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Anyone else suffering with the mobile app?

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smac

Active Member
Aug 4, 2013
1,745
851
Nottinghamshire
#1
This the second day in a row now.

I try to switch on the heating (it was -3c here) and after multiple times of trying, and minutes of waiting on each attempt, the app pops up with: "Cannot connect to your vehicle" :(

I give up and go to the car, and manually switch it on, but as soon as I get out it switches back off :( Hmmm.... this pre-heat was supposed to be one of the major benefits of an electric car.

Previously at this point I would have used Trevor Stone's Chrome plugin. There's a big thread about this too, but it looks like Tesla have kyboshed (sp?) that... argh!!! :cursing:
 
#2
smac said:
This the second day in a row now.

I try to switch on the heating (it was -3c here) and after multiple times of trying, and minutes of waiting on each attempt, the app pops up with: "Cannot connect to your vehicle" :(

I give up and go to the car, and manually switch it on, but as soon as I get out it switches back off :( Hmmm.... this pre-heat was supposed to be one of the major benefits of an electric car.

Previously at this point I would have used Trevor Stone's Chrome plugin. There's a big thread about this too, but it looks like Tesla have kyboshed (sp?) that... argh!!! :cursing:
Click to expand...

Yes I've definitely had a few occasions where the app will not connect, for no good reason. But it's pretty rare.

If you want the car to stay "on" after you get out then you need to get in, press the brake to start it up, put it in N, and then manually engage the parking brake (there's an option in the menus somewhere).

But this is exactly equivalent to leaving the engine running in an ICE - it won't lock when you walk away, it won't switch off, and anyone can get in and drive it off if they want to, without the key.
 
#4
mgboyes said:
If you want the car to stay "on" after you get out then you need to get in, press the brake to start it up, put it in N, and then manually engage the parking brake (there's an option in the menus somewhere).

But this is exactly equivalent to leaving the engine running in an ICE - it won't lock when you walk away, it won't switch off, and anyone can get in and drive it off if they want to, without the key.
Click to expand...

You can also just get out, then stick your foot back in and tap the brake. This will power the car up and it will stay that way for 30 minutes. You can also lock the car with the keyfob, walk away, and it stays powered on. I've done this a number of times.


Edit: also to the original post, when its cold and I want to power on the heat without getting in the car or using the app, I just open one door and then partially close it (one click) and the climate control comes on and stays on for a little while. Not sure if it stays on 30 minutes, like fully powering on the car, but it stays on long enough to get some warmth in the cabin. This will prevent you from locking the car, however.
 
#5
Not locking the car isn't a problem I have a private "compound" away from the main road, so theft isn't an issue. In fact in weather like this we are used to leaving ICE's running to warm up.

MGBoyes, out of interest, does Visual Tesla still work for you ? I Think TM have been moving EU people onto different servers, and there's some suggestion this might be to blame.

I guess more frustrating is the car is on my home wifi which my phone is also connected to, and it still doesn't work. (I've also tried combo's of both phone on 3G/Wifi + the car on 3G/Wifi). So either app or Tesla servers.

Ultimately, whilst I am being picky, the real problem is I shouldn't need to go out to my car! Previously my routine was get up, switch on the car (normally on browser but then reluctantly phone), get in the shower, get dressed and drive off in a pre-warmed car...

The disruption to my routine leads me to think my neighbours will be placing a class action case against Tesla for "mental distress" caused by having to watch me walk around in my dressing gown :D
 
#6
Android Mobile App is working great for me .. just checked it now again and it connects no problems .. we did have a worldwide outage about 3 weeks ago for a day, but since then I've not had any problems .. Is your car in good 3G coverage when parked ? Do you have a Wifi connection for it ??

What do you set Controls > Displays > Energy Saving to ? I have mine set to Always Connected
 
#7
It's been flaky since NYE.

Car is connected to my Wifi, and also shows 2 bars of 3G. My energy saving settings are set to scheduled.

I generally leave for the office at 8:00 - 8:30, so you'd hope it had switched on by then. Friday it didn't work, Saturday it didn't work, today at 11:45am it didn't work :(

I might change the settings to "Always on" and see if it's more reliable. When I first got the car it was OK, then we had the vampire drain patch and it was flaky, then from v6.0 onwards using scheduled it has been fine until very recently.

Weird!

- - - Updated - - -

Thinking about this....

Does anyone know what the "schedule" is on the energy saving mode ? Is it trying to be clever and learn your patterns, because I noticed it going wrong after the holiday week of not using the car to my normal routine, and there isn't anywhere to set the schedule. hmmm...
 
#8
I've just been out in the car, so took the opportunity and changed it to always on (it was set to "nightly" not "scheduled" it was months ago, sorry for any confusion).

App seems to be behaving better now, might by co-inky-dink, but will give it a whirl and see how it compares tomorrow.
 
#10
TES-E said:
You didn't mention rebooting. That might be worth a try as well.
Click to expand...

There was a period of about a week last December when I could not connect with the car. The "waking car up" circle just kept spinning and transitioning to the "cannot connect" message. I reloaded the app and that did not help. Finally I decided to reboot the main screen. It has been working fine since then.
 
#11
VisibleTesla seems to be fine for me.

The incompatibility could be related to software version - there are two quite different versions of v6 around at the moment - 1.67.xx (the old track for the non-D cars) and 2.0.xx (the new track with stuff for D cars and autopilot).

Even those of us with non-D non-autopilot cars will eventually get upgraded to the 2.0.xx variant, which might have changed the API and therefore have impacted Visible Tesla.

I'm still on 1.67.23.

Definitely worth rebooting the centre console if you haven't tried it already.

I believe the "nightly" option for sleeping means something fixed like 22:00 - 06:00. I have mine set to nightly sleep. It always seems to connect fine, but on the rare occasions where I want to drive somewhere after 22:00 there is a noticeable but short delay before the screens come on (5s or so) when I get in.

Agreed on the other options of tapping the footbrake having already got out of the seat, or leaving a door ajar, both of which will run the car's systems for 30 minutes (and both of which will defeat walk away locking, but you can manually lock the car in the case of the footbrake).
 
#12
I'm on 2.0.77 (according to the about screen) which might explain it. There's definitely some quirks with it, like the 3 symbol when charging from 3 phase now appears shifted left and half under the regen/power bar.

I've disconnected the car from my WiFi, and changed the sleep setting to off, and now it all seems fine again.

It's good to know the foot brake tap trick, though I did prefer my old routine that didn't involve going outside :D
 
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