Air suspension unlevel - Ride height uneven

[olemsand]

Ride height uneven - Air suspension not level after being on lift.
Car was on lift for tire change - car was in jack mode.

After, the car is alot higher on the right side - no fault code in the display.

I checked all the level sensors visually (one on each wheel) all OK and not stuck.

Tips & Tricks? Tesla work shop is far away with long wait.

Can i perform a recalibration? tried going all the way up, and down again - always higher on right side.

Also tried cold resett (HV and 12v battery of)

Tesla Model S 2014 85

 

[DerbyDave]

Seems to me that it is normal for a car to not be exactly level. Mine has never been level. If we didn't have the information available that Tesla gives us, we wouldn't even notice. You can pay to have Tesla recalibrate. I don't know of any other way. Most minor inconsistencies probably do not adversely affect the operation of the car. I hope my thoughts on this are correct, because I would rather not fool with this issue if it is not significant.

 

[olemsand]

Seems to me that it is normal for a car to not be exactly level. Mine has never been level. If we didn't have the information available that Tesla gives us, we wouldn't even notice. You can pay to have Tesla recalibrate. I don't know of any other way. Most minor inconsistencies probably do not adversely affect the operation of the car. I hope my thoughts on this are correct, because I would rather not fool with this issue if it is not significant.

Its so unlevel you fall out of the seat

Picture is lowest level in car - right side.

When its on hight, its higher then i have ever seen it on right side.

 

[DerbyDave]

Yeah, you might need an adjustment if it is way off.

 

[Gtech]

Ride height uneven - Air suspension not level after being on lift.
Car was on lift for tire change - car was in jack mode.

After, the car is alot higher on the right side - no fault code in the display.

I checked all the level sensors visually (one on each wheel) all OK and not stuck.

Tips & Tricks? Tesla work shop is far away with long wait.

Can i perform a recalibration? tried going all the way up, and down again - always higher on right side.

Also tried cold resett (HV and 12v battery of)

Tesla Model S 2014 85

If you put jack mode on and manually drop air from one or both of the right struts and turn jack mode off does it starts increasing height immediately?

 

[VegarHenriksen]

Try driving for a little bit and it should even out

 

[Aggmeister2010]

Oh wow, from that picture, you definitely have an issue. I'm not sure how just being on a lift would cause this, but dang.

I'm wondering if one of the sensor brackets somehow bent....they're right behind the wheel if you can take it off and check.

 

[cpaull]

I have a similar issue on my 2012 MS P85. The rear passenger side was running a bit lower than the rest (maybe 1/2 to 1 inch). I took it to the closest tesla shop for a ride height calibration. Should have been an easy tweak. They said the sensors were not connected properly, and reconnected them with the green arm pointing up. Then they couldn't get the calibration to work. The car now rides much higher and no longer adjusts properly, and tesla says I need new sensors. I reviewed all my suspension pictures, and did a bunch of on-line searching, and the green arm is always pointing down. So I'm pretty sure the Tesla service person messed things up. Has anyone had a ride height calibration done successfully? Recommendations for a shop in Central/Northern CA? Thanks.

 

[Aggmeister2010]

I have a similar issue on my 2012 MS P85. The rear passenger side was running a bit lower than the rest (maybe 1/2 to 1 inch). I took it to the closest tesla shop for a ride height calibration. Should have been an easy tweak. They said the sensors were not connected properly, and reconnected them with the green arm pointing up. Then they couldn't get the calibration to work. The car now rides much higher and no longer adjusts properly, and tesla says I need new sensors. I reviewed all my suspension pictures, and did a bunch of on-line searching, and the green arm is always pointing down. So I'm pretty sure the Tesla service person messed things up. Has anyone had a ride height calibration done successfully? Recommendations for a shop in Central/Northern CA? Thanks.

I’ve had it recalibrated like 2-3 times, it’s done via Tesla Toolbox. They don’t need to touch the sensors at all.

The whole process is just getting a reading from each corner sensor, and then adjusting each corner up and down in small increments, within an acceptable range, so that the ECU knows what PSI correlates with different ride heights.

Remember, though, that those sensors are VERY sensitive. 1mm difference in arm position translates to 1/4 inch of ride height. If the bracket got bent a little bit, it could throw off a corner.

But to your point, the sensor arms should be pointing down, not up. Any Tesla-certified shop with Toolbox can do the calibration for you, or you can buy a 1 month subscription to Tookbox and do it yourself (though it's not cheap).

IIRC, Tesla just uses Mercedes' AirMatic system behind the scenes.

 

[beyerch]

I’ve had it recalibrated like 2-3 times, it’s done via Tesla Toolbox. They don’t need to touch the sensors at all.

The whole process is just getting a reading from each corner sensor, and then adjusting each corner up and down in small increments, within an acceptable range, so that the ECU knows what PSI correlates with different ride heights.

Remember, though, that those sensors are VERY sensitive. 1mm difference in arm position translates to 1/4 inch of ride height. If the bracket got bent a little bit, it could throw off a corner.

But to your point, the sensor arms should be pointing down, not up. Any Tesla-certified shop with Toolbox can do the calibration for you, or you can buy a 1 month subscription to Tookbox and do it yourself (though it's not cheap).

IIRC, Tesla just uses Mercedes' AirMatic system behind the scenes.

Hi - Any chance you can give more detail about the comment "adjusting up and down in small increments"?

My MX is being difficult and today me and our local mobile tech used the official Tesla measuring tool and Toolbox 3 to try and recalibrate. When we entered our new values, the tool return a "failed" and said that variance between the TAS value and technical value were not within tolerance.

Reading the process document from Tesla, I don't recall anything about an "incremental" approach to this.


Thoughts?

 

[BostonBurley]

Try driving for a little bit and it should even out

This is how I burst two air struts in about 10 seconds. A 2.5 ton test bench with every bump… it had around 170psi, or more, was overinflated bc leveling sensor was telling the car it needed more, and I thought, “if I drive it, at 19mph it will lower”.

 

[Aggmeister2010]

This is how I burst two air struts in about 10 seconds. A 2.5 ton test bench with every bump… it had around 170psi, or more, was overinflated bc leveling sensor was telling the car it needed more, and I thought, “if I drive it, at 19mph it will lower”.

Yep.

On standard coil and shock suspension, the shock “settles” when you drive it after it has been lifted off the ground.

Not so with air suspension that has level sensors. It’s just a bag of air. There isn’t any “settling.”

 

[canasion35]

Anyone tried the 1-month subscription to toolbox to adjust their suspension calibration and care to share your experiences? Looking to go that route as the SC is over an hour away.

 

[DerbyDave]

I was thinking the other day about the differences in height data on the four corners looking at suspension details. Maybe the height is different at different locations because the objective is not to make the suspension level, rather the suspension is making the car level. That would likely cause some differences in the suspension data at each corner.

 

[sorka]

Its so unlevel you fall out of the seat

Picture is lowest level in car - right side.

When its on hight, its higher then i have ever seen it on right side.

View attachment 776147

They disconnected the link and then reconnected inverted. Super easy to do. I did it myself when installing my lowering links.

 

[sorka]

They said the sensors were not connected properly, and reconnected them with the green arm pointing up. Then they couldn't get the calibration to work. The car now rides much higher and no longer adjusts properly, and tesla says I need new sensors.

^^^^ This.