Update on my car repair following the "Acceleration Reduced" warning message
Following my post on December 21st, the earliest service appointment date at the San Francisco service center I could get was January 2nd. When I arrived that day the service advisor advised me that it may two weeks for the repair to be completed.
The advisor said this was due to the end of year sales rush and fewer technicians being available.
They gave me Uber credits since no loaners were available, but three days later they were able to get me a loaner. On January 7th I was told that the repair work was started. Long story short, I got the car back on January 16th, exactly two weeks later. They did not replace the battery, but replaced these items:
- High voltage Battery Contactors
- High voltage pyro fuses
- Busbar
The battery did need to be dropped from the car for this work, all of which was covered by the 8-year battery/drivetrain warranty.
During the entire repair, the service advisor kept me updated on progress as well as lack of progress. Communication was done via text messages on what appears to be a line which is used commonly for service communication and routed to the active advisor. He did a great job keeping me updated, even when the completion of the repair got delayed a couple times when new problems were found and when the repair tech got sick.
I was expecting to drive the loaner to the service center to pick it up my car, but the advisor said they could have a driver bring my car to me and pick up the loaner. This was very convenient, though the driver arrive at our house in the middle of a downpour. I was told that Tesla no longer does "courtesy washes," so it was nice that mother nature took care of that.
On a side note, after the car was dropped off I needed to head to the store to get some items. I noticed a high pitched hum as I got in the car and during my drive to the store. I got the items, headed home and when I parked the car in my garage the hum was still there. Hmmm. Was there a new problem following the repair?? It was now over an hour since the drop-off, so I was puzzled about the hum, which was coming from the front area just behind the frunk. So I texted the service advisor reporting the issue, but within another half-hour I went down to the garage and discovered that the hum had stopped.
I put two and two together and realized that the hum was the battery coolant pump running -- they had supercharged the car just before delivering it to me. It's been a while since I've take a ride on the supercharger highway, so I wasn't used to that hearing that hum.
Overall, it's disappointing that the car had this failure. While it's nice that the warranty covered it, I would hope that the systems would be robust enough to not require warranty repair. I realize that my 2015 Model 85D was still somewhat early in the manufacturing history of Model S, so perhaps this repair is not that surprising. While the repair took a long time, I was kept apprised of the work, was given a Tesla Model S 75D loaner car, and the car was returned to my house. All of this made the repair experience much better.
