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Bluetooth won't disconnect?

crackers8199

Active Member
May 31, 2015
1,261
575
lake elsinore, ca
is there a way to get Bluetooth to disconevdi when I park the car in my garage and come inside? lately it has been staying connected constantly while I'm at home and the car is parked in my attached garage...
 

favo

P3D+ owner
Apr 5, 2012
1,035
1,128
Durham, NC
Just parked in the garage for the first time and my phone is still connected, does this matter?
In my experience so far, it doesn't. The car will go to sleep anyhow. (At least on FW 34.1 and 36.2, which are the only ones I looked at somewhat systematically.)
 
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favo

P3D+ owner
Apr 5, 2012
1,035
1,128
Durham, NC
One minor "issue" is if your phone is paired to the car for phone calls, you are outside the car within about 10 ft, the car is unlocked, and a call comes in, the phone will grab the audio. Happened to me while washing the car, and it took a second to realize what was going on. It seems like the car should know the phone is not inside it and thus not grab the call audio.
 

forkee

Member
Jul 20, 2018
770
957
Southern California
the car "pairs" with you phone just like a set of wireless headphones. bluetooth should automatically disconnect when the car is out of bluetooth range, like 30 something feet. isn't that how it knows you've walked away so it can lock?

when you go inside your house, your phone might still be too close to the car, within bluetooth signal range.
 

favo

P3D+ owner
Apr 5, 2012
1,035
1,128
Durham, NC
the car "pairs" with you phone just like a set of wireless headphones. bluetooth should automatically disconnect when the car is out of bluetooth range, like 30 something feet. isn't that how it knows you've walked away so it can lock?

when you go inside your house, your phone might still be too close to the car, within bluetooth signal range.
Range is theoretically >100m for BLE, and 100m for Bluetooth Classic, assuming clear line of sight. I have seen the app report being connected (which presumably just refers to BLE phone-as-key connection) from at least 100 ft. away. Bluetooth has a (not entirely accurate) mechanism for determining how far away a device (phone) is from the host (car). From my limited testing, it looks like the lock/unlock works from about 10 ft. away (YFMV). Not sure how close phone has to be for call audio will transfer to car.

Ideally, the car should know the phone is inside and only take over calls if so. The car could also warn you (with a honk) if you leave your phone in it, get out and close the driver's door. I'm pretty sure there are enough Bluetooth antennas to allow this to work via triangulation, but maybe they found that it isn't accurate enough. Or it could just be waiting to get to the top of the priority list.

BTW, people assume that the phone as key uses BLE, but I haven't seen that officially confirmed by Tesla, and it's not explicitly stated in the manual. It probably does, though.
 

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