I will say for anyone filing an arbitration case you shouldn't say anything about the "HV Battery System". The warranty doesn't cover the system. It covers the battery. (Of which the PCS is a part of, IMO. Which seems obvious, because if you by a HV battery it comes with a PCS already installed.)
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Power Conversion System (PCS) failure
- Thread starter Concestor0
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Yanquetino
Member
Fine. So… what constitutes "the battery"? Only the 2170 cells? Not the skateboard that houses them? Not the BMS? The cathodes? Cables? Themal Management System? HV Battery Service Panel? Well… sorry… that's too late for my Brief, but… thanks for your input.
There has been more than one post on this forum reporting PCS failures on cars less than one year old. There are also posts where owners had the PCS board failure twice. I hope there are less failures on the newer rev boards but only Tesla knows for sure. When I had my PCS replaced, it took all day; therefore, a large portion of the replacement cost must be labor related. If the board COULD be purchased and installed by someone other than Tesla, maybe the cost would be lower? Has anyone purchased a PCS board from a salvaged car or anywhere else and successfully had it installed by anyone other than Tesla?
Definitely not the Thermal Management System, as that includes the radiator, pumps, fan, A/C compressor, valves, hoses/pipes (that are external to the HV pack), etc.
The HV Battery warranty should include everything you get when you buy an HV battery. The case, cells, BMS, PCS, bus bars, etc.
This bothers me on both sides when people conflate repair with maintenance. They are not the same thing.
That's a new one. I don't think anyone here has reported getting a PCS alert for a car that can do 32A. Only for the ones that fail twice down to 16A.
In my area, it takes 18 months to even have your first hearing in Small Claims, so you may still be ahead. Good for you for going after Tesla though!
Which is why the only thing that matters is total cost of ownership.
If you focus on "maintenance" then Tesla will just tell you to not proactively replace anything. Not even windshield wipers. Only when it fails. Volia! No maintenance costs.
Want to minimize repair costs? Just replace your whole car every 3.9 years. Voila! No out of pocket repair costs.
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Alkor
Member
I have access to the service manual. For what it's worth, the service of "Power Conversion System (Remove and Replace)" is a 2.45 hour labor job. It is filed under these categories: 16 - Battery System > 1630 - HV Battery Electrical Components
Thanks for the info. It did take them all day to swap out my PSC but maybe they did not work on it the entire time. My PCS was replaced under warranty so there was no price breakout listed for the board or labor.
OK, I'll add my data point for my 2018 LR RWD. This past July during a road trip, three months after my battery warranty expired, I plugged into a greater than 24amp EVSE for the first time in over a year. Tried to charge at 48amps, but soon threw the dreaded PCS_a019 error and it backed down to 32amps @200VAC (why the voltage drop from 240VAC ???). At this point I'll wait until we hear of any resolution to this with regard to the warranty, unless I lose another 16amp unit, but at least I'll be aware of this when charging at 24amps at home. Another thing to add to the list of things to check before your warranty expires.
davewill
Active Member
Charging locations at commercial locations (in North America) are almost at 208v instead of 240v.
Residential electricity is generally split phase. There is one neutral and two hot wires, and each hot wire is 120V with respect to neutral. They are also 180° out of phase with each other, i.e. when the voltage of one is +X, the voltage of the other is -X. This makes 240V from hot to hot. Commercial electricity is 3 phase instead of split phase. There is a neutral and not two but three separate hot lines. Each hot line is 120V with respect to neutral, but is out of phase 120° with respect to the others. Like this:
Some motors can use all 3 phases and there is a big advantage to using 3 phase if you are running a motor. You can also deliver more power over the same amount of conducting material on a 3 phase system (with 4 wires, the 3 hots plus a neutral) than you can over a split phase system. Tesla's OBCs in some countries actually can use all 3 phases, and the J3068 (Mennekes) connector supplies all 3 phases to a vehicle. But in North America, the J1772 connector and Tesla Proprietary Connector only supply 2 AC lines to the OBC. But if you're on a 3 phase system in a commercial building, which two do you use? And the answer is you take two of the 3 phases (either 1+2, 2+3, or 1+3) and use them to power the OBC. What's the voltage from phase to phase? Well unlike in split phase, where it's twice the phase to neutral voltage, it's the phase to neutral voltage multiplied by the square root of 3. 120*sqrt(3) V = 207.8V. This is commonly referred to as 208Y/120V power. By the way, the entire electricity grid from generators to transmission transformers to power substations is 3 phase. It is only at the last step, where power is converted to 240V split phase for residential usage, that one of the 3 phases is dropped.
By the way, some large apartment buildings and condo complexes have a system where they have a 3 phase transformer supplying the building, but each unit only has 2 of the 3 phases. In other words, the electrical panels are like any other residential panel, with 2 hot wires and one neutral, but if you measure the voltage from hot to hot, you'll measure around 208V. And if you connect an oscilloscope to the two hot wires and put the ground probe on neutral, you'll see a graph like the one above, but with one of the 3 phases missing. In such a scenario, your next door neighbor might have one of the phases that is missing from your panel, and you'd have one that is missing from his or her panel. If you look at the name plates for major appliances like ovens, dryers, stoves, AC units, etc., they'll generally show that they're designed to run on anything between 208V and 240V. This is why.
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I'm curious what all you included in your brief... For example did you include that the service procedure to remove and replace the HV battery does not have any steps to remove the PCS from the old battery and install it in the new battery? (So obviously the HV battery comes with the PCS pre-installed.)
AFAIK,the PCS board has been revised several times. What year and month was your car built? Can you see the part number and rev number on the outside of the case? You might want to contact the guy at the Youtube channel Ingineerix to see if he might want it to compare to his PCS board and possibly fix it and report his results. The PCS boards are expensive enough that they might be refurbished (if possible) in the future and resold. If I paid for the repair out of pocket, I would also request the defective part. I think only some states require the part must be given to the owner if requested? Hopefully, Tesla will give the part to anyone who requests it? From posts on this forum, brand new cars are having PCS board failures. It would be nice to see someone like Ingineerix try to determine what is failing.
Thanks for your reply. My car was built in June 2018 and, yes, I can see what I believe to be the part number. I'll look into Ingineerix to see if they are interested.
Add me to the list. Had my 2018 Model 3 AWD LR in for service this week (West Chester, PA) and the PCS was replaced under warranty. Warranty expires in November so I just barely made it. Started noticing the charging issue a few weeks ago (stuck at 32A) and also had an error message show up on the screen.
davewill
Active Member
They have three identical charging boards in them (2 for an SR) and are usually replaced because one of them has failed. If that's the case with yours, the good ones left could be used to repair another unit of the same model that had a bad board (or two) in it.
See my post #112 above there was a Technical Service Bulletin for the June 2018 build date Model 3's regarding the PCS boards. I tried to find my rat holed copy of the PDF TSB document but could not find it, maybe someone on the forum has a copy? My PCS was replaced under the 4yr/50K warranty but I assumed it would have been replaced after that at no cost, due to the June 2018 TSB.
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Nope, most TSBs are just instructions, they don't extend the warranty on items. (Recalls are different in that it doesn't matter if you have warranty coverage, they are always free.)
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