I had checked with them when I went in for a drive repair. it wasn't covered under their warranty
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I had checked with them when I went in for a drive repair. it wasn't covered under their warranty
I think I'm part of the club. Jan 2016 MS 85D. Center screen blank (but drivers screen ok). i could not connect to the car via the mobile app. Went to the car and held both scroll buttons for 4 minutes twice. Also tried both scroll buttons and pressing down brake for 4 minutes and still no go. Im the past 6 months, I had warning indicators where I would lose connectivity and blank center sceen but during these previous times , the issue was resolved by holding the two scroll buttons for a few minutes, Not today. I think my luck ran out. I am in the SF Bay area. I know of EVfixme , but is there a local bay area shop that could do the same? I don't really want to take apart the car. A friend mentioned Phil Sadow in Berkeley ? Anyone ever get this fix from him?
dark cloud
Active Member
Has anyone else had issues with warning messages for parking brake failures when experiencing these memory issues?
My car seems to be inching towards a memory failure, based upon the list of "symptoms" listed in the first post of this thread. So, I made an appointment for the service center to have a look next week.
More or less simultaneously with the recent round of computer-related symptoms, I have also had intermittent warning messages that my parking brake is not engaged when i park (so my car might roll, it says), and sometimes it says the brake did not release when I put it in Drive. (The parking brake calipers don't seem to get warm from driving, so I doubt the validity of at least that message.)
These messages might be unrelated to the memory failing, but i cannot help but wonder....
Thanks.
My car seems to be inching towards a memory failure, based upon the list of "symptoms" listed in the first post of this thread. So, I made an appointment for the service center to have a look next week.
More or less simultaneously with the recent round of computer-related symptoms, I have also had intermittent warning messages that my parking brake is not engaged when i park (so my car might roll, it says), and sometimes it says the brake did not release when I put it in Drive. (The parking brake calipers don't seem to get warm from driving, so I doubt the validity of at least that message.)
These messages might be unrelated to the memory failing, but i cannot help but wonder....
Thanks.
dark cloud
Active Member
Relationship between the MCU eMMC chip and parking brake? Nope. Unrelated issue.
I am guessing your parking brake is seizing up. Not sure about the climate of MA, but if the vehicle is used on sandy/salty roads, have you ever serviced the parking brake? Or any brakes?
whitex
Well-Known Member
Car sitting unused for long times? Maybe parking brake is seizing up? I would tend to agree with @dark cloud that it doesn't seem related to eMMC failures, especially if shifting in/out of PARK doesn't fix it, does it?
2014 S85 - I got a notice that my 12v battery needed to be replaced. After Tesla mobile replaced the battery I got the Black screen of death. Tesla has been less than helpful or forthcoming. It took two weeks to get an appt and they ordered an MCU which is now in. It’s a refurbished unit I believe. (MCU,MDLX,NA PREMIUM,REMAN)
I asked them about driving the car to the service center in this state - no HVAC, abs etc and they said it’s fine which I think is a little concerning but I’m not too far away.
I fought them to give me a loaner as they only want to provide Uber credit. I already dislike Uber and I don’t want to ride with them during this pandemic.
I drop it off Monday for repair and I’ll update with the experience. I am still under my extended warranty luckily.
I asked them about driving the car to the service center in this state - no HVAC, abs etc and they said it’s fine which I think is a little concerning but I’m not too far away.
I fought them to give me a loaner as they only want to provide Uber credit. I already dislike Uber and I don’t want to ride with them during this pandemic.
I drop it off Monday for repair and I’ll update with the experience. I am still under my extended warranty luckily.
You still have ABS and many of your features. Just no control of MCU controlled items.
Yes, I have had Tesla do the brake service they recommend for snowbelt locations, every year. It was last done in late February, which is not that long ago considering what little driving I have done since March 13 (when virus-related shutdowns began here in MA). I do know the sound of the parking brake releasing when it has "stuck" because the car sat in wet weather, and it did not do that this past week.
Shifting in and out of Park does not fix it. What is odd is that one message says it did not releases, and the other one says it did not actuate. So it is hard to know what state it is really in. And as I said, the caliber stays cool, and the car will coast just fine in neutral, so the brakes do not seem to be grabbing. I have added it to my service request as a second item.
Well it’s good to have ABS but I don’t know what other “features” I have without a working MCU. If driving the car in 90 degree heat with no AC, no ability to open the sun roof, no Bluetooth, no navigation, no ability to control steering mode or driving dynamics is ok for most people I would be surprised.
This may be the end of my Tesla experiment. I love the car but the awful service experience and overall dishonesty of the company leadership is making it less and less desirable. Hopefully we will have more alternatives like the Taycan in the coming years.
I bought my 2013 Tesla though a third party. the extended warranty I got didn't cover the mcu even though most of extra control functions are run though it. I put out the money to replace the eMMC through a third party because I don't want to have to replace the whole unit ,then in another 2-5 years have to do it again. I mean it looks like on my unit that it had been a referb replacement in 2018.
On a brighter side of Tesla service. Before the covid pandemic hit here in Orlando. I had made a service appointment to get the drive unit looked at. their was a vibration at speed above 60mph and also when the car was regenerating during breaking. I contacted them directly to see if i needed to bring our second car to bring me home, and they already set me up with a loner model s . Because the drive unit was considered a safety issue they replaced the entire drive assembly right to the wheels at no cost. the car is still covered under the drive train warranty.
It almost seems kinda petty at the point that Tesla could have set up a service to replace the eMMC with a 16GB or larger , but insist they need to replace the whole mcu. and on vehicles older we would get the old 8GB MCU1 model and still have the issue a few years down the road. I mean on a high end car like the model S I really think the solution should be long term.
This is what we know so far:
While your eMMC is dead *(foot note below)
· I don't recommend driving beyond the distance you can travel to and get back, I've seen a car that lost ability to charge to max, and actually limited to about 30% after mcu went black
· Drive after a 30 second timeout
· No AEB (Advanced Emergency Braking)
· No controlling suspension height
· No manual control of headlight lights
· No blinker sounds
· Steering mode defaults to some setting (e.g. if I have it set to sport, during reboot of MCU is changes to standard or comfort, not sure but I can feel the steering wheel take less effort to turn than my normal sport mode)
· No HVAC (heat, cool, vent)
· No defrosters
· No seat heaters
· No steering wheel heaters
· No radio/streaming
· No app connectivity to control the car
· No ability to see the car charge status from app
· Trip A/B
· Profiles
· User Settings
· Homelink
· Bluetooth pairings
· No rear view camera
· Metric areas may have speed shown in MPH and not KPH so be careful
· Do to a few strange reported charging issues, be CAREFUL driving beyond the ability to get home without charging, (range) since I have seen a car that continued to get less max available range in capacity (Still monitoring the issue)
Consolidated eMMC Thread (MCU repair) (Black Center Screen)
Let us know if you need help. We cant do anything about the leadership. But we try to provide support to those who want it from us.
whitex
Well-Known Member
Personally I'd be more worried about parking brake not holding and the car rolling away. It could be that one brake works but not the the other (you have 2 parking brakes), so the car may be ok on flat ground for now, but on a hill it could end up giving way.
PS> if you had someone in the car who would shift in/out of park for you, standing next to the parking brake you should be able to tell if it's doing something, at least nail down whether it's one of them.
whitex
Well-Known Member
I assume the missing footnote meant to be at the bottom was going to say "MCU dead but not missing, i.e. still present and all plugged into the car"? With MCU physically removed the main issue is 12V battery dies within hours, after which nothing works.
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whitex
Well-Known Member
Chip replacement at the SC would be extremely impractical - it's not rocket science but a car repair shop usually doesn't have the tools or staff trained in how to do BGA chip replacements (or deal with possible complications which may arise during a rework). HOWEVER, in this case the solution was obvious, rather than replacing the entire MCU they should have simply replaced the Tegra module, which is absolutely something well within a car repair shop competency. Such repair would be very comparable to the LTE upgrade (which replaces another module inside the MCU), so $500 price instead of $2,500 - and that's at Tesla level pricing (the module itself is much cheaper, for example a similar board but with more memory and using much newer processor retails at $99).
Whether or not the board would have a larger emmc is a secondary issue, as to do that they might have to re-qual the board and its software, which could be expensive so I'm not sure how the economics of that work out, but even with just a brand new 8GB chip and lowered logging, this $500 repair would go a long way.
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dark cloud
Active Member
you must have got one of those extended warranty’s that covers everything that doesn’t go wrong, and excludes everything that does.
Thanks for the information and advice. Much appreciated. I may just have AAA tow it to the service center because I have plenty of free tow miles to use anyway. What is shocking is the Tesla doesn't even advise that there are ANY issues driving without an eMMC. They seem to think it's no big deal to drive this car for two weeks without an eMMC (luckily I have other cars to drive and we aren't really going anywhere) but it seems like a real liability issue.
My wife has also decided not to order the Model Y as a result of seeing what is going on with the S. I am more wiling to put up some issues because I like the car, but seeing that screen go out she lost faith in the idea of a car where everything goes through one screen....
you must have got one of those extended warranty’s that covers everything that doesn’t go wrong, and excludes everything that does.
It covers most of the basic stuff, no one seems to really want to get into the more technical end. Though they do totally cover the brakes, lights, oddly enough whippers, and towing.
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