding aftermarket parts?
• If yes, are there warranty issues?