Beware of Model X

[Dutchie]

My Model X started making some weird noises coming from the front suspension. Brought it in for service. Changed
- aft link assembly (both sides)
- fore link assembly (both sides)
- tie rod ball (both sides)
- driven Hub (both sides)
total costs over $5,000

After picking it up I noticed there were still noises so I brought it back again. Now the air spring needed replacement. Additional cost $3,500

I was very taken aback. Where are all these people telling me they drive 500.000 miles with only changing the washer fluid? I talked to the lady at the reception and she said that this is normal for higher mileage Model X. They are now coming in in droves with similar issues. She has worked at other high-end dealerships (Lexus. Mercedes) but she never seen anything like this with Model X. The other day there was a client who needed both front and rear suspension repair. Total cost $16,000!

The lady told me that Tesla - being a newer company- doesn’t have the experience in designing good suspensions and now we are paying the price for that. I even have to sell stock to pay for this!

We also talked about FSD. She told me to not hold our breath for having this anytime soon. My believe in Tesla is shaken to its core..

 

[strider]

No surprise here. Elon/Tesla are always the smartest people in the room. They way they do it has to be the best and the way everyone else has done it has to be wrong. Because Elon is a micromanager from hell, no one actually competent will work for him (see also: revolving door of senior leadership). So Tesla reinvents the wheel over and over again.

Don't get me wrong, reinventing the wheel in areas like the drivetrain, are absolutely outstanding. This outside the box thinking has produced some amazing advancements. But it would be better if Tesla would hire and retain a few graybeards to help them with the things that are common across all vehicles and vehicle manufacturers. Stuff like suspension, glass, logistics and parts supply, etc. If they were able to take the best of the current industry and combine it w/ their advancements in places the current industry falls short, they would be unstoppable.

Of course, it's easy for me to say that sitting behind my keyboard. In practice it is much harder to know what parts of the current industry are the best and what can be improved without first trying new things.

It's no secret that the S/X suspension puts strain on the front half-shafts and chews them up. Running in the lowest suspension setting helps. Supposedly the Refresh model has an all-new suspension that hopefully addresses the issue. Though some people are reporting vibration under acceleration which I believe is what destroys the half shafts.

All that being said, I would be nervous owning a Tesla outside of the warranty period. My wife and I have decisions to make as hers is up in December, 2022. She hates the yoke so doesn't want a new S.

 

[SO16]

That is unfortunate.

But for comparison…
Similar priced car: 2015 Mercedes-Benz AMG C 63 coupe

5 year maintenance cost: 19,831

Mercedes Maintenance: Cost, Plans And Repairs (2024)

On average, Mercedes-Benz maintenance costs $908 a year. See how this price compares to the average annual maintenance costs of other car brands.

www.motor1.com

 

[mr-dmitry]

My Model X started making some weird noises coming from the front suspension. Brought it in for service. Changed
- aft link assembly (both sides)
- fore link assembly (both sides)
- tie rod ball (both sides)
- driven Hub (both sides)
total costs over $5,000

After picking it up I noticed there were still noises so I brought it back again. Now the air spring needed replacement. Additional cost $3,500

I was very taken aback. Where are all these people telling me they drive 500.000 miles with only changing the washer fluid? I talked to the lady at the reception and she said that this is normal for higher mileage Model X. They are now coming in in droves with similar issues. She has worked at other high-end dealerships (Lexus. Mercedes) but she never seen anything like this with Model X. The other day there was a client who needed both front and rear suspension repair. Total cost $16,000!

The lady told me that Tesla - being a newer company- doesn’t have the experience in designing good suspensions and now we are paying the price for that. I even have to sell stock to pay for this!

We also talked about FSD. She told me to not hold our breath for having this anytime soon. My believe in Tesla is shaken to its core..

Just do not use it over the warranty period. Though having it regularly coming to the service center during the warranty is also not fun.

 

[EbS-P]

My Model X started making some weird noises coming from the front suspension. Brought it in for service. Changed
- aft link assembly (both sides)
- fore link assembly (both sides)
- tie rod ball (both sides)
- driven Hub (both sides)
total costs over $5,000

After picking it up I noticed there were still noises so I brought it back again. Now the air spring needed replacement. Additional cost $3,500

I was very taken aback. Where are all these people telling me they drive 500.000 miles with only changing the washer fluid? I talked to the lady at the reception and she said that this is normal for higher mileage Model X. They are now coming in in droves with similar issues. She has worked at other high-end dealerships (Lexus. Mercedes) but she never seen anything like this with Model X. The other day there was a client who needed both front and rear suspension repair. Total cost $16,000!

The lady told me that Tesla - being a newer company- doesn’t have the experience in designing good suspensions and now we are paying the price for that. I even have to sell stock to pay for this!

We also talked about FSD. She told me to not hold our breath for having this anytime soon. My believe in Tesla is shaken to its core..

How many miles does it have?

 

[strider]

That is unfortunate.

But for comparison…
Similar priced car: 2015 Mercedes-Benz AMG C 63 coupe

5 year maintenance cost: 19,831

Mercedes Maintenance: Cost, Plans And Repairs (2024)

On average, Mercedes-Benz maintenance costs $908 a year. See how this price compares to the average annual maintenance costs of other car brands.

www.motor1.com

This is an interesting point. Tesla's have almost zero "regular" maintenance costs like oil changes and such. But they do have big things that break. So you can go sometimes a year or 2 spending nothing except electricity and tires and then bam, $3,500 for something.

That being said, Tesla and others cite "less maintenance" as a benefit of EVs when the reality is that this is not really the case. Expensive things still break on EVs.

 

[SO16]

This is an interesting point. Tesla's have almost zero "regular" maintenance costs like oil changes and such. But they do have big things that break. So you can go sometimes a year or 2 spending nothing except electricity and tires and then bam, $3,500 for something.

That being said, Tesla and others cite "less maintenance" as a benefit of EVs when the reality is that this is not really the case. Expensive things still break on EVs.

Always good to have money in an emergency fund. More should be set aside for expensive vehicles. I keep 10% of purchase price set aside.

The Maintenance on the Mercedes is pretty much a guaranteed 19k expense no matter what.

These unfortunate experiences with the MX are not necessarily massively systemic. So an EV ON AVERAGE, would still be much cheaper to own than a comparable gas car. Especially a Model 3/Y. Lighter vehicles with simpler suspension.

 

[strider]

Well, we will see. Earliest M3 have been out of warranty for <1 year and MY still have 2 years left.

The suspension issues w/ S/X have been going on for a while - Tesla clearly knows they are a problem. There are people in the MX forum getting new front shafts every 11,000 miles.

I doubt I will keep my MX past the warranty period.

 

[SO16]

Well, we will see. Earliest M3 have been out of warranty for <1 year and MY still have 2 years left.

The suspension issues w/ S/X have been going on for a while - Tesla clearly knows they are a problem. There are people in the MX forum getting new front shafts every 11,000 miles.

I doubt I will keep my MX past the warranty period.

Half shafts on the S/X have been a problem. I haven’t seen that with the 3/Y yet. Warranty repair items have been quite low from what I understand with Tesla.

Yes… we will see.

 

[glide]

No surprise here. Elon/Tesla are always the smartest people in the room. They way they do it has to be the best and the way everyone else has done it has to be wrong. Because Elon is a micromanager from hell, no one actually competent will work for him (see also: revolving door of senior leadership). So Tesla reinvents the wheel over and over again.

Don't get me wrong, reinventing the wheel in areas like the drivetrain, are absolutely outstanding. This outside the box thinking has produced some amazing advancements. But it would be better if Tesla would hire and retain a few graybeards to help them with the things that are common across all vehicles and vehicle manufacturers. Stuff like suspension, glass, logistics and parts supply, etc. If they were able to take the best of the current industry and combine it w/ their advancements in places the current industry falls short, they would be unstoppable.

Of course, it's easy for me to say that sitting behind my keyboard. In practice it is much harder to know what parts of the current industry are the best and what can be improved without first trying new things.

It's no secret that the S/X suspension puts strain on the front half-shafts and chews them up. Running in the lowest suspension setting helps. Supposedly the Refresh model has an all-new suspension that hopefully addresses the issue. Though some people are reporting vibration under acceleration which I believe is what destroys the half shafts.

All that being said, I would be nervous owning a Tesla outside of the warranty period. My wife and I have decisions to make as hers is up in December, 2022. She hates the yoke so doesn't want a new S.

Teslas are maintenance free. Not repair free.

That’s what the EV evangelists fail to tell you.

Never own a Tesla outside the warranty period.

 

[Billmister]

I’m sorry to hear you are having a bad experience with your car. I will say that for every bad experience I hear there are many good experiences as well. I don’t want to devalue your situation but In my field I’ve seen many people own many products of a brand and the moment one doesn’t work the way they expected, I hear “it’s the last ______ product I will own!”

I’m a very brand loyal customer. If I buy something that I really like, I see what other products that company makes and I buy them. I understand if one of them may fail. A company can’t make perfect products every single time. What is really important to me is the support I get when issues happen. Is the company quick to brush me off, do they not return my email/calls/feedback. Do they look to for ways to decline my claim. If all of the above happens then they loose me as a customer. But I can’t judge a company that has offered me 2 amazing products because 1 fails. But again it’s how they treat me when that one fails.

Also every company has an employee or two that may not be happy with the company who are not shy to bad mouth the company. At the end of the day they speculate just like any rumor web site may. Extremely small percentage of the team may know about FSDs release ETA, reliability, cost, and it’s challenges.

I hope your issue finds a good resolution in the end I know it can be frustrating.

 

[_Redshift_]

My Model X started making some weird noises coming from the front suspension. Brought it in for service. Changed
- aft link assembly (both sides)
- fore link assembly (both sides)
- tie rod ball (both sides)
- driven Hub (both sides)
total costs over $5,000

After picking it up I noticed there were still noises so I brought it back again. Now the air spring needed replacement. Additional cost $3,500

I was very taken aback. Where are all these people telling me they drive 500.000 miles with only changing the washer fluid? I talked to the lady at the reception and she said that this is normal for higher mileage Model X. They are now coming in in droves with similar issues. She has worked at other high-end dealerships (Lexus. Mercedes) but she never seen anything like this with Model X. The other day there was a client who needed both front and rear suspension repair. Total cost $16,000!

The lady told me that Tesla - being a newer company- doesn’t have the experience in designing good suspensions and now we are paying the price for that. I even have to sell stock to pay for this!

We also talked about FSD. She told me to not hold our breath for having this anytime soon. My believe in Tesla is shaken to its core..

This is happening on my S. I need to replace several parts, the most serious of which is the cracked sway bar joint.

Why the front suspension? I don’t know. Majority of the weight is on the rear suspension.

 

[Dutchie]

How many miles does it have?

105.000 miles - so it is a lot

 

[Dutchie]

I’m sorry to hear you are having a bad experience with your car. I will say that for every bad experience I hear there are many good experiences as well. I don’t want to devalue your situation but In my field I’ve seen many people own many products of a brand and the moment one doesn’t work the way they expected, I hear “it’s the last ______ product I will own!”

I’m a very brand loyal customer. If I buy something that I really like, I see what other products that company makes and I buy them. I understand if one of them may fail. A company can’t make perfect products every single time. What is really important to me is the support I get when issues happen. Is the company quick to brush me off, do they not return my email/calls/feedback. Do they look to for ways to decline my claim. If all of the above happens then they loose me as a customer. But I can’t judge a company that has offered me 2 amazing products because 1 fails. But again it’s how they treat me when that one fails.

Also every company has an employee or two that may not be happy with the company who are not shy to bad mouth the company. At the end of the day they speculate just like any rumor web site may. Extremely small percentage of the team may know about FSDs release ETA, reliability, cost, and it’s challenges.

I hope your issue finds a good resolution in the end I know it can be frustrating.

Thank you. The car drives like new again. I can even remember it has ever driven so well. It is just a pain that I have to sell Tesla stock to pay for this.

 

[Dutchie]

This is happening on my S. I need to replace several parts, the most serious of which is the cracked sway bar joint.

Why the front suspension? I don’t know. Majority of the weight is on the rear suspension.

So, even S has it?! I think the steering makes it worse for front suspension.

 

[_Redshift_]

So, even S has it?! I think the steering makes it worse for front suspension.

I have around 84K miles on mine. It’s never been abused or ridden on rough roads for too long.

The auto mechanic I went to (there aren’t many 3rd party shops who will agree to work on a Tesla) said “oh yeah, this suspension is very similar to the Mercedes one.”

I remember in the early days MBZ invested in Tesla and provided some parts as well (steering wheel, I think, and some others). It’s probable they provided some suspension know how as well.

The mechanic said MBZ suspensions also show similar problems on MBZ vehicles.

I think it’s just a case of bad design.

 

[Harvey Danger]

Teslas are maintenance free. Not repair free.

That’s what the EV evangelists fail to tell you.

Never own a Tesla outside the warranty period.

So true. Somewhere here on TMC, once I combined these two categories of expense and quickly got called out for it. I was mostly thinking on an emotional level it's costing me money either way so I just budget a certain amount for "keeping the car alive". But yes, maintenance and "repairs" are very diferent.

It's sort of a car-manufacturing truth: Most customers, when faced with *repairs* that arise out of failures experienced in normal non-negligent use, freely accuse manufacturers of some kind of bad-faith profit-extracting motive. The practical engineering reality is things have to be designed with a tolerance and every design+tolerance tradeoff will eventually result in a "failure" if you make enough of them and even one of them exceeds the limits of the designed tolerance and experiences the necessary conditions needed to expose this. (Additionally, when designing something totally novel, some future outcomes are hard to predict and certain designs turn out to be terrible even on a theoretical level once more is understood about basic properties of materials etc.) Could you higher more experienced (more expensive) designers that anticipate known failure modes and made less profit? Sure. Could you have enforced tighter (more expensive) tolerances and made less profit? Sure. Could we design an airplane that will never crash? Actually yes, but it will cost 100 trillion $ per plane. So we make a tradeoff and move on.

 

[SageBrush]

The mechanic said MBZ suspensions also show similar problems on MBZ vehicles.
I think it’s just a case of bad design.

I'm thinking heavy car, powerful motor, and low volume parts.

 

[SageBrush]

That being said, Tesla and others cite "less maintenance" as a benefit of EVs when the reality is that this is not really the case. Expensive things still break on EVs.

I'm reading it more like this:

Tesla X: inexpensive maintenance, expensive repairs
MB: expensive maintenance, expensive repairs

 

[_Redshift_]

I'm thinking heavy car, powerful motor, and low volume parts.

All of which they need to account for, and design for.

The low volume might not have anything to do with it. Tesla made their own parts after all?