Tesla Suspension Breakage: It's Not The Crime, It's The Coverup (dailykanban.com)

schwit1 quotes a report from Daily Kanban: For several months now, reports have circulated in comment sections and forum threads about a possible defect in Tesla's vehicles that may cause suspension control arms to break. Many of those reports appeared to come from a single, highly-motivated and potentially unreliable source, a fact which led many to dismiss them as crankery. But as more reports of suspension failure in Teslas have come in, Daily Kanban has investigated the matter and can now report on this deeply troubling issue. Our investigation began in earnest upon reading a thread titled "Suspension Problem on Model S" in the Tesla Motors Club forum. The original poster (OP) in that thread described the suspension in his 2013 Model S (with 70,000 miles) failing at relatively low speed, saying the "left front hub assembly separated from the upper control arm." Images of the broken suspension components showed high levels of rust in the steel ball joint and the OP reported being told by Tesla service center employees that the "ball joint bolt was loose and caused the wear," which was "not normal." Because his Tesla was out of warranty, the repair was reportedly sent to Tesla management for consideration. According to a subsequent post by the OP, Tesla management refused to repair the broken suspension under warranty despite the "not normal" levels of wear reported by the service techs. Then, just days later, the OP reported that Tesla had offered to pay 50% of the $3,100 repair bill in exchange for his signature on a "Goodwill Agreement" which he subsequently posted here (a scan of the stock agreement can be found here). That agreement included the following passage:

"The Goodwill is being provided to you without any admission of liability or wrongdoing or acceptance of any facts by Tesla, and shall not be treated as or considered evidence of Tesla's liability with respect to any claim or incidents. You agree to keep confidential our provision of the Goodwill, the terms of this agreement and the incidents or claims leading or related to our provision of the Goodwill. In accepting the Goodwill, you hereby release and discharge Tesla and related persons or entities from any and all claims or damages arising out of or in any way connected with any claims or incidents leading or related to our provision of the Goodwill. You further agree that you will not commence, participate or voluntarily aid in any action at law or in equity or any legal proceeding against Tesla or related persons or entities based upon facts related to the claims or incidents leading to or related to this Goodwill." [Emphasis added]

This offer, to repair a defective part in exchange for a non-disclosure agreement, is unheard of in the auto industry. More troublingly, it represents a potential assault by Tesla Motors on the right of vehicle owners to report defects to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's complaint database, the auto safety regulators sole means of discovering defects independent of the automakers they regulate. Reuters also reports today that U.S. auto safety investigators are reviewing reports of suspension problems in Tesla Motors Inc's Model S cars.

Comments

Uh?

[Anonymous Coward]

This "deeply troubling" issue is what? A control arm issue?

1) I've had the control arms go out on cars, including an Audi A4. Is this some other kind of failure that is more hazardous?

2) At least on normal sedans this doesn't doesn't generally result in death or major injury the way a car fire may, gas tank explosion etc.

3) Where are the other reports from other users about this deeply troubling issue? They've got 100K+ cars on the road, and actually even though this random website is deeply troubled about this issue, these guys have one of the best safety records going.

4) Any chance this is an astro-turfing campaign or something - the write-up is insanely long.

Re:Uh?

[quantaman]

I was just reading a related article on Tesla and the underlying claim is it may be a symptom of a bigger problem.

The thrust of the argument is that cars in general are shockingly reliable, this isn't an easy thing to do which is why car companies have been working at it a very long time and still have trouble.

Tesla is very new to making cars and their cars haven't been around a long time. The chances are really good that their cars will have huge reliability problems as they age.

Re:Uh?

[Anonymous Coward]

They weren't gagging him. They offered him money for fixing the issue in return for not then turning around and suing / generating bad PR for the company. He wasn't forced to take the money, he could have quite easily ignored the offer which he did. No one is being silenced.

Re:Uh?

[thegarbz]

Is unheard of to gag someone in the industry because it's unheard of to offer out of warranty "good will" something which the car industry simply doesn't have. That's the only thing the gag order covers, and that is standard practice to stop word spreading and prevent vultures lining up.

Also it's not unheard of. I've seen several reports of lemons over the years where car companies have agreed to do something in exchange for silence. To claim this is a first is just stupid.

Re:Uh?

[Mashiki]

Ask yourself if you'd be saying the same thing in the case of the defective Takata airbag recall.

Look people

[rahvin112]

No legal agreement can override the law. You might be able to sign away your rights, but you can't sign away the governments or ones guaranteed by government. I do not believe any contract provision that bared you from participating with a government inquiry would be legal and depending on whether the terms are severable could invalidate the entire agreement.

This is why you can't sign a legal agreement to be someones slave. You can sign it, but it's not legal, it can't be enforced and any attempt to enforce it is likely to get someone in serious trouble. Just as in that case Tesla can't bar you from talking to NHTSA, the laws about vehicle safety would specifically preclude such a clause. Any attempt by Tesla to enforce such a clause would be dangerous beyond measure to the company. And as I mentioned previously the fact that such a clause exists could invalidate the rest of the agreement.

The person that posted that agreement should have a long and frank talk with a lawyer experienced in vehicle and NHSTA law.

Re:Look people

[Nethemas the Great]

Maybe I'm missing something in that agreement, but I don't see where there's a prohibition on talking to NHTSA or anyone else about the problem. The gag is on telling people that Tesla offer remedy out of warranty and that in accepting that "goodwill" they could neither join party nor testify in any legal action taken by other parties against Tesla related to this. Further, that in offering this "goodwill" they are not admitting fault, nor acknowledging any inherent defect.

Yes, its written in legalsleaze, but presumably they paid the lawyers to make sure being "nice" didn't have any blowback. The dealers of other car brands would simply tell you to "get bent," and make you pay for the out of warranty work since the factory won't compensate them. This is a benefit of NOT having independent dealers in the loop. It's a shame this legal CYB is being contorted to attack Tesla rather than acknowledging the unheard of in the industry kindness you'd never see elsewhere unless NHTSA forced them to fix.

Re:Warranty

[bloodhawk]

It matters because it appears to be a manufacturing defect. It wasn't noticed till after warranty expired but due to rust etc it was obviously not something that just happened. Refusing to fix out of warranty for such an issue is not unheard of and while an arsehole act could at least be justifiable under the warranty conditions, trying to cover it up though is most definitely NOT justifiable.

Nornal Maintance

[fred911]

So the guy had a ball-joint failure at 70,000 miles. Ball-joints are replaceable maintenance items on suspensions of most cars. Vehicles with loose ball-joints have noisy front ends, unusual tire wear and steering anomalies.

  The real question one has to ask is when was the last time you had your vehicle inspected and had normal maintenance performed on it?

  If recently, you need to be looking at your technician and thanking the manufacturer for the good will repair.

Re:Nornal Maintance

[drinkypoo]

Replacing a ball joint is just as much "normal maintenance" as replacing a CPU is normal maintenance.

70k is a little early, but it's not uncommon for ball joints to fail. Most older Audi A8s are on their second set of front suspension links.

Re:Nornal Maintance

[NormalVisual]

How about the fact that he has been driving it ignoring the "thunk Thunk" noises for 5,000-10,000 miles? If a ball joint is failing it thunks. They guy ignored it for months.

I'm wondering about this as well. Short of a truly random catastrophic failure, ball joints (and most suspension components in general) give plenty of warning when there are problems. I'm no Tesla fanboy by any means, but any marginally attentive driver should have noticed handling issues well in advance of the failure. Rusty ball joints would have been making all kinds of noise and grinding sensations long before then.

Propaganda wars

[axewolf]

Which rich asshole's agenda should I fall in line with?

Re: Warranty

[Type44Q]

I dig Musk and his companies but I do believe liability due to "defects in materials and workmanship" doesn't cease when the warranty does.