Wind noise seems somewhat obtrusive

[BioSehnsucht]

I originally had a higher pitched whistling wind noise on top of the regular wind noise above 50 mph.

I took it in to the Plano Service Center (for this and a few unrelated minor things). Went on a test drive with service tech (I think his name might have been Robert?) didn't seem to think it was an unusual amount of wind noise, but I think he was only listening to the volume and not thinking about the frequencies involved - I don't think they would have had much experience driving 3's at speed yet. He visually inspected the weather seals around all the glass and said that there was a few "cosmetic" spots that he could try to adjust for better "visual aesthetics" by heating them up and adjusting them somehow.

After he did that, I haven't had ANY high pitched whistling, just regular "whoosh" wind noise at high speed. It's been fixed for about a month.

So if you have some whistling aspect then you might see if you can get the SC to look into that and see if there's any such issue. I'm guessing a slightly loose edge of the weather stripping was acting like a reed and vibrating at high speed, and whatever he did stuck it down properly.

 

[robd]

The black triangular piece appears to be held on by an adhesive pad which does not go all the way to the top part of the triangle. This leaves an open edge where air can pass. I think there’s wind noise through the open edge at the top. As an experiment I put some silicon between the rubber piece and the top of the triangle on the leading edge since that’s where the air would pass. I think it helped with freeway/high speed noise. You could try even putting tape over the edge to see if it helps. Something to try, I couldn’t glue it down without heating it or something to “mold “ the plastic to shape. Open the door for quick access to this area.

 

[vikefan]

Costa Mesa SC is ordering a replacement to completely swap out the triangular piece. I’m still concerned they thought the existing wind noise is behaving normally. I’ve had more than one passenger comment that it sounds like the window is cracked open, and it only comes from that side. If it was normal, it should come from both sides.

I haven’t tried covering it with anything yet, mostly due to laziness. I might before I leave for work tomorrow and see if that resolves it.

 

[BioSehnsucht]

Costa Mesa SC is ordering a replacement to completely swap out the triangular piece. I’m still concerned they thought the existing wind noise is behaving normally. I’ve had more than one passenger comment that it sounds like the window is cracked open, and it only comes from that side. If it was normal, it should come from both sides.

I haven’t tried covering it with anything yet, mostly due to laziness. I might before I leave for work tomorrow and see if that resolves it.

Is it a high pitched whistling wind noise? If so, have them double check all the seals around the front / top glass are fully glued down. My whistling was fixed when they corrected a "cosmetic" issue with my seal that had it not fully flush/stuck in place. I was also told the whistling was normal, but after they found the not-quite-perfect "cosmetic" issue with the seals and did something involving heating them up to fix them, the high pitched whistling has been gone.

 

[emadz89]

Costa Mesa SC is ordering a replacement to completely swap out the triangular piece. I’m still concerned they thought the existing wind noise is behaving normally. I’ve had more than one passenger comment that it sounds like the window is cracked open, and it only comes from that side. If it was normal, it should come from both sides.

I haven’t tried covering it with anything yet, mostly due to laziness. I might before I leave for work tomorrow and see if that resolves it.

Any update for you?

 

[vikefan]

Any update for you?

I tried several strips of electrical tape, but they all just got ripped off by the wind within a few minutes, and they were flapping almost immediately, so unfortunately I couldn’t tell anything.

The Costa Mesa SC *still* has my part on back order, which is pretty frustrating since it’s been about a month now since I first reported the problem to them.

Tesla has some of the best cars on the road, but it’s virtually guaranteed that any other car manufacturer could have fixed this problem without a month+ wait

 

[vikefan]

Is it a high pitched whistling wind noise?

Negative, not high pitched. Just sounds as if you’ve got the passenger window just slightly cracked open.

 

[emadz89]

I tried several strips of electrical tape, but they all just got ripped off by the wind within a few minutes, and they were flapping almost immediately, so unfortunately I couldn’t tell anything.

The Costa Mesa SC *still* has my part on back order, which is pretty frustrating since it’s been about a month now since I first reported the problem to them.

Tesla has some of the best cars on the road, but it’s virtually guaranteed that any other car manufacturer could have fixed this problem without a month+ wait

I tend to get wind noise from my B-pillar area on the driver's side. According to service note they resealed that area but I'm still getting that noise. I noticed a very tiny opening by the b-pillar on the inside where the weather seal is - i'm thinking of stuffing some insulation in there and seeing what happens.

 

[chracatoa]

@vikefan I'll be taking my model 3 for the second time to the SC on Tuesday. I have the same problem you have. It'll stay there a couple days while they investigate it. Last time they replaced the windshield to no avail.

I'm going to be honest, I'm not looking forward to the loaner they're going to give me. Last time it was a Chrysler mini-van from Enterprise.

 

[Richt]

Wind noise hasn’t bothered us on our model x or October model 3. OTOH, our last car was a Honda Fit and then a 2008 mazdaspeed3 that defined the word noisy!

 

[ecarfan]

Ever since we got our Model 3 a few months ago, my spouse has complained of a faint whistling sound that seems to be coming from the right side of the car. She doesn’t hear it when she’s driving.

I recently noticed that the triangular black plastic piece at the lower front corner of the passenger side window is partially detached at the top (others in this thread have commented on the same thing) whereas the driver side triangular black plastic piece is more flush.

Today at a test, after my spouse got into the passenger seat and closed the door, I applied a strip of blue painters tape along the leading edge of that plastic piece to block air flow between it and the layer it had lifted away from, and then drove the car on the freeway at 70mph.

My spouse tried hard to detect the noise but admitted that it was either extremely faint or non-existent. I got off the freeway and stopped, removed the blue tape, and got back on the freeway at the same speed and she immediately heard the noise.

That seems like proof that the noise she was hearing was due to the gap. Here’s a photo; it’s difficult to see in this image, but obvious in real life. When I push in on the top corner of the plastic piece I can depress it about 0.25”. It needs to be re-glued.

Here is a photo of the drivers side; I can depress the top of the plastic piece a tiny bit.

 

[voip-ninja]

Has anyone gotten a satisfactory resolution to this problem by Tesla?

Wind noise coming from passenger side near top of A pillar is extremely obnoxious. I don’t want to take it in if techs can’t fix the issue.

 

[voip-ninja]

I just looked at my car and noticed it definitely has more pronounced passenger side A pillar mirror trim piece extension than what is on the driver's side.

My commute is short and not at highway speeds so this really only bites me on weekends and side trips on the highway.

I will give Tesla another month or two of angry customers demanding they do something about it. Perhaps by then there will be an actual possibility they can fix it.

They can fix the annoying rattle in my passenger side seat belt anchor on the B pillar by then too, hopefully.

 

[chracatoa]

They mostly fixed my issue by replacing the side mirror assembly. Now the noise only starts around 60mph and it's on par with the Cadillac sedan loaner they gave me.

 

[jasontallman]

Has everyone given up on this issue or did you actually find a solution.

 

[Petrlol]

I think mine is quieter with the single strip of black electric tape on the triangle. It hasn't came unstuck at all. That being said I use 3m super 88 tape... Not just whatever is around.

 

[vikefan]

As an update to this, I’m STILL waiting for Tesla to fix it. Their tech agrees with me that the triangle piece seems to be sticking out more than it should and could be causing extra noise, and he took a test drive with me and agreed the noise was unusual. So there’s that.

The problem has been that on my initial service appt, they had me sit around for 3 hours while all they did was apparently re-adhere it to the car. Then they tell me “all done!” And I walk out to the car and can see the piece already sticking out again. Did not fix the issue. Then they say “ok we’ll just replace the part but need to order it...”

Not only did it take months for the part to come in, but they didn’t even realize it when it did show up in their warehouse. Only found out when I called (for the 4th time and waited on hold for 45 min as usual) and asked why I haven’t gotten any updates. Not ideal when every single time I call Tesla customer service, the wait time is a minimum 30 minutes at best.

So then I schedule a 2nd appt to have the part installed, and I confirm I’ll need a loaner that day, but on the DAY of the appt, they tell me “oh sorry we don’t have any loaners right now because of too many cars in shop last week, but we’ll give you Lyft credit to wherever you wanna go!”...I guess no one at Tesla has ever had a small child who requires a child seat like I did that day, and none of them need to drive 60 miles to get to work like I did that day. Glad they thought that a very last minute Lyft offer is a one-size-fits-all solution for every customer.

So after driving all the way over there to supposedly get this piece finally installed (for the SECOND time wasting my day), I have to tell the agent that Lyft is unacceptable for me and I need a loaner or I can’t do the repair that day. She says “let me see if we can do this via remote repair” and sure enough! They can! They could have just sent someone to my house to repair it all along! So now I’m waiting on that person to just give me a call and come fix this damn thing before I can verify that this is actually the correct fix.



Tesla’s customer service has some SERIOUS upgrading to do.

 

[Firedog7881]

Mine is at the SC right now and one of the things they are repairing is the triangle piece on the passenger A pillar. When I dropped off the car the advisor made a side comment “I thought they fixed that around 100K” and mine is 1090XX. You can easily see that there is something additional beneath the passenger side that isn’t there on the driver side but they’re trying to use exact opposite pieces. Hopefully whatever they do fixes it.

 

[ecarfan]

Tesla Mobile Service tech came to my house and replaced the passenger side black triangular piece. The new part had the small black foam piece on the back side positioned closer to the edge. With the new part installed, the faint whistling sound at speed is gone.

Ever since we got our Model 3 a few months ago, my spouse has complained of a faint whistling sound that seems to be coming from the right side of the car. She doesn’t hear it when she’s driving.

I recently noticed that the triangular black plastic piece at the lower front corner of the passenger side window is partially detached at the top (others in this thread have commented on the same thing) whereas the driver side triangular black plastic piece is more flush.

Today at a test, after my spouse got into the passenger seat and closed the door, I applied a strip of blue painters tape along the leading edge of that plastic piece to block air flow between it and the layer it had lifted away from, and then drove the car on the freeway at 70mph.

My spouse tried hard to detect the noise but admitted that it was either extremely faint or non-existent. I got off the freeway and stopped, removed the blue tape, and got back on the freeway at the same speed and she immediately heard the noise.

That seems like proof that the noise she was hearing was due to the gap. Here’s a photo; it’s difficult to see in this image, but obvious in real life. When I push in on the top corner of the plastic piece I can depress it about 0.25”. It needs to be re-glued.

View attachment 349887

Here is a photo of the drivers side; I can depress the top of the plastic piece a tiny bit.

View attachment 349888

 

[vikefan]

Update (finally).

Mobile tech finally made it to my house and replaced the side mirror+triangle plastic piece (it’s all one part apparently), although he noted the new part still isn’t sitting as flush as he would like, but he didn’t have any additional copies of the part and so will be coming back to install yet another, better fitting one later.

Took it for a test drive with him, and the wind noise was definitely much better, although still noticeable and likely related to the part not fitting exactly. The tech did mention that he’s had to replace other mirrors before for the exact same issue. He also said, “I wish they had told me this was to fix wind noise. I would have made sure to bring several copies of the part because they don’t always fit the same,” which was pretty frustrating for me since I’ve been talking to NUMEROUS Tesla employees trying to get this repair for months now, and every single time I talked to someone I said it was for wind noise...

The tech also mentioned that they’ve made some design revisions to that piece since I bought the car in August (he said mine was like version 3 and now they’re on version 5 of that piece).

Anyway, the fact that it’s better now seems to confirm for me that the plastic piece sticking out of the side of the car was in fact the cause of the excessive noise. Hoping the next install continues to lessen it further.