- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
Scottish couple facing $33k repair bill after driving Tesla in heavy rain::undefined
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Water got into the battery. Well that sounds like it is squarely a fault of Tesla and its QC or R&D. Who tf builds a car, with a battery, doesn’t make sure that the battery and all other major components are IP68 rated for “full immersion up to a meter or more for 30 minutes” ?
Its a CAR. We have Fords to cross. And some RAIN fscked it up??!!
QC
That’s implying they have one at all!
The official QC policy from Musk himself is “don’t”
He probably thinks QC is a bit ‘woke’ and thus dismisses it out of hand.
Nah, it’s because he’s obsessed with getting cars out the door as quickly as possible to shorten the waiting list he’s always hearing about.
Coupled with fact that he doesn’t care about the safety and happiness of people whose surname isn’t a perfume ingredient.
It makes no sense…
It does when you’re a narcissist who cares a lot about your own reputation and how endless waiting lists are tarnishing it and not at all about the safety and happiness of people who have already given you their money.
Teslas are very pretty and quick, but this welding is symptomatic of their overall build quality:
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Gotta save that time and money
The second car here is a Tesla, and it still runs at the other side of the ford (but we don’t know for how long). But I agree, driving through rain should not damage a car.
It didn’t get fucked up by rain. They drove it on heavily flooded roads, according to Scots from the area.
Myself and about 3 million other Tesla owners can attest that they are not perturbed by rain.
Well, it is a SUV. Why not?
Why not what?
I think it’s important to mention that this isn’t an issue EVs have but an issue Teslas in particular have. They seem to have a really bad build quality from what I hear.
It’s the remote workers.
Battery was installed over zoom and the call dropped before the insulation part
an issue Teslas in particular have
I suppose you have evidence of this “issue” with Teslas?
The article this entire post is about…
This post is about a single vehicle that was most likely driven in deep water, but even if it wasn’t, is not indicative of an “issue Teslas have”.
Just in case anyone thinks this is a problem with all electric cars…
I own a Chevy Bolt. It lives in the driveway, as my house doesn’t have a garage. And I live in a city that gets Scotland levels of rainfall. It’s not uncommon for a heavy downpour to leave some low-lying streets with an inch or more of water on them in some places, and that’s perfectly normal here.
My Bolt does just fine in that. I never even considered the idea that I might need to take extra precautions with it because fucking rain might kill its battery.
This wasn’t everyday “Scotland levels of rainfalls” though, it was a specific storm that posed a risk to life in many areas.
That said I still would expect my car to endure anything short of being submerged underwater.
Southern California may be mostly dry, but has had several storms this year with inches of rain each. So even the"home" of Tesla needs to take that sort of weather into account.
It’s
(so far) in this case, so pretty exceptional and more than a few inches.
Regardless, my point was that this isn’t just “another rainy day in Scotland”. The circumstances are exceptional even for stormy weather.
Wow!
Keep in mind we didn’t see articles like this coming out of California during all the flooding. I’d be willing to bet money this guy drove through a flooded street and killed the car. If this was a design flaw, we’d be hearing a lot more about it I’m sure. Tesla is like the #1 news topic.
I second this. Drove my Zoe through rain, snow and ice, never had any problem or even thought about with water ingress.
Just in case anyone thinks this is a problem with Teslas, I have driven mine through several dozen heavy rainstorms and even a hurricane and my Tesla does just fine in that.
And as everyone knows, science is comprised of my personal experience.
I don’t think anyone thinks this is a universal problem with Teslas. It’s just a possible case of quality control failure. That said, quality control has been a problem lately.
I’ve been hearing of quality control problems when it comes to everything Tesla for years. This hardly seems like a recent thing.
Quality control is a problem with every product. Once you reach a certain point it just makes more financial sense to fix any issues when they’re discovered and reported by the consumer rather than going over it with a microscope. Most consumers don’t care about panel gaps.
Until someone completes and publishes a scientific study on the matter, and compares them to other OEMs, I’ll continue to assume that these are just anecdotes from click-hungry publications that know anything to do with Tesla or Elon drives clicks, because everyone I know and every Tesla I’ve seen (with the exception of S/X) is totally fine.
The problem is, Tesla’s “ignore it till people complain” baseline is lower than most other mfgs.
How many references would you like? https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/24/tesla-lags-auto-industry-in-quality-finds-new-jd-power-study.html https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1128625_tesla-ranks-last-in-initial-quality-build-issues https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/03/business/elon-musk-tesla-quality-problems/index.html
How do you like your bolt? I’ve been thinking about getting one or maybe an equinox when that comes out
Best car I’ve owned, without a doubt. I charge it overnight, and never have to even think about range (it’ll do 300 miles in good conditions if driven carefully). Keeping it charged costs a few dollars a month most of the time, unless I’m on a road trip and need to pay for charging on the way - which is still far, far cheaper than paying for gas.
The only downside is that road trips require more planning, because you need to know where you’re going to stop for a charge beforehand, and you need to plan out the time it’ll take to get a decent charge. But that just means making sure you’re going to have lunch or take a break to stretch your legs and walk around where you’ll be charging. Long-distance trips are definitely doable, you just plan them around charging locations.
And it’s impossible to beat the maintenance costs: Nearly $0. Very few moving parts and an electric motor means no oil changes, engine maintenance, and general wear-and-tear are much lower.
It’s a great car.
Maintenance is something I’ve been thinking about a lot, thanks for mentioning it. I know it’s supposed to be a lot cheaper than other cars but at the same time I’m curious what maintenance looks like 10+ years out, in other words older than probably most of the bolts out there. I appreciate the comment though!
I love my bolt euv, but they are hard to get, high demand and discontinued. For me the autopilot is a huge feature, makes moderately long trips way less fatiguing. It has great set of camera for maneuvering and isn’t too big (still I would prefer smaller). Range is fine for everything I do, 400km in summer, 275 in winter. That’s what the gauges say, but with good driving habits and practise you can get that significantly better. A full charges costs me about 5 bucks and its very nice to not have to think about it unless roadtripping. It charges slowly compared with some evs but I don’t find a 1hr to full charge on a fast charger particularly problematic. My wife did toronto to ottawa (about 500km) twice now and the stop for charging was shorter than the time it took her to grab lunch. Cooled front seats are very nice and the price was much more affordable than cars with similar ranges. Almost No maintaince is great, although chevvy will message you for an oil.change (lol!).
On the downsides, the bose sound system is crap and there’s no front trunk like many evs.
Yeah if any dealerships near me ever had any in stock I probably would have bought one by now on impulse, I wish you could purchase it without any kind of dealership intervention though
Unfortunately, you’ll probably have a hard time finding a new Bolt at this point. They’ve just stopped making them and dealerships haven’t really been able to keep any in stock for months in my neck of the woods. Apparently they will eventually come back but the timeline hasn’t been announced so probably several years.
Yeah I’m pretty split right now between getting a bolt while they’re still available or waiting and hoping the equinox is as good as they are saying it will be. I definitely want an EV at some point though my current (ancient) car currently does the job for short trips
Muskrats: “Why would anyone think they can drive in the rain?”
I don’t even believe the story happened.
Got any more sources target than carexpert.com.au lmao
Also Aussie sites often cover news in the UK.
Edinburghlive is a shit rag BTW. It’s a clickbait farming site, always has been be careful with trusting it.
How to spot the cult worshipers
How to spot bots
Are you well regarded in your community? Because you are certainly regarded here.
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This isn’t surprising at all. Have you ever looked at a Tesla up close? The fit and finish is bad. Like really bad. I have never understood how anyone could walk up to one, look at it and think “I’ll buy this”. Tesla has absolutely miserable quality control.
I’ve been in a Model S, and don’t get me wrong the acceleration was absolutely phenomenal
But my Skoda Fabia (which for the first owner probably cost £15k instead of £70k+) absolutely beat the shit out of it for how well-built it was. (For the yanks - Skoda is a sub brand of the VW group - think of them as a slightly cheaper Volkswagen)
Everything is rigid and you’d need a sledgehammer to shift it. In the Tesla you could just grab random parts of the interior and wobble it about. Everything shifts about, rattles, and shakes.
The paint on my Fabia is flawless - it’s of equal thickness everywhere, whereas for the Model S some parts were clearly thinner than others.
The panel gaps are a meme for a reason. On the Fabia, sure the panel gaps are wider than they are on a Porsche or something, but they’re exactly the same everywhere. On the Tesla you’d see it completely flush at the top of some panels, and a 6mm gap at the bottom! It was so inconsistent.
And the rear passenger-side door’s rubber seal where the window comes up was peeling off. This car is only 3 years old ffs!
I wish Tesla would license their drivetrain designs out to people who can actually build cars.
Skoda was the brand we’d take the piss out of in the early 90s.
I wonder if 2030s kids will be laughing at their friends being driven to school in a clapped out Model S, with half the panels falling away, one door a slightly different colour to the rest, and a battery that goes maybe 40 miles, going “Ahhh, your mum drives a Tesla!”
Skoda’s and Lada’s were the classic cars to rip people for having. Communist junk. VW really did a LOT to rehabilitate the Skoda image.
Some Skodas are better looking than their VW brothers. Especially the crossovers.
That’s funny because my Jetta felt like it was going to rattle itself apart.
I’m currently driving a Scoda Fabia myself. The globe box just broke, because something inside got stuck, and the 20 year old plastic handle just didn’t want to budge, and broke instead. Meanwhile, I just drove 1500km in it over the span of 3 days. It just keeps chugging along.
I rode in one for the first time a few months ago and it immediately broke any preconceived notions I had of it being a luxury product. The weather stripping on the doors was installed crooked and the material on the seats wasn’t lined up properly either. That’s just what I noticed in the first minute or two. It wasn’t even old, it was brand new since the owners first Tesla was totaled in an accident (in which all the recorded camera footage was lost on impact, you know the most important time you would want recordings to work).
That’s why they sell them online. So you can’t walk up to it in a dealership and see them up close.
Tesla has showrooms. It’s just they’re fully part of Tesla, instead of being little franchises with wingnut owners and weird regulatory capture.
Musk is a jack-ass, but the showroom model makes sense.
Tesla was only able to open these showrooms on American Indian Tribal Land due to car dealerships. Pretty smart workaround and I’m assuming a large money maker for some of the reservations.
Good god what are you going on about? The majority of showrooms are in malls. The delivery centers and repair centers that aren’t in malls are located in the middle of large cities.
I drive one and its the worst purchase I made to “save the environment”.
Apparently I’m going to Tesla dealer ship near my and from what I heard the cars aren’t actually there you just get to look at them on a screen . And there would be nowhere to get it serviced if something happened to it .
“They said it’s not necessarily my fault but it’s not Tesla’s to pay under warranty.”
If it’s not a warranty case and not a misuse case that means it’s designed and it’s supposed to function like that. Imagine an “automotive” grade battery pack with a lower IP rating that the car itself :))))
I don’t get why the service centre isn’t covering it in warranty, given the car should be able to handle rain (or even driving through floodwater) just fine and many Teslas do just that, including the many currently in Scotland. Clearly there was a fault that allowed water ingress to the battery… eventually it would have failed anyway, just in normal weather.
Tesla customer service seems to be based on deflection, rather than responsibility.
Because that costs money, and they absolutely hate that. Those insane margins have to come from somewhere.
Maybe a force majeure clause stating they aren’t responsible for “acts of god” like freak storms.
How to avoid such issues ?
STOP BUYING TESLA
The problem is nowdays it’s not only Tesla.
Yes, but he , as capitalists do, exploited EV for money. First step is to reduce, not make more. Chevy is working on an electric motor that will go in the differential. Reduce the existing cars by reusing the old. New cars can be made, we just need to make sure the old ones are gone. Me, I like the idea of retrofitting old cars. Yes, it can be expensive, but once again, if capitalists wouldn’t be constantly capitalizing, we all could have nice things.
I have no sympathy at this point for anyone buying one of these pieces of garbage from a company led by a person who quite obviously a flaming piece of garbage, producing products that are quite obviously flaming pieces of garbage.
I mean, there are so many alternatives now, you really have to ignore how horrible Musk is to buy one of these, and you have to have your head stuck in the ground for a couple of years now to not know that Tesla quality control is diaper poo.
There aren’t alternatives is my part of the USA due to lack of charging options. That is changing now that Tesla’s network is opening up but that hasn’t happened yet.
So buy a hybrid, charge at home, and done. Is the environmental impact different enough from a fully electric vehicle vs hybrid, when you take into account the pollution from lithium mining and refinement? Not dramatically better, no. It’s idiotic to buy a Tesla that is a flaming piece of garbage, just because it’s the only option in a particular area or country. The simple solution is to wait until viable, good quality products are available. It won’t be long.
I get it that people don’t like Elon. I don’t either, but I’ve gotta say the Tesla Model Y is my favorite car I’ve owned. I’ve owned 7 or so cars at this point.
I’d rather not own it at this point for Elon/political reasons but it isn’t because of the car itself.
Yes, expensive new car shiny. Right up until something or anything goes wrong with it and you get charged 10 times more than any other company and ripped off. I’m sure at that point your opinion about that car will change. perhaps you’ll be among the lucky owners that don’t encounter that kind of fun. Your solo experience means practically nothing.
Must be nice to own a home
Who said anything abt owning? U can charge a car with a plug socket it’s just slow but if its at your house that wouldn’t matter as much.
So are you suggesting someone in an apartment building should run an extension cord out to their car to charge it?
I’d probably just ask someone on the ground floor to use theirs and cover the added cost of electric
I mean, who would ever expect RAIN in SCOTLAND?? There’s no way that Tesla could have predicted that the car might be subjected to such a freak occurrence! 🤦😂
The number keeps going up every time I see someone post about it lol
This article had more info than the last one I saw floating through the feed (The article I saw had been “enhanced” by AI writing and you could tell).
In this article “A couple from Edinburgh was shocked after receiving a £17,374 (A$33,370) bill”
The last article floating through the feed didn’t really cover any real ponts about what happened and seemed to be targeting Elon in a negative scope.
This article had information about the issue they faced when attempting to leave and waiting 5~ hours for Tesla RSA. Then calling Tesla and talking to a manager that that was covering Tesla’s ass with warranty talk.
Were the currencies the same? In CAD it would read like something similar to $28,961.42.
All the posts keep using the $ symbol. But I bet that’s exactly what’s going wrong.
Earlier it was listed at 17k Euro which is only $18k USD or $28k AUD. Somehow it does keep rising.
From the article.
A Scottish couple has been confronted with a £17,374 (A$33,370) bill after their Tesla Model Y wouldn’t start after a night out.
Them exchange rates be crazy. I wonder if it really fluctuated $5k between the time of the article and when I looked it up yesterday.
That’s why I mentioned it, it gets me sometimes lol
Didn’t they have already issues with water on the Model 3 bumper? Still remembering seeing my first Tesla Model S… Worst bodypanel gaps I’ve ever seen on a new car
One of the most important things when buying a used EV is checking the base of the car for any punctures. One could happen due a plethora of reasons.
Combine a puncture with driving in heavy rain/puddles and water damage may occur.
I hate Musk and wouldn’t buy Tesla ever, but this isn’t necessarily just because of the shoddy quality control they have.
I maybe could understand if they had tried fording a stream or something, but the car was just sitting in the parking lot?
no excuse imo. its a car. Its even stupider that it failed from rain (even bad rain) in a car park. Cars can deal with 1m water easily (most batteries are that high, the air intake for the engine is easily that high (I will ignore Lambos and similar, built for different purposes).
In the worst case for a ‘normal’ car (what is the TLA for them now?) a replacement battery would cost you a couple hundred bucks at most.
Even if water got into the intake, the whole overhaul would not cost $20k or whatever it was.
Its even stupider that it failed from rain (even bad rain) in a car park.
Yeah, that is what I was trying to communicate.
Cars can deal with 1m water easily
Maybe some of them can, but that much water can wash a car off the road very easily.
If water gets into the intake the engine is a rightoff and often the car. You need to watch more bengreggors at the Ford matey.
well aware of how it works. just a little dramatization for shits and giggles. But I disagree that it is an instant right-off. it can be salvageable 90% of the time.
On the dime of the company who produced the car?
I always hear bad things from Tesla owners after the honeymoon phase is over.
Am owner of 3-year-old model X. Can confirm. Build quality is shit, and service experience is worse. Will never buy another Tesla.
