Tesla's clearly were developed in Cali - weather issues

[Mod3forMe]

I love my model 3, but I have to wonder if it was ever tested in the rain. At here in the Pacific Northwest we have the rainy season upon us and the Model 3 has some rather silly design issues:

• Open the trunk in the rain and the water rushes in. Can't say I have had a car that had this issue before
• Roll down the windows in heavy rain and the rain on the roof drips down into the car. Makes using the Starbucks drive through a bit of task. I seems like the channels on the car to move the rain around the windows does not handle enough volume for heavy rain
• Windshield wipers! The wipers themselves are great, but the program to run them and access to them is silly. Auto barely works and when it does come on it is on a speed way too slow. Going manual is on the screen only (other than pressing the button for one wipe) and as heavy rain hits on the highway I would rather I have my eyes up then trying to work the touch screen. Hopefully they will update the software to fix this as right now I think I hand crank connected to the wipers would work better.
• Foggy lights - what is up with that?

The good news is defrost works well and the car handles very well on wet roads. I can live with most of the stuff, but the wipers are a safety issue.

I have little experience in snow and below freezing weather so other can chime in on that.

 

[kwest2]

Pretty poor performance so far here in Boston. I had to make an appointment this week for 12/20 (the first one avail...wow) to address:

1) Door handles don't automatically retract in the cold weather. Basically you open, get in, then the handle stays out and the door won't latch.
2) Rain leak in trunk - I discovered that in all the recent rain, there's a leak in the trunk that drips. Both my trunk and the lower compartment have been soaked multiple times.
3) Window failed to go down upon closing the rear door in the recent cold, resulting in a slam, bounce back, and scratched trim.

I've also been having a lot of issue with the frunk latching when closing it lately. Not sure if it's the cold weather or what, but sometimes it takes 5+ push downs to get it to latch.

 

[bradkeller]

I also had all the snow on my back window fall into the trunk when I opened it. I had cleaned off the window enough to see out of it, but there was a little snow still there. Plop. Right in the trunk.

 

[dusdev]

1st generation car. I think a lot of these issues will be improved over time. If they took the time to address every one of these issues the car would have probably taken another year.

At least certain items are addressable in the software. The windshield wiper setting should be controllable from the button the stalk, for example.

 

[Mod3forMe]

1st generation car. I think a lot of these issues will be improved over time. If they took the time to address every one of these issues the car would have probably taken another year.

At least certain items are addressable in the software. The windshield wiper setting should be controllable from the button the stalk, for example.

I agree with why it happened. First generation car from a new automaker. I get it. But I do think some of the issues do speak to the location their testing. Deeper Chanels around the windows/trunk would not take a year to design and the need to have them shows up the very first time you are in heavy rain - so it would not have taken allot of rain testing to see the issue.

The windshield wipers issues is pretty silly, particularly as I assume it would be very easy to program the auto windshield wipers to wipe faster and/or make the button on the steering wheel stock control them.

I love the car, but it is not hard tell that a Tech Company in California designed it rather than a Car company in Michigan or Bavaria where they get real weather.

 

[nagypite]

https://electrek.co/2018/11/29/tesla-software-update-rain-sensing-neural-net-easter-eggs-elon-musk/

 

[MorrisonHiker]

I love my model 3, but I have to wonder if it was ever tested in the rain. At here in the Pacific Northwest we have the rainy season upon us and the Model 3 has some rather silly design issues:

• Roll down the windows in heavy rain and the rain on the roof drips down into the car. Makes using the Starbucks drive through a bit of task. I seems like the channels on the car to move the rain around the windows does not handle enough volume for heavy rain

My first year 1997 Honda CR-V had the same issue, so it's not a flaw unique to Tesla. Fortunately, I never go to Starbucks and usually go inside instead of using the drive-thru so it wasn't an issue for me in the 20 years that I owned the car.

I also had all the snow on my back window fall into the trunk when I opened it. I had cleaned off the window enough to see out of it, but there was a little snow still there. Plop. Right in the trunk.

I predicted that would be an issue when I saw videos of the test rides on 3/31/16. I've always had hatchbacks or an SUV but noticed the potential problem right away. Some pointed out that other makes/models have this same issue. Cars with trunks don't work for me so again, this isn't an issue personally.

I can see how both of these issues would be problems for some buyers.

 

[shrspeedblade]

A quick workaround if you don't like the wiper speed: just lightly push the left stalk button once, then tap the desired manual speed on the menu screen that comes up. A lot less hunting/pecking.

It's raining cats and dogs in the Bay Area today.

 

[SMAlset]

We do get rain here in Tesla Factory country (and temps back in 2013 dropped to around 25F, coldest winter since we've been out here). We finally started getting some rain the last few days, actually a few good downpours already and a couple of inches in my former empty fountain, so finally got a chance to check out the seals on the headlights and taillights on my car--all good. Trunk and frunk and door seals looking good. Same with glass roof. Whew!

I was aware from reading on this forum about the water flying into the open trunk issue and so have been curious about that. I haven't opened the trunk while it's raining hard but yesterday and this morning when I was out I opened the trunk with water on it. Wanted to see what would happen. Some water fell onto the rear window and ran down it towards the trunk but it was caught by the black elevated seal around the window bottom and diverted to the side. A little bit did fall over the edge on one occasion but was caught by the larger trunk gasket seal and diverted as well. Yesterday I had one small water droplet fly into the trunk onto my all weather cargo mat and that was about it. I was afraid that the water remaining on the car after it had rained would be an issue but at least to me it doesn't look to be the case. Now I haven't been brave enough to head out when it's raining and see what happens but assume with any good amount of rain some will go into the trunk.

I do a morning run through Starbuck's drivethru so understand the drippy window issue. I have a feeling frameless windows on cars will all do this as there's no trim to divert the rain into a track and in another direction. It's the same on our MS. I had one car, maybe my Avalon, that had the window/door frame located more tilted in from the side body of the car and I would always roll down my window and have water drip onto the inside door panel.

 

[SMAlset]

Well just saw this news on a update coming out next month on the auto rain sensors.

Elon Musk announces Tesla software update with new rain sensing neural net and Easter eggs

When I used mine yesterday and set them to auto they seemed to work fine but it wasn't raining much. I left the setting on auto (not intentinonally) and when I got in the car this morning rain on the car and sort of drizzle, they came on and were kind of behaving strange as far as the wiper timing. But again not out with them when it was raining hard.

 

[SDKoala]

First rain in a long time here in San Diego today. I can't even imagine how all of you that live in non-drought areas are putting up with the car in the rain and snow.

Auto wipers are absolutely worthless. Way to fast when there's barely a drizzle, way to slow when it's actually raining. It's hard to find that sweet spot with the manual preset speeds, so it has been a lot of just pressing the stalk button whenever I need to wipe. I'm aware that pressing the stalk button is the shortcut to opening the wiper sub-menu but the point is a car this expensive shouldn't require constantly fiddling around with the wipers. My other car that costs half as much has auto wipers that work perfectly.

I will echo the frustration with the poorly designed trunk opening that allows water to get in when the trunk is open. I've always had hatches and SUVs, so maybe this is not unique to the Model 3. I know I don't have leaky seals as everything is staying dry otherwise, but more than a little bit of water that pools on the trunk lid is able to find its way inside when it opens.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Oh, so rain in California, and Musk announces an NN update for the wipers.
We need record lows and unusual snow storms in California.

 

[dusdev]

"Auto wipers are absolutely worthless"

^ this

 

[thewishmaster]

I agree, the auto wipers are pretty terrible at the moment - so slow in heavy rain that driving with auto wipers feels unsafe on the freeway. I vaguely remember a youtube video demonstrating that the Model S has the same issue with water falling into the car when the window is open.

 

[Eno Deb]

I drove through a heavy downpour for the first time earlier today and the auto wipers were completely useless. It was bad enough to require the fastest wiper setting, but they either didn't come on at all or wiped every 5 seconds or so. Fumbling around with the screen in this situation felt downright dangerous. I've also had them fail in a light drizzle. They seem to work reasonably well only in moderate rain. This needs to be fixed ASAP. I'd also like some way (e.g. double click on the button) to quickly turn on the wipers on setting 3 manually in case the automatic fails.

 

[xilex]

When wipers are off, press the wiper button once, and it will display the button on the left lower panel to turn on wipers. Then you can select speed or auto.

 

[Eno Deb]

When wipers are off, press the wiper button once, and it will display the button on the left lower panel to turn on wipers. Then you can select speed or auto.

Yes, we all know this, but it still requires you to look down at the screen in situations where this is often dangerous because the rain already makes it difficult to see.

 

[SMAlset]

Oh, so rain in California, and Musk announces an NN update for the wipers.
We need record lows and unusual snow storms in California.

We could send you our wildfires and you can test out the air filter... which works pretty well after being in smoke from the Camp fire recently.

 

[Skione65]

First rain in a long time here in San Diego today. I can't even imagine how all of you that live in non-drought areas are putting up with the car in the rain and snow.

Auto wipers are absolutely worthless. Way to fast when there's barely a drizzle, way to slow when it's actually raining. It's hard to find that sweet spot with the manual preset speeds, so it has been a lot of just pressing the stalk button whenever I need to wipe. I'm aware that pressing the stalk button is the shortcut to opening the wiper sub-menu but the point is a car this expensive shouldn't require constantly fiddling around with the wipers. My other car that costs half as much has auto wipers that work perfectly.

I will echo the frustration with the poorly designed trunk opening that allows water to get in when the trunk is open. I've always had hatches and SUVs, so maybe this is not unique to the Model 3. I know I don't have leaky seals as everything is staying dry otherwise, but more than a little bit of water that pools on the trunk lid is able to find its way inside when it opens.

@SDKoala,

Agreed. I was out the other night and got so frustrated with the Auto Wipers. Useless. I too just resorted to constantly reaching up and just pressing the stalk sweep button when I needed it but why? The 3 settings below auto were mind numbing as I couldn’t set a precise wipe to account for the amount of rain. Either sweeping too much or I’m staring through a rain soaked windshield wondering when it’s going to sweep again and just stabbing the button. My ‘07 Civic that cost A QUARTER of what this car cost at least had a potentiometer on the stalk as most do to ‘set’ a corresponding sweep to account for rain amount. Is that to much to ask?
I guess in retrospect we all just need to constantly file ‘bug reports’ as it’s happening...(I know another unsafe gesture) to get Elon’s attention on this ASAP. Maybe once he’s flooded with BRs he’ll get his team to address this issue, rewrite some code and push a new release.

Ski

 

[lolder]

In S. Florida the auto wipers were only several seconds slow in ramping up to speed in heavy rain. The new update should fix that.