I've searched a few times on the forum and I apologize if I just used the wrong key words, but I'm not finding much on this subject. I've been studying Model S issues for about 60 hours worth now in preparation of purchasing a late 2016 - early 2017 P100D. One issue that stands out was sudden battery failure (as opposed to degradation). One YT I watched (and failed to bookmark) indicated when this happens, it tends to happen early on (< 40K miles). If I remember correctly it stated after 80K miles there were only two instances of it happening.
Obviously, I'm concerned about doing all the due diligence for everything and finding a car that is well within a good degradation (say... <5%/100K miles) have it for a couple of months and it suddenly die and require a replacement battery. Can someone help clarify some things:
Obviously, I'm concerned about doing all the due diligence for everything and finding a car that is well within a good degradation (say... <5%/100K miles) have it for a couple of months and it suddenly die and require a replacement battery. Can someone help clarify some things:
- Are there some key words (like Tesla codes) or something that I can better search this forum for relevant information?
- Are there any symptoms before these failures that I might see while doing my car search? I've learned how to query the car's Service Mode.
- Has the forum's experience also concluded that this is an issue that happens early on and if beyond a certain mileage, it's unlikely to occur. IOW, this would drive my search to a higher mileage car.
- Is there a way to determine if a car has already had a replacement battery? Even if I have to get the car up on a lift? Can it be determined if it was a refurbished or new battery?
- What actually causes this type of failure (a single BMS, a single cell, a single module).
- I've watched several YT on the repair of a battery. What expectation is it that a single small piece that alone would only be $10, but because the labor is so huge to crack the battery open and find that broken piece, that is driving these $15K-20K replacements?