Model S - pass door opened by itself while driving

[vthomas]

Not sure if anyone else has experience d this, but while I was driving to the Service Center this morning to get some parts installed, my front passenger door opened automatically while I was on the highway. Sept 2017 S90D on 2018.12. SC is checking logs and hypothesizing issue could be a sensor fault on the door handle.

To put it lightly, quite the jarring and unpleasant experience. Just glad no passengers were in the car.

 

[Brettski]

Not sure if anyone else has experience d this, but while I was driving to the Service Center this morning to get some parts installed, my front passenger door opened automatically while I was on the highway. Sept 2017 S90D on 2018.12. SC is checking logs and hypothesizing issue could be a sensor fault on the door handle.

To put it lightly, quite the jarring and unpleasant experience. Just glad no passengers were in the car.

Scary. I wonder if this has been reported with the Model X, with the door doing more than just releasing and opening a crack....

 

[project880]

Yup, same happened to me, but on the driver's door. I was also on the highway. Service replaced the latch and door panel.

 

[JasJ]

Yup, same happened to me, but on the driver's door. I was also on the highway. Service replaced the latch and door panel.

+1 (except passenger rear door)

 

[Lu Ann]

Me too 2013 P85.

 

[Burnt Toast]

Hold on OP, you chose to take a photo at 54mph, rather than pull over, or lean over and close it? The picture came first?

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

Scary, and it's happened before.

Makes me wish we had purely mechanical doors.

 

[Rbcnr]

Happened to me while using AP on highway, 2017 MS75D. Door opened just a little and I was very surprised. No one else was in the car - rear passenger door. Had read about this on a thread a few ago. SC said microswitch failure and going have latch replaced next week. They said this was a known issue on older models but first time they saw it on a new model.

Had me turn off auto present and child safety lock for the time being. Got frustrated and turned auto present back on. Hasnt happened in the past 2 weeks but getting it repaired just in case it happens again. Gluck

Honestly i love tesla but they have to get to the bottom of this. Couldve been very frightening if my child was back there .

 

[vthomas]

Service manager confirmed- it’s the micro switch. Hope they resolve permanently. I had the same thought - glad my kids weren’t in the car.

 

[Ketchups]

OP, next time record a video instead of snapping a photo

Opened, as in the seal was broken and air was allowed into the cabin "opened", or just unlocked - door handle presented "opened"?

Pretty sure the Model S doesn't have the same "door open" feature as the Model X, where the door unlocks and pops out.

 

[Rbcnr]

For me, i heard wind noise coming into tbe cabin so for a millisecond thought it was my left knee but AP also disengaged and when I pulled over, the door was slightly cracked open (1 inch).

Maybe we need to report this to HQ bc I dont know if SC really reports the full case or just orders the necessary parts for repair..so that we can help (maybe) prevent others from encountering this.

 

[BIG ACH]

Happens to me sometimes when I unlock my car.... passenger door just opens, never happened when I'm moving though. Scary for sure.

 

[Doanster1]

Scary for sure. Our X5 with Soft Close doors also spontaneously unlatched once when my son was in the back. Faulty sensor module. TSB subsequently issued across the board.
Alarming in both cases (Tesla and BMW), but the doors will never actually fly open unless we had suicide doors where the wind would force them open. Some things should stay mechanical vs electrical/sensor-based...

 

[liquidcrystal]

Just happened to me yesterday. Pulled out of my parking spot and about 20 feet later the front passenger door just swung open...luckily I was still in the parking lot and the door didn't hit any of the row of cars I was driving by. I tested it at home...anytime I approach the car all the door handles present, as would be expected, but the front passenger door quietly unlatches and opens about 1/4 inch, ready to swing out. When testing it at home, I also heard four very faint bell sounds which I did not hear in the parking lot. I didn't see any "open door" warning on the dashboard....thought that was strange.
This is the same door that had to be repaired the day I picked up the new Model S (2018 75D), three months ago, because it wouldn't open at all. The service department recommended setting the "door unlock" feature to only the driver's door...I'll give that a shot and see if it makes any difference at all. And they are sending out a mobile team next Monday or Tuesday (unfortunately, it happened late Thursday and I called them on Friday.)

 

[whitex]

Just happened to my 2015 Model S with 40K miles on it. Passenger door just keeps randomly popping open (window lowers, door pops open). I started thinking perhaps this was caused by a recent software update (given Tesla's famous software QA), but from this thread it seems it's just Tesla's design quality/durability (or lack thereof). I've had many cars in my life, never ever had that happen to any of my cars and I only saw that happen once on a 20 year old Lada (passenger door opened when the car was cornering).

Anyone know which microswitch is causing this? Given Tesla's designers often don't use automotive grade parts, I might be able to just get a replacement at local electronics hobby store since Tesla will likely want few hundred dollars to fix this.

 

[EZBoy]

This is the one: ASQ10410 Panasonic Electric Works | Switches | DigiKey

I just had the same problem 2 weeks ago, got 10 of this to fix future doors ( and from the looks of it, it will happen sooner or later) . You need 2 switches per door. There are bunch of YouTube videos on how to change them.

you might also consider changing paddle gear while you are at it, that one can be bought at SC for 5$ or so

 

[Doanster1]

Def shouldn’t happen on any car, but I can unfortunately say that my F15 X5 with the soft-close door feature did have one door that unlatched on its own. I say unlatched vs open because it’s a two step function so at least there was no danger of the door being able to fly open at speed. Mechanism replaced under warranty. High tech convenience breeds faults/issues like this.

 

[Gtech]

When your door spontaneously pops open there's a big chance you have to adjust a tiny screw under one of the micro switches:

With this screw you can adjust how much pull out movement you need to apply to open the door. When this adjustment is to tight you only have to touch the door handle to open it and sometimes it will open automatically with the force of the handle is coming out.

This does not apply on Gen 3 handles.

Happy wrenching

 

[whitex]

This is the one: ASQ10410 Panasonic Electric Works | Switches | DigiKey

I just had the same problem 2 weeks ago, got 10 of this to fix future doors ( and from the looks of it, it will happen sooner or later) . You need 2 switches per door. There are bunch of YouTube videos on how to change them.

you might also consider changing paddle gear while you are at it, that one can be bought at SC for 5$ or so

Thanks! I wish it happened 2 weeks ago when I was ordering some other digikey parts. Will order a few (probably 8 or 10 since already paying for shipping), but will also try the adjustment screw as @Gtech suggested. Might not get a chance to get to it till this weekend.

It sounds like this has been a known issue for a bit (how a door out of reach of the driver opening while driving is not a safety recall issue I have no idea). I wish Elon would have mitigated this failure mode at least via a software setting, perhaps "Disallow specific doors to open when driving", but I bet he thinks it's all good now if the new generation cars don't have this issue, and who cares about old cars, especially out of warranty. I bet no FMEA was ever done on this (other automotive guys do that).

[UPDATE EDIT] Ordered 10 of those, paid more for shipping than the 10 switches to get them here by the weekend, as I don't think I can enable child lock mode on the front passenger door and would rather not deal with an accident, especially that I pull in real close to some shelves in the garage, if the door was to open while backing in, it could cause some damage. What worries me though is that other doors might fail at any time, but I don't know whether I'll have the time to replace all 8 switches in the car. And then there is my wife's Model S to worry about, that one is still under warranty but still not a happy thought what would happen if the door opened while turning and hit another car or a cyclist or a pedestrian. Oh, that tri-motor Audi eTron GT can't get here soon enough.

 

[BigNick]

Doors popping open at speed should NEVER happen; this should be a recall.

The driver door popping open in a hard right-hand sweeper (think a P model being driven aggressively) can be deadly.