Front left wheel - loud creaks?

A few days ago at ~26K miles (S85, standard suspension) and about 1K after my "annual" service I started hearing creaks coming from the front left wheel. At first I thought it was just bad pot holes but its also on normal bumps, turns etc. Its very noticeable and seems to be getting louder. Im going to call Tesla in the AM, but i'm sure it will be a while before I can get it in. Is it likely to be something just annoying or could it be possibly dangerous to drive?

People in cars passing me on highways can hear it. Very noticeable at lower speeds but not constant. Some kind of motion seems to need to happen it seems. Accelerating and decelerating sometimes does it. I looked under the car and in and around the wheel but didnt see anything obvious to my untrained eyes.

Cyclone said:

I can't recall a description quite like that, but there have been posts about a rock getting in between the brake pads and rotors. Could this be what you are hearing?

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The rock would be a constant grinding, this is more of a creaking. For instance if it was a rock a slow crawl on straight and level road would sound bad. It doesnt unless its also bumpy.

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Cyclone said:

Does it sound anything like this?
Sound of Rock stuck in brakes - YouTube

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No thats like a high pitched squeal. I'll try to record it tomorrow. Sounds more like gramma on the rocker...

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Xenoilphobe said:

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on second thought, i bet it is a rock in our brake rotor can you see scoring on the rotor?

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Nothing on the rotor

Here's an attempt to catch the sound:

I called Tesla service this am (4/7) the earliest appointment I could get is May 20, more than 6 weeks out...

They did say if I drove it to the service center they would have a tech listen to it on a test drive and let me know if its dangerous to drive or not.

I've never had a car where it wasn't possible to get service within the same week. I dont really want to drive a creaky car (sort of embarrassing also given what people know I paid for it) for 6 weeks.

I took it by the service center just so they could get a listen. They said it was a ball joint on the control arm. They're supposed to be good forever but it must have been made poorly. They moved up my date so its getting replaced next week.

FrozenCanuck said:

Hey tliving - I have this exact same sound going on in my car:
I used the iPhone voice notes recorder and put it in dropbox here:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1563938/Tesla1.m4a

Is the car safe to drive with this? I just noticed it today and emailed Tesla already. But lately it's taking 2-3 weeks to get a service appointment and I don't wanna drive an unsafe car.

How did things get resolved for you?

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Sounds just like what I had. If its the same its a bad ball joint. Originally they booked me far out (6 weeks), I went to the service center and took them for a ride and they moved it up 2 weeks. Its not really unsafe unless you let it go a long time but the noise gets progressively worse. 2-3 weeks should be fine. Over the 2 week wait it got quite a bit worse so expect that. You may be able to convince them to move it up if its very noticeable.

I should mention I put several thousand miles on (Boston to Philly a few times) it while waiting for my appointment. Many highway miles but some nasty backroads too.