Stranded - new Tesla 10 days old

[mknox]

Would love to see the service record on every other "expensive car" you've owned.

Well, what I can say is that I've had more problems and issues with my car than I have had with possibly every prior car I've owned combined. Now having said that, I knew I was going all in on a new car from a new company and had my expectations mapped accordingly. I purchased the 4 year extended warranty right off the mark too. The saving grace is that Tesla has always bent over backwards to deal with the issues, never once questioning me or seemingly trying to weasel out of a repair.

 

[mmccord]

HUMMMM!! I did not understand what does this one has to do with your misfortune of 2 bad key fobs. Totally uncalled for and rude to knife people just because you are PO for not knowing how to handle your own demise.
BTW I am not from there, never been there have no one that lives there. just think you look to be just a BIG AH.

Baltimore is ranked #4 for murder rate in the US. I don't think he's out of line.

 

[TexasEV]

I am from Baltimore and didn't appreciate that irrelevant comment either. As with any large city, there are neighborhoods you wouldn't want to be stranded in (or wouldn't want Tesla to locate superchargers in), such as the part of the city in the news recently. Just as it is in the OPs location of D.C.

 

[LargeHamCollider]

HUMMMM!! I did not understand what does this one has to do with your misfortune of 2 bad key fobs. Totally uncalled for and rude to knife people just because you are PO for not knowing how to handle your own demise.
BTW I am not from there, never been there have no one that lives there. just think you look to be just a BIG AH.

Bro, relax.

 

[mibaro2]

The only time I've had my keyfobs not working was at a parking space right by a TV station. So there was lots of interference.
It doesn't seem like this was the case for the OP since the fobs still didn't work when he was home.
Unusual that both would die at the same time. I've started keeping a spare fob battery in the glove compartment just in case.

Be interesting to see what caused this on a 10 day old car.

 

[tezzla]

I'm pretty sure I've seen videos of using the FOB (without batteries even) by placing on the windshield.

 

[mknox]

Be interesting to see what caused this on a 10 day old car.

My guess is the receiver or antenna in the car.

In the past, cars often came with an "emergency" manual key to open the door. I once had one that was hidden inside of the fob. You would push a tiny little release latch and the fob would slide into two pieces with the metal key blade exposed. Tesla has a kind of high-tech version of this: Launch the Mobile App, unlock your doors and use the app to "start" the car.

 

[mibaro2]

So then perhaps the receiver in the car stopped working?

-------

mknox typed in the answer very quickly

 

[kuttakamina]

At the service center now. Waiting for the car to be fixed. Let's see what they come up with. This would be a lot harder if I had a normal job like normal people.

As far as the comment about baltimorons, I'll stick to my opinions about that cesspool. But the only relevance to this issue at hand is that, it would totally suck to be stranded in a bad neighborhood

I am not an AH though. But I refuse to be over PC or pander to those who don't like to talk straight.

Update: they said the security module was "locked up" ... They reset it and it started to work again.
The keyfobs are working again, but they will monitor it remotely.

Just like mknox, my expectations were also realistic when I got the car. The service experience, albeit my first, seems pretty good.

 

[spc]

Baltimore is ranked #4 for murder rate in the US. I don't think he's out of line.

Perhaps and my apologies. unrelated comments have its place, and that is not in this thread here.

 

[cgiGuy]

Good thing you were never really "stranded" anywhere.

Almost a year on TMC and posted 544 times, yet didn't know you could unlock the doors/drive car with the phone app?

 

[mknox]

But the only relevance to this issue at hand is that, it would totally suck to be stranded in a bad neighborhood

It's bad to be stuck anywhere. When my main contactors failed, it was 10 degrees F and with the main pack off line you have no traction power or heat. Tesla Service was dealing with 2+ hour wait times for a tow. That sucked. The 12v ran for a bit so I did have 4-way flashers and the radio.

 

[kuttakamina]

Good thing you were never really "stranded" anywhere.

Almost a year on TMC and posted 544 times, yet didn't know you could unlock the doors/drive car with the phone app?

Nope. I've had the car for only 10 days and have been active for only 2 months or so. Anyway I know this now .
Cellular coverage can be spotty though. Still, a very nice feature to have.

 

[Shawn Snider]

Baltimore is ranked #4 for murder rate in the US. I don't think he's out of line.

Sounds like 'Murrica needs less Guns and more SuperChargers..

 

[EVenthusiast]

At the service center now. Waiting for the car to be fixed. Let's see what they come up with. This would be a lot harder if I had a normal job like normal people.

As far as the comment about baltimorons, I'll stick to my opinions about that cesspool. But the only relevance to this issue at hand is that, it would totally suck to be stranded in a bad neighborhood

I am not an AH though. But I refuse to be over PC or pander to those who don't like to talk straight.

Update: they said the security module was "locked up" ... They reset it and it started to work again.
The keyfobs are working again, but they will monitor it remotely.

Just like mknox, my expectations were also realistic when I got the car. The service experience, albeit my first, seems pretty good.

Did they give you any instructions which would allow you to reset this module yourself? I find it hard to believe there's no watchdog timer resetting critical locked up modules (or at least generate an error).

 

[kuttakamina]

Did they give you any instructions which would allow you to reset this module yourself? I find it hard to believe there's no watchdog timer resetting critical locked up modules (or at least generate an error).

No they didn't give me any such instructions.
They did say they opened an "engineering case", so I guess the programmers at Tesla will figure this out.
As a techie myself, I think we vastly underestimate the importance of good software. And since software isn't something you can touch or feel, the situation isn't improving much. Thankfully Elon is a techie.

 

[AB4EJ]

Sounds like Tesla is learning some of the things that new OEMs learn (based on my experience at Mercedes):

- The difficulty of your quality assurance task goes up as the square of your production volume.
- Luxury car owners expect both lots of content (plenty of nice features) as well as, at the same time, zero defects. It takes a lot of practice to achieve this.
- The OEM gets hammered if suppliers provide less-than-perfect parts. The suppliers have the same quality challenge as the OEM, except more so: they also have to produce service & repair parts as additional volume. The OEM may have to have a rep living at the site of any supplier with volume and/or quality issues.
- As you ramp up production to higher volumes - if you have a process problem - you can build a lot of junk very quickly, when then requires an army of people & much time to rework.
- When you build multiple models (Model X in pre-production now), management can become distracted with trying to manage existing production while starting the new model.

So you see, Tesla has its hands full right now - which could explain "infant mortality" in some vehicles now being built.

 

[mknox]

No they didn't give me any such instructions.

It's interesting that a re-boot of the 17" screen wouldn't have reset this "locked up" security module. I've been surprised at just what a re-boot will fix. Once my car wouldn't go in to Park. The door handles would extend, and the indicator said "P", but the car was free rolling. A re-boot fixed that.

 

[snellenr]

Update: they said the security module was "locked up" ... They reset it and it started to work again.
The keyfobs are working again, but they will monitor it remotely.

Glad to see that it was a relatively easy fix for you -- and now they have (probably) added the case in their support database so that if/when this happens to one of the rest of us, Support can reset the car remotely as a quick fix.

Thanks in advance!

 

[sorka]

When you say the fobs weren't working, does that mean you double clicked on the top of the fob to unlock the car as well? I had a problem where the handles wouldn't extend automatically or by touching them but it would unlock by physically pressing the unlock button twice. If this is the same thing that happened to you, then there's a song and dance to do to fix it that involves a reset, another step, another reset, and then another step.