Major UI problem in cold weather

[Smallfootprint]

Lately I've been having a consistent problem whenever it's cold out.

Upon entering the car, the center screen doesn't turn on, nor does the HVAC or radio, thus I'm assuming some form of the central computer isn't activating.

The screen above the steering wheel is active and I can drive the (chilly) car. However, the screen above the steering wheel has a display that reads "battery heating, power will increase while driving."

After about 10-15 minutes of driving I can reboot and the 17" screen/hvac/radio will come on.

This problem persists even though I've de-activated sleep mode. When the car goes into this deep cold hibernation it also doesn't react to the mobile app, so it's not like I can pre-heat it to avoid the problem.

This is really inconvenient and scary. Has anyone had a similar problem? I reported it to the service center and sent the car in for a checkup and they said everything was fine. Yet I'm still getting this problem whenever the car is outside in sub-freezing temperatures for more than a few hours.

 

[Doug_G]

Complain again and tell them you want the touchscreen computer replaced. It's obviously not booting up properly in the cold, and the logs should tell them that.

 

[Alysashley79]

Have you tried setting your car to charge right before you would leave? This will also warm the pack.

 

[artsci]

I reported it to the service center and sent the car in for a checkup and they said everything was fine. Yet I'm still getting this problem whenever the car is outside in sub-freezing temperatures for more than a few hours.

The SC is wrong. This is not normal and you should insist that it be fixed.

 

[jerry33]

Contact ownership experience and complain about it. Unfortunately, Tesla has had to recruit service people from traditional dealerships and some of them are still in the "Say whatever it takes to make the customer settle rather than investigating and fixing the issue" mode.

 

[Zythryn]

Anytime service says something you describe is normal, ask them to describe the normal behavior. Just to make sure they understand what you are experiencing and you understand what they mean by normal.

 

[Al Sherman]

Contact ownership experience and complain about it. Unfortunately, Tesla has had to recruit service people from traditional dealerships and some of them are still in the "Say whatever it takes to make the customer settle rather than investigating and fixing the issue" mode.

True but the Service Center manager should positively NOT be this person.

 

[montgom626]

I can tell you a story about how I handled a problem with the SC. I had a video of my driver side door handle not working. I emailed the video of the door handle malfunction to the SC. The SC sent a Ranger out to my home who told me that since he could not reproduce the problem, he was not going to fix it. I showed him the video I had emailed to the SC and he still said he would not fix it. Then I got a follow up email from TM asking how my experience was with the service. I gave the SC the lowest scores possible and wrote in the comment box that they were inconsiderate of my time. The next week the SC called to schedule the repair of my driver side door handle.

 

[bonnie]

Point the Service Center to this thread. (If they haven't already seen it - a lot of people at Tesla monitor TMC - you may get a phone call tomorrow morning asking you to bring your car in.) If that doesn't get their attention, then escalate. But first make sure the SC manager is aware.

The car behavior isn't right, you shouldn't have been dismissed with 'looks fine', and it needs to be fixed. Are you okay with leaving it with them a few days so that they can allow it to get cold overnight to reproduce the problem?

 

[Forty Creek]

Lately I've been having a consistent problem whenever it's cold out.

Upon entering the car, the center screen doesn't turn on, nor does the HVAC or radio, thus I'm assuming some form of the central computer isn't activating.

The screen above the steering wheel is active and I can drive the (chilly) car.

This is really inconvenient and scary. Has anyone had a similar problem? I reported it to the service center and sent the car in for a checkup and they said everything was fine. Yet I'm still getting this problem whenever the car is outside in sub-freezing temperatures for more than a few hours.

This or something very similar happened to me today. The car was set to charge at 3:00 AM but didn't. Touch screen was black this morning and wouldn't wake up until a did a reboot. I didn't try to drive it with the black screen. If it happens again, I'll be talking to TC for sure.

 

[GDH]

The dashboard screen in my car either takes forever to boot up, it stays black for a few minutes when the car is cold. No issues with the large console screen.

 

[Smallfootprint]

Thanks for all the support. I'm going to call the service center again in the morning to try to get this problem fixed now that I'm more confident it's not a setting or software bug I can fix on my end.

If the car is cold enough to have the problem again tomorrow I'll take a video as well.

As a last resort I might also try one of the other service centers in the area (we're lucky to have more than 1 in the NY area).

 

[lloyds]

Very convenient nowadays to take a photo or vid with your phone to document issues.

 

[William13]

My car had this happen one time before the 5.8 update. I rebooted both upper and lower twice and talked with a nice young man at my local service center while it went on. No recurrences.i suggest the double reboot of both before further agitation.

 

[PatP]

I'll repeat myself, but I strongly believe Tesla should have a full time engineering team based in a cold climate. They have to live with the car in a real winter situation on a daily basis (freezing charge port, better cold climate range calculation). Not just in special tests.

Many improvement have already been made since last year (vent, winter package) but it's not enough.

Good news is that many issues will pop from Norway as it's a huge market for Tesla.

 

[Smallfootprint]

As Bonnie presciently predicted, we got a call from the service center management today proactively before I had a chance to call them.

The car is going in on Wednesday for a computer component replacement.

Seems like customer satisfaction is a big priority for the SC managers.

I also have to say that despite the fact that this cold-related issue wasn't fixed on the first visit (which overlapped with our annual inspection), my interactions with the Tesla service center have been many times more pleasant and convenient than either of the big German brands I've dealt with previously.

 

[brianman]

Anytime service says something you describe is normal, ask them to describe the normal behavior. Just to make sure they understand what you are experiencing and you understand what they mean by normal.

And get that information documented with a name attached so that Tesla can make appropriate employment decisions going forward.

 

[Smallfootprint]

Status update for anyone having similar problems: This issue was kind of entirely my fault - but I would have never guessed it in a million years.

The deep hibernation cold issue was caused by having ESPN set as the homepage on the internet browser. Apparently, having it constantly refreshing scores in the background while the car was off and charging caused the computer to shut down after a while. There was no mechanical issue. Now that a more static webpage is set as the homepage everything appears to be fine.

I didn't know enough about web design/tech to realize this could be the problem - and Im warning other users who may not be web savvy either.

 

[pgiralt]

I assume Tesla is still taking this back to engineering so they can put in a software fix for this?

 

[jerry33]

Status update for anyone having similar problems: This issue was kind of entirely my fault - but I would have never guessed it in a million years.

The deep hibernation cold issue was caused by having ESPN set as the homepage on the internet browser. Apparently, having it constantly refreshing scores in the background while the car was off and charging caused the computer to shut down after a while. There was no mechanical issue. Now that a more static webpage is set as the homepage everything appears to be fine.

I didn't know enough about web design/tech to realize this could be the problem - and Im warning other users who may not be web savvy either.

I would have thought that if the web brower was in the background (not visible), it would be turned off. Thanks for the heads-up although mine is set to a mainly static page (TMC). I seldom use the web browser except at car shows.