Consumer Reports Withdraws Its Tesla Model S Recommendation (consumerreports.org)

An anonymous reader sends news that Consumer Reports, after earlier giving the Tesla Model S a perfect road test score, has now withdrawn its recommendation for the electric car after investigating its reliability. As part of our Annual Auto Reliability Survey, we received about 1,400 survey responses from Model S owners who chronicled an array of detailed and complicated maladies. From that data we forecast that owning that Tesla is likely to involve a worse-than-average overall problem rate. ... The main problem areas involved the drivetrain, power equipment, charging equipment, giant iPad-like center console, and body and sunroof squeaks, rattles, and leaks. ... Overall, squeaks and rattles appear to be the most prevalent complaint. But as one respondent commented, "The car is so very silent when driving that minor squeaks and rattles that you wouldn't be able to hear in a gasoline engine car become very annoying." The list of issues also includes more significant problems, which could be pricey to fix once out of warranty. Based on survey responses, Tesla has made a habit of replacing the car’s electric motors. The brake rotors tend to warp. And the door handles often fail to “present” themselves as drivers approach their cars.

Comments

My 93 Escort squeaks and rattles a lot

[93 Escort Wagon]

Hearing those noises is reassuring - it tells me the part making the noise hasn't fallen off yet.

The car is great to drive, but...

[Strudelkugel]

I always wondered how the door handles would work after an ice storm or freezing rain. I've dealt with my share of frozen car door locks, but at least I could get the handle to move. I think the touch screen console was a big mistake. You need to be able to manage things like climate settings, radio stations, etc. by touch. Forcing the drive to look at a screen for mundane things was a bad idea. I don't own a Tesla, partly because they are so new and I don't like the design elements I mentioned. But I have driven one. There are very few other cars that are as much fun to drive.

Re:The car is great to drive, but...

[Moridineas]

I think the touch screen console was a big mistake. You need to be able to manage things like climate settings, radio stations, etc. by touch.

Knobs and buttons in a car seem to be going the way of the dodo. It's a major pet-peeve for me--I can't stand the idiocy of car user interface design--they seem to be getting so much worse. Wife's Honda Odyssey has two screens (one touch, one not), and it's never clear which information will display where, the climate control is dreadful, tuning the radio is time consuming and attention-grabbing. It's just awful.

Nice car though.

Re:The car is great to drive, but...

[rmdingler]

Yes, and the inevitable learning curve every new technology encounters.

It takes a while to work out all the bugs during the incipient stage.

I just always figured the wealthy are covering the R & D expenses in exchange for the Look what I got! conversation starter;

so that, in the future, these become within the realm of affordable for us mere mortals.

Re:The car is great to drive, but...

[Rei]

That's pretty much what the article says - the summary only cited the bad:

The Tesla wasn’t the only high-performance vehicle that fell below average in reliability. Others include the BMW X5 and 5 Series, and the Chevrolet Corvette.

When automakers roll out new technology, be it infotainment, transmissions, or engine variations, it often has a deleterious effect on vehicle reliability. Tesla is not only the poster child for a new type of high-performance, high-mileage EV, but it also has been adding complex new variations as assembly-line updates, such as all-wheel drive this year. So it’s not surprising to see problems continue to crop up.

Despite the problems, our data show that Tesla owner satisfaction is still very high: Ninety-seven percent of owners said they would definitely buy their car again. It appears that Tesla has been responsive to replacing faulty motors, differentials, brakes, and infotainment systems, all with a minimum of fuss to owners.

And Tesla’s attention to customer service has been effective. Almost every survey respondent made note of Tesla’s rapid response and repair time, despite the lack of a traditional dealer service network. For its early adopters, Tesla has made a practice of overdelivering on service problems under the factory warranty, as noted by these owners:

“A minor amount of play developed in the differential gears. Tesla replaced the entire drive system. Remarkable service!”

And:

“Had a creaking ball joint in the driver[-side] front lower control arm. Tesla replaced it the following day after they were notified.”

Re:The car is great to drive, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

True, they will often look. The difference is the time needed to actually actuate the control. A quick glance is enough to get your finger on the right real button, because you can rely on touch to "zero in" on the control.

With a touch screen, you have to keep your eyes off the road a lot longer, because there is no point at which you can rely on touch alone.

Re:The car is great to drive, but...

[Solandri]

Knobs and buttons will always be best in cars for physically manipulated interface controls. The reason is pretty simple - cars move. When they move, they hit bumps that makes everything inside jiggle. Unless through a remarkable coincidence the mass, springiness, and dampening of your body, arm, and fingertip exactly matches that of the LCD display, this means your finger will move relative to the screen every time you hit a bump. This makes trying to precisely manipulate touchscreen controls in a moving car an exercise in frustration.

Knobs and buttons are not just decorative. They support your fingers as you wrap them around the controls, effectively "docking" your fingers to the control. When the Shuttle or Soyuz capsule reaches the International Space Station, do they just kinda press up against the ISS and open the hatch? No. They dock the two with clamps which hold them together, then open the hatch. That's an extreme example because lives are at stake, but the principle is the same. By docking your fingers to the knob or button, you prevent your fingers from slipping around the control with every little bump you hit - your wrist and arm absorbs the relative motion of your body with the car, while your fingers remain stationary relative to the controls. Thus allowing you to precisely manipulate the interface in a moving, jiggling, bouncing car.

Don't get me wrong, touchscreens have their place. They're especially good for arbitrary 2-dimensional inputs, like typing on a virtual keyboard or flinging a GPS map back and forth. But the designers who decided to make basic controls like the radio and climate control touchscreen-only were idiots too caught up in the hype over the latest trend to bother thinking about why traditional interface controls are built they way they are. They can be somewhat forgiven because they probably used their phone or tablet inside and car and thought it was great. But what they didn't realize was that when you use a touchscreen phone or tablet in a moving car, you're holding the device so it doesn't move relative to you. And so accurate touchscreen inputs are possible.

Re:The car is great to drive, but...

[rmdingler]

Like the light switch in the dark in the bathroom of a domicile of long habitation,

a radio knob can be located in the dark of night on an unfamiliar interstate, on virtual autopilot, drinking truck stop coffee while needing to pee.

Reminds me of a stand up joke:

[UnknowingFool]

Comedian: "So I just spent $200 to fix my muffler."
[Crowd cheers]
Comedian: "No, no. It's a bad thing. It was so loud that I couldn't hear all the other things that were wrong with my car."
"Now I'm going to have to spend $500 . . .
. . .
. . .
"for a better stereo system."

Says more about Consumer Reports than the car

[Anonymous Coward]

That a car can fall this far this fast with little or no structural or locomotional changes says more about the raters than the ratee.

I'm not surprised

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not surprised. NADA wrote about their experience driving one for a year, and they experienced a lot of problems over that time. Their problems, like what CR indicates, were with drivetrain and touch screens mostly. Frankly, I don't even find anything about this concerning except the drivetrain problems. The only electric I'd be interested in would be a low-mid end model, which likely wouldn't have as much extra stuff to break (touch screens, pop out handles, etc.). However, if they can't even keep the drivetrain from breaking, that doesn't bode well for the lower models.

I like Tesla, but I have a nagging feeling that what's going to happen is that one of these days Toyota or Honda or someone will start taking electric very seriously, and Tesla will be done. Toyota and others have experience and economies of scale that Tesla can't match.

I see through Tesla's scheme

[GoodNewsJimDotCom]

They aren't powered by electrity, but hampsters. Now hampsters normally are not enough to power a car, but put some snakes in with them, and they make orders of magnitude more energy trying to run away. This is the only possible reason you hear squeeks and rattles.