Hello, World

[BlueIsGreen]

Last night I left a deposit on a signature Roadster. I'm going to keep full details private for the moment, but the Bay Area will have one come home next weekend.

What should I know about dealerships? I assume I want to start with a visit to Palo Alto for service (rather than Sunnyvale, which would be more convenient.) Who are our local Roadster techs? Is there someone in particular I should ask for? During the weekend I could not even get answers on if there are service contracts available. Any advice?

I am happy to have stumbled upon the VMS Log Parser and The CAN thanks to prior threads, both of which are fantastic to see. Very cool stuff. I am a lucky novice, delighted to have this new adventure. Are there in-person meet ups planned? Any thoughts or tips are quite welcome.

Looking forward to getting to know you!

 

[im4uttx]

Congrats! Hopefully you have as good of luck with yours as I've had with mine in the last 4 months. Very much fun to drive...

Service centers seem to be hit and miss, depending on where you are. You found some good threads. Best to continue searching threads for any info desired as most everything has been discussed.

This forum is most beneficial for all roadster issues and enthusiasts. Very knowledgeable folks here and are more than willing to help with answering questions.

There were 2 meetups and drives in CA earlier this year, and I'm sure there will be more...they are a lot of fun as we just had one with 8 roadsters in TX weekend before last...

 

[jkoya]

Congrats !!!

 

[BlueIsGreen]

Thank you both! This looks like a great community. 8 roadsters in one meetup had to have epic photos.

 

[im4uttx]

Thank you both! This looks like a great community. 8 roadsters in one meetup had to have epic photos.

Got a couple pics at the end of this thread:
Central Texas Roadster meetup and Drive - Sept/Oct 2019?

But nothing like the ones in CA...2 drives this past summer...
https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/sf-bay-roadster-drive-meetup-13-july.157667/
Aug 11th, So Cal Roadster Meetup

 

[BlueIsGreen]

Wow! Thank you @im4uttx
The rainbow sorted shots are particularly amazing. Beautiful.
I look forward to adding one more to the mix.

 

[MCroadster]

It might be a bit out of the way, but I have had a good experience at the Burlingame SC. For the annual service they give you a signed report with notes on the checklist. They were pretty fast and efficient with the service and the car seemed to be more balanced (lower vibration at high speed), then when it was brought in.

 

[BlueIsGreen]

It might be a bit out of the way, but I have had a good experience at the Burlingame SC. For the annual service they give you a signed report with notes on the checklist. They were pretty fast and efficient with the service and the car seemed to be more balanced (lower vibration at high speed), then when it was brought in.

Perfect, this is just the sort of thing I was looking to understand. Anyone in particular to ask for? Or a direct phone number?
Thank you!!!

 

[drewski]

It might be a bit out of the way, but I have had a good experience at the Burlingame SC. For the annual service they give you a signed report with notes on the checklist. They were pretty fast and efficient with the service and the car seemed to be more balanced (lower vibration at high speed), then when it was brought in.

Good to know about Burlingame. I went to the Berkeley SC to buy a car cover and the service advisor said they rarely see roadsters and recommended SF, San Rafael, or Dublin (I'm in Oakland)

 

[MCroadster]

Perfect, this is just the sort of thing I was looking to understand. Anyone in particular to ask for? Or a direct phone number?
Thank you!!!

Hmm, you probably could make an appointment by phone but that seemed to take a long time last time I tried. I had a few other things to get done at the same time so I walked in and made an appointment in-person. It was pretty easy doing it that way as I was only second in line and we could take a look a some of the part availabilities right there on their computer. If you walk up to the service desk most of any of Advisors should be able to help you, but Alexandra did a great job last time. Deven was the service technician for my annual service.

Keep in mind there is limited indoor space at the Burlingame SC, so it would be wise to bring the hard or softop as it will be sitting outside most of the time.

If the car did not already come with it, I would recommend getting a hcsharp's CAN SR and an OVMS module.
The CAN gives you much more freedom of where you can charge. It's a real top grade piece. This summer I made to Tahoe and back just on the CAN SR.

The OVMS module offers cellular communications for the roadster, and is huge peace of mind. Most of the functions of the car can be remotely actuated using the app. Being a able to remotely monitor the charging status of the car is worth it just in itself. It has a ton of other functionality that has been discussed here.

Congrats on the purchase, and be careful with the traction control switch!

 

[beefchowmein]

Welcome!!
I just got my annual service done at Burlingame SC along with few other tidbits fixed. Mostly cause I live around about. While shooting the breeze with the service adviser, he said they usually get about the same 3 roadster getting stuff done there, not including mine. He also told me that the guy that does the roadster maintenance have been with Tesla since the days they were building the roadster. If there are odds and end questions about the Roadster, the guy would know.
Overall, seem like they can still source parts for the most part. And yes, if they have your car for a few days, it will sit outside.

lastly, the only way to make an appointment now is to call the sales line or part line and ask them to transfer or else they'll tell you to book it via the Tesla App (which btw, does not work with the roadster if you haven't figure it out yet.)

 

[BlueIsGreen]

If the car did not already come with it, I would recommend getting a hcsharp's CAN SR and an OVMS module.

Thanks for this. So -- I think Gruber's sells the CANs from hcsharp? My mental model is that ordering a CAN Jr from Gruber supports everyone? (If not, I'll order the CAN Sr from @hcsharp directly to share the love.)

The OVMS module is utterly new information, and I will go check that out, thanks for the pointers!

Partly also for @beefchowmein, I drove to Burlingame today. I now have the direct number for service there, which I will not post publicly, but if folks PM me I'm happy to provide it. Apparently they have one tech who is familiar with the Roadsters. They actually refused to give me his name. And I rather like that -- he's there to work on the cars, not be hounded. Good policy. [Edit to add: and the name is in the thread above anyway. ]

They very kindly and genuinely helpfully tried to talk me out of buying a Roadster, with a few interesting bits of information. They currently have three Roadsters sitting on the lot for several months waiting on parts (PEM and/or battery.) They have no idea when parts will arrive, if ever. In particular, I was warned off because the 12V battery is no longer made. "Oh no, this is a 1.5, so it does not have a 12V. It uses the first two sheets of the main and only battery," I answered. And then I tried to keep a straight face, because I would not have understood anything of that even a few days ago. It seemed impolitic to point out the 12V batteries *are* available, just not from Tesla.

A friend-of-a-friend with a Roadster loaned me his trickle charger cable, and spoke well of Palo Alto SC. It sounds like they also have one guy who knows Roadsters well. It would be easier for me to get to Palo Alto, so I confess I am tempted.

Thanks for the tip on making sure the Roadster wears a hat for service. Very good advice.

 

[im4uttx]

If you want to support Gruber, I think it's FAR better to throw them business for PEM rebuild when needed, or battery work when needed. They will make FAR more on that than the few $ they will make on a CAN.

The knowledge base on roadster is far better in this forum than in most SC, from what I gather. I have yet to make an appt at the SC in Austin, but probably won't have major work done at Tesla SC for a roadster. The standard answer from most SC is to replace stuff until the problem is fixed, regardless of how simple some fixes could be. You already seem to know more about roadsters than those who were trying to talk you out of buying one.

There just aren't enough roadsters to expect Tesla to have experienced technicians at ALL SC. But, they COULD afford to keep a few and have roadsters directed to specific SC within specific timeframes and send technicians on the road (to work short term at SCs across the US and even Europe/Asia) to help when needed. Tesla has ALL the information on the roadster and should be supported in some fashion. Tesla just needs to figure out a better support system, including a phone hot-line number provided to documented roadster owners (when owners register their roadster with Tesla).

Part of the issue is Tesla is still learning how to deal with service overall. There are wildly different stories of support for MS/MX/M3, so it's not surprising roadsters aren't getting much support.

 

[BlueIsGreen]

It's been a while. I figured I'd just update this thread. After a flurry of activity to get Roadster #48 home (calling her Tess, short for Tessellation,) and jump through the hoops to get a Tesla repair team willing to take a look, it turned out the PEM was fine. Whew! Battery sheets, not so much. That was disclosed by the seller, and batteries are a lot easier to address in many ways than the PEM, so this was good news. The Tesla repair group was all doom and gloom and once again tried to convince me to trade it in for a new Tesla. Uh.... no !

Long story short: Gruber. They did great work and the car is back to me as of Wednesday. Some things were cosmetic (peeling headlights) some were crucial (coolant pump) and the revamped batteries are not likely to leave me slowly coasting to a stop on a highway if I ever accelerate too hard. Long list of fixes, and Gruber was great throughout, even sending me a highly entertaining story that boils down to in all likelihood the seat heater *never* worked, but Tesla folks knew this and shipped it anyway (and, of course, Gruber fixed it, with no little detective work and ingenuity!)

In Santa Clara County we are currently permitted to drive in order to exercise, so I'm looking forward to a very long drive to go hiking tomorrow. The hike will be nice too, but really: I've missed this car. Cannot wait to open it up without fear of something failing.

Yesterday someone slowed down and started taking pictures pointing at our house. I was all set to go out to yell and then realized: nope, the pix were of the Roadster. I have to say I am not thrilled with that either but... I sure do understand the appeal!

 

[Bunnak]

awesome! show us pics of your roadster. hopefully we can do a roadster round up again later this year.

 

[sethr]

Yesterday someone slowed down and started taking pictures pointing at our house. I was all set to go out to yell and then realized: nope, the pix were of the Roadster. I have to say I am not thrilled with that either but... I sure do understand the appeal!

There's a fun thread of owners taking pics of people taking pics of our Roadsters - so next time take advantage! Have fun, and enjoy your Roadster. I frequently have great conversations with people interested in my Roadster, and use it as an opportunity to advocate for EVs in general.