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Warranty Maintainence

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My Roadster's within a few hundred miles of going out of warranty, so I took it in for its 36K maintainence.

Since the warranty was almost done, my local Ranger decided to go above and beyond and look for any possible problems with the car. In addition to more normal things, he found a tiny crack in a weld in the subframe:

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He told me that if the crack got bigger and the weld broke that the car would start making a clicking noise. While he could have done nothing or just redone the weld, Tesla's policy is to replace stuff if it's at all wrong. So, he decided to replace the entire subframe assembly. This requires removing the entire back half of the car. He sent me some pictures of it. In case you ever wondered what half a Roadster looks like (without the benefit of a horrible crash), wonder no more:

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And remember, this happened just before the warranty expired, so Tesla covered the entire expense, while they could have waited for me to notice the problem and then charged me for it.

You've really got to apprecieate Tesla (and the Seattle service guys), it's hard to imagine getting this kind of service from any other car company.
 
That is fantastic! Thanks for sharing this. In the long term this kind of care just can't be cost effective (without killing TeslaMotors), so enjoy it while it lasts!

Wait a minute... isn't that a clicking noise I hear in mine now? Damn! ;)
 
When the weather is cold, I get a strange metallic "chirp" sound coming from somewhere around the passenger door whenever I go over a bump. It's louder when it's cold and pretty much absent in hot weather. I wonder if it's possibly an issue with the frame?
 
I read about a CD you could buy that had all the weird mechanical noises that an airplane makes in normal operation, along with commentary from a senior mechanic explaining what they were. Target audience are people like my wife, who assumes any noise is a sign of imminent catastrophe. (What is that sound that often happens just after the plane as pulled up to the gate, which sounds like someone taking a hacksaw to the landing gear? Some leveling device?)
 
I read about a CD you could buy that had all the weird mechanical noises that an airplane makes in normal operation, along with commentary from a senior mechanic explaining what they were. Target audience are people like my wife, who assumes any noise is a sign of imminent catastrophe. (What is that sound that often happens just after the plane as pulled up to the gate, which sounds like someone taking a hacksaw to the landing gear? Some leveling device?)
Airbus PTU (power transfer unit) noise. The aircraft has left and right hydraulic systems that are redundant and there are pumps that move pressure back and forth. At startup and shutdown the PTU makes all kinds of racket - typically because operators tend to leave one engine powered down to save fuel so the PTU is having to transfer hydraulic pressure from the "hot" side to the "cold" side.