Model S Technical / Mechanical Issues

[dflye]

2,300 miles on a Model S signature and these are the problems I have seen:

- Windshield washers hitting too low.

If you mean the spray from the windshield wiper fluid nozzles hitting too low on the windshield, I had the same problem.

When car was being worked on for other issues, mentioned that problem. Tech used something that resembled a pick used by a dentist cleaning between teeth to jab into the nozzle end and point it in a different location. After a few tries, it was pointed in a more reasonable location.

 

[Zapped]

(If anyone wants to adjust the headlights yourself, I can now walk you through how to do it - it's pretty simple).

That would be great. Was this already posted somewhere ?

 

[lolachampcar]

That's pretty disappointing. There should be a calibration tool at the shop so that the lights can be aimed precisely. A tiny difference at the headlight grows bigger and bigger with distance, so just "eyeballing" it is really not good enough.

I use two tape circles on my garage wall along with a tape line on the floor so the car is always positioned at the same distance from the wall. -- Document the starting point and adjust until happy.

 

[fluxemag]

I've been following this thread religiously and wanted to make a few comments. I washed my car and my wife's car (G37 and a 3 month old Lexus) and both had condensation in the tail lights, which went away pretty quickly. My G37 periodically fails to recognize the key fob when it's in my left pocket and I have to shake the contents a bit. The moonroof on my old Solara would stop half way requiring a second push. These are issues that I find a little annoying but weren't enough to bring in for warranty work. The door handles malfunctioning, some of the body panel gap issues, door not closing easily and screen blackouts would be totally unacceptable. I'm really picky. My old service adviser said Engineers and Pilots were always the worst But I just thought I'd put it in perspective a little bit. Cars have issues. First year production models have more issues. I am confident these will be addressed by service as they add more staff.

 

[William3]

If anyone wants to adjust the headlights yourself, I can now walk you through how to do it - it's pretty simple.

I would love to find out how to do this. My local Service department seems unwilling to resolve this for me.

 

[MikeK]

My old service adviser said Engineers and Pilots were always the worst

Doubly damned!

But I just thought I'd put it in perspective a little bit. Cars have issues. First year production models have more issues. I am confident these will be addressed by service as they add more staff.

Hear, hear.

 

[mknox]

My G37 periodically fails to recognize the key fob when it's in my left pocket and I have to shake the contents a bit.

My Cadillac CTS fob is the same. I have to slap my pants pocket then pull the door handle to get in sometimes. It must look odd to onlookers! In my case, dust gets inside the fob and I just pop it apart and blow the dust out, remove and clean the battery and all is well for another 6 months or so!

 

[aviators99]

Doubly damned!

Me too

 

[smoothoperator2]

That's pretty disappointing. There should be a calibration tool at the shop so that the lights can be aimed precisely. A tiny difference at the headlight grows bigger and bigger with distance, so just "eyeballing" it is really not good enough.

Most Tesla workshops have a few pieces of tape on one of the walls that they use for headlight calibration. I know this was true for the Roadster, and I am pretty sure it holds true for the Model S?

 

[teslasguy]

I've had the sticking sunroof problem for quite a while. A tech tried to get it working by removing some "gunk", but didn't work. i tried getting it to open on one try by using the steering wheel option, but that didn't work either.
I got the 4.2 update last night and today my pano now opens with one swipe, no problem! Hooray! Now if we could just get some weather a little warmer than the teens we've been seeing this week...

 

[contaygious]

haha yeah I opened mine in the rain. I was so anxious to try it out!

 

[steve841]

Now if we could just get some weather a little warmer than the teens we've been seeing this week...

Now if we could get below 80 I'd be happy!:scared:

 

[ChadS]

The same thing happened to me this morning. I was having the electricians install my outlet, and I had opened the hatch to check on something. After I close and left the area, the electricians reported the hatch opening within 10 minutes after I had left.

Yesterday, my wife came home (in the Roadster) and said she noticed the Model S hatch was open as she drove in. And I just went out in the garage, and noticed the hatch was open again.

We've got 1.15.14. We've had the car four months and this hasn't happened; now it's happened two days in a row. The car is set to auto-lock as we walk away, and although the fobs are stored nearby, the car can't seem to detect them (it won't open the door when I press on a handle unless I bring a fob with me) so I am mystified as to why it is opening the hatch on its own.

In addition to obvious implications if the car was parked outside somewhere, it's a problem when this happens in the garage too - the hatch hits the metal support bars on the garage door, and it's going to get scratched that way.

--------------Update--------------------

I suspect this issue was a low key fob battery. More details in a Feb 16 post below.

 

[GeekGirls]

... it's a problem when this happens in the garage too - the hatch hits the metal support bars on the garage door, and it's going to get scratched that way.

While I have no insight into the rest of your mystery, you might want to consider setting the maximum amount the hatch will open to avoid scratches while you're sorting out the cause. Just manually open the hatch to the highest you deem safe, and then press and hold the close button until a long beep signals the new setting.

 

[jwal]

Oh wow I REALLY hope my S doesn't come with any of the problems in this thread. Knock on wood..:scared:

 

[Gino Bernardi]

I have one small caveat after my test drive. Im a big fan of public radio and in Chicago one of my favorite radio stations is Q87.7 (very bottom of the frequency spectrum) The station comes in crystal clear on my current car, but during my test drive I noticed 87.7 had way too much static. I guess I am 0.01% of the Model S population that has an issue with this....but does anyone think there's anything they can/would do about it?

 

[Lloyd]

try finding that station on Slacker. If here as long as you have an ATT signal you will be able to listen to your station.

 

[ggr]

We had our first "leave me stuck" issue on the Model S today. I was taking my dog for a walk on Mount Soledad. The car started fully (standard) charged, drove to the store to pick up dog food, drove up the mountain, everything fine. Got out, walked around for half an hour, got back to the car, and the door handles wouldn't extend. Tried to unlock with the fob, nothing happened. Couldn't open the trunk or frunk with the fob either. Tried the fob in both corners of the windscreen, and in both front wheel wells. Now the big hassle with this was that I didn't have my mobile phone with me! (I swear that Tesla builds telepathic cars... I never have trouble unless I've somehow forgotten to bring my phone with me!) Borrowed a phone long enough to call my wife to bring her fob and my phone up the mountain.

Pat arrived, and we tried all the same things with her fob. Still no go. Now that I had a phone I could stay talking on, and which knew the number for Tesla roadside assistance, I called them. After verifying who I was (took a while 'cuz it was extremely windy on top of the mountain) he issued a remote unlock command. From there, everything was fine. I suspect that somewhere in there, he also rebooted the car, because it had forgotten what radio station I was listening to.

The irony is he said "You're on a really old software version (1.14.15), so I'm going to push you the most recent." This, after I've been asking for months about the status of upgrades and getting nowhere. I'm now back home, plugged in, waiting for the upgrade to arrive.

 

[cinergi]

We had our first "leave me stuck" issue on the Model S today. I was taking my dog for a walk on Mount Soledad. The car started fully (standard) charged, drove to the store to pick up dog food, drove up the mountain, everything fine. Got out, walked around for half an hour, got back to the car, and the door handles wouldn't extend. Tried to unlock with the fob, nothing happened.

There weren't lots of cell/radio towers there were there? (I'm thinking of the recent thread where this happened when too close to too much RF)

 

[GeekGirls]

try finding that station on Slacker. If here as long as you have an ATT signal you will be able to listen to your station.

Do you mean TuneIn? Or does Slacker have features I’m not familiar with?

I do love the ability to tune stations over 3G instead of relying on FM or AM reception. I absolutely adore not having to care where I am when I want to pick up a favorite station – even those from across the country or around the world. I’ve found myself listening to stations I haven’t had access to in decades.