Front vibration when accelerating - accelerometer graphs....

[rns-e]

I had a front shaft replaced and it seamed to help for a while. It does seam to be back ...

Does any of you also experience occasionally vibration under hard braking at high speed? I'm sure the discs are ok.

 

[sorka]

The other day I started noticing the slightest hint of it returning. It was good for about 5K miles or and it's not bad now. Honestly if it never got worse than it is now, which is about 1/10th of what it was before, it'll be fine. But I suspect this is how it started before. If it continues to get worse, I'll have to conclude this is a design flaw and that the front driveshaft/suspension setup can't handle the few hundred ft lbs of torque.

 

[tmarcc]

Just to revive an old thread, I had the same shudder issue when accelerating. They ultimately replaced the following items which eliminated the shudder - for now anyway. Service notes pasted below.

-----------------------
Concern: Vehicle has noise or vibration while driving (customer couldn't determine location)
Customer states: When accelerating there is heavy vibration and shutter coming from front right right of vehicle.
Pay Type: Warranty
Corrections: Interior NVH General Diagnosis

Performed road test during service visit and found vehicle experiencing torque steer and wheel shudder. Due to the amount of torque vehicle produces will will experience shudder and torque steer, front tires will make screeching noise as tires are trying not to lose traction. Upon road test did verify steering clicking noise. Next step is to lift vehicle and retorque front suspension and retest for system operation
Corrections: Suspension - Front - Check Torque
Torqued front suspension to specification. Road test vehicle.
Corrections: Halfshaft Assembly - Front - RH
Removed and replaced halfshaft assembly.
Part Quantity
FRONT RIGHT HALFSHAFT - DUAL MOTOR (1030616-00-B)

Parts Replaced or Added
Corrections: Jackshaft Assembly - Front
Removed and replaced jackshaft assembly.
Shop foreman test drove vehicle prior to installation of new parts. Following installation of the front right halfshaft assembly and the installation of the front jackshaft assembly, shop foreman test drove and verified that vehicle is now operating to the specifications of like models. No further work recommended at this time.
Part Quantity
JACKSHAFT ASSY, FR (1030632-00-A) 1
Parts Replaced or Added

 

[sorka]

Just to revive an old thread, I had the same shudder issue when accelerating. They ultimately replaced the following items which eliminated the shudder - for now anyway. Service notes pasted below.

-----------------------
Concern: Vehicle has noise or vibration while driving (customer couldn't determine location)
Customer states: When accelerating there is heavy vibration and shutter coming from front right right of vehicle.
Pay Type: Warranty
Corrections: Interior NVH General Diagnosis

Performed road test during service visit and found vehicle experiencing torque steer and wheel shudder. Due to the amount of torque vehicle produces will will experience shudder and torque steer, front tires will make screeching noise as tires are trying not to lose traction. Upon road test did verify steering clicking noise. Next step is to lift vehicle and retorque front suspension and retest for system operation
Corrections: Suspension - Front - Check Torque
Torqued front suspension to specification. Road test vehicle.
Corrections: Halfshaft Assembly - Front - RH
Removed and replaced halfshaft assembly.
Part Quantity
FRONT RIGHT HALFSHAFT - DUAL MOTOR (1030616-00-B)

Parts Replaced or Added
Corrections: Jackshaft Assembly - Front
Removed and replaced jackshaft assembly.
Shop foreman test drove vehicle prior to installation of new parts. Following installation of the front right halfshaft assembly and the installation of the front jackshaft assembly, shop foreman test drove and verified that vehicle is now operating to the specifications of like models. No further work recommended at this time.
Part Quantity
JACKSHAFT ASSY, FR (1030632-00-A) 1
Parts Replaced or Added

They told me they replaced both halfshaft assemblies, so I'm wondering what this jackshaft assembly is and why they didn't do it to mine. Then I thought perhaps they might have, so I goto gmail and type in "jackshaft" and sure enough my repair invoice pops up(cool gmail searches for your search terms inside attached documents) and there it was.

Obviously a very common problem and they know exactly how to fix it now.

Mine was repaired successfully at 24117 miles. It now has 34K miles on it and the issue is just starting to return. Since I'm really attune to the symptoms, I'm sure I'm noticing it many thousands of miles sooner than I did the first time. Pretty sure bet it will be back to full strength shake before my 50K warranty expires but then I'll have to pay for it out of pocket when it happens 10 to 15K miles after that.

 

[travwill]

Have my x in for service as the screen is always unresponsive/freezing. They are trying to figure out why but I've also told them about the vibration at high/full acceleration.

They ordered a new halfshaft that comes in tomorrow. Hope that fixes the issue so will report back...

 

[sorka]

Just hit 35K miles and the vibration is back in full force just as bad as it was right before it was fixed at 24K. My suspicion is that WAY many more PDL cars have this folks realize.

 

[davidc18]

Just hit 35K miles and the vibration is back in full force just as bad as it was right before it was fixed at 24K. My suspicion is that WAY many more PDL cars have this folks realize.

Sounds like my issue. I was hoping that there was an actual fix and not a just a band aid.

 

[sorka]

Just got the car back. The replaced both CV half shafts again. This time the part numbers are are different this time. Rather than ending with a -A, the part numbers end with a -B.

I have a strong suspicion that these are the half shafts that come on the P100D and are probably a lot stronger.

From August last year:

From yesterday:

 

[sorka]

I guess I should have mentioned that replacing the half shafts again fixed the problem again. I hope it stays fixed this time

 

[BrokerDon]

I guess I should have mentioned that replacing the half shafts again fixed the problem again. I hope it stays fixed this time

Has your vibration returned now that you have the suspected stronger half shafts that come on the P100D ?

 

[Muzzman1]

Sorry to bring up a dying thread, but because of this thread my 85D is in service and they are replacing both front shafts. I will report the part # when it happens.
Thanks for putting this on my radar @sorka , hopefully the new part resolves it. I'm at 35k mi and I don't want to pay for this down the road if it's caused by a poorly designed part.

 

[mmccord]

Sorry to bring up a dying thread, but because of this thread my 85D is in service and they are replacing both front shafts. I will report the part # when it happens.
Thanks for putting this on my radar @sorka , hopefully the new part resolves it. I'm at 35k mi and I don't want to pay for this down the road if it's caused by a poorly designed part.

Mine were just done again at 71k. Last set was at 49k

 

[Muzzman1]

They completed the work on my car. Here's the parts list:

 

[sorka]

Has your vibration returned now that you have the suspected stronger half shafts that come on the P100D ?

The jury is still out. I thought the problem was returning when I felt the same vibration when accelerating hard during a right turn out of a driveway but it seems to still be fine in straight line acceleration.

It occurs to me that the CV joints are under severe stress when applying power at an angle when the steering wheel is turned so far to the left or right and it now occurs to me that driving this way could very well be what caused the failures given the incredible torque at really low speeds.

Therefore I'm resigned to only accelerate hard when I've straightened up from coming out of a 90 degree turn.

 

[MIssiontoMars]

Got the car back today. As I suspected, it was the right hand side CV joint. They replaced the half shaft on that side. After confirming it the fix, they decided to also replace the left hand side as well. Not sure if it's because they still detected some vibration or not. They said it was "for good measure".

Finally smooth and vibration free. In fact, I guess the problem has been there for quite some time because it's far smoother than I remember even when it wasn't bad enough for me to call it a problem.

Just heard from my TSC- This was in the service report-

"Concern: Customer states the vehicle is vibrating while driving at any speeds, check and advise. Vibration is felt in front end.

Roadtested customer vehicle. Confirmed customer concern. Found excessive vibration from front axle shafts. Please order front axle shafts and jackshaft, Contact customer when received. "

Parts coming next week

 

[sorka]

So my vibration has returned full strength and it did so after a specific incident. Did a full power acceleration on a right turn with the suspension on max which resulted in a violent shake.

After that normal straight line acceleration on "normal" or "low" produce a modest vibration.

I'm fairly certain that the CV joints when put under tremendous torque while at an angle caused the joints to stretch and loosen.

I think they should limit torque (i.e. power at low speed when during sharp turn or when on the highest two suspension settings.

 

[bmah]

Just got my car back from service today. It went in for a totally unrelated problem (GPS) but I did mention a slight vibration from the front left corner of the car under heavy acceleration. Now this is an S85D, not an SP85D, so "heavy" means different things to me compared to you performance types. I did a road test with the tech when I dropped the car off, and we did experience the symptom I was concerned about, but he said it was normal. (shrug) Anyway I had piggybacked an annual inspection onto this service appointment as well, and when I picked up the car today, I learned that they replaced the left front half-shaft because they observed it was leaking grease. The replacement is P/N 1030615-00-B. Not sure quite what to make out of this, and I haven't yet had a chance to see if the vibration is still there or not.

Bruce.

 

[randall_s]

So my vibration has returned full strength and it did so after a specific incident. Did a full power acceleration on a right turn with the suspension on max which resulted in a violent shake.

After that normal straight line acceleration on "normal" or "low" produce a modest vibration.

I'm fairly certain that the CV joints when put under tremendous torque while at an angle caused the joints to stretch and loosen.

I think they should limit torque (i.e. power at low speed when during sharp turn or when on the highest two suspension settings.

Agreed. I pull out onto a road with brisk traffic that is within the geo-location radius of my driveway. I set the air suspension to high for the driveway so it's on high at this intersection. If I manually lower the suspension at this intersection, I have to remember to raise it again for my driveway. I've had the jack shaft replaced once and feel the vibrations on hard acceleration returning. I try to always lower the suspension before accelerating, but sometimes I don't have a chance or just forget it's on high.

After exceeding 45 mph the AS will move from high to normal. I don't see why Tesla couldn't program the car to reduce torque and protect the drivetrain in these circumstances. Surely there's enough data to understand the failure modes here.

 

[mmccord]

To follow-up on this thread, my half shafts (which were replaced in October of 2016) needed replacement again in August of 2017. The right side half shaft was replaced for a third time yesterday (october 2017). This was initially done under warranty.

Warranty on parts is 12 months/12k miles, so all the replacements have been under warranty also, though my car is now well out of warranty. I don't expect these to outlast the warranty period either.

 

[scottm]

It's almost predictable that these torque monsters are going to stress and wear out some part/s sooner than most any other car... electric motors are sweet cruelty on the mechanically driven parts. It makes sense CV's are the Achilles heal of it all. Thank goodness these are easily replaceable parts, and it's not something else in the "tranny" that wears.

Making CV's / half shafts a "consumable item" on the model S... can be somewhat mitigated I guess by easing up on the pedal, and certainly.. no more power slide attempts around corners!

I'm just going through the suspension parts on my beast now... at 100K km... But I figured this would be the price for the world's heaviest car too.. ball joints don't like it.