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

Posted by BeauHD on from the safety-investigators dept.

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.

17 of 271 comments (clear)

  1. Uh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:Uh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

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

      No! Many cars have mechanical faults. The deeply troubling issue is the use of gag restrictions. This is something new to the automobile industry, the creeping-in of the kind of software-industry agreements we have seen from Microsoft and others.

    2. Re:Uh? by quantaman · · Score: 4, Insightful

      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.

      --
      I stole this Sig
    3. Re:Uh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      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.

    4. Re:Uh? by thegarbz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      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.

  2. Look people by rahvin112 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:Look people by rahvin112 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I should have Googled before posting. It seems NHTSA has already been to visit Tesla and remind that that such clauses that say you can't talk to NHTSA are not legal and if they don't remove them immediately Tesla is going to get a rectal exam from NHTSA.

      http://www.usatoday.com/story/...

      You might laugh, but that clause is what got NHTSA involved, a joint falling apart in a single car is not cause for them to get involved but that clause drew their involvement and it's going to result in a full investigation of this issue. It would have taken dozens of people having the same issue and some of them getting hurt of this type of issue to normally get in front of NHTSA but Tesla's illegal agreement put them right at the front of the pack. This will hurt Tesla, and their own lawyers did it to them.

    2. Re:Look people by Nethemas+the+Great · · Score: 4, Insightful

      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.

      --
      Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once ... with negative results.
    3. Re:Look people by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      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_.

      Which would include the part failure...and includes everyone...

  3. Re:Warranty by bloodhawk · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.

  4. substandard parts by siamesevodka · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The ball joints were probably sourced from china. I have collector cars and this has been going on in this area as well. If Tesla would use Moog ball joints instead of lowest bidder they might have better results. That is what we found to cure early failure. Ball joints should last 100,000 miles easily if they are quality and your not hitting every pot hole in town every day. Recent conversion to the chinese market for this item has magnified issues of ball joints not lasting as long. I have been told by the local big box appliance store not to expect anymore than 8 years out of any major appliance you buy. That way we can squeeze more buying into your life span. After all we are the carcass everybody else feeds on. On any major purchase source the forum for that particular item.It might cut down on the jackals feeding on your money for a few years. It will alert you to the issues with that particular item.

  5. Re: Warranty by Type44Q · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.

  6. Re:Warranty by sunking2 · · Score: 4, Informative

    The point is it appears Tesla was trying to hush this guy so that there was no inquiry that may cause a recall. That's the real story.

  7. Tesla responded to this issue in a blog post by whh3 · · Score: 5, Informative

    They just responded to this issue on their blog:

    https://www.teslamotors.com/blog/grain-of-salt

    Interesting how they call out the author for his previous "death watch" on the company.

    As usual, there are three sides to every story: yours, mine and the truth.

    Will

    --
    remove nospam. to email!
  8. Re:Lemons by vtcodger · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Yeah, I'm mildly surprised. Tesla doesn't MAKE ball joints. It BUYS them from someone and they probably are not custom engineered for the unique needs of Tesla's vehicle. Tesla does design the suspension, but this sounds like a defective part rather than an overstressed part. Overall, Ball joint failure in modern cars is uncommon. Which is a very good thing as it often causes complete steering failure and can kill you if the ball joint fails at speed or at the wrong time and place.

    BTW, I'm not a big fan of Tesla or Elon Musk. I think electric cars (as opposed to hybrids) are a poor choice for cold climates or long distance driving, and I think Musk is a con artist who will tell us anything he thinks we're dumb enough to believe if it is to his advantage. But his companies do seem to do decent engineering.

    As for the agreement. The no admission of fault part seems reasonable. The confidentiality clause seems to me to be unconscionable and if this crap is enforcable, laws need to be changed to make it unenforcable.

    --
    You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
  9. Re:Because internet unicorns. by michelcolman · · Score: 5, Informative

    Tesla has a slightly different take on this story which is worth reading. I\m not saying they are necessarily right and the customer is necessarily wrong, just that it could be useful to hear both sides of the story:

    - They haven't seen this problem on any other cars (and they would know as they own all service centers).
    - The car in question experienced a very unusual use case, it was regularly used on a long dirt road and was caked in dirt (it took two tow trucks to retrieve it, one to get it to the highway and another to get it to the service center)
    - The NHTSA has not actually opened even a preliminary evaluation
    - Their document would not prevent the customer from talking to the NHTSA.
    - Tesla regularly meets with the NHTSA and has often issued recalls for defects before they ever became anything close to an actual safety issue
    - The blogger who fabricated this issue (sic) is the same person who previously wrote a blog titled "Tesla Death Watch", starting on May 19 2008.

    (Those are just a few highlights, read the to make up your own mind)

  10. Tesla has issued a statement by b0bby · · Score: 4, Informative

    I noticed this article this morning:
    http://www.cnbc.com/2016/06/10...

    Seems Tesla disagrees with the Daily Kanban's report:

    "With respect to the car that is discussed in the blog post that led to yesterday's newsthe suspension ball joint experienced very abnormal rust. We haven't seen this on any other car, suggesting a very unusual use case. The car had over 70,000 miles on it and its owner lives down such a long dirt road that it required two tow trucks to retrieve the car. (One to get the car to the highway and one to get it from the highway to the service center.) When we got the car, it was caked in dirt."

    Secondly, Tesla said that the NHTSA had not opened any investigation and hadn't even started a so-called "preliminary evaluation", which is the "lowest form of formal investigatory work it does". The car maker said on April 20 the regulator asked about its suspension as part of a "routine screening" and on April 30, Tesla complied.

    "NHTSA has since told us that we have cooperated fully and that no further information is needed. Neither before nor after this information was provided has NHTSA identified any safety issue with Tesla's suspensions. This can be confirmed with NHTSA," Tesla said.