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4 year MOT - Fail!

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Both front lower control arms on the Model 3/Y are prone to the rubber bushes tearing or delaminating. There's a lot of force going through these bushes and the range of movement they have to deal with is part of the issue. If you only use your car in town or on good quality roads, or you drive like Miss Daisy, they'll last for years but for a lot of us these arms are going to need replacement every few years unless you upgrade them to something like Powerflex poly versions. Even going to metal spherical replacements isn't going to sort it forever as they wear out too.

My advice is if you are coming out of warranty soon, get all the suspension arms and knuckles examined as some may already be torn or worn enough to need replacement. If you're out of warranty, there are lots of choices in the aftermarket now, but I'd avoid anything that looks too good to be true price-wise and anything from no-name Chinese factories. Cleevely supply good quality OE-spec. arms made in Denmark, which are a very fair price.

Replacing any of these front arms does not mean you'll have to pay for a 4 wheel alignment. At the very most, you may have to have the front tweaked, but you shouldn't be paying for a 4 wheel alignment anywhere. Take it to a decent indy who should charge you a small amount to check and then price accordingly depending on the actual work carried out.
In any case, you can do the service test yourself for nothing to see if any alignment is required. It's called the EPAS test and is in the hidden service menu.

As costs are being discussed a lot in this thread, here are the Tesla Model 3 parts costs as of a couple of weeks ago:
All prices ex-VAT
Front Upper control arm (new version to fix the ball joint issue) £65.63 each side
Front lower compliance link £135.63 each side
Front lower lateral link £188.43 each side

Model 3 Performance brake parts:
Front discs £125
Rear discs £95.98
Front pads (axle set) £166
Rear pads (axle set) £310

You can't get front M3P discs from anywhere other than Tesla currently. It's a bit easier for the M3LR, MY and MS/X as the calipers are used on other makes/models. Beware of typos on many motor factor websites. There are a lot of websites claiming to offer M3P front discs, when they are actually M3P rears or M3LR/SR discs. Same with pads. Even the likes of Brembo, who make them, have typos on their website!

But, as pointed out to me by M00cow, Cleevely do offer M3P pattern pads and rear discs and everything for the other models and you can save a lot of money if you go with those parts.

The work involved to change anything to do with the brakes or suspension arms is not at all difficult. If you have done car maintenance before you could do this. Any garage worthy of your business can do this sort of work. No special tools, diagnostics or ADAS calibrations required other than what you could do using the service tools built in to the car's software.

Hopefully that answers some questions but ask away if you have any more!
Cleevley apparently don't do pattern rear discs at the moment.
Just been quoted £110 + VAT each for OEM Tesla rear discs. It seems they have had a price increase.........or...........
 
Looks like an apology is in order. I wasn't aware Cleevely were offering those pads, but I am now!
Another learning day and I'll amend my previous posts to withdraw my disparaging remarks!
Sorry :rolleyes:

No worries at all - I hadn't seen them that cheap before either when I last looked mate. To be fair, it was a year ago I last looked prices on common DIY fit parts when I was working out if I could afford the P model 3 - and then found out that they are so infrequently replaced that it was not worth worrying about :D

Apologies on my part too - when I said for all 4, it was because not everyone knows that they are sold as axel sets with pads so thought I would clarify that it wasn't per pad so to speak. Ask my dad, the last time I helped him do brakes on his van he bought 4 COMPLETE sets from Eurocarparts when he just wanted one box :D
 
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Cleevley apparently don't do pattern rear discs at the moment.
Just been quoted £110 + VAT each for OEM Tesla rear discs. It seems they have had a price increase.........or...........
I've got a quote from 31st Jan p/n 1044636-00D @ £95.83. I've seen some price discrepancies between different SCs before and haven't been able to explain them, but maybe the price has increased. I think I'll put a service request in now and see what I get back...
 
No worries at all - I hadn't seen them that cheap before either when I last looked mate. To be fair, it was a year ago I last looked prices on common DIY fit parts when I was working out if I could afford the P model 3 - and then found out that they are so infrequently replaced that it was not worth worrying about :D

Apologies on my part too - when I said for all 4, it was because not everyone knows that they are sold as axel sets with pads so thought I would clarify that it wasn't per pad so to speak. Ask my dad, the last time I helped him do brakes on his van he bought 4 COMPLETE sets from Eurocarparts when he just wanted one box :D
Those are such good prices for pads I have to admit, which is why I doubted them in the first place!
They are all R90 approved. If you're on a budget and you don't drive like you stole it, I can't see much downside.
 
Also, thought it might be interesting to reference some other Tesla owners I've come across and how their brakes have held up.
Model S/X brakes are really no different to M3/Y. Apart from the earlier models the discs and pads come from Brembo and are made of the same materials.

Here are examples from four model S owners I know:
* 7 years and 92,000 miles on the original pads/discs
* Front discs changed at 120,000 miles, rears at 150,000 miles
* 113,000 miles on original discs and pads
* 8 years and 167,000 miles on original pads/discs

Why could this be more of a Model 3 issue?
My guess is a combination of more being sold, less being garaged overnight, owners less obsessive about the general state of their cars, younger owners with less experence of maintaining cars. Just IMO.
 
One pedal driving has taught drivers to be afraid of the brake pedal which causes rust and corrosion to build up from lack of use.

Maybe they need to program in the software to apply the brakes instead of regen once in a while
I've had a similar issue, but there is an option within the sevice screen on all models. There is a function that allows you to Burnish your brakes. Regen is deactivated for the duration, but there's a requirement to come upto the optimum speed, car indicates this, and when at said speed, manually apply brakes to within the green task bar. This is conducted for 10 counts and it is pretty amazing how much rust and dirt is removed from the brakes and associated disc's.
 
I've had a similar issue, but there is an option within the sevice screen on all models. There is a function that allows you to Burnish your brakes. Regen is deactivated for the duration, but there's a requirement to come upto the optimum speed, car indicates this, and when at said speed, manually apply brakes to within the green task bar. This is conducted for 10 counts and it is pretty amazing how much rust and dirt is removed from the brakes and associated disc's.
I've read about this, how often is it recommended to try this?
 
I've read about this, how often is it recommended to try this?
As required:

You should burnish the brakes after replacing brake pads and/or brake rotors. In addition, burnishing the brakes might eliminate a situation where the brakes emit a high-pitched squealing noise while braking, especially if the noise is present while driving in the rain, driving in cold and/or humid climates, or if there is surface rust present on the brake components. Note that all vehicles with disk brakes can experience this situation and that braking performance is not affected.

 
Not sure if it makes any difference, but I’ve taken to going to low regeneration mode (when I remember) during or after rain so that hopefully when the car sits afterwards the discs are less inclined to rust.

When the car had its second MOT at four years old a week or so ago, having a chat with the tester afterwards he said although there are grooves and some surface deterioration on the discs, they are nowhere near bad enough yet to fail.
 
Not sure if it makes any difference, but I’ve taken to going to low regeneration mode (when I remember) during or after rain so that hopefully when the car sits afterwards the discs are less inclined to rust.

When the car had its second MOT at four years old a week or so ago, having a chat with the tester afterwards he said although there are grooves and some surface deterioration on the discs, they are nowhere near bad enough yet to fail.
Sadly they've removed the option to change this on newer cars. I believe they have to report the range based on the worst configuration so giving you the option to lower the cars range means they'd have to lower it on their website. Hence better to remove the option and keep a higher range as it's better for sales.
 
Sadly they've removed the option to change this on newer cars. I believe they have to report the range based on the worst configuration so giving you the option to lower the cars range means they'd have to lower it on their website. Hence better to remove the option and keep a higher range as it's better for sales.
I wonder if they could have included it as an optional extra? E.g. pay £20 to unlock the regen customisation. Would have gotten round the issue with range tests whilst still giving customers the option.

Though perhaps starts a dangerous precedent…
 
Sadly they've removed the option to change this on newer cars. I believe they have to report the range based on the worst configuration so giving you the option to lower the cars range means they'd have to lower it on their website. Hence better to remove the option and keep a higher range as it's better for sales.

I wasn’t aware of that unfortunate change, guess then the only option would be to do the full on brake stamping routine every so often.
 
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I wonder if they could have included it as an optional extra? E.g. pay £20 to unlock the regen customisation. Would have gotten round the issue with range tests whilst still giving customers the option.

Though perhaps starts a dangerous precedent…
I believe even with options they’d then have to lower the range. My gut is acceleration boost lowers range slightly and why it’s no longer available on the highland.
 
I wasn’t aware of that unfortunate change, guess then the only option would be to do the full on brake stamping routine every so often.
Or put it in creep mode. Certainly no need to stamp on the brakes as the manual notes.
FYI I had my MOT just before Xmas and had no issues with the brakes despite doing nothing proactive and certainly not drying them
 
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Or put it in creep mode. Certainly no need to stamp on the brakes as the manual notes.
FYI I had my MOT just before Xmas and had no issues with the brakes despite doing nothing proactive and certainly not drying them
Sadly they’ve removed creep mode on new cars also. I mean I like the one pedal driving but shame they’ve had to remove choices just because they’d have to lower the range if they had it available.
 
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