Suspension Problem on Model S

[glhs272]

If your are right, this sort of behaviour in my country is named as to be a "Chico esperto", that we can translate as something as to be a "clever clogs". Here, the mentality of a lot of people drives them to have this sort of behaviour (and this make me sick every time a see it).
I hope to be wrong but my guess would be of someone that detects the problem but didn't care or didn't want to spent the money for repair. So he let the thing going worse until breaking, then he report to Tesla as a fabrication default to have a free repair. One more time, I'm not saying that was actually the case there, but it's a scenario that I could perfectly imagine because very common here with a lot of people to trying to have free repairs in cars after doing bad thing with them (so going to brand repaired shop to have free repair) or driving to fast in bad roads to make old suspensions or old tires that were in need to be changed braking and then going to city hall to demand it to pay the change to new suspensions or new tires! Very common in fact.

I hope I am wrong. Actually I didn't mean he was intentionally running his ball joint to failure, hoping to get a free repair. It's just that ignorance is not an excuse. If it was clunking he should have looked into it before it failed.

 

[JRP3]

70k on a stock part is pretty frigging good

No, a ball joint should last twice that. This one obviously has premature corrosion. However, that does not mean it's a fleet wide issue. I'm quite sure if Tesla had seen any significant percentage of these failures they would have already done a recall. I have no problem with NHTSA looking into this because I'm fairly sure they will not find any wrongdoing. I do have a problem with certain people blowing this completely out of proportion with no evidence at all, and with anyone using known anti Tesla lunatic to "back up" their claims.

 

[Pdub2015]

No, a ball joint should last twice that. This one obviously has premature corrosion. However, that does not mean it's a fleet wide issue. I'm quite sure if Tesla had seen any significant percentage of these failures they would have already done a recall. I have no problem with NHTSA looking into this because I'm fairly sure they will not find any wrongdoing. I do have a problem with certain people blowing this completely out of proportion with no evidence at all, and with anyone using known anti Tesla lunatic to "back up" their claims.

My Audi S4 needed to have control arms replaced around 80k. I was surprised to learn that was considered normal wear and tear. And yeah, in the old days, they would just replace the bushings, etc, but for the new cars, they replace the whole shebang.

 

[RobertF]

Is this problem independent of which shock system the car has?

 

[TMSE]

My Audi S4 needed to have control arms replaced around 80k. I was surprised to learn that was considered normal wear and tear. And yeah, in the old days, they would just replace the bushings, etc, but for the new cars, they replace the whole shebang.

Did you notice any rattling, shaking before yours got replaced? Were they as rusted out as in this case?

 

[Legitsu]

@JRP3 LoLwat
no ball joints usually are kaput at about 50k on modern vehicles
about the only time you can see more then that is if you do nothing but steady highway driving
as for the corriosion it simply looks like it wasn't greased regularly and I have seen far far worse ones

 

[Legitsu]

Hell I have had ball joints go bad at 20k
you expecting a major suspension part to last 140K
sorry bud thats now how it works

 

[Az_Rael]

Weird. I have driven several vehicles well beyond 100k miles and I have never needed to replace a control arm. Wonder if it's a salted road issue?

 

[JohnSnowNW]

Weird. I have driven several vehicles well beyond 100k miles and I have never needed to replace a control arm. Wonder if it's a salted road issue?

My 1991 318i needed them replaced at 60k, this was not in MN.

 

[stevej119]

Did you have the extended warranty for your Model S?

no, foolish in hindsight.

If you have 73,000 miles on the car and would have been responsible for half of this repair, or even the full repair, that would still have been less money than the cost of the ESA. Your decision will only be "foolish in hindsight" if your total cost for repairs which would have been covered by the ESA are significantly higher than the cost of the ESA. As you will reach the end of the ESA term within 23k miles, chances are good that you will come out ahead by not having made that purchase.

We always seem to forget that we don't lose money on repairs that would have been covered until the cost of those repairs exceeds the present value of the money we would have paid for the extended warranty (ESA).

 

[exLeaf]

I am not Tesla owner, but I would like to know as much as possible about the car, great things, and not so great too. Problem discussed here never happened to me in fact current car have 216KM and never a problem or visit to SC. Wonder how many owners here that drove MS for 150 or 200KM and never experienced any problem or needed SC visit?

 

[traxila]

I am not Tesla owner, but I would like to know as much as possible about the car, great things, and not so great too. Problem discussed here never happened to me in fact current car have 216KM and never a problem or visit to SC. Wonder how many owners here that drove MS for 150 or 200KM and never experienced any problem or needed SC visit?

OK, so I have been perfectly happy to visit the SC, because I arrange for a loaner get to drive a different Tesla every time! They all rule!

A little perspective, exLeaf - you have driven your current car 216000 KM - cool! You never had a visit to an SC - but of course you have had multiple visits to garages for fluid changes. Probably more than annually. So yes, I have have had my annual visits to the SC in my three year old Tesla. Similar in the end, no?

Did have more than annual visits for two reasons - once I was rear ended and another time bent my passenger side wheels in a camouflaged pot hole. Which made me very sad. Sigh. It is a heavy car. But that was a nasty sinkhole of a pot hole!

Anyway, I digress. The whole tone of this thread distresses me. And I believe that was the intention of some of the posters. Which makes me even sadder.... Anyway, overall the car has been terrific. Let us see what happens with this investigation.

 

[Pdub2015]

Did you notice any rattling, shaking before yours got replaced? Were they as rusted out as in this case?

No to both. But I did feel it was out of alignment that's why I took it to service. I saw the parts, they were exquisite aluminum beauties, but the ends were pretty buggered. [edit for clarity] I mean to say the rubber around the bushings was very worn. The aluminum showed what I took to be normal wear; there was no rust, corrosion or any major degradation of the structure.

 

[neroden]

No, a ball joint should last twice that. This one obviously has premature corrosion. However, that does not mean it's a fleet wide issue. I'm quite sure if Tesla had seen any significant percentage of these failures they would have already done a recall. I have no problem with NHTSA looking into this because I'm fairly sure they will not find any wrongdoing. I do have a problem with certain people blowing this completely out of proportion with no evidence at all, and with anyone using known anti Tesla lunatic to "back up" their claims.

I strongly suspect that the dirt roads, very-heavy-salt environment of the OP was accelerating the corrosion. It was probably also making it a lot harder to hear any problems, because road noise on those dirt roads can be *really loud*.

Still, this is something for Tesla to pay attention to. If the dirt-roads-with-heavy-salt environment (fairly typical for rural Northeasterners) environment causes early corrosion, then that tells them that the rest of the cars will have the same corrosion -- later, after a lot more miles. They then have to decide how many miles they actually want to design the parts for. Given that this failed after the regular warranty expired but before the extended warranty would have expired (it seems like he didn't get the extended warranty), Tesla probably should want to make these parts last a lot longer than the current version actually does.

It would be wise of Tesla to be nicer to high-mileage customers, and customers who are in particularly hostile environments (lots of salt, really bad roads, bitter cold, scorching heat) who are the first to come in with unexpected problems. These are Tesla's "canaries in the coal mine" and are giving Tesla crucial design feedback, which they can use to improve the designs before the problems appear for other customers.

 

[TMSE]

No to both. But I did feel it was out of alignment that's why I took it to service. I saw the parts, they were exquisite aluminum beauties, but the ends were pretty buggered.

Thanks Pdub for the clarification. So, you felt something was wrong, even when the parts weren't as bad as in this case. You did what anybody would do, took it to service and got it fixed.

The mystery here is why this guy ignored all the warning signs, probably for weeks and may be even months on end. Made sure part broke down, gets his car towed to service, create all this scene, blog about it, report it to NHTSA on the same day, act very innocent here asking fellow Tesla folks on what to do and reveal pictures and information day after day which he already had on day 1.

I didn't doubt this guy before, but now I find it real hard to believe him.

 

[Electroman]

I didn't doubt his intentions until he quoted the internet troll.

By a rule here I wish anyone who quotes his site as a supporting argument, or known to have done in other forums should be kicked out.

I have no time or respect to those who align with outright fraudsters.

 

[Az_Rael]

The mystery here is why this guy ignored all the warning signs, probably for weeks and may be even months on end

Some people are not car savvy and ignore subtle signs that something is wrong for a long time. If all I noticed was my car was out of alignment, I might have let something like that go for a while before repairs. The service center is over an hour away and I would have to take off work to get the car in. I might wait until my annual service was due, honestly.


I think the OP was genuine when he arrived, but got taken down a crazy path by that troll dude who was here and maybe by the less than welcoming reception he was getting.

 

[JRP3]

@JRP3 LoLwat
no ball joints usually are kaput at about 50k on modern vehicles
about the only time you can see more then that is if you do nothing but steady highway driving
as for the corriosion it simply looks like it wasn't greased regularly and I have seen far far worse ones

Hell I have had ball joints go bad at 20k
you expecting a major suspension part to last 140K
sorry bud thats now how it works

The last two Toyotas I sold with 90K + miles on them still had original balls joints in them and were fine. I've never seen a ball joint go bad at 50K, or 70K.

 

[gpcordaro]

Regulators probe reports of Tesla Model S suspension problems
http://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/feds-investigating-potentially-widespread-tesla-model-s-suspension-issue/

 

[TMSE]

Some people are not car savvy and ignore subtle signs that something is wrong for a long time. If all I noticed was my car was out of alignment, I might have let something like that go for a while before repairs. The service center is over an hour away and I would have to take off work to get the car in. I might wait until my annual service was due, honestly.

Az,
In this case, the corrosion was so bad, the ball dislodged from the socket. While that corrosion happened over weeks/months, you wouldn't just feel misalignment, you would hear loud clanks, rough shakings, loud noise so that your ride is practically impossible. It is impossible to ignore. But this guy just suddenly woke up to the problem one fine day.