Yup, I had a SR+ for 7 days, and just returned it. Ok here’s the story (signed up just to post this):
Ordered a black on black SR+ a week ago and took delivery last Friday
Delivery wasn’t super smooth: was told to show up a Burbank at 11am, did the orientation with 7 other M3 owners and was told my car is being prepared not yet ready. In group orientation, everyone found their car in parking lot by using the phone app and honking the horn or lights. I didn’t find mine. Was then told by Burbank my car is at Marina Del Rey location, 25 miles away. They uber’d me there, so was not a huge deal. Not smooth, but I wasn’t going to let that ruin my special M3 delivery day!
Got to the other delivery location, picked up the car, had 15 miles on it. Started navigation but it didn’t work- not available, it has AP. No big, maybe still map updating, used my phone Waze. About 5 miles from delivery center, while driving, the screen goes blank. Car still drove fine, but no screen visible. Was trying to find a place to pull over, then I realized the screen was rebooting, saw the big T logo. So I kept driving home, noticed that navigation is now available and I used it. I reasoned that maybe the map/nav was the cause of rebooting, temporary blanking the screen for 3 minutes or so.
Day 2-4 no issues, except maybe the phone app key doesn’t work 100% of the time. Sometimes had to use wallet key card.
Day 5, leaving office for lunch, got inside my M3, no screen, all black and shiny. I thought the car didn’t turn on, so I exited , locked and unlocked 3x. No change, still no screen, so I tried the shift lever, the car drives D and R. But kinda scary not knowing if it’s in P or not. While still at office parking lot, I recall YouTube video on how to reboot via scroll wheels hold, so I tried it. Saw the big T logo on screen after 30 sec or so, and then the screen returns to normal. I’m thinking- dang, I just got this thing. It seems to go blank screen after being parked for a while and upon returning, unlocking the door, the screen does not show up. This happened 6x on day 5 at work and at home. Every time, I soft rebooted to get the screen back to normal. Maybe not related, the M3 started “reduced camera / blind spot visibly” message, but that sometimes went away with reboot and sometimes not. I was rebooting several times a day. Made a service appointment from app, the earliest available was 2 weeks away, then a month away. So I picked the 2 week one. At my darker indoor garage I noticed that the screen is really not blank, but actually on and displaying, just very very dim. See pic attached. I turned the brightness to 100% to take that pic.
Day 6, to my surprise the M3 screen was fine in the morning when I got in! But when I went to lunch, same thing, blank/very dim screen. Dang! So I drove to the service center that I had the appointment for in 2 weeks, it also happens to be the dealership I bought/ordered from. They told me it was definitely a firmware issue, new one just came out, they will brute force a firmware update and that will fix it. So I asked, what if it’s a hardware issue? He assured me it’s firmware and it will get fixed. Happily picked up the car 2 hrs later, hopeful I won’t see the screen issue again. Nope! After being locked/parked, opening the door, the screen is blank again! Fudggggggge. Rebooted, drove it home, tested out a few more times and video’d on my phone the screen failure a few more times. It doesn’t always misbehave, it’s intermittent.
Day 7, drove the car to work 30 miles away. Yeah, the screen would blank out half the time when getting in, needing reboot to drive safely. Left work early to go to service center dealership, didn’t get the prior service advisor- Rene, so Blake helped me today. Showed him my screen failure video clips. Blake still insisted this is a software/firmware issue and Tesla engineer are working on it. I asked him how many M3 have come in for this issue? He said several, 5 or so this week. I told Blake and Rene I couldn’t find this screen going blank issue in online forums that required multiple reboots daily. Blake assured me that with patience my screen will be fixed with software updates. I told him excluding the possibility of hardware issue is not good systems engineering or simply technical trouble shooting. Blake actually question what kind of engineer I was, I told him aerospace and I’ve worked with SpaceX as well. Thought that was a bit rude, and didn’t want to hear Blake’s explanation bs- I asked what it takes to return and get another M3.
Drove the car 3 miles to the delivery center, Blake said they would call and give them a heads up I was coming in for return. I was not planning to return the car today, but Tesla service center refusing to consider hardware issue and wanting me to wait on my time to maybe fix my M3 in a few weeks or months, and Blake being Blake, I figured this is the right move. During my return, I tried to get them to trade me another new M3, same colors, spec, and they are in stock at that delivery location. Mine had less than 400miles and a defective screen. They thought about it, had the car, but said I would need to pay for the 2nd car and wait for the refund on the 1st car, which could be weeks- I forgot how long they said. Although I have the cash, I didn’t want to give them $90K+ and get one SR+ and wait for the return check. They almost didn’t want to take the return, the M3 was in perfect shape, maybe a little dirty, no scratches anywhere, they admit it was in returnable condition. But I didn’t have the 2 key cards, only one, the other was at home. After checking with supervisor, they said they’ll take the return, but I’ll need to return the other key card tomorrow. The return service advisor was Robert, he’s alright, got me a Uber ride home. The screen did go blank on Robert when he opened the door.
I really like the M3, If it wasn’t for the screen blanking out often, I would still have that M3. Instead I’m going to order another one after I confirm the refund is processed. Maybe I won’t get M3 #2 for a week or so, maybe a month max? I believe in Tesla and its products. I’m willing to give it another shot. Still own TSLA stock. I think I had a M3 SR+ with a defective screen and/or hardware. Suspect video driver.
Anyone else have this screen blanking/very dim issue on M3 requiring rebooting? Multiple times a day?
