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Tesla To Voluntarily Recall Every Model S Because One Seat Belt Came Apart (jalopnik.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Earlier this month, a passenger in a Tesla Model S turned to talk to people in the back seat, and her seat belt somehow disconnected itself from the front seat. According to a Tesla spokesperson, "The seat belt is anchored to the outboard lap pretensioner through two anchor plates that are bolted together. The bolt that was supposed to tie the two anchors together wasn't properly assembled." Though the company hasn't been able to replicate the issue on any other cars, Tesla is issuing a recall for roughly 90,000 Model S vehicles so they can test that bolt.
Assuming it costs $20 to check each car (about a half hour of mechanic time) that's less than $2 million. They're getting a ton of good publicity, good will from their customers--we like to buy stuff from companies that don't want to kill us--and if one of these belts fails and leads to a death they could easily lose that much in just one lawsuit.
It's as if Musk is asking himself "How would GM handle this?", then doing the opposite.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
I think it's more that they can't afford to have something go wrong because they know the press will rip them apart. This will cause hundreds of shit journalists to delete the sensational clickbait articles they were working on, and gives huge cred. to their quality.
If a seatbelt in a Toyota comes apart, nobody gives a shit, and you couldn't pay a reporter to make a story about it. Is there some name for this type of "quality curse", similar to what Apple has?
Right now the auto industry is reeling from a serious of serious "we had a problem, but we didn't want to say anything" scandals, from the GM ignition switch to the VW super smoggers, and don't forget the shrapnel bags. The entire ecosystem is full of distrust, some of it fairly active distrust.
In this environment a one off assembly mistake where there was no accident, no damage of any kind, is a marketing opportunity you couldn't even buy in a normal market environment.
Musk already recalled all his cars once, to bolt extra belly armor on them because of an accident which would have been considered extreme in any vehicle, and in which his car came out smelling like a rose.
This recall is going to be a lot cheaper. No engineering, not even any replacement parts, but now Tesla is Even More Different(tm) because they recalled a potential problem immediately, before anybody even asked about it.
Based on Musk's previous behaviour I think he really cares that his products are perceived as the best. I am not making a character reference because I don't know the guy, but he obviously cares about at least the appearance of superlativeness.
The guy runs a marketing machine that reminds me of the late Mr. Jobs in his prime.
"Proximity to wonder has blunted our perception and appreciation of it" --Tim Hartnell in 'Exploring ARTIFICIAL INTELLI
This is a Good Company. I wish more of them did things like this!
They do. Once I took my car in for routine service at the dealership. On the bill it mentioned a complimentary inspection of my seat belt buckle per manufacturer recall XYZ. My car was "old", the warranty expired. I think over the decades I've seen stuff like that three times. Twice the inspections for defect or abnormal wear were negative. Once a part's lot number was such that the part was replaced for free.
On a fourth occasion I received a traditional recall, a letter in the mail saying bring the car in to have part ZYX replaced. The other three were silent recalls, surprises during routine service.
Well, Tesla is quite different - you can buy an annual $600/year service plan that covers everything except tires, and for a bit more, you can have it that Tesla will come to you to service it.
The thing is, an ICE takes a lot of maintenance - between stuff like engine oil and other fluids, there's a bit of tuning to keep things in shape. An EV is different - there's actually very little in the power train that requires regular servicing - so much so that users may go for years between tune-ups (Tesla recommends users come in at least once a year to get service and replace consumables like brakes). Most ICE service schedules range from every 3 months to every 6 months.
And yes, Tesla will probably come out ahead - I mean, look at the other recalls out there - between Toyota's sudden acceleration, GM's ignition switch and many others, either the company didn't act until forced to, or they still don't act, even when there are multiple deaths attributed to the flaw.
So they get a lot of PR over it - "we're recalling every Tesla S to make sure the seatbelts are bolted on correctly, even though there was only one failure and everyone lived, and the government isn't making us do it, but we will because it's the right thing to do."