Tesla monitored our production and updated solar roof

[jboy210]

Hi,

A few months ago I sent in a request via the app to Tesla stating that I thought the production from our Solarroof was a little low. Then I did not hear anything from Tesla. Typical I thought.

However, apparently, Tesla was monitoring our roof's production for a month or two and decided it was not high enough. So 3 weeks ago they asked if they could come out and take a look. I said yes, but we were going to be on vacation until 6/30 and scheduled an appointment for 7/7. Then while we were on vacation, they called and said they had a crew available and asked if could they come out. We pointed out we would not be there, but the Tesla coordinator thought they could check and fix anything without needing to get into the house. So we said go ahead.

Last week they spent a couple of days troubleshooting and could not get power from some of the south side tiles. They finally just decided to replace all those tiles. So the day we came home there was a box truck with 4 Tesla badged installers working on the roof. And for the next 2 days, they replaced and double and triple-checked that the production of the new tiles that met or exceeded specs.

So far, the production peak is up 2 kW and daily production has increased from 40 to 57+ kWh, even with overcast mornings (Bay Area June Gloom - minimal production until 9 AM). Hopefully, it will do better starting tomorrow when the sun is visible earlier.

 

[trautmane2]

Thanks for sharing this! It gives me hope since after 6 months my solar roof has only produced 62% of (half of) Tesla's estimated annual production. I spoke with tier 1 support earlier this week and did not have to twist any arms to convince them there is an issue. I'm waiting to hear back from tier 2 support on what to do next. I'm excited that Tesla was willing to replace tiles for you and that the replacement was done successfully.

I'm curious, how many tiles were replaced?

 

[jboy210]

Thanks for sharing this! It gives me hope since after 6 months my solar roof has only produced 62% of (half of) Tesla's estimated annual production. I spoke with tier 1 support earlier this week and did not have to twist any arms to convince them there is an issue. I'm waiting to hear back from tier 2 support on what to do next. I'm excited that Tesla was willing to replace tiles for you and that the replacement was done successfully.

I'm curious, how many tiles were replaced?

They pretty much replaces the whole South roof of active tiles including all wiring. The service lead said it was quicker to do that then try to troubleshoot individual active tiles and decide which ones were good, which ones were bad, and which ones were maybe bad.

 

[trautmane2]

They pretty much replaces the whole South roof of active tiles including all wiring.

Wow - that's not good. I wonder if they tested the removed tiles later to see which ones failed and why.

For my low production, I've been assuming the key problem is that I have a string pair with one string of south facing tiles and one string of west facing tiles (based on stuff @nwdiver has posted). I have also wondered if misplacement of some of my tiles is a problem (see Incorrectly Placed Solar Roof Tiles ). I had not considered the possibility that some or many of the tiles themselves were bad.

 

[jboy210]

Wow - that's not good. I wonder if they tested the removed tiles later to see which ones failed and why.

For my low production, I've been assuming the key problem is that I have a string pair with one string of south facing tiles and one string of west facing tiles (based on stuff @nwdiver has posted). I have also wondered if misplacement of some of my tiles is a problem (see Incorrectly Placed Solar Roof Tiles ). I had not considered the possibility that some or many of the tiles themselves were bad.

They said they were sending the old tiles back to engineering for testing. So hopefully they figure out the issue and improve the product. We did tell them we would be happy to try out any new and improved version.

Not sure about the placement issue. They did pull a few on the North facing side, so maybe we had some miswiring.

 

[holeydonut]

Just in case a Solar Roof customer finds this thread but not Jboy210's original thread... here's what he experienced that caused him to think something was wrong before:

Why is our solar production getting cut off?

Hi, I was looking at the graphs for our SolarRoof's production and noticed that the top is getting cut off. The roof has a total rating of 12.75 kW and the South facing portion is 8 kW. Both the north and south-facing roof planes are in complete sunlight. I have verified there is no shading on...

teslamotorsclub.com

It was possible to rationalize the system was simply being affected by the angle and azimuth of his roof. But it looks like indeed some of the solar tiles weren't performing. It's not possible for the individual homeowner to really tell how the individual tiles on the roof are performing.

So it's good to see Tesla is putting some tech (maybe some self driving AI? ) to work analyzing actual production vs expected production and remedying as an active measure.