Front Collision TESLA P85. Repair and Troubleshooting Help Needed.

[Gizmotoy]

The system needs to be bled. You may need access to the service menu in the car and as far as I know only Tesla SC's can do that.

Unfortunately, bleeding the coolant system is indeed one of the items in the service menu. From what I recall of previous discussions, the car itself is capable of doing this without any additional tools (beyond the coolant you'd be adding to the reservoir, obviously) by cycling the pumps, but to actually initiate the process you need the display's service menu.

You may be stuck without Tesla . Even if you drain the coolant and manually refill ensuring no air gaps, it might now be impossible to clear that error message. Uncharted territory, I think.

 

[green1]

if it's just a matter of running the pumps, you could probably find the pumps and apply 12v to them instead of opening the door repeatedly to try to force it.

However as others have said, I would not be at all surprised if you can not clear the final "service required" error without Tesla's blessing. (though we're all eagerly awaiting your results, as your success bodes extremely well for everyone who wants to be able to work on the vehicles they have bought and paid for.

 

[Otmar]

I am not aware of any sensors, other than temperature, that would detect air pockets in the system. It seems unlikely to me that air pockets would cause the system to throw such an error. It does make me wonder though, is there any chance of coolant leaking internally in any of the systems? I'm assuming that no coolant was leaking out under the car. If your battery (or any other water cooled electronics) was leaking coolant internally I would expect the car to disable any driving and post an error like the one you describe.
In general, my experience is that once you repair problems on the Tesla the errors stop being displayed though they are logged for future reference. My only exception so far is the air bag controller (Delco I believe) that still lights the small red air bag light despite the parts being replaced.

 

[jaguar36]

Have you tried finding someone in MA to get you access to the service manuals? Per the MA laws there has got to be a way for interdependent shops to do a coolant flush.

 

[Yauheni]

Im not sure is the coolant system on the battery is open all the times, I assume that there is some kind of valve that opens when the pumps start running. Im not sure if its true thou. Anyways, from what I noticed before, any codes that i had before disappeared except the little Red Light for the SRS System. I have speed sensor not connected and I had ABS, Brake Light, and some other error message; its all gone after I connected the sensor. I have not noticed any outside leaks, so I hope that i dont have any internal leaks or broken parts.

Another thing that just came up to me, I had temperature sensor connected before and I remember seeing the outside temperature on my screen, however this saturday the temperature was not displayed on the screen. However, the car mover in the morning before the pumps started running. I have to investigate it.

I will try to buy this Radiator Vacuum Refill Kit, if my First Procedure doesnt help me (try to run pumps a few times when the car wakes up).

 

[spaceballs]

I am not aware of any sensors, other than temperature, that would detect air pockets in the system. ....

Roadster coolant pump has a current sensor somewhere on it or inline, as it will trigger if there is no coolant present at the pump. Maybe same style of pump present in the MS?

 

[Otmar]

Roadster coolant pump has a current sensor somewhere on it or inline, as it will trigger if there is no coolant present at the pump. Maybe same style of pump present in the MS?

That's certainly possible. Aside from power and ground connections the pumps seem to have a PWM input for speed and a status output. Maybe they are faulting when they have too little load?

 

[skilly]

Sure they can. Just like you don't OWN your copy of Windows (you just have a license to use it), I'm pretty sure that if push comes to shove, Tesla could say that they are denying you the license to use their software, meaning the car is disabled. Since everything is driven by software, and not enough people (besides us techies) care to fight this, we are going to be at the manufacturer's mercy (for the time being).

Check out this Wired.com article about software licenses, and this article about John Deere trying to pull a fast one on its customers. I'm only mentioning this so people are aware of this risk before considering buying a salvage vehicle.

A software EULA is hardly a comparison to owning and purchasing an automobile. In fact, with perpetual use of software, unless it is expressly written in the EULA, they could only ever deny the support AND that in itself would have had to be contracted as such and would be subject to termination clauses etc. In your scenario, usage rights would have to be contemplated and contracted separately from a car contract...pretty sure that didnt happen nor was it implied in the details of the sale. On the contrary, I would say that TM may be forced to provide updates because, as the one of the other posts noted, there is nothing expressly written in the terms of receiving updates that limit them through an accident or vehicle salvage.

And, in stating the obvious, today EVERY car at the dealer has software running it...its just not as pervasive as the TM product and the updates are typically downloaded at the dealership for a fee or part of a warranty claim/update/recall. As far as rendering a car unusable after an accident, that isn't done at the sole discretion of the manufacturer. Talk about avoiding bad press - imagine "Tesla Builds Cars that Cannot Be Salvaged" as a headline with contents like "rendering the car useless"...they would struggle a lot more with that to deal with.

 

[mwulff]

I would not apply a forced vacuum to the system without more details about its construction. I think the smart choice here is to let Tesla have a look.

 

[Yauheni]

I just want to inform that today after i connected my 12v battery all old messaged disappeared. So the car started and moved. The message - unable to drive, disappeared. Car is back on. My coolant level dropped a little more, so i refilled it again. For some reason my outside temperature sensor is not reading the temperature.

I got my 100amp breaker, so will be installing my Wall Charger soon.

Thats about it for today.

 

[BoldSharpe]

It seems like you're getting very close! Please let us know how you end up bleeding the coolant system. I don't necessarily disagree with the others when they say you should just bring it to the SC at this point but there's certainly a part of me that wants you to complete the repair with zero help from the SC. :smile: Once you get past the error messages and the car is driveable, paying $600 for the annual service seems like a no-brainer to ensure everything is completely up to snuff.

Out of curiosity, how much do you have invested at this point?

 

[Yauheni]

I will keep you informed about how the project goes. I am a young guy, and very risky i would say. I had no idea how im going to repair the car. Many people told me that im stupid and crazy, but its my life, so I have a choice try it or not. Im soo glad I made it up to the point that car runs and drives ( on my parking lot) lol. I have a lot of positive attitude to achieve something that close to impossible. That was one of my projects that keep me happy making something on my spare time.

I would love to go the SC, however as far as I understand they wouldnt service my car because it has salvage title, or am I wrong ??? I would love to give them the car to check my error message and clear all that make sure car is up and running with 100% functionality of all its options. I contacted one guy who works in the SC, and he told me that Tesla will check EVERYTHING on the car, before the will "Bless YOU" after the car was salvaged. Even thou my repairs were done very good, car is in amazing shape aver all, the repairs were not done at TESLA SC, so im kind of skeptic yet on bringing my car to SC. Not sure what they are going to say and do. Any advice???

So far, the project cost is around $45k already. Not counting my time and effort thou

 

[BoldSharpe]

After reading about some other people's experiences with salvage titles, Tesla is going to have to inspect and sign-off on the car if you want 3G, SuperCharger access, and the Tesla app to work. If the car doesn't meet their specifications, this opens the door for Tesla to turn off the car completely so this certainly poses some risk.

A call to your local SC might be a logical next step to see how they recommend you move forward but proceed with caution.

 

[qwk]

If I were you, I wouldn't take it to an SC, nothing good will come of it.

 

[jaguar36]

If the car doesn't meet their specifications, this opens the door for Tesla to turn off the car completely so this certainly poses some risk.

Is there a report of this actually happening against the owners wishes? I don't think they could legally disable a car without the owners permission. Refusing to service it is one thing, but Tesla doesn't own the car.

 

[BoldSharpe]

Is there a report of this actually happening against the owners wishes? I don't think they could legally disable a car without the owners permission. Refusing to service it is one thing, but Tesla doesn't own the car.

I'm in complete agreement with you but check out post #103 by CJS2 in this thread. Subsequent posts add a little more detail but there is not a resolution posted, unfortunately.

 

[jaguar36]

It sounds like they didn't just remotely brick CJS2's salvage car or anything. However as a condition of doing the inspection they did requrie him to give them permission to kill the car if they felt it was warranted. Without that they wouldn't let the car supercharge, or use 3G, which does make sense.

I certainly think that Tesla has to do a better job dealing with salvage cars, as it will start to effect insurance rates.

 

[Yauheni]

I agree with jaguar36, insurance rates are pretty high and will go higher if in many cases insurance company will have to write off the car even for the small damage as it seen pretty often right now.

This weekend I received another shipment for some little parts that I was missing. I also got a new 12V battery (RED). I heard that the old battery was discharging fast or what was deal???? When I charged my original 12V battery and connected it to the car, it discharges pretty fast, i don't know why ? Maybe its because its not charging from the big battery pack like it should, or maybe i have had a bad battery. Not sure yet. Im about to put back headlights and all other parts, so maybe after all this is back on the car and connected the battery will be getting charge from the big battery pack as scheduled.

Also, one of the Tesla guys told me, that in order to get to Tesla Diagnostic mode, the Tech should connect his laptop to the car and request the code from Tesla, only then he gets a code to access the Diagnostic Mode.

Best Regards

 

[Yauheni]

Yesterday i connected the brand new 12v battery which i was fully charged ( i was told by the tesla service that its fully charged) But i put it in the car i couldnt start the car and i had to jump start it in order to be able to drive it. It seems like my 12V batteries discharges very quick. When i had an old one i thought it because its faulty battery but now, with the new 12v battery why it doesnt want to drive until its jump started from my truck? I left the 12v battery connected to terminals overnight , so i little later i want to check if it got charged up from big battery pack or got fully discharged.

Any advice???

 

[wk057]

Sounds like your DC-DC converter may have some issues, since it should be maintaining the 12V battery.