Million mile motor?

[Revver]

Anyone remember that claim? Seems some owners have had to replace motors under 100,000 miles due to drive train problems. Soo, what sort of problems? Bearing failure, spline wear, gear wear, pump failure, etc.?

If you have had to have a motor or drive train replaced, post about it below. Also, if you know the cause of failure, post that too.

Keep on revvin',
Bill

 

[TLLMRRJ]

Kinda funny the Tesla website sells you on buying 2 motors because in case one fails, you'll be able to drive on the other.

"Your car can drive on either motor, so you never need to worry about getting stuck on the road. If one motor stops working, you can safely continue to your destination with the second."

From what I have read, that's not even true as the whole car can be disabled by a failed drive unit, but nevermind that, if they are telling you to buy 2 motors so you can still get home, it sure doesn't sound like they believe in their own 1M mile motor claim, does it?

 

[Knightshade]

if they are telling you to buy 2 motors so you can still get home, it sure doesn't sound like they believe in their own 1M mile motor claim, does it?

Uh- Tesla never claimed current motors go 1 million miles.

Plus of course there's a difference between average and individual. The average american only drives between 10 and 30 miles per day, but the fact YOU PERSONALLY might drive more doesn't mean we can't "believe" the cited number.

 

[LowBattery]

Uh- Tesla never claimed current motors go 1 million miles.

I believe this is likely the source that Revver and TLLMRRJ were referring to:
Tesla Shows off Model 3 Drive Unit after One Million Miles of Driving

 

[outdoors]

My Suburban had to have cylinders rebored or something physically had to be redrilled in the motor. Was never the same. From the longest-selling nameplate in North America the Chevrolet Suburban.

Here we read the occasional story of a car that has a motor issue of what 500k made? This forum is not representative of the general public of Tesla owners. We might like to think it is as we are members but it is not.

Best thing about a Tesla motor is they don't try to fix yours. They swap it out. Getting any other ice manufacturer to swap out an entire engine. Good luck with that. The dealer wants the labor hours to tinker with your car. The manufacturer is just doing math on how least cost to fix. Between those two. You are fighting an up hill battle to get a long lasting engine/motor.

I'll take a Tesla motor any day.

 

[TLLMRRJ]

Uh- Tesla never claimed current motors go 1 million miles.

Uh, surprised you never heard that:

https://electrek.co/2019/04/13/tesla-model-3-longevity-claims-elon-musk/

 

[Fernand]

I just checked and I've been using my Note 3 Samsung 24x7 since 2013, it refuses to die. Bought 3 (removable) batteries in that time. The old proverbial YMMV at work. But DC motors are a very mature technology. A lot of 60 year old trams and locomotives are still running on their original motors.

 

[Bill Foster]

My Suburban had to have cylinders rebored or something physically had to be redrilled in the motor. Was never the same. From the longest-selling nameplate in North America the Chevrolet Suburban.

Then whoever rebuilt your motor screwed up.

 

[outdoors]

Then whoever rebuilt your motor screwed up.

Of course. Owned 3 suburbans. Dealer didn't care. Wanted billable warranty work. Fought tooth and nail with GM. Had 18k in miles. Lasted till 150k. Wasn't like the others.

Will go with the swap out motor. Easy. Kind of hard to argue that it just stops and tells you your done. ICE leads you on a never ending path of guessing.

 

[iamnid]

Kinda funny the Tesla website sells you on buying 2 motors because in case one fails, you'll be able to drive on the other.

"Your car can drive on either motor, so you never need to worry about getting stuck on the road. If one motor stops working, you can safely continue to your destination with the second."

From what I have read, that's not even true as the whole car can be disabled by a failed drive unit, but nevermind that, if they are telling you to buy 2 motors so you can still get home, it sure doesn't sound like they believe in their own 1M mile motor claim, does it?

It doesn't say what you quoted. It says, "Tesla All-Wheel Drive has two independent motors that digitally control torque to the front and rear wheels—for far better handling and traction control. Your car can drive on either motor, so you never need to worry about getting stuck on the road."

It doesn't claim to be able to drive on one if the other fails.

 

[mswlogo]

My Suburban had to have cylinders rebored or something physically had to be redrilled in the motor. Was never the same. From the longest-selling nameplate in North America the Chevrolet Suburban.

Here we read the occasional story of a car that has a motor issue of what 500k made? This forum is not representative of the general public of Tesla owners. We might like to think it is as we are members but it is not.

Best thing about a Tesla motor is they don't try to fix yours. They swap it out. Getting any other ice manufacturer to swap out an entire engine. Good luck with that. The dealer wants the labor hours to tinker with your car. The manufacturer is just doing math on how least cost to fix. Between those two. You are fighting an up hill battle to get a long lasting engine/motor.

I'll take a Tesla motor any day.

Keep in mind they are replacing with "new" drive units today because most Model 3's probably have less than 20K miles. Once they start getting higher mileage they will install refurbished motors (repaired motors). They also use refurbished batteries. What the cut off is for new versus refurb I have no idea.

I've seen more blown motors on this forum than I have seen in a decade on Jeep and VW forums combined. And Jeep sold 1 million in 2018. VW Sold around 4 million in 2018. So 10x more vehicles, over 1/10 the amount of time, 10x more frequent. That's a 1000%. But it still might be relatively low.

 

[TLLMRRJ]

It doesn't say what you quoted. It says, "Tesla All-Wheel Drive has two independent motors that digitally control torque to the front and rear wheels—for far better handling and traction control. Your car can drive on either motor, so you never need to worry about getting stuck on the road."

It doesn't claim to be able to drive on one if the other fails.

What's up with the people on this forum?? I literally copy and pasted what I posted from the Tesla.com home page at the time I posted that.

People like you just like to start arguments.

Model 3 | Tesla

Scroll down to blue Model 3, read and comprehend, and come back to us with your crazy explanation that you are still right and I am wrong (in your own mind).

 

[outdoors]

I've seen more blown motors on this forum than I have seen in a decade on Jeep and VW forums combined. .

We are talking S's correct? Haven't seen that many 3's.

 

[JasonR67]

It doesn't claim to be able to drive on one if the other fails.

Yes.. It literally does and I quote: "Your car can drive on either motor, so you never need to worry about getting stuck on the road. If one motor stops working, you can safely continue to your destination with the second."

 

[SSedan]

The million mile motor idea is idiotic anyway as the rest of the car is just a car, nothing about it makes the rest of it more durable than any other car on the road.

Lots of ICE engines will got 300k, but people get rid of the car when brake lines are rusting out and electronics stop working and the suspension is shot..........

 

[ewoodrick]

When someone says that a product is rated to a certain amount, that doesn't mean that ever instance will go that far.
If a million instances are sold, maybe 10% will give out before then. And there will always be instances that die really early.

So, they are still on target.

 

[SD_Engnr]

We are talking S's correct? Haven't seen that many 3's.

Pretty sure they're referring to the 3. If you're a member of enough Model 3 groups, you'll see them pop up in your feed. I think part of the issue is that Tesla does not always provide sufficient information to the customer when there's a motor problem, and just labels it as a "motor failure".

For example, I had my car for 4 weeks, and less than 1k miles when my "motor failed". Car was driving just fine aside from a really loud squeal at the front inner CV joint. I was convinced it was an inner CV joint failure or possibly an axle bearing issue, but all I was told after they had my car for 20 days was that the "motor failed" and it was replaced it with a "newer revision". So, now I'm a data point on the "motor failures" metric.

 

[outdoors]

Pretty sure they're referring to the 3. If you're a member of enough Model 3 groups, you'll see them pop up in your feed. I think part of the issue is that Tesla does not always provide sufficient information to the customer when there's a motor problem, and just labels it as a "motor failure".

For example, I had my car for 4 weeks, and less than 1k miles when my "motor failed". Car was driving just fine aside from a really loud squeal at the front inner CV joint. I was convinced it was an inner CV joint failure or possibly an axle bearing issue, but all I was told after they had my car for 20 days was that the "motor failed" and it was replaced it with a "newer revision". So, now I'm a data point on the "motor failures" metric.

So let's extrapolate that out by how many you estimate you've seen. Then say that we are 9 to 10% of the Tesla public? Are we at 500,000 vehicles yet? Want to put a real number on something rather than I've read about them or I've seen a lot. Are we at 1%? 1/10 of 1%?

Edit:
@SD_Engnr Just trying to get a handle on the OP's goal here. Is it trying to find the cause of the problem or draw attention to it. Either way I would like a statistical answer. Maybe even a Tesla answer at some point we are seeing cars with in excess of 100k in miles.

 

[mswlogo]

We are talking S's correct? Haven't seen that many 3's.

No actually I have not seen any S or X since on this forum 18 months. I know a while back S’s had lots of problems. I’ve seen at least 6 Model 3 motors or more. I didn’t keep track. But eyebrow raising. Quite a few were what appeared to be unrelated issues but the fix ends up being a new drive unit. Quite a few batteries too. I don’t know the exact stats on either. I know things lean toward complaints on forums. But I also know there are folks with new drive units and batteries that also never posted here.