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car needs service power reduced (newbie)

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@baw
Does the attached pic look similar to the error you received? We may be dealing with the same issue. My wife and I, however, have a little more experience with it.

March 11 - Delivered in San Diego
March 14 - 1st error occurrence
  • Diagnosis - Air bubbles in coolant system caused battery to think it's overheating
  • Response - Purge coolant and top off fluids
March 17 - 2nd occurrence
  • Diagnosis - More air bubbles in coolant system
  • Response - Flush system 4-5 times and top off
March 29 - 3rd occurrence
  • Diagnosis - Faulty temperature sensor located in drive unit (DU)
  • Response - Waiting approval from Fremont to replace DU
The last two occurrences took place under simular circumstances - going uphill on a highway at 80+ mph with an outside temp around 80 degrees F. Tesla created a case study of our issue upon the second visit. Repairs could become expensive, if Tesla discovers a bad batch of sensors were installed in our DUs.

Personally, we've only driven our car for 9 of the 23 days we've owned it. My wife is livid and my head hurts just thinking of it.

The car is gorgeous (obsidian black/glass roof/ultra white seats) and fun to drive (when it's running properly, of course), which for me will help make this nightmare easier to get over. I cannot say the same for my wife.

I'll keep you posted as things change. Appreciate you doing the same. Good luck.
 

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I just hope this does not become a regular occurrence. Do other owners find themselves having to bring the car in a lot?

Damn sorry to hear about the issue. But unfortunately I am in the same boat as you when it comes to service center. I've had this car since Jan 2017, been to the service center 3-4 times now. All kinds of little small problems here and there.
 
Update:

Yesterday I got same warning/notification again 3 times in a span of an hour. Wasn't surprised as I suspected that chalking it up as a "glitch" was inadequate. Took back to Tesla. Got another loaner. Just got a call this afternoon asking if they could drive it 75 miles to further diagnose issue. I guess they need to drive it a lot more to get to the bottom of the issue. They believe it's either accelerator pedal or DU (rear I believe). Supposed to get another update before end of the day.

Questions for the group:
1) I did not custom order this car from the Tesla site (would have taken longer to get). This was an "inventory" car with 30 miles on it that the Tesla sales rep arranged for me (it matched what I was looking for). Manufactured at the end of 2016 I believe (Model S 75d). It was transported last week to my Tesla center (from Ohio I think). Did I make a mistake?

2) I leased the car. Do I have any recourse here if problems continue?

Thanks in advance for any insights.
 
I did the same with mine last yr on may 28. It had 15 miles on it but had old nose cone so I got 8500 off but had every option I wanted. I will tell you I don't think you made a mistake as my guess is they will fix this issue quickly and correctly after a long test drive.
 
@uuette

Yes, your picture is the same notification I am getting. However, my understanding is that this "car needs service" notification can mean many different things. Presumably there is another code that shows up in the logs right before the error occurs. That code tells them where to start looking. That would be my guess..
 
Status update - The DU was replaced and the car is finally back in our possession. Unfortunately, since they weren't able to recreate the error they aren't sure if this fixes our problem.

@baw
Certainly can't say the symptoms or root cause of our problems are the same but Tesla seems comfortable in providing us with the same solution. Best of luck to you.
 
Damn sorry to hear about the issue. But unfortunately I am in the same boat as you when it comes to service center. I've had this car since Jan 2017, been to the service center 3-4 times now. All kinds of little small problems here and there.

You're on about the same schedule as me, basically mine goes into the SC about once per month. Each visit has a list of problems to work. I've had my S since Sept 2016.
 
You're on about the same schedule as me, basically mine goes into the SC about once per month. Each visit has a list of problems to work. I've had my S since Sept 2016.

Hmmm. That's not pleasant to hear at all. Sorry about your situation. At this point I don't know what to expect as there are people who apparently have no issues at all and others with nothing but. Time will ultimately tell.
 
After a couple of days in the shop, I have my car back. They replaced the rear drive unit.

I had the exact same problem with my S75. I picked the car up in Vegas and was driving it back to Jackson when that message popped up. I was on the freeway just north of the SLC Service Center when it occurred. I called Roadside Assistance and they put me on hold while they pulled the logs. They told me the drive unit was showing a temperature "imbalance" -- one side was hotter than the other. I indicated I was able to drive the car to the SvC so they called ahead for me.

When I arrived, the manager met me and told me they would have to replace the drive unit but they had a loaner ready for me. In < 30 minutes I was able to continue my drive to Jackson and a few days later they delivered my car to me. No problems since then.

I was mightily impressed with their service.
 
Just took delivery of my new MS 75d 2 days ago. This morning after pulling out of garage, I got the "car needs service power reduced" notification/warning. Pulled over to the side of the road. Tried to call Tesla (both local service and roadside). Roadside never picked up and local service forwarded me to a voice mail. At that point I decided to exit car, lock it and then unlock it. After starting up again, warning went away. Unfortunately warning came back a bit later in the day having only driven a few miles. Got a hold of Tesla service and bringing in Monday morning.

I am dumbfounded that 2 days after delivery my very expensive car already has issues. XM radio interface is also not working. Yikes

I got this message driving from LA to San Diego the other day (I took delivery in early June), Tesla Service Center rep told me that it seems to be a glitch, because the message went away after I had stopped for lunch. But the message came back today driving back up to LA from SD this afternoon. Hopefully they figure it out soon. I've already been to the SC twice in the last month to deal with the a/c not working correctly.
 
Hi All,

I’ve been reading through this thread as this problem has just happened to me now.

I took delivery of a new S75 on Friday and less than 24 hours later, and with only 88 kilometres (i live in New Zealand) on the clock I got the ‘car needs service’ with reduced power. I limped the car off the motorway, and phoned Tesla Roadside assist. I was answered in seconds and advised to take the car back to the dealership.

The concern I have is that if we’re talking about a drive unit or a big problem I may not have my car for months. New Zealand doesn’t have a service centre yet.

Still I’m hopeful they can find and fix the issues easily.

A question for you all; The scheduled update the one with Chill mode) notified me that it had failed to install, then roughly 15kms down the motorway was when I got the error message. ‘Car needs service’. And it went into reduced power mode. Could the failed update be the problem?

PS. The team at Tesla Auckland have been beyond excellent. I was put straight into a P100D loaner and the Manager drove from his house to the dealership on a Saturday to personally deal with me.

Will update again when I have more...
 
I've put 17,000 miles on my pre-owned P85 since September 8th. I did get the DU replaced, due to an old issue with the early drive units that took about 50,000 miles to appear on my car. Other than this, and a craptastic navigation system, I haven't had any complaints or issues with my car.

Tesla will get you sorted out and take care of any issues you find/have. You may run into some issues early on, but usually once the little things are fixed early on, more problems are rare.