You seem to know more about this from a technical perspective so curious your thoughts:
I really don’t. I’m just an inquisitive engineer that tends to annoy the crap out of everybody by attempting to learn enough about others’ trade and calling them out when they’re full of it. These things are a lot less complicated than they make them sound.
By the way, when they tell you the clunk is “within spec”, ask them where they think the term “clunker” comes from.
1) safety concerns with this?
2) will the clicking get louder?
3) will more damage occur over time?
4) previous poster says his car drives smoother now...placebo or makes sense?
5) after only retorquing my model 3 axle nuts (no lube) the accel and decel sound is still there (which i'm cool with...could hardly hear) but now I'm getting a random pop like sound over bumps or accelerating out of turn...is this related?
I’m not exactly “qualified” to answer these, but, in my best Vulcan voice, logic dictates that:
1. Unintentionally loose things are never good in a mechanical system. In the best case, more damage will occur, in the worst case something will snap or bend to the point where it will be a safety hazard.
2. Possible. Depends on how loose the axle is already. As more damage is created, that does not necessarily mean more noise (although it probably will get louder).
3. You bet!
4. Think of what the axle is. It’s a glorified rod with splines at the ends, used to transfer rotational motion from a gearbox to the wheel. Each end of the axle is shoved into a socket, and it’s held in by the pressure exerted by a nut. If that nut works itself loose, the axle will work itself out of its socket to some degree, the splines will press less tightly against each other and will bang (getting deformed in the process). The more deformation, the more space is created between the splines, so there’s even more room to accelerate them before they make contact, i.e. they will slam into each other with even more force. Every bit of damage, creates the conditions for further, more significant damage.
If you then re-torque the nut, it pushes the axle back in tighter, the splines make better contact with each other, and the clunk is diminished or eliminated.
There are two issues with this: at least some damage (wear/deformation) of the splines would have already occurred. Re-seating the axle in properly will hide that for a while, but the lifespan of the axle is now definitely reduced (to what degree, we don’t know, but any mechanic who deals with such things could probably give you a good guesstimate). The other unaddressed issue is why the nut worked itself loose to begin with and what have they done to prevent that from happening again (my solid guess would be nothing).
5. Yeah, what are the odds of having two similar symptoms, in the same area, from two different conditions? Just as in medicine, the chances of those symptoms being unrelated are slim.
Think of why it happens in turns or over bumps. The force exerted over the wheel/axle changes, because of either the centrifugal force (in turns) or gravity (over bumps). That change in force must be equalized by the shocks/springs, so, until the suspension fully counteracts the change in said force, there will be some vertical acceleration. That acceleration means force applied to the axle within its socket. If there’s room for it to move, it will bang/clunk. You hearing that noise means there’s already plenty of damage there.
Conclusion:
While it’s fun to wax lyrically and semi-scientifically here about such issues, it’s an effin damaged axle that any responsible manufacturer would quietly replace. Attempting to pretend that it’s normal is quite astonishing.
What’s even more astonishing is that Tesla seems to get away with it, at least for now. As far as I can imagine, that can only be explained in one of two ways:
a) they’re exceptionally well connected and
b) the authorities that normally look into this type of thing (NHTSA?) were made aware of their precarious financial situation and instructed not to rock the boat.