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My 2 day old P85D suddenly died in the middle of an intersection

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Well ... my short range brand new P85D with 191km (120mi) died suddenly in the middle of an intersection (completely stopped moving) on -12C weather. Even the heater stopped working. My 10 year old son and I had to get out and push it to the side. Called my DS who called roadside assistance who put him on hold for 30 minutes and then told me that it will be an hour before a tow truck arrives. My son and I were freezing with no heater so I made my 80 year old dad come and pick us up. Needless to say ... I am NOT impressed. I knew I was buy bleeding edge but a COMPLETE breakdown 2 days and 140km after leaving the showroom? Really?

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Uh oh, sorry to hear that. Keep us posted. Wondering if this is just one of the usual culprits that have plagued Model S for the last 3 years, or something new and specific to the P85D. Guessing the former, but still not an excuse for Tesla.
 
Another 12v failure. Tesla really need to have some better way of checking these before delivery.

Then again, my wife's brand new Passat had it's 12v die the day after we bought it in the middle of the freeway, so maybe there's something tricky in checking a 12v?
 
Sounds similar to that guy in San Francisco who had his P85D die after only a day or two after delivery. What ever happened to him?


Does not sound similar to me. The other guy had an issue with his front motor, and was able to continue driving with the rear motor only. Later on, after he was home, the car was unable to start, but that was of course much easier for him to deal with as it was mostly a problem for the tow truck driver.

Much worse to die in the middle of an intersection.

I agree with others that it sounds like this was probably just a failed 12V battery, though.

Not trivializing the situation, it is a terrible experience -- but likely caused by a small simple failure.
 
It seems likely the -12 C weather you had at the time was a factor for both the 12V battery and the main battery pack. The dotted limit line in the regen region of the speedometer suggests that the main pack was quite cold. Normally you might see that limit only when the battery is nearly full, not near 50%. Had you been driving the car long enough to warm up before it failed? I realize that this temperature is not unusual for your region this time of year, and that the Tesla is supposed to be able to handle it, but you may need to take some precautions. Was the car plugged in the night before ?
 
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Finally got the car towed. By the time the truck showed up the car was COMPLETELY dead. No screens no nothing. We had to take the nose cone off and jump the 12V battery. The displays came up but the car would not shift out of park. Then we managed to release the brake by selecting "TOW MODE" from one of the menus. Once we took the jumpers off the car died again immediately.

How can the 12V battery die so suddenly. No warning whatsoever. One minute you are driving normally and the next minute BOOM you're dead in the middle of an intersection.


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I hate that our cars are so dependent on the 12V battery. I realize ICE cars are dependent on them too, but only to start the cars, not to operate them.

Tesla should make their own 12V so they can control the quality. I hear about 12V lead acid quality problems too often.
 
Finally got the car towed. By the time the truck showed up the car was COMPLETELY dead. No screens no nothing. We had to take the nose cone off and jump the 12V battery. The displays came up but the car would not shift out of park. Then we managed to release the brake by selecting "TOW MODE" from one of the menus. Once we took the jumpers off the car died again immediately.

How can the 12V battery die so suddenly. No warning whatsoever. One minute you are driving normally and the next minute BOOM you're dead in the middle of an intersection.


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Osama, sorry to hear about this, glad you and your son were ultimately OK.
FWIW My Sig died on the highway 2 months after I got it so I was one of the first to get a drive train replaced.
Still hasn't soured me on the car or Tesla. You may want to correspond with Eli the service manager. He has been there since day one and will get to the bottom of it for you. Great guy.
Good luck.
 
In fairness to Tesla, I have had 12V batteries in ICE cars fail suddenly and without warning. I normally put my ICE cars on a trickle charger once a month or so to get them topped up (which is good for AGM and Lead Acid batteries), and I've had it happen twice in the last two years that an AGM battery was fine one day, and totally dead the next, putting me in a bad position to get to an important appointment (in one case, I almost missed a Cruise ship!)

This was in Florida, where freezing temps were not even an issue.

The one nice benefit to ICE cars is that once they are started, generally speaking you can even unplug the 12V battery and the car will keep running -- that does not seem to be the case on Tesla.
 
Osama, sorry to hear about this, glad you and your son were ultimately OK.
FWIW My Sig died on the highway 2 months after I got it so I was one of the first to get a drive train replaced.
Still hasn't soured me on the car or Tesla. You may want to correspond with Eli the service manager. He has been there since day one and will get to the bottom of it for you. Great guy.
Good luck.


Eli has already called me. He was instrumental in guiding the tow truck driver and I to get the car into neutral. It wasn't trivial to figure it out. Tesla has also delivered a loaner to my house.

This was my wife's car that broke down. I just happened to be driving it to pick up our son from swimming because my P85D was charging. I am just REALLY glad that it happened to me and not her. She was extremely skeptical about buying a Tesla and I twisted her arm. If she was driving the car when this happened, I can guarantee you we would have one less Tesla in the house tomorrow morning.

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It seems likely the -12 C weather you had at the time was a factor for both the 12V battery and the main battery pack. The dotted limit line in the regen region of the speedometer suggests that the main pack was quite cold. Normally you might see that limit only when the battery is nearly full, not near 50%. Had you been driving the car long enough to warm up before it failed? I realize that this temperature is not unusual for your region this time of year, and that the Tesla is supposed to be able to handle it, but you may need to take some precautions. Was the car plugged in the night before ?

The car was parked outside on the driveway for no more than an hour. My wife dropped of our son for his swim team practice and come home and left the car outside. An hour later, I took her car (mine was charging in the garage) and picked up our son and half way home the car broke down. Total time from leaving the house to pick up my son and back is approx. 25 minutes. Interior was warm.

The car was charged to 90% this morning before my wife took the kids to school.

What precautions should I take???

We are still in the mild part of winter here. What is going to happen when we get -22C early tomorrow morning?

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I hope they figure out how to make 12 V batteries work before the model X comes out. Wife will kill me if this kind of nonsense happens to her.

Its funny now that all of the inner pieces of my car have been replaced (drivetrain, both batteries, even steering column) it is super reliable. At least it's an easy car to rebuild!
 
Had you just made a hard acceleration? Any unusual noises? Who's picking the music?
It's not so much the 12V that can be the problem, but things like the contactor and DC-DC converter--the 12V quickly fades when it's no longer fed energy.

Hard acceleration no ... more like spirited acceleration. May be 50% of the pedal travel. The car was in sport mode.
Yes. I heard a clunk that seemed to come from the front somewhere immediately before the car died.
The music is Slacker "Today's hits". I guess my wife picked when she last drove the car.

Any thoughts on what happened?
 
Hard acceleration no ... more like spirited acceleration. May be 50% of the pedal travel. The car was in sport mode.
Yes. I heard a clunk that seemed to come from the front somewhere immediately before the car died.
The music is Slacker "Today's hits". I guess my wife picked when she last drove the car.

Any thoughts on what happened?

My guess would be that the contactor in the traction battery failed. This has been a weak point and it usually happens under sudden higher current application.