Adaptive Cruise Control breaks hard for no apparent reason. If there had been any cars trailing close behind I could easily be rear-ended. Happens at least once every time I turn on cruise control. On a recent longer highway trip of about 90 miles it happened three times. One time on that trip it happened while passing under a bridge, did it pick up the lower speed from the bridge above? The other times it seemed to happen for no reason. All these times our hearts dropped (2 passengers in car). Note that I do not have full self driving, so I’m talking about adaptive cruise control being the problem.
2021 Tesla Model Y driver assistance complaints
Page 21 of 22: complaints 581 to 610 of 630, newest first, as owners wrote them.
Every time I drive on a two lane undivided highway with traffic aware cruise control or AutoPilot engaged, the car will slam on its brakes when a large vehicle is passing in the oncoming lane, even if the passing vehicle is safely passing. Phantom braking with vision only.
While driving on a two lane highway at 70mph with adaptive cruise control on, every time a semi would approach the car, the car would brake really hard with no notice. Not one car caused this issue. It was only large semis trucks or trailers.
Car is frequently emergency braking when autopilot is enaged and large trucks or semi tractor trailers merge from the right. Car will also unnecessarily and prematurely emergency brake when cars are climbing a hill. The unexpected braking has nearly caused several accidents and we have discontinued use.
When placed in cruise control (which is called TACC: traffic aware cruise control), and driving on 2 lanes road, the car frequently (more than 10 times over 20 miles) slams on the brakes when incoming large vehicles on the other lane. This is generating dangerous situation with following cars being surprised for sudden (and unwarranted) braking occurs. I have a dash cam video of one such incidents
When driving with Cruise Control engaged, the car repeatedly brakes VERY HARD. Sometimes the braking is when there is a car in the opposing lane and is approaching but not over the line. Sometimes the sudden hard braking occurs for no apparent reason. But on a two lane highway this occurs VERY regularly. It occurs several times an hour. This is a serious problem because if there is a car behind me the sudden hard braking may cause that car to crash into me from behind. You can submit a bug report to Tesla by pushing the right hand steering wheel button, saying "Bug Report" and then describing the report verbally while driving. This will include all sorts of driving data being sent to Tesla. I have done this dozens and dozens of times. Each time I get a message on the screen thanking me for sending in the bug report. Never once have I ever heard back from Tesla other than the instantaneous message on the screen saying that the bug report has been submitted. I believe that Tesla has had a recall for a very similar problem with the Model S and Model X with Full Self Driving. This recall was fixed almost immediately with an over-the-air software update. However my problem does not relate to Full Self Driving (which my car does not have). This relates only to cruise control. I have spoken to several other Model 3 and Model Y owners who ALL report the exact same problem. A quick search online will reveal hundreds of other similar reports for Model 3 and Model Y owners who do NOT have Full Self Driving. I believe this is a very serious safety problem and needs to be addressed immediately. Regards, Ken Maples
Vehicle will brake hard when approaching oncoming large trucks. This may result in a rear end collision of the following vehicle and possible chain reaction incident. The vehicle has not been inspected and is two months old. This is an ongoing issue and common with this make and model.
On September 26, on our first long distance trip with our just delivered (9/17/2021) Tesla Model Y, during daylight nice weather driving with Adaptive Cruise Control switched “On”, on at least 6 occasions (strait roads, freeway and non-freeway driving), the car suddenly, without any reason, violently slammed on the brakes. These events are hair raising for me and passengers, let alone for a driver behind me. If he/she does not pay attention at that very moment, the result could even be disastrous. I would never have expected such a serious safety issue with a Tesla. Suffice to say that this is absolutely unacceptable to me. When checking out the web, many people reported similar issues with their Model Y vehicle. I had the car checked-out at the Tesla Lynnwood, WA, Service Center on September 30, 2021, and when picking-up the car I was informed that no anomalies had been found. At later dates, similar emergency braking occurred without any reason, while driving with Adaptive Cruise Control. Obviously, I do not trust this Cruise Control system one bit anymore, and no longer use it. I have written a letter to Tesla (11/12/2021) requesting a time frame when a solution can be expected, but so far, I have not received any word from them. I sincerely feel that Tesla should temporarily disable this Adaptive Cruise Control feature on ALL Model Y vehicles currently on the road and those still to be delivered (to unaware new owners), until this serious safety issue has been resolved.
When on Cruise Control or using Autopilot mode, there are frequent phantom breaking issues. On a long trip, we experienced phantom breaking consistently on the Highway both at night and during the day. These phantom breaking issues would sometime be significant and immediately drop speeds 10 miles an hour creating a danger of surprising people behind us. On a 2 lane country road, the issues are GREATLY compounded. The breaking would constantly trigger with oncoming traffic in the other lane and break VERY hard with the auto break alarm sounding. At night on a country road, it occurs with almost EVERY oncoming car. It is amazing to me that this made it through quality control because it is easily reproducible. The auto braking feature should just be turned off for country roads if this can't be fixed. At one point, I was right next to an older Model 3 on a mountain passing lane when an oncoming car was coming. The Model 3 was in the left lane closer to the 'danger' and my car phantom braked with the auto breaking alarm coming on and the model 3 just continued on, no issue. No idea if they were on cruise or auto pilot etc.
Driving I5N near Delmar with auto pilot in daylight, car suddenly braked while there was no obstacle, or any other car in front of it. Luckily no one rear-ended me. Max cruise speed was set to 75 MPH, and speed suddenly dropped below 45 MPH. The maximum cruise speed I set to also automatically changed to 45 MPH as well.
When driving on cruise control the car will suddenly and randomly decelerate and/or break for no reason. I have had this happen on empty two lane highways and on 4 lane highways with cars around me. It's incredibly stress full and if cars are following too close very dangerous.
Repeated automatic breaking in the assisted driving mode when the road is clear and there are no other drivers or obstacles. The other day my speed was dropped from 55 to 45 mph. It was fortunate no one was behind me.
I have been having inconsistent behavior from the autopilot system. The vehicle has hit the breaks hard when no obstacle was present. I have not had this problem verified by a dealer/service center. It happens seemingly randomly. There was no warning before the breaking started.
I have 13987 miles on the car. 2 times in 1 month on a 2 way highway that has lane markers on the left side of the road. While using cruise control once and the second time was in auto drive mode going about 60. Hard braking with no notice, good thing no one was right behind me. I took control with no issue but this is really a safety issue. I see others reporting it maybe cars coming toward you. But in one case I was alone no on coming cars. Like I said the road has safety markers that are about 3 ft high.
Driving across the country in Model Y. Passed semi in left lane, and when merging back into right hand lane vehicle applied full brakes dropping the vehicle speed from 80mph to 60mph, right in front of semi. I was forced to take over and accelerate to avoid serious rear end collision. It wasn’t just the one time, vehicle continued to perform aggressive braking actions many times. Autopilot was unusable for majority of trip. Tesla needs to make autopilot able to be disabled, and standard cruise control possible. Tesla vision is not safe, and is a major liability. It’s very clear Tesla vision is an attempt to remove radar to get around supply chain issues, at the cost of consumer safety.
The latest version of Autopilot has very serious phantom braking issues. It will brake hard frequently for no apparent reason. Other times it will slow down, but not braking hard, also for no apparent reason. It will also beep at me frequently when cars are approaching in the opposite lane, again for no apparent reason. In short, the latest version of AP is all but unusable and more importantly is not safe for us b/c of the phantom braking issue. Luckily no car has been close behind me when the hard braking has occurred but it certainly could be and could cause a serious accident.
Using basic Autopilot (adaptive cruise control without auto-steer), the car randomly slams on the brakes putting me at risk of being rear-ended by any vehicles following me.
Vehicle braked suddenly on the exit lane of a highway around noon time, when there was no car ahead of me. There was a large truck passing on the adjacent lane. My car gave a red color warning of imminent collision and braked hard. Fortunately, I avoided having an accident with cars following me by pressing on the gas peddle and moving ahead. Tesla service remotely reviewed and determined that at that time emergency brakes were applied because the car detected an object. Tesla said it could have been a reflection, the sun, or any number of things that could have triggered the false detection causing the vehicle to brake.
The contact owns a 2021 Tesla Model Y. The contact stated that while driving at 60 MPH, the lane assist feature operated independently as he attempted to merge into the right lane. Due to the failure, the vehicle pulled back into the left lane which caused the vehicle to spin in a circle and crash into a median. The air bags did not deploy upon impact. The contact was not injured as a result of the accident. A police report was not filed. The vehicle was initially towed to the dealer where he was informed that the vehicle would be towed to an independent body shop for repair. The vehicle had yet to be repaired. The failure mileage was 24,300.
This is our second Tesla, so I am familiar with the function of adaptive cruise control and autopilot. Vehicle frequently initiates hard braking events without warning or cause on the highway. I have contacted Tesla service, and they are stating that the car functions normally, and that this is normal behavior. If this is normal behavior, it is definitely unsafe. I have almost been rear ended several times.
Very often when "autopilot" or "traffic aware cruise control" are activated on two lane roads (county or state highways) and there is oncoming traffic the system will alarm and brake hard as though the car is about to have a head on collision. This is a safety hazard because if anyone is following me when this happens it would be very easy to get rear-ended. This problem has been happening since I purchased the car and has been reported to Tesla 4 times along with videos of the incidents and they refuse to fix it.
The car will hard brakes all the time on autopilot. I've had it occur going up slight hills, the sun being out, rounding bends, etc.
While using Tesla Autopilot, I’m receiving significant “phantom breaking” events where the vehicle, for no apparent reason, applies the breaks, quickly and unexpectedly decelerating at highway speeds.
I had 2 accidents both caused by the wheel forcefully turning and not letting me take over. First incident: On 8/31/21 I was driving on the right lane of the palisades pkwy S (NJ) the car was on “autopilot” my hands where on the steering wheel. It was raining, there was no car around me for at least a few hundred feet. Suddenly the “forward collision warning” started beeping, and I felt the steering wheel is forcing itself very sharply to the left, I tried turning back to the right, but I couldn’t. Fearing that the car will end up in the lane of the opposite traffic, I slammed the breaks. The car ended up doing a 180 hitting the dividing guardrail against oncoming traffic. The car was towed to a shop where it was until oct 18 when it was ready for pickup, damage costed about 15k to repair. There was no injuries, and no other car involved. Second incident: On oct 26 A week after I picked up the car from the repair shop, I was driving on the NJ Turnpike N on the left most lane. It was raining, and the car drove over a small puddle of water. Suddenly I felt the steering wheel turning very forcefully to the right. I tried pulling back to the left, but was unable. it felt as if the steering wheel was locked, causing the car to abruptly make a hairpin curve, bypassing the next lane, and hit a car two lanes over. From the impact the car was thrown back to the left, knocked into the highway divider, the car then spun and flew all the way to the other side of the highway. This time there was another car involved. I was in the car with my wife, both of us besides being all shaken up had no injuries, it is not known to me if there was any injuries to the other driver My car was a total loss. In both instances I felt the car taking over the steering wheel and not letting me take back control. The first incident was on autopilot, second time was not. I have dash-cam footage of both incidents (can’t upload it here, will provide upon request)
While driving using cruise control the vehicle will occasionally brake suddenly for unknown reasons. In one instance I was worried that the car following me would either hit my car or be forced to take other action possibly causing an accident. When I contacted Tesla regarding my concern they said something about the software program evolving…no fix available. The cruise control system is Dangerous. There is NO warning, you are traveling down the highway, all seems fine, and then for no apparent reason the car applies the brakes so hard that everyone in the vehicle is startled and vehicle behind you sounds their horn!
Our 2021 Model Y features the new vision based cruise control system, both traffic aware cruise control and autopilot utilize this camera only system. At the time of ordering we were under the impression we were getting a much safer and mature radar based system. Upon accepting delivery at the end of May we have accumulated 9,000 miles on the car and have a had horrible experiences with the traffic aware cruise control slamming on the brakes for no apparent reason with nothing ahead or passing cars. Behavior can be 5-10mph slowdowns or in some cases FULL brake pressure which puts us in danger of being rear ended. Multiple times we have been close to rear ended. In addition the system can also produce audible beeps when cars pass however no warning or message is displayed. I want to stress this behavior is a daily occurrence day or night. We have reached out to Tesla in order to get the vehicle looked at for repairs and have a been denied even a service appointment. The vehicle was declared fine hardware wise. I documented our experiences in just one evening of driving and put together this YouTube video showing the behavior. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20ETPyzjc_U As referenced in the video below Tesla explains the cruise control is BETA and to be ready to take over at any moment. I take great exception to the practice Tesla is utilizing of declaring previously standard features "BETA" and making customers deal with their poor results with no accountability. We don't accept BETA seatbelts or BETA tires. This feature was enabled by default on the car upon purchase and it objectively doesn't work safely. This compliant is really an act of desperation as we simply have no other avenue to express our frustration and safety concerns for a half baked feature.
The Vehicle was in FSD Beta mode and while taking a left turn the car went into the wrong lane and I was hit by another driver in the lane next to my lane. the car gave an alert 1/2 way through the turn so I tried to turn the wheel to avoid it from going into the wrong lane but the car by itself took control and forced itself into the incorrect lane creating an unsafe maneuver putting everyone involved at risk. car is severely damaged on the driver side.
The contact owns a 2021 Tesla Model Y. The contact stated while driving at various speeds, the vehicle would experience random braking without input from the driver. The contact stated no warning lights were illuminated. The vehicle was taken to a local dealer but was not diagnosed or repaired. The manufacturer was not informed of the failure. The failure mileage was 6,450
Sudden, hard self breaking when in autopilot mode. Danger of collision at high speeds.
While driving on well marked highways, the adaptive cruise control would initiate rapid and unsafe braking while using the vehicles “AutoPilot”. The braking is equivalent to a user putting full pressure on a brake pedal, losing 10-20mph by the time I am able to intervene, even if I’m ready to take over. Such rapid deceleration leaves me vulnerable to a rear collision from following drivers There is no warning, and no alarms from the vehicle. The manufacturer has no specific response, other than advising a system reset. The system reset does not solve the problem.
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