Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

Tesla: The real out of warranty costs

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
@Electricious , ironically it is you who are defending the status quo and arguing that Tesla should mimic the status quote regarding service/parts.

We'll have to agree to disagree. You guys sounds like those (Nokia, Palm, Microsoft) who scoffed at Apple's weird closed system way of doing things early on. Only time will tell which of us is right.

Well Android has 86.2% of the mobile market and iOS has 12.9% of the market. Which is "better" is personal taste and way off topic but I tend to like open not closed.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Icer and Mattzilla
@tyson , this is amusing in a good way. You and I are like polar opposites. Even on the phone analogy, I have the opposite preference and I consider Android's market share as jack of all trades, master of none (a negative from my personal preference view).

Certainly the iOS is a far greater financial success (regarding profitability) than the Android OS.
 
@tyson , this is amusing in a good way. You and I are like polar opposites. Even on the phone analogy, I have the opposite preference and I consider Android's market share as jack of all trades, master of none (a negative from my personal preference view).

Certainly the iOS is a far greater financial success (regarding profitability) than the Android OS.
Certainly seems like it! I have a close friend who shares your views on that front.

Profitability? That's kind of murky when comparing an open source OS who's primary purpose is to drive users in to Google search and other products where revenues can be realized to an OS that can't be bought or run on anything other than the hardware is was purchased with. How do you determine profit on the OS as compared to the hardware? Certainly Apple is more profitable company as a whole but Google tends to take much more risk in innovation, let's see how Waymo plays out eh .

Now back on topic... Tesla can still be the walled garden you love while selling parts to those who want to work on their own cars or to 3rd parties. It's really not a mutually exclusive thing. Alternatively Tesla could lower the cost of maintenance for the model 3 and that will likely work in the short term. Eventually 3rd parties will make the parts if there is a market Tesla is not filling.
 
  • Like
Reactions: croman and P85Dave
To add some data to my post.. 17.6 million new vehicles were sold in 2016, which was a record at the time. However, there were 268.8 million cars registered across the US that same year. So just over 6.5% of cars on the road were new cars.

All the more reason customers should be able to buy parts for their cars and hopefully we will start seeing independent repair shops as well.

Without less expensive repair options, many will not want to touch a used Tesla out of warranty.

I know I would not buy one out of warranty for the same reason.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Icer
I don't know how many motors Tesla has gone through... But my S was not screaming or whining as far as I could tell at 80K Current one is at 60K, not whining. Sold RAV at 60K, not whining, original motor.

Unless you mean the standard gear reduction noise that it came with when new.
I'm now on my fourth or fifth drive unit after 73,500 miles. Consider yourself lucky.
 
What a great video. I have a 2015 and I've been holding my breath, I haven't had a single problem of any kind beyond some dash squeaks that were fixed. I'm 30k in for miles so far and after reading this thread, I'm terrified to go out of warranty.
 
What a great video. I have a 2015 and I've been holding my breath, I haven't had a single problem of any kind beyond some dash squeaks that were fixed. I'm 30k in for miles so far and after reading this thread, I'm terrified to go out of warranty.

Get the warranty while you still can. Will make a huge difference if you decide to sell the car later.

If you get the warranty, make sure you follow through with the required annual maintenance.
 
I have had my Roadster for over 7 years now and well over warranty. And while parts are not cheap they have not been outrageous. I now do my own service maintenance which has not been too hard either. So fortunately this has been a nonissue.

Same experience here. I've spent about $8k on out-of-warranty service work keeping my 2008 Roadster in great shape. Meanwhile my wife has spent about $15k fixing anything that breaks on our 2004 Toyota Sienna. The labor costs on the Roadster are always very modest and the markup on parts seems modest. In contrast, we get fleeced on everything the Toyota dealer does. One time they charged over $2000 to fix a broken cruise control sensor (I would not have paid it but my wife is determined to keep this thing running because she knows I'll never agree to buy another ICE van).
 
  • Informative
Reactions: dhrivnak
Same experience here. I've spent about $8k on out-of-warranty service work keeping my 2008 Roadster in great shape. Meanwhile my wife has spent about $15k fixing anything that breaks on our 2004 Toyota Sienna. The labor costs on the Roadster are always very modest and the markup on parts seems modest. In contrast, we get fleeced on everything the Toyota dealer does. One time they charged over $2000 to fix a broken cruise control sensor (I would not have paid it but my wife is determined to keep this thing running because she knows I'll never agree to buy another ICE van).

Does the roadster require any special software sets to change parts? That's the only rub with the S and X. There is almost nothing you can do without Toolbox.
 
.


I've seen people say that before but https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/model-s-preowned-warranty.pdf says

Basic Vehicle Limited Warranty
Subject to separate coverage for certain parts and the exclusions and limitations described in this Pre-Owned Vehicle Limited Warranty, the Basic Vehicle Limited Warranty covers the repair or
replacement necessary to correct defects in the materials or workmanship of any parts manufactured or supplied by Tesla that occur under normal use for an incremental period of 4
years or 50,000 miles (80,000 km) from the first day and at the mileage a Pre-Owned Vehicle is delivered to the first Pre-Owned purchaser, whichever comes first, irrespective of the expiration date or mileage of the Basic Vehicle Limited Warranty specified in the original New Vehicle Limited Warranty for the Pre-Owned vehicle
.

I'm reading that to mean odometer use as a new first owner car isn't part of that mileage because it didn't happen after the car was sold as a CPO.

So it appears that the CPO warranty can expire before or after the regular warranty. As in even a 99,000 mile car still could get additional years and miles from the CPO warranty.


that is correct...I bought a service loaner and the 15,000 km already on the car is not part of the warranty coverage
 
I would love to hear what went wrong with your leaf... if anything it is an outlier and you got unlucky. I think the fact that every major youtuber who owns a Tesla has had to had their car hauled away on a flat bed speaks volumes about Tesla's bad quality control(its not a concidence that they all had major mechanical issues). My Model S 2017 was delivered with a obviously cracked B Pillar, a vibrating speaker and a faulty door handle before developing many squeaks,pops and rattles through out the car. Where as my I have owned 3 japanese cars and my family has probably owned 20+ all together and there was only one 600 CAD repair needed outside of regular maintenance on my Accord that I owned before my model S.

I'm with you on this. I have a 2013 Leaf that I've had for almost 4 years now, and it's needed *nothing*. And I don't just mean "I haven't had any expenses since everything has been covered under warranty", I mean I haven't had to do squat to it other than plug it in and drive. I take it to the dealer for the annual state inspection, they say "yup, everything's fine", and off I go.

As someone who is looking to replace the Leaf with a Model S, I find it rather disturbing that a much more expensive car apparently doesn't have as good of quality control as my economy car (and perhaps the S also has some inherent design flaws, such as with the door handles).
 
  • Like
Reactions: croman
It *can* be true, as most people with Nissan Leafs have found (including me).

My 2014 SL has only required 31 dollars in new wiper blades and a new cabin air filter. I did all the work myself.

I'm getting new tires soon so that will add to the cost but it's an amazing car for what it is. I love my S and I can't imagine now having it. So far no major issues and Tesla has been wonderful. Don't be afraid because of some internet posts. A model S should be fine, even a CPO. I assume no warranty cars should be priced to include likely service costs or don't buy it.
 
Thanks Croman, that's comforting! A friend of mine has two Model S, and didn't bother getting the extended warranties on them since he has had almost no problems. It seems like there's almost no middle ground - either someone has an S that has no issues, or they have one that is constantly in the shop.
 
  • Like
Reactions: croman
I certainly feel like this is true. For about a year I had almost no issues with my S then all of a sudden it has been in the shop once a month or so for the last 3-4 months. Has had active louver replaced, the HV battery pack and now the heater core has gone out. Now lucky for me this is a CPO and all is covered under warranty but still. Makes it hard to sell the wife on swapping her leaf, which we have had 0 issues with over the last year, for an X which may have even more issues than my S. Now, if I could work on my S myself I would not be apprehensive at all about the warranty expiring. But if that doesn't happen I may sell and get another that is still covered or explore 3rd party warranty options.
 
I've had two trips to the shop in the 13,000 miles since my 2013 S went out of warranty: a rear window regulator failed and the window wouldn't roll up, the 12v battery failed, one of the TPMS sensors failed, and a few lug nuts were getting out of tolerance and my tire shop wanted new ones before they couldn't get the wrench on anymore. About $900 total in repairs over 9 months, vs. $1400/month to buy a similarly equipped 2017 to restart the warranty. I'll gamble on the occasional repair bill a little longer I think until I'm ready to replace it, hopefully once there's some semblance of value in the FSD option.

Meanwhile my wife's Lexus is going in for $3800 in front end steering and suspension work, so it's not like ICE cars can't rack up the bills out of warranty too.
 
  • Informative
Reactions: Brian-MS90D