Here is a model s in the junkyard. Https://www.copart.com/lot/60431229 the driver has escaped death by a few inches when the car ran into a wooden pole which has entered through the windscreen and speared through into the back seat. A sharp eyed investigator will notice that the back rh wheel has lost its tire and has been pushed back into the wheel well. It seems most unlikely that the wheel went whompy as a result of the crash. It has to be considered as a strong possibility that it was the wheel going whompy that caused the car to swerve and narrowly miss impaling the driver. I really feel that it would be worthwhile for you to investigate these failed suspensions which occur almost daily. Thank you. Keef
2016 Tesla Model S suspension complaints
Page 5 of 8: complaints 101 to 130 of 211, newest first, as owners wrote them.
Model s in junkyard. Https://www.copart.com/lot/60677309/photos front suspension has broken fore-links (subject of many other reported failures) broken links have scraped through the wheel from the inside slicing it in two. The sliced wheel has been stashed in the back seat of the car - photo attached. Even though these fore-links are the subject of a tsb tesla has made no attempt to warn owners or to retrofit the parts before they fail. Tesla forum discussions prove this. Sample: https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/fore-link-suspension-failure-while-driving-on-the-freeway.141701/#post-3367491 ***the service guy did not seem surprised and diagnosed the problem right away on seeing the car. The left front fore link in the suspension broke. If this was a known issue, I'm wondering why there hasn't been a recall. What if I was driving with my 2 kids? *** it seems that the "new improved" fore link is not much better. Thread: https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/another-front-suspension-control-arm-failure.114967/page-8#post-4081304 how in the world is tesla allowed to get away with this? Most owners reports are about cases were this part has failed at low speed. Failures at high speed? Dead men tell no tales. One day soon the media will have the courage to report on this despite the determined efforts of the tesla propaganda organization. This will not be a good look for the federal safety agency. Regards [xxx] information redacted pursuant to the freedom of information act (foia), 5 u.s.c. 552(b)(6).
Tesla model s freshly arrived in the salvage yard. Https://www.copart.com/lot/58902739/photos the entire rear suspension has snapped off with all of the links broken. This is not the result of a crash. No airbags have been deployed. The only mark on the bodywork is around the wheel well caused by the wheel whomping around. This is utterly insane. When are you going to recall these deadly cars? Keef outraged citizen forced to share the roads with these deadly out of control battering rams.
This is a complaint about the fragile tesla suspensions. Please note that I have used a VIN from a junkyard tesla to satisfy your website requirements. I do not have the VIN of the car that is the subject of this alarming video. Link: https://twitter.com/melaynalokosky/status/1190452753627090944?s=21 the tesla suddenly swerves right. It seems unlikely that this is driver error. More likely the tesla has had a mechanical failure or has entered "insane mode" no matter. The back wheel went whompy. The wheel and tire did not get biffed much. Why did the entire suspension go whompy. Perhaps if they did not make the parts out of extruded monkey metal??? Respectfully unhinged citizen etc.etc.
2016 tesla, 3 yrs old with 61,170 miles. While backing out of a driveway, at slow speed, with steering wheel turned, both forelinks (suspension arms) broke. The car appeared drive-able and the only issue I noticed was a loud metal grinding sound when braking at slow speeds. Tesla service center inspected and confirmed both forelinks were broken but I'm still waiting to hear back on any additional damage (I.e. Steering knuckle) resulting from this issue.
Here is a tesla in the junkyard. Https://www.iaai.com/vehicledetails?itemid=33887421&rownumber=2&similarvehicleitemid=&isnext=&loadrecent=true biohazard stickers indicate that an occupant has been injured. The front steering knuckle has snapped in half. It is unknown whether the snapped knuckle was the cause or the result of the crash however it is obvious that the casting is of low quality. Such a crucial component should not be made of brittle monkey metal. Quality control at the supplier and at tesla is deficient. I petition you to launch an investigation into the reason for so many teslas suffering from suspension breakages.
Model s in the junkyard. Vendor has been kind enough to provide a close up photograph of the snapped front suspension parts. The suspension arm has broken in half due to the bad quality cast monkey metal that tesla uses. How many more examples of these failures do you need before you demand a recall? Thank you for your attention. Vexed citizen etc. Etc.
Sudden squeak and front of the car felt more bouncy when going over bumps or any elevation. Also when lowering or raising air suspension will make rubbing sound. Car has never been into accident or any damage.
Tl* the contact owns a 2016 tesla model s. While driving approximately 45 MPH, the contact heard a loud cracking sound and the vehicle started to veer to the left. The contact pulled over to side of the road. The contact exited the vehicle and noticed that the front driver's side was very low and close to the ground. The vehicle was towed to tesla (9850 w broad st, glen allen, va 23060,) where it was diagnosed that the front end was fractured for no apparent reason. The manufacturer was notified of the failure. The vehicle was not repaired. The approximate failure mileage was 38,756.
3 year old tesla model s 71k miles. Catastrophic front suspension control arm failure. Wheels disconnected from frame and rubbing against wheel well after low speed drive (<10 MPH) inside parking lot. No collision. No prior damage to suspension. Large grinding noise and unable to steer. Had to call tow truck to send to tesla service.
Left forelink cracked while turning the wheel in a parking lot
Front right fore link failed disabling steering to wheel. Failure occurred while in city driving at medium speed. Symptom was loud noise from front right quarter panel area and shuddering. Car was towed via flatbed trailer to tesla service facility in riviera beach, fl. Service personnel replaced both front fore links along with the right front tire. Work was covered by warranty.
Tl* the contact owns a 2016 tesla model s. While driving various speeds, a loud humming and knocking noise occurred and the vehicle vibrated. The origin of the noise was unknown and there were no warning indicators illuminated. The vehicle was taken to tesla (located at 9428 reisterstown rd, owings mills, md 21117, (410) 415-1411) where it was test driven. The technician heard the noise, but could not determine from where it was coming. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The approximate failure mileage was 19,232.
Suspension: the vehicle started making crunching/grinding sounds when turning or going over any slight bumps at high and low speeds. When turning the steering wheel, the entire vehicle would tilt up and down. Also in drive and reverse, the front passenger tire would hit the wheel well. When the brakes were applied, the vehicle would make sounds as well. We took the vehicle in and they found that the upper control arm had snapped and the lower control arm had been damaged as well. They said it was a result of the vehicle going over a severe bump or normal wear and tear. The vehicle only has 38,000 miles on it and has never been driven over extreme conditions. When looking at the part, it looks more like a result of a manufacturing defect (stress fracture) rather than normal wear and tear. Fortunately we did.m not experience complete failure while driving, as it potentially could have been catastrophic.
Left front suspension was broken. Car was laying flat on the floor without any prior incident.
I had just finished washing/drying my 2016 tesla model s (less than 22k miles), and while very slowly backing out of my inclined driveway with the steering wheel turned to the right, I heard an audible crack, followed by the right tire rubbing against the wheel well liner. On the driveway, I found a semi-circular piece of aluminum, which turned out to be a cracked forelink.
Here is a thread in which a tesla owner credits tesla with saving his life. Https://forums.tesla.com/forum/forums/my-tesla-saved-my-life#comment-1670291 photos reveal that the rear left wheel is missing and the suspension completely torn off. See attached photo. Owner subsequently posted a video of the crash: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8e5_ehkpri&feature=youtu.be playing that video at 0.25 speed or wathching it fram by frame on analyzer: http://anilyzer.com/?page_id=7&type=youtube&vid=h8e5_ehkpri#playbackrate=1&seekto=0 you can see that the tesla tilted to the left and then drifted to the left. The foreground lights and cars go blurry at about 0:12 into the video. The tesla is out of control long before the passing car comes into view. An almost identical event on the pali highway hawaii claimed the life of of a passing driver just a year ago. There are far too many of these cases for it to be just a fluke event. The tesla suspensions are too weak for the weight of these heavy and powerful cars and because they are made from cast or extruded aluminum they will become even weaker with age and fatigue. Please launch an urgent investigation into this. Thank you. A very concerned citizen. Please note that I am not the owner and have used a dummy USA address to conform with your website requirements. I have been advised by a the federal safety agency investigator that it is permissible for a non-owner and non us resident to file a complaint. My full contact details are included with this submission.
I am requesting that the federal safety agency investigate tesla's unexplained swerving on the highway, followed by its failure to respond to the driver's inputs to the steering, resulting in a single car crash. I was driving my tesla model s in the leftmost lane of the northbound florida turnpike around 8 pm. I was following the traffic and I believe my speed was around 70 MPH. I was in full control and the vehicle was not in self-driving mode. Suddenly, and without warning, the car started swerving. I tried to steer it, but the car failed to respond to my inputs to the steering (the steering was not locked). Within seconds, the car crashed into the median, and from that impact, cut across the highway and crashed next into the guard rails at the other side of the highway, and from the impact of that crash, turned around and stopped in the rightmost / center lane. The accident resulted in a total loss of the vehicle. The weather was clear but right around when the accident happened, a light drizzle started. Because the accident resulted in damage to the highway guard rails, I received a citation (which I am pleading 'not guilty' to). My husband and I bought this new model s vehicle in march 2016. The current mileage on it was almost 60,000 miles. With regards to the maintenance history of the vehicle, the following may be pertinent information: 1)we received a safety notice from tesla in march 2018 regarding the power steering component (email attached). However, the email did not require any immediate action on our part and simply advised us to wait for availability of parts in our region. We never received another notice. 2)in april 2018, after a heavy rain event, the car would occasionally shut off and not restart. It was serviced by tesla, and found to have no other concerns (invoice attached). Tesla was notified 9 days back and we are waiting for an explanation.
This is a complaint about tesla suspension failures. Here is a recent forum discussion in which several owners post photographs of suspensions that have snapped at low speed and not as a result of collision damage. This is absolute proof of tesla suspensions failing from snapped alloy parts and from snapped (2 piece) steel bolts. Despite this evidence neither the owners nor tesla have seen fit to report this to the authorities. Please do your job and investigate this problem. These are not isolated events, they are part of an ongoing pattern of failure. Https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/another-front-suspension-control-arm-failure.114967/ ** bkelly, sep 22, 2018 wow that is weird. Different than mine. If you look at the suspension detail photo there are three circular pieces in a triangle below the rubber cv joint boot. On my car the top one of those three circles, the shiny one, broke. I believe that is what most people have experienced. In your case the lower left circle seems to be broken I.e. The actual hub or wheel carrier. Somehow the ball joint came apart perhaps as a result. I cant see if the bolt holding the ball joint in the lower right circle is still in place pointing down to the ground, or if that broke. I have not heard of a wheel carrier breaking since the morris minors in the 60's.** ** ampedrealtor, sep 22, 2018 maybe musk should smoke less pot and focus on putting out quality cars.** **cncrepairman, sep 23, 2018 wow. I cannot believe these suspension concerns have not been recalled.** I am not an owner. I am a concerned citizen. A dummy USA address has been used to satisfy your website requirements. My genuine name and contact details are included with this submission
This is another complaint about the tesla suspensions. Commenting in this forum:https://seekingalpha.com/news/3396557-musk-denies-murdoch-favorite-tesla-chair *** simon mac, contributor comments2440 | + follow @idaho stoic meanwhile tesla have redesigned the suspension control arms for the model s/x with much stronger forged items. My model s had replacement suspension links on multiple occasions, which in fairness to tesla were done under the auspices of a tsb and without me bringing it up as a concern to the service department. I also had a lot of work done on the hv junction box (again not raised by me). This seemed to happen not far after the suc fire in norway a little while back, a lot of other model s owners I know had the same work carried out. The question is are those folks who are skipping the suggested maintenance regime, missing out on a lot of work which is borderline recall, and tesla are doing stuff that can't be ota'd under the cover of servicing.*** please read this report from an owner and demand that tesla recall all affected cars to avoid further crashes and loss of life. I am not a tesla owner. I am a concerned citizen. My full name and contact details are included with this submission.
Tl* the contact owns a 2016 tesla model s. While driving approximately 5 MPH, the front driver side wheel seized and the vehicle came to an immediate stop. The failure occurred without warning. The vehicle was towed to tesla service center (457 pleasant st, watertown, ma) where it was diagnosed that the driver and passenger side link assemblies were defective and needed to be replaced. The vehicle was repaired. The manufacturer was notified of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 42,000. The VIN was not provided. **tr updated 10/31/18
Cracked front suspension - lower fore arm - drivers side, cracked at the ball joint interface resulting in the ball joint separating from the control arm. This vehicle has 23,140 miles and has only been driven on paved roads in the midwest us. No off road or rough service. Failure happened while backing out of a parking space. Within 5 feet a loud snap was heard then rubbing like the tire was hitting the wheel well. Stopped the car and found the drivers side lower ball joint separated at the lower fore arm. Lower fore arm was cracked. Tesla towed the vehicle to service center and replace fore link assy, lh (1041570-00b). Original damage to part appeared to be a crack in the part with lower fore arm interface hole to the ball joint still round in shape. Picture attached show more damage due to moving the vehicle for towing and repair.
Tesla model s 2016, vehicle is making a grinding noise from the left side and that the wheel appears to be too close to the wheel well. A noise started 2-3 days ago when the we try to turn the steering wheel to take a sharp left or right turn. The front suspension link on the driver side wheel broke while parking the car. Got the car towed to tesla service and they fixed it 1 day later. Corrections: link - front suspension - lower - fore - lh replaced the left fore link to specification. Verified proper operation. Parts replaced by tesla - fore link assy, lh (1041570-00-b) 1washer, nordlock, 15.2x30.7x3.4 (1033093-00-a) 1nut hf m14x1.50 [10] znni nl insert (1004358-00-c) 1bolt h cam m14x2.00x114 [10.9]-g720 (2007108) 1washer cam m14x38x6x2.5 [10]-g720 (2007115) 1nut cln hex m14x2.0 [10] znal-w (1006484-00-a)1
Below is a copy of an email I sent to tesla on april 30,2018. I have yet to receive a response. Please contact me if you need more information. On january 23, 2018 I had an incident with my tesla where I hit a small pothole (11' wide by 18' long and 2' deep) at a moderate speed of about 40mph. (I have pictures of the road the pothole in question.) I lost some control of my car swerving into the oncoming lane from the impact, but managed to pull over about a couple of hundred yards after that with no further incident. I thought I had blown a tire since I have low profile tires on the larger rims only to find the tire was still inflated. However the wheel was off camber and I noticed that it had damaged some of the wheel well on further inspection.I eventually got everything fixed (about four weeks later) and the bill was $4200.00 which I paid. However, after much thought and consideration, I believe the control arm is of a faulty design and this should have been covered by tesla. In fact, I have a picture of the control arm while it was on the car and I am in possession of it and all the damaged parts. I do not believe that my tesla should have suffered so much damage for a relatively small pothole and believe the heavy lithium battery coupled with the improperly engineered control arm caused the problem. I also note mine is not the only complaint of this nature as I have seen other complaints in online blogs and feel that this may be a systemic problem with tesla's control arms. It is also important to note that I purchased the tesla for many reasons, but one of the main reasons was its safety record and ratings by the federal safety agency who I have copied on this email. After losing momentary control from hitting such a small pothole which put me into the oncoming lane, (I was lucky there was not oncoming traffic) I do not have the confidence in the car that I once did.
Here is a tesla that is in a junkyard in uk. Https://www.copart.co.uk/lot/23480858 the front rh suspension is smashed into pieces. The damage looks much more consistent with a mechanical failure than with being the result of a collision. The lower suspension ball joint stems have snapped. This failure has been reported on many other teslas. The cast aluminium steering knuckle has fractured which is indicative of a casting flaw. The wheel has been sliced apart almost certainly due to contact with a broken suspension part whilst the car was still driving down the road. These cars are arriving in the wrecking yards in huge numbers considering how relatively few teslas have been sold. It is very strange that so few owners make their own reports to the safety authorities. This is probably because so many owners are also tesla shareholders. Please investigate. Thank you. Genuinely concerned citizen.
Tesla in the junkyard: https://www.copart.com/lot/25226748/photos no crash, no impact damage, no airbags deployed. Just the usual wheel fallen off. Please investigate. Thank you. Persistent citizen
Here is yet another tesla just arrived in the junkyard: https://www.copart.com/lot/21757678/photos no air-bags have gone off. The front suspension has snapped off. Photographs show that the suspension links have snapped. This appears to be yet another case of self inflicted injury. Please please please investigate. Thank you. Perturbed citizen.
Please excuse me if I am boring you but here is yet another tesla in the junkyard and of course the suspension has fallen to bits. Https://www.copart.com/lot/48769717/photos obviously a single failure of a tesla suspension component could be the result of crash damage or simply a random failure but if you would take the time to look back at all of the complaints that have been filed against tesla it is clear that there is a disturbing trend of failure in these fragile alloy giblets. Please be so kind as to investigate so as to avoid further loss of life. Thank you. Concerned (and very persistent) citizen. Date of crash is an approximation.
Here is a tesla in a uk junkyard: http://www.hbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/zyview/d=vehicles/v=popwin/r=6955348/make_model=tesla%20model%20s%2075/zv_and_or=and/make_model_zv_enabled=no http://www.hbc.co.uk/auction-models/tesla/model/car%3a%3alight%20commercial.html front suspension has completely fallen to bits. This one is an absolute shocker. These cars are falling to bits all over the world. Please take immediate action. Thank you. Concerned citizen etc. Date of crash is an approximation.
Another tesla in the junkyard: https://www.copart.com/lot/24093828 same old thing. Suspension collollopsed. Front suspension snapped off like a sparrows leg. Please investigate. (sigh) peeved citizen. Etc. Etc.
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