Cabin camera broken

[GalacticHero]

I came here having the exact same issue. My Model 3 has just passed 3 years in March and has 67k Miles on it. I've gotten FSD in November last year and the issue started shortly after with documented logs.

I've scheduled and appointment in Dec '21, but was told they don't have the part yet and I should come back in the new year. In 2022 I schedule an appointment in March. Before going in, I actually asked about the warranty on the piece and was declined.
I made the point that this should be covered under warranty as the cabin camera was just enabled with FSD and there was no way for me to even check functionality at the time of taking ownership. The service person on the chat declined it but mentioned I could talk to the service rep at the SC during the appointment.
At the appointment (2hrs drive), I was being told by the service rep that warranty cases are only handled by the supervisor and that was the person I spoke with on the chat (the person never identified him/herself) but she would go ahead and talk to her supervisor again.
Off I went with the Uber voucher just to get a call a bit later telling me that her supervisor is out and if I wanted to get the camera replaced it'd be $750 - Tesla can't help me any other way.
Obviously I went back, got the car back without any work ever having been done and left.

Now what's worrying is that despite perfect driving, we've already gotten two strikes (forceful disengagement) which happened within a single second after engaging autopilot. No matter if FSD is activated or not - the car immediately nags and disengages, clearly a sign to me that the cabin camera is broken.

I wanted to reach out to Tesla pleading my case hoping for it to be fixed under warranty, but it seems there are no communication channels for that. Did anyone in here have luck getting this fixed under warranty or know of a way to plead your case to Tesla?

Thanks!

Mine was replaced under warranty. It's a 2018 with the Basic Warranty good through Nov this year. However, looking at the warranty it's also limited to 50,000 miles, whichever comes first. So, you're out of warranty by the strict letter. However, it seems pretty sucky of Tesla to not fix this. It's clearly not an isolated problem, and it's essentially impossible to detect for a user unless you get FSD Beta,

 

[Daoasis]

I came here having the exact same issue. My Model 3 has just passed 3 years in March and has 67k Miles on it. I've gotten FSD in November last year and the issue started shortly after with documented logs.

I've scheduled and appointment in Dec '21, but was told they don't have the part yet and I should come back in the new year. In 2022 I schedule an appointment in March. Before going in, I actually asked about the warranty on the piece and was declined.
I made the point that this should be covered under warranty as the cabin camera was just enabled with FSD and there was no way for me to even check functionality at the time of taking ownership. The service person on the chat declined it but mentioned I could talk to the service rep at the SC during the appointment.
At the appointment (2hrs drive), I was being told by the service rep that warranty cases are only handled by the supervisor and that was the person I spoke with on the chat (the person never identified him/herself) but she would go ahead and talk to her supervisor again.
Off I went with the Uber voucher just to get a call a bit later telling me that her supervisor is out and if I wanted to get the camera replaced it'd be $750 - Tesla can't help me any other way.
Obviously I went back, got the car back without any work ever having been done and left.

Now what's worrying is that despite perfect driving, we've already gotten two strikes (forceful disengagement) which happened within a single second after engaging autopilot. No matter if FSD is activated or not - the car immediately nags and disengages, clearly a sign to me that the cabin camera is broken.

I wanted to reach out to Tesla pleading my case hoping for it to be fixed under warranty, but it seems there are no communication channels for that. Did anyone in here have luck getting this fixed under warranty or know of a way to plead your case to Tesla?

Thanks!

SC now tells me that they’re searching through logs for the first sign of the errors and if it was before the warranty existed they’d cover it.

Conveniently for them that error isn’t included in the logs that the customer is supplied through the request for data information that customers can do with Tesla. So you have to take their word that the error showed up after the warranty.

I’ve requested them to send me their version of the log files showing the error and after three weeks and four requests they haven’t even responded.

This in addition to waiting for a SC Manager to get back to me regarding this issue which I’ve been waiting for since June. After multiple times being told someone would contact me, nothing.

Pretty brutal scheisterish responses.

 

[CaffeineFlo]

SC now tells me that they’re searching through logs for the first sign of the errors and if it was before the warranty existed they’d cover it.

Conveniently for them that error isn’t included in the logs that the customer is supplied through the request for data information that customers can do with Tesla. So you have to take their word that the error showed up after the warranty.

I’ve requested them to send me their version of the log files showing the error and after three weeks and four requests they haven’t even responded.

This in addition to waiting for a SC Manager to get back to me regarding this issue which I’ve been waiting for since June. After multiple times being told someone would contact me, nothing.

Pretty brutal scheisterish responses.

I feel you, like I said, the SC manager lied to me telling me the advisor could make the warranty judgement and never identified him/herself on the chat. Ended up wasting a whole day and 4 hrs drive ...

When I asked them to look up that it started with the day I got the FSD beta back in November 2021, I was told they could only look up the last 30 days.

I don't think I will get an answer form Tesla like that unfortunately

 

[Daoasis]

I feel you, like I said, the SC manager lied to me telling me the advisor could make the warranty judgement and never identified him/herself on the chat. Ended up wasting a whole day and 4 hrs drive ...

When I asked them to look up that it started with the day I got the FSD beta back in November 2021, I was told they could only look up the last 30 days.

I don't think I will get an answer form Tesla like that unfortunately

They told you that they could only look back at the logs 30 days? One, or both of us are being lied to.

I was told that they went back and found the first time an error (non customer facing and only in the logs) was given by the cabin camera In March 2022, 5 months ago. Although I have asked to see the logs multiple times and they haven’t bothered to respond. At first they told me I can make a privacy request for the logs. I did and when I got them a month later, they didn’t contain any errors with the camera.

Then I was told this error doesn’t show up in the logs I get. So I asked for theirs and silence.

I would push your SC letting them know that Toronto SC said they went back 5 months. I’m going to push on my end but they are ghosting me.

 

[GalacticHero]

They told you that they could only look back at the logs 30 days? One, or both of us are being lied to.

I was told that they went back and found the first time an error (non customer facing and only in the logs) was given by the cabin camera In March 2022, 5 months ago. Although I have asked to see the logs multiple times and they haven’t bothered to respond. At first they told me I can make a privacy request for the logs. I did and when I got them a month later, they didn’t contain any errors with the camera.

Then I was told this error doesn’t show up in the logs I get. So I asked for theirs and silence.

I would push your SC letting them know that Toronto SC said they went back 5 months. I’m going to push on my end but they are ghosting me.

When my camera failed there were definitely logged errors I could see. However, that doesn't mean there aren't other errors only the SC can see. In fact when I made my service request they messaged me to show them the errors in my log. It ultimately ended with my camera being replaced under warranty.

 

[CharleyBC]

Since being on FSD beta, we've also gotten "Cabin camera unavailable", and then it clears in a minute. This most often happens the instant we put the car in gear, though now and then it'll pup up while we're on the road. It's been my hunch that it's a software bug, like software tries to connect to the camera while it's initializing. Though that wouldn't account for the en route instances.

I know the camera works at least sometimes, because the car will nag me if I spend too long looking at the Energy graph or whatever.

My wife thinks it's creepy that the car is watching us, period.

Anyway, Wattney is in service right now in Bend, OR for something else, and I asked the service advisor about it. He checked with a tech, and reported back that they think it's software—wait for a fix in some future update. Not absolute reassurance, but it's something!

 

[Bruinfan]

I finally gave in and got the camera replaced. They charged me $500. I didn't push back on the out of warranty. I did get $100 of uber credit, which they started giving out routinely apparently, so that was something. And I had a few errands to run, so I used it all up. It's only been a day, but so far no problems. i'm going to turn on my fsd beta tonite....

 

[legendsk]

Interesting logic on display here: you paid $3K for vaporware, and the feature still doesn't work.
But you feel great about that, because the same vaporware is now priced higher?

a

Exactly! For me it was a lottery ticket. An expensive lottery ticket, but much better odds, so it's pretty much certain to pay off $100,000 eventually. I think it may not happen in my lifetime, but eventually and hopefully that will pay off better than if I invested the $10,000 that it cost in Tesla stock (@$700) at the time. Who knows? Life is a gamble, but good.

 

[afadeev]

Exactly! For me it was a lottery ticket. An expensive lottery ticket, but much better odds, so it's pretty much certain to pay off $100,000 eventually. I think it may not happen in my lifetime, but eventually and hopefully that will pay off better than if I invested the $10,000 that it cost in Tesla stock (@$700) at the time. Who knows? Life is a gamble, but good.

 

[EV Rider]

I came here having the exact same issue. My Model 3 has just passed 3 years in March and has 67k Miles on it. I've gotten FSD in November last year and the issue started shortly after with documented logs.

I've scheduled and appointment in Dec '21, but was told they don't have the part yet and I should come back in the new year. In 2022 I schedule an appointment in March. Before going in, I actually asked about the warranty on the piece and was declined.
I made the point that this should be covered under warranty as the cabin camera was just enabled with FSD and there was no way for me to even check functionality at the time of taking ownership. The service person on the chat declined it but mentioned I could talk to the service rep at the SC during the appointment.
At the appointment (2hrs drive), I was being told by the service rep that warranty cases are only handled by the supervisor and that was the person I spoke with on the chat (the person never identified him/herself) but she would go ahead and talk to her supervisor again.
Off I went with the Uber voucher just to get a call a bit later telling me that her supervisor is out and if I wanted to get the camera replaced it'd be $750 - Tesla can't help me any other way.
Obviously I went back, got the car back without any work ever having been done and left.

Now what's worrying is that despite perfect driving, we've already gotten two strikes (forceful disengagement) which happened within a single second after engaging autopilot. No matter if FSD is activated or not - the car immediately nags and disengages, clearly a sign to me that the cabin camera is broken.

I wanted to reach out to Tesla pleading my case hoping for it to be fixed under warranty, but it seems there are no communication channels for that. Did anyone in here have luck getting this fixed under warranty or know of a way to plead your case to Tesla?

Thanks!

I keep postponing my appointment to have this issue fixed hoping this could be resolved and fixed under warranty. After reading everyone's comments, it appears to be clearly not a coincidence because this forum has so many complaints. I had to search for a place to express my concerns, I am glad I found this group.

 

[Allx]

so my car seems to only do it when the interior burns up from 90-100F exterior temps. which means inside is 140F+. I've seen as high as 146F in the app and cabin overheat protection seems to function only 75% of the time. Drove the car within 2 minutes got the warning the cabin camera needs service, autopilot completely unusable. at my destination I turned off sentry to let the car sleep. once it woke up (and the temps outside/inside stabilized to 75-80, I was able to use autopilot/fsd beta without issue or camera error

Seems like a temp issue indeed . This happened multiple times while the temp was quite hot out here. As others have been saying Tesla seems to have moved to ignoring this (I’m under warranty and they’re quoting a price on assessment even) .
Looks like they’re standing less and less behind their product (demand being what it is I suppose it’ll take time before dysfunctional service catches up).

 

[Virtualet]

another data point: i just requested to fix this error (out of warranty), expecting a $700 estimate. They quoted me 2300! They included a 1800 charge for something that I was unfamiliar with. Suffice it to say, I canceled my appointment. I'm going to wait a bit and try again later.

 

[Virtualet]

BTW, I've observed that when this happens, the car gets SUPER sensitive. Like, lane departure warning gets set off at the smallest movement towards a lane, nagging gets worse and only the red kind of nag, and nagging is instantaneous. I THINK if I drive the car for a bit w/o enabling autopilot, it tends to make the error not appear so quickly. It's when I engage it near the start of a drive, it'll increase the chances of this weird behavior.

 

[Daoasis]

another data point: i just requested to fix this error (out of warranty), expecting a $700 estimate. They quoted me 2300! They included a 1800 charge for something that I was unfamiliar with. Suffice it to say, I canceled my appointment. I'm going to wait a bit and try again later.

What was the $1800 charge for?

 

[AKAlex]

I've had some luck at keeping the cabin camera going by keeping it cool. I've set the AC on 10 pointed only at the windshield, set the AC on keep when the car is parked, park in the shade and used the windshield washer fluid for additional cooling. This kept me going until around 1PM in Phoenix a couple of days ago. This doesn't solve the problem, but it does at least buy a bit of time until a better solution is available. Also! Remember! Winter is coming, this should buy several more months...

 

[CaffeineFlo]

BTW, I've observed that when this happens, the car gets SUPER sensitive. Like, lane departure warning gets set off at the smallest movement towards a lane, nagging gets worse and only the red kind of nag, and nagging is instantaneous. I THINK if I drive the car for a bit w/o enabling autopilot, it tends to make the error not appear so quickly. It's when I engage it near the start of a drive, it'll increase the chances of this weird behavior.

I think I’ve mentioned it here before, but we already got two strikes (forceful disengagement) within a second of activating FSD due to the camera issue.

I’ve requested a mobile service appointment for the issue now and was quoted $375 for the replacement.

I’ve sent a message asking for it to be fixed under warranty when I made the appointment last week but they didn’t even acknowledge the message. I’ll save myself the meta commentary but it’s obviously *sugar*.

 

[Daoasis]

I'm pleasantly surprised to report that Tesla has resolved my issue with the Cabin Camera, and some additional items, all at no cost.

A special shout out to the Manager at the Tesla Toronto Railside location, who looked over all my correspondence with Tesla and agreed that their complete lack of response was unacceptable.

I had been communicating with them since the first time I turned on the FSD beta and I started getting Cabin Camera errors in June 22. Because I was 12,000km over the 80,000km warranty (but still 4 months left in the 4 years) they refused to repair the camera under warranty. It took 4 months of repeated ignored emails and ignored messages through the Tesla Service App to get someone to acknowledge that they erred. It also took me booking a service appointment and speaking to the Manager directly to get this resolved.

In addition to covering the cost of the camera and cable replacement, he was good enough to ensure that all other ignored items were taken care of. This included replacing my front bumper which was damaged due to a faulty tow hook and finally fixing the rear drivers side sagging wheel well liner, which I've been waiting for them to fix since I got the car 4 years ago.

The take away for experiencing this issue, I'd recommend reading the thread and following up in person with the Manager at your SC.

Good luck,

 

[JakeTrilla]

Another data point. Our cabin camera is having the same issue.

We were told today it’ll be $195.

 

[CharleyBC]

Another data point. Our cabin camera is having the same issue.

We were told today it’ll be $195.

Are you choosing to go ahead? I'm curious what they propose to actually do.

In yet another data point, I've had no cabin camera errors since our computer was replaced in September. That process kicked us out of FSDß for a while, but we got that fixed 2 weeks ago, back on FSDß, release 2022.20.18. And so far, no more cabin camera errors. Make of that what you will.

 

[BossHoggz]

Hi all,

My first post... love the information I get from this site.

I just purchased a 2018 model 3 RWD long range.

The seller informed me that the car has this weird cabin camera error... and that he had it looked at... but there was nothing found.

I purchased the vehicle in Riverside, CA... drove it back to Phoenix, AZ. I used FSD quite a bit along the drive... the error popped up occasionally... but never interrupted my FSD experience like others mention in this thread.

I took the vehicle to the SC to have the issue diagnose (before coming to this thread)... they explain that the "selfie camera" is defective and that the vehicle is out of warranty... they would need to replace the "selfie camera" and a harness near the windshield. Cost $571. I elected not to do the work as it has not affected any FSD drives.

I am on FSD 10.69.2.3 (2022.20.18)... and continue to get the pop up to update software to 10.69.2.4 (2022.20.19)...since I am not being interrupted during FSD...I will try to not upgrade...don't see how an issue that appears to be faulty hardware from the start should cost me $571.