[HN Gopher] Tesla Recalls Cars with EMMC Failures, Calls Part a ...
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Tesla Recalls Cars with EMMC Failures, Calls Part a 'Wear Item'
Author : nickthegreek
Score : 125 points
Date : 2021-02-11 16:31 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (hackaday.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (hackaday.com)
| naebother wrote:
| Just write to the blockchain, problem solved.
| nickthegreek wrote:
| Tesla's response is ridiculous.
|
| "Now they are claiming that the eMMC chip, ball-grid soldered to
| the motherboard, inaccessible without disassembling the dash, and
| not specifically mentioned in the owner's manual, should be
| considered a "wear item", and thus should not be subject to such
| scrutiny."
| foepys wrote:
| I didn't expect other from a company that is immediately
| blaming the victim when their self-driving car once again
| drives somebody into a stationary object or lane divider
| instead of showing compassion first and launching an
| investigation later.
|
| As a parent/child the first thing that comes from Tesla is a
| blog post and public statement on how your loved one allegedly
| was too stupid to use the car while Tesla goes into technical
| telemetry to grant themselves absolution.
| glsdfgkjsklfj wrote:
| > I didn't expect other from a company that ...
|
| oh let's not forget how they dealt with engineers calling out
| problems before they actually happened too:
|
| well, i am just going to link to a search because i learned
| now there were SEVERAL of them
| https://www.google.com/search?q=tesla+whistleblower
|
| ...Also, while we are not-forgetting... TSLA CEO defended
| trump calling the country to reopen in the middle of the
| pandemic, just like other CEOs that sell pillows or
| something. Funny how we only keep one of them accountable.
| shiftpgdn wrote:
| Tesla at no point anywhere advertises they have a full self
| driving car ready to go. FSD optioned onto the car when you
| purchase is for "future delivery."
| foepys wrote:
| Tesla lost the right to call their drive assistance
| "Autopilot" in Germany because Tesla couldn't stop implying
| that their cars were already very close to FSD and more
| capable than they actually are.
| camjohnson26 wrote:
| You can buy a car with a full self driving package but they
| don't imply they sell full self driving. That's some mental
| gymnastics, even if they say it's for future delivery.
| After all cars have a limited life span, what good is the
| package if it isn't delivered within the life of the car?
| judge2020 wrote:
| https://www.tesla.com/model3/design
|
| > The currently enabled features require active driver
| supervision and do not make the vehicle autonomous.
|
| It's in the fine print but it's brought up every time you
| talk about Autopilot and enabling it in the car (it's
| disabled by default) requires you accept a disclaimer
| saying that you need to be paying attention at all times.
| camjohnson26 wrote:
| I understand that they provide a disclaimer, I'm saying
| they shouldn't sell it as FSD until they can guarantee
| FSD will exist within the life of the vehicle.
|
| It seems highly unlikely that Tesla is close to fully
| autonomous driving. The "Paint it Black" demo was over 4
| years ago and we haven't seen anything better since then.
| We were supposed to get an autonomous road trip from LA
| to NY by 2017. The videos that have come out of the FSD
| beta release make it clear that you couldn't leave the
| car without intervention for 30 minutes without a major
| crash occurring.
|
| Tesla doesn't even have any autonomous miles to log in
| California, unlike dozens of other companies including GM
| and Waymo.
|
| www.businessinsider.com/tesla-rolling-stones-song-latest-
| autopilot-video-2016-10
| iamatworknow wrote:
| Yeah, by that logic any car that came with a tape deck
| had "future aux cord capability": https://i.ebayimg.com/i
| mages/i/312120241135-0-1/s-l1000.jpg
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Yup. Per Tesla it's unfair to consider eMMC something
| that should last the lifetime of the car, and entirely
| fair to sell you FSD that may never work in the lifetime
| in the car, may never be regulatorily approved, or both.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| They have gotten better about it, but for a long time they
| absolutely advertised FSD as mostly complete, and capable
| of actual unsupervised self-driving. Even after people
| started pointing out how much of an overt lie the marketing
| material was, it took a year or so for them to walk it back
| to something that at least seems to match what you are
| actually going to get.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Absolutely. For a long time they basically all but
| implied, "the car can do it, we/you just need the
| regulators to allow it".
|
| Not so much.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Tesla's response is of course self serving. It should be
| expected from their legal department as a cost control measure.
| You cannot expect corporations to act benevolently or morally,
| hence the need for legislation (right to repair, warranty
| periods set by statute as is done in the EU) and regulation
| (NHTSA forced Tesla's hand to issue a recall, which they were
| strongly attempting to avoid).
|
| Usual disclosures: We own Teslas and TSLA.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I expect both. We have regulations because oftentimes
| corporations need a little inspiration to stay honest. And I
| expect a good corporation to stand behind their product, and
| not overtly attack their customers at every opportunity.
| Tesla's culture strongly reflects Elon's personal ethics, and
| it shows.
| ska wrote:
| > You cannot expect corporations to act benevolently or
| morally
|
| You absolutely can and should expect good behavior of
| corporations. You can't rely only on that expectation so
| agree if it's important, legislate it.
| ouid wrote:
| You absolutely can't and shouldn't expect this.
| Corporations are your adversary.
| salawat wrote:
| Corporation are tools wielded by committees of people.
|
| If you don't like the outcome, change the people.
| vkou wrote:
| You can't change the people owning or running a
| corporation, but you can change the rules they operate
| under.
|
| In this case, though, I don't think the rules should be
| changed. I'm fairly certain that Tesla is not the first
| automaker to have come up with this kind of money-saving
| idea. This _has_ to be well-trodden ground in consumer
| rights.
|
| In this case, people should vote with their wallets, and
| the occasional class-action lawsuit, or, if things get
| too far out of line, expect the same kind of regulator
| intervention that would happen against any other car
| company. If regulators would not intervene against any
| other automaker trying this sort of thing, then I don't
| think they should intervene against Tesla.
| ska wrote:
| I think this is too binary. By all means don't count on
| it, but we can and should expect better.
| abfan1127 wrote:
| why shouldn't they cover their butts when people will look to
| extort? I'd much prefer a situation where companies take
| responsibility and customers show grace and courtesy, but
| that's not the world I live in...
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Tesla will actively throw you under the bus to defend
| themselves.
|
| "His vehicle had warned him about having hands on the
| steering wheel" (... fourteen minutes prior to the
| accident).
|
| Leave aside the fact that if you have an accident in your
| Tesla you will need to go to court to subpoena telemetry
| data. But they'll happily publish your telemetry data
| without your (explicit, I know, I know, TOS) agreement if
| they think they're being painted in a bad light.
|
| And if you disclose information about the vehicle, they'll
| happily force push neutered/old firmware to your vehicle to
| hide or prevent such activities, lock you from future
| upgrades, and disable ethernet and OBD ports in your
| vehicle.
|
| Or a Douglas Adamsesque approach to right-to-repair, where
| there's a website with parts you can "order" (except
| everything down to the most commodity bolt says "Call
| Tesla" and they will tell you its unavailable to order via
| the website), that's if you know what parts you need, a
| process which required making an appointment with Tesla to
| look at the service manual, several months out, which
| required a fee, had a time limit, and put you in a room
| where you were not allowed a computer, phone or camera,
| just a notepad and pencil), all the while touting their
| "corporate commitment to transparency" as they pulled out
| of NHTSB testing.
|
| Is this your idea of responsibility?
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Expecting reasonable product longevity from a durable good
| is not extortion.
| abfan1127 wrote:
| I wasn't speaking specifically to this situation. The
| previous comment was about knee jerk legal reactions,
| which is what I was referring. On that note, flash memory
| isn't a durable good though.
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Can you provide a citation to another automobile with an
| infotainment system that is only spec'd to last 6 years
| (due to flash wear)? The one in our 14 year old Toyota
| SUV is still working without issue.
| abfan1127 wrote:
| nope. But I can cite expectations for vehicles' parts
| that should last longer, but don't. It only takes a
| viewing of Consumer Reports to see that.
|
| Note that many electronics are designed to last 10 years
| (i.e. electromigration). Obviously, use cases matter (24
| hour use, high temp or lots of heat cycles).
| [deleted]
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| > _reasonable average daily use of 1.4 cycles, the expected life
| would be 5-6 years. NHTSA has not presented any evidence to
| suggest that this expected life is outside industry norms or that
| the eMMC flash memory device itself does not comport with that
| average lifetime estimate.
|
| Instead, NHTSA has asserted that the component should last at
| least the useful life of the vehicle, essentially double its
| expected lifespan. Tesla has significant concerns with the impact
| tentative conclusion._
|
| Despite popular belief, corporations are in fact _not_ faceless
| entities.
|
| Let's place the blame and embarrassment squarely where it
| belongs:
|
| _Elon Musk thinks 6 years is the useful life of these Tesla
| vehicles._
| rcxdude wrote:
| > reasonable average daily use of 1.4 cycles
|
| I kind of want to unpack this statement a bit more. The number
| of cycles of a flash chip is the number of times each bit is
| erased/written to. If you're wear-levelling the device this
| means that each time you write the capacity of the device to
| the chip that's one cycle. The affected flash chip is 8GB. This
| means that Tesla thinks it's reasonable for their software to
| write just over 11GB of data a day to this device. What the
| hell are they writing? The endurance of their flash chip may be
| industry standard but their use of it certainly is not.
| CameronNemo wrote:
| I'm pretty sure that is not what they are saying. They are
| saying the component should not need to last the full vehicle
| life cycle.
| [deleted]
| mikeyouse wrote:
| To be clear - the component controls the entire media console
| which has climate controls, the backup camera, defrost
| settings, all the media, etc. etc. etc. You can't replace the
| component without disassembling a huge portion of the
| interior of the car. So either "the component should not need
| to last the full vehicle life cycle" and people are expected
| to drive their $100k Teslas without the giant center console
| working, or it's not actually a "wear" component and they
| should be responsible for fixing it.
| caycep wrote:
| not being well versed in the embedded/industrial field, I wonder
| if there is any group of automotive specific engineers/suppliers
| looking at how electronics are made for these things. I assume
| there is expertise over the decades electronics esp infotainment
| systems being a "thing" in cars, not to mention aerospace, etc.
|
| I do recall the Nav/infotainment unit on a 1st gen prius going
| out, and the problem was traced to the solder between some
| daughterboard deteriorating after ~4-5 years. Replacement units
| were hard to come by and expensive on the secondhand/junkyard
| market...
| csours wrote:
| Yes, automotive manufacturing is a tiered system with the OEMs
| (Tesla, GM, Toyota, Volkswagen etc) at Tier 0.
|
| Tier 1 suppliers deliver high level, ready to install
| components like radios, seats, electronic control modules, etc
|
| Tier 2 suppliers deliver subcomponents like boards
|
| Tier 3 deliver chips etc
|
| OEMs generally come up with a list of component requirements
| like temp ranges and wearability/durability. The supplier
| community then bids based on that spec. Of course once one OEM
| asks for something, it becomes to other OEMs after a period of
| time; so there are a LOT of common components and
| subcomponents.
|
| Engineering for those specs and testing and proving that you
| conform to those specs both costs a lot of money and is worth a
| lot to OEMs who have to provide warranties to their customers.
|
| Edit: The supplier contract also makes the supplier responsible
| for warrantee on that component; the OEM bears final
| responsibility, but they will try to make the supplier pay for
| component failures when they can. (This is not precisely
| correct, I am not a lawyer, I am not your lawyer)
|
| Disclaimer/source: I work for GM, not on vehicle engineering.
| Everything in this comment is solely my own opinion
| 34679 wrote:
| What percentage of writes are coming from the consumer's normal
| use of the vehicle and what percentage comes from Tesla's
| telemetry collection?
|
| It amazes me that people are OK with paying $60k+ only to be
| constantly tracked everywhere they go by a process that destroys
| the product they purchased. I don't even like being tracked in a
| free web browser.
| averynicepen wrote:
| Look, most people are probably smacking that "Accept all
| cookies" button on websites faster than the speed of light, so
| let's be real that the average consumer doesn't really
| understand how a Tesla really works.
| gscott wrote:
| California is designing a Road Charge program to track you
| everywhere you go so they can charge you a fee per mile.
|
| https://dot.ca.gov/programs/road-charge/faqs
| naebother wrote:
| Great another tax for the poor who already have to commute 2+
| hours for a wage that mostly goes to the landlord. Brought to
| you by The Most Progressive State(tm).
| fl0wenol wrote:
| This would replace, not be in addition to, the gas tax.
|
| Cheaper, less fuel efficient vehicles (like an old work
| truck) would effectively taxed less than a Prius, although
| I think weight per axle is also intended to factor into
| this.
| 34679 wrote:
| One more reason to be glad I left.
| ellard wrote:
| It's unfortunate that they went in that direction as opposed
| to something like a tire tax. Just have the regular smog
| tests also include a tire wear check to catch the folks
| trying to run their tires bald.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Because the people slogging out commutes from places they can
| actually afford don't have it bad enough?
|
| What is the logic behind this? I get that "cars bad" but do
| they seriously believe they're so bad that tradesmen who
| lives way out there so they can afford homes should pay more?
| They're already paying with their time.
| vkou wrote:
| The logic behind it is that someone should pay for road
| construction and wear and tear, and it should probably be
| heavy road users, as opposed to, you know, light road
| users.
|
| The beauty of the free market is that increases in cost of
| shipping and transportation trickle down to prices paid by
| consumers, who can then vote with their wallet. If the cost
| of road usage is factored into the price of a good, I can
| choose to buy a good that results in less road usage,
| because it's cheaper.
|
| Gas taxes (as opposed to mileage taxes) are decent enough
| driver of environmental policy, but they don't accurately
| capture road usage, especially in a world that's moving
| towards electric cars.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| >The logic behind it is that someone should pay for road
| construction and wear and tear, and it should probably be
| heavy road users, as opposed to, you know, light road
| users.
|
| But it still seems wildly incompatible with the "equity
| over equality" theme that most other new and upcoming CA
| government policy is based off of. Especially so
| considering that road wear is mostly from heavy trucks.
|
| >Gas taxes (as opposed to mileage taxes) are decent
| enough driver of environmental policy, but they don't
| accurately capture road usage, especially in a world
| that's moving towards electric cars.
|
| But the people who are moving to electric cars are
| already the ones who will benefit most from a mileage
| based tax since they tend to be wealthier and already
| have shorter commutes. It's not like CA is going to stop
| taxing gas.
| vkou wrote:
| Road wear is mostly from heavy trucks, but road
| _construction_ isn 't driven by heavy trucks. It's driven
| by the needs of normal people driving sedans and SUVs and
| pickups.
|
| Wealthier people buy more goods and services, which get
| delivered to their local store/home on roads. While they
| personally won't pay more mileage taxes, they will end up
| paying more of them through their purchases.
|
| I get it, this isn't the most progressive form of
| taxation, but neither are gas taxes (if they don't come
| with a dividend, like they do in BC.) If anything, poor
| people pay disproportionately more in gas taxes, than
| they would in road use taxes, because they tend to drive
| longer distances in less fuel efficient vehicles. That's
| a double-whammy.
| michael1999 wrote:
| Because governments collect road tax from gasoline as an
| approximate usage fee. As EVs become a measurable part of
| traffic, they require a replacement.
| indus wrote:
| Tesla and LinkedIn (in chorus):
|
| "We are programmed to receive. You can check out any time you
| like But you can never leave"
| ping_pong wrote:
| I have a Model 3 that is less than 2 years old. The build quality
| is terrible.
|
| The side of my Model 3 trim on the inside just fell off for no
| goddamn reason. I don't even know how to fix it, it looks like
| the glue wasn't applied properly? This is on top of countless
| other problems that I've faced over the last 2 years.
|
| It's impossible that Tesla is 3X the market cap of Toyota Why
| they didn't stop buying of Tesla the same way they stopped GME is
| criminal.
|
| And they keep failing external quality tests and no one seems to
| care:
|
| https://finance.yahoo.com/news/teslas-failed-every-edmunds-e...
| smmnyc wrote:
| For what it's worth, my Model 3 from December 2018 with 35K
| miles on it has only had one issue (with squeaking upper
| control arms) and they replaced it under warranty, coordinated
| through the mobile app. I haven't had any other issues that
| would indicate build quality is terrible.
| tristanb wrote:
| Same here - I have a 2018 model 3 and its gone in once to get
| a warning for the seat belt fixed. Its got 45k miles and had
| no other issues. Best car I've owned.
| kalium-xyz wrote:
| The best car I ever owned is my current car, a 16 year old
| Audi that had many prior owners and has nearly 300.000km on
| the teller. Its never given me trouble and anything you run
| into you can fix yourself with volkswagen parts. The build
| quality comes into play sooner than later.
| caycep wrote:
| Ah that's good to hear. I have heard some model years of
| Audi were notorious for reliability, maybe coinciding
| with the dips in VWAG quality in general, but they are
| one of the few makers of station wagons selling them in
| the US anymore and I might seriously consider an A4 or A6
| wagon...
|
| I think maybe a lot of their bad rep came from the all
| road "Air suspension" era...although the simple fix was
| to install regular shocks/springs.
| tristanb wrote:
| My other vehicle is a 60s Royal Enfield, which operates
| at the other end of the reliability spectrum.
| sib wrote:
| I also have a Model 3 from December 2018. No issues / defects
| at all.
|
| I have had mobile service for things like rotating tires and
| installing a rear spoiler.
|
| Better "initial quality" experience than the VW and Subaru
| vehicles that I've purchased.
| mohaine wrote:
| Agree, Mine is a Model 3 from May 2018 with 22k. I've only
| had a couple of small issues, (Infotainment computer would
| fail to wake back up often and a bad switch on break pedal
| meant to register a foot but no press) both fixed with no
| issues. Judging by the serial number on my included diecast
| mine was close to one of the first 12k produced.
| wilhil wrote:
| Can't agree enough.
|
| I'm not wealthy, but, got enough to be happy... I really wanted
| to treat myself to a Tesla and went to the local shop a while
| ago and I went out thinking - I'm not buying this.
|
| The glovebox required such force to close. I put my arm on the
| armrest and the rear drinks holder opened The centre console
| was VERY loose.
|
| and so many other problems.
|
| Compare this to a family member's ~PS13k Hyundai i10 where the
| gear selector was SOLID, I just didn't feel like the Tesla
| (Model S) was good value for money in the slightest.
|
| I don't think anyone can touch them technically (yet), but,
| they have A LOT to learn about building cars.
| caycep wrote:
| I kind of wonder - how much of the valuation is actually in
| cars/car sales vs. the charger/battery infrastructure and
| expertise that they are building?
| csours wrote:
| The valuation is entirely in Full Self Driving and Memes.
|
| Disclaimer: I work for a Tesla competitor.
| szczys wrote:
| I don't have a Tesla, but I had upholstery on the backs of the
| rear seats (the part that becomes the floor of the hatchback
| when you fold them down) all off on my Ford C-Max. It looks
| like an adhesive failure there.
|
| Not making excuses for the big T, just saying that there's a
| lot places for things to work out poorly in automotive.
| dotancohen wrote:
| > I had upholstery on the backs of the rear seats (the part
| that > becomes the floor of the hatchback when you fold
| them down) all > off on my Ford C-Max. It looks like an
| adhesive failure there.
|
| The wife's Focus has the same issue.
| hinkley wrote:
| Pretty much all GMs in the 80s had problem with summer heat
| eventually separating the headliner cloth from the padding.
| Aeronwen wrote:
| The foam padding breaks down and even though the glue
| holds, there's nothing for it to hold the cloth to but
| dust.
| bluesquared wrote:
| I just recently got a Chevy Bolt. 240 mile range for 1/2 of the
| cheapest Model 3 (used, paid in cash). It has the typical GM
| fit-and-finish, nowhere near what I'd demand out of a car with
| an MSRP at ~$43k with the trim level I have. GM took so many
| shortcuts with materials and design choices in what I assume
| was an attempt to not take a loss on each Bolt sold. Aside from
| a pretty nice big infotainment screen, it lacks the features,
| fit, and finish that I'd demand from a $20k car. I still love
| it, very peppy electric motor, drives well, plenty of space for
| a baby seat and passengers, decent cargo room.
|
| It's still a bargain GM car at luxury prices, you'd be nuts to
| pay full MSRP for this vehicle. I got a great deal on a used
| one; tons of great deals were to be had on cars coming off of
| the first batch of 3-year leases until the battery recall put a
| stop-sale on everything at GM dealerships.
|
| I know they don't stack up good against other brands comparing
| MSRP to MSRP, but I have to wonder how bad Tesla's "initial
| quality" really compares against all of the electric options
| out now.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I think the Bolt is one of the better car choices we've made
| in a while. But we didn't buy it, we leased one last year.
| $6K for 3 years at 18K miles/year, residual is in the
| mid-20s, which is what I could have bought one for brand new
| with all the discounts they had running. For the first 5K
| miles it's been really great, better than I expected, really.
| If it's still this good in a few years, maybe I'll buy it
| when the lease ends. But only if I can pay something close to
| the auction value and not the stated residual value :)
| dragontamer wrote:
| > 240 mile range for 1/2 of the cheapest Model 3 (used, paid
| in cash).
|
| Do you get near the 240-mile rated range? I ask because...
|
| https://www.edmunds.com/car-news/electric-car-range-and-
| cons...
|
| 2018 Tesla Model 3 Performance: 256 miles under test. 310
| miles EPA-estimated.
|
| It seems like some EPA EV ranges are not very realistic.
|
| --------
|
| Edmunds tested 277 miles on the 2020 Chevy Bolt. But I'm
| interested in hearing your personal experience.
| bluesquared wrote:
| Right now with the cold, the car is telling me ~150 miles.
| But this is during below-freezing temperatures in the
| midwest, and I've only had it for a few weeks. My commute
| is ~3.5 miles, around town trips of no more than 10 miles
| round-trip, and I don't typically precondition before my
| drives.
|
| From what I've read, the 240 mile estimate is pretty
| accurate - some more spirited driving will obviously have
| you fall short of that number, and some users have reported
| getting more than 240 miles.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| I have a 2020 Bolt, and a 2019 Model 3 Performance. In my
| experience the Bolt's range prediction is dead on. The
| Tesla overestimates by a lot. So much, in fact, that I just
| switched the range display to battery percentage.
| xedeon wrote:
| That Edmunds test is flawed in so many ways.
|
| Not only they fudged the numbers:
|
| https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/tesla-tsla-the-
| inves...
|
| There was also a fatal flaw. They did not perform the
| testing under the same conditions. They tested the Teslas
| with temps being 10F (~60F) colder and using the cabin
| heat.
|
| https://twitter.com/AEONde/status/1359599422733172736?s=20
|
| While other being tested under ~70+F with no heater used.
| Any EV owner knows that will significantly affect range. I
| guess they don't really care about being an authoritative
| source.
|
| Other offenses: https://twitter.com/enn_nafnlaus/status/133
| 1154577387905024?...
| dragontamer wrote:
| https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/best-cars/electric-
| cars-b...
|
| Its not just Edmunds who are reporting lower range than
| expected. Also autocar (of UK) reports lower Tesla range.
|
| > In our tests, the Model 3 Performance achieved 239
| miles of real-world driving.
|
| > Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus, 181 miles
|
| > (The Model S) is now available in a choice of different
| battery capacities, with the current entry-level 75kWh
| model managing 204 miles of real-world range
|
| --------
|
| All tests have their flaws. But real-world testing by 3rd
| parties is far more reliable than the government-mandated
| tests.
|
| Its like they say: any official benchmark will be
| cheated, gamed, etc. etc. You really only figure out who
| can beat the test, as opposed to figuring out reality. A
| series of trusted 3rd party tests (by magazines and
| smaller communities) is small and unique enough that no
| major automaker can really "gamify" the tests, leading to
| more realistic results in the aggregate.
| xedeon wrote:
| The issue is that Edmunds fudged the numbers. Twice!
| Therefore, it's a hard sell calling them a "trusted 3rd
| party" as I mentioned here:
|
| https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/tesla-tsla-the-
| inves...
|
| https://twitter.com/enn_nafnlaus/status/13311545773879050
| 24?...
|
| Your Autocar link did not even give any data on their
| testing methodology. It's even more vague than Edmunds.
| What were the conditions? These things matter to an
| informed consumer who value objectivity. I hope you're
| not implying that one should just blindly trust that
| article.
|
| Speaking of 3rd party tests. A realtime one conducted on
| the same day, like this one has more merit.
|
| https://youtu.be/ZH7V2tU3iFc?t=1535
| dragontamer wrote:
| https://www.caranddriver.com/tesla/model-3
|
| Car and Driver only got 200 highway miles on their Model
| 3
|
| There's plenty of 3rd party review sites. They're all
| coming in lower than the EPA-estimated-range.
|
| -------
|
| Carwow, the Youtube-site you linked to, has its article
| here: https://www.carwow.co.uk/blog/ultimate-electric-
| car-range-te...
|
| Percentage of claimed range achieved: 78% for the Tesla
| Model 3
|
| In any case: my point stands. We can't trust the EPA-
| ranges / government mandated range tests. They seem to be
| getting gamed.
| xedeon wrote:
| > Car and Driver only got 200 highway miles on their
| Model 3
|
| That's only highway miles... EPA, WLTP and NEDC
| efficiency tests are highway and city driving. They are
| standardized for a reason. This is to control as much
| variables as possible. Which is fundamentally essential
| to anyone who understands the scientific method.
|
| > Percentage of claimed range achieved: 78% for the Tesla
| Model 3
|
| Same with the other cars on the lineup. The only one that
| was a clear winner was the Hyundai Kona, at the expense
| of lackluster performance and driving dynamics.
| jsight wrote:
| That test is 60% city. On the highway at 75 mph, the Bolt
| would likely drop to 200 or a little below. The Model Y LR
| AWD does ~240 under similar conditions.
| judge2020 wrote:
| Yep - Augusta to Atlanta (Lithonia Supercharger) is also
| brutal going 75mph and up 400ft in elevation, and there's
| no supercharger in between the two cities. A 3 SR+ RWD
| will average maybe 150 miles of range along that route.
| jsight wrote:
| Yeah, that'd be cutting it pretty close. I'd be tempted
| to bring a CHAdeMO in case it looked risky mid-route. I
| bet there's at least one CHAdeMO along the route.
| draw_down wrote:
| I mean, they got your money... and people are still falling all
| over themselves to give Tesla _their_ money... their stock
| price has gone extremely high... so I guess I wonder how much
| of a problem this really is for them. Doesn 't seem to affect
| their brand, even if one thinks it should.
| gruez wrote:
| >It's impossible that Tesla is 3X the market cap of Toyota Why
| they didn't stop buying of Tesla the same way they stopped GME
| is criminal.
|
| GME wasn't stopped because it was too overpriced. A few
| brokerages stopped accepting new GME positions because they
| couldn't afford the deposit requirements. That's it. If you
| went with another broker (eg. fidelity), you could buy all the
| GME you want.
| kryogen1c wrote:
| > It's impossible that Tesla is 3X the market cap of Toyota Why
| they didn't stop buying of Tesla the same way they stopped GME
| is criminal.
|
| ...what?
|
| - GME trading wasn't halted. some high profile platforms like
| robinhood went literally insolvent and had to put a stop to
| some volatile stock trades and borrow billions in cash to stay
| legal. other well-capitalized platforms never restricted GME.
|
| - related to above, GME wasn't halted on some platforms because
| of some market-cap vs actual value mismatch. this is not a
| thing.
|
| - as for the market cap, well... prevailing wisdom is we're in
| some kind of bubble. something bad will happen eventually.
| canada_dry wrote:
| > no one seems to care
|
| Shareholders only care about increasing the volume of cars
| rolling off the assembly line.
|
| Tesla was on my short list of next car purchases... but now
| that the old guard are getting fully into the game it's very
| unlikely (unless Tesla is able to pull a Jaguar like quality
| rebound _or_ they actually deliver on "full" self driving).
| alfalfasprout wrote:
| Frankly people give Tesla a pass for things that would be
| unacceptable from any other automaker. The reality is that I
| don't see Tesla coming anywhere close to the build quality of
| established high end brands anytime soon.
|
| You compare eg; a Mercedes or Porsche interior with a
| comparably priced Model S and it's no contest.
| spideymans wrote:
| What will happen first:
|
| A) Traditional automakers becoming good at making great EVs
|
| or
|
| B) Tesla matching the quality standards of traditional
| automakers.
|
| The traditional automakers are quickly learning how to make
| great EVs. Tesla may get away with substandard quality for
| now, but they won't get away with it a decade from now when
| ever automaker is producing decent EVs. I hope Tesla improves
| fast.
| hinkley wrote:
| I have a recollection that people used to say similar things
| about Ferrari, especially among people who were not Ferrari
| fans or were former Ferrari fans. Hand built, often in need
| of some rework.
|
| I wonder if there's any way to tell if the build quality is
| going up with their increased volume, down, or remaining
| even.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Ferrari came from racing and were basically just slapping
| passenger car amenities into performance chassis wherever
| they fit.
|
| Hyundai/Kia are probably a better point of comparison.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| Absolutely. My 2017 Audi A4 is a far nicer, higher quality
| build than the last (similar era) Model S that I was in. And
| it's not even close.
| Judgmentality wrote:
| https://www.theverge.com/2021/2/9/22274376/audi-etron-gt-
| rs-...
|
| I posted this the other day. I think most people agree the
| Germans make better interiors. But nobody can deny Tesla
| has a superior charging network, and for the vast majority
| of people their battery technology is superior (longer
| ranger, but more prone to overheating from aggressive
| driving).
|
| I think Tesla is just riding the underdog wave extremely
| well - they're new, they're different, they're trendy, and
| they're eco-friendly. And honestly, if you're not a car
| person, their cars _are_ fun and different (if you are an
| enthusiast you will likely have very mixed opinions of
| Tesla). Combine that with a CEO that can bend the laws of
| reality while he talks, promises for full self-driving
| which will absolutely never ever materialize, the fact that
| the competition is really quite slow to show up...and you
| get a ridiculous stock price.
|
| I don't think Tesla is going away, but I think in 10 years
| they're going to be just another car company, especially if
| they shift their focus towards energy which is where the
| real money is for them.
| ping_pong wrote:
| How are Teslas eco-friendly? I had to get a lower panel
| near the bottom of the door replaced, and they literally
| had to take apart the entire car. Literally my backseats
| and front seat were taken out just to get to this piece.
|
| Teslas are about as eco friendly to repair as iPhones,
| which is not friendly at all.
| clouddrover wrote:
| > _But nobody can deny Tesla has a superior charging
| network_
|
| It isn't the future. There's more investment from more
| companies going into CCS networks. For example:
|
| https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/industry-news/shell-
| pledg...
| Someone wrote:
| "and they're eco-friendly."
|
| They certainly have that image, but I think an eco-
| friendly electric car would have to be smaller and
| lighter, even if that means decreasing range.
|
| Going for a long range makes their cars unnecessarily
| heavy. That makes them require more power and increases
| tire and road wear.
|
| I also think the competition is timing its entry quite
| well, arriving close to the moment when it becomes
| possible to make money making electric cars.
| selimthegrim wrote:
| Not on their US VWs they didn't.
| CoolGuySteve wrote:
| Tesla reminds me of Saturn, a car company that rode a
| wave of an enthusiastic buyers until people started to
| notice their quality declining after significant cost-
| cutting.
|
| Unlike Saturn, GM isn't meddling in Tesla's management,
| but it seems like similar mistakes are being made.
|
| At least Tesla's are more fun to drive.
| unethical_ban wrote:
| Not much to add. I hope they get their stuff together and make a
| wear item easily replaceable, with proper health monitoring or
| redundancy.
| saluki wrote:
| sounds like something that inexpensive they could add redundant
| ones to the board to exceed the expected lifetime of the
| vehicle, plus to have a backup failover since it causes some
| serious issues. Or just have a location where they can be
| swapped out like on a camera.
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| Tesla will get away with terrible manufacturing practices and
| quality until the established or new car makers come up with an
| equally viable electric car and charging network solution, not
| just the compliance cars they produce at negative margins(almost
| makes you think it's a reverse marketing thing to make people buy
| petrol cars). Also, how can anyone think Tesla or Elon are good
| people with those self serving contracts and terms and conditions
| is unexplainable to me.
| judge2020 wrote:
| > Also, how can anyone think Tesla or Elon are good people with
| those self serving contracts and terms and conditions is
| unexplainable to me.
|
| Replace Tesla and Elon with any company and their CEO. Every
| single company that collects data needs a TOS to be able to
| manage their service without legal trouble.
|
| When you use Ford's SYNC 3 you agree to these terms:
|
| https://owner.ford.com/support/sync-terms-and-conditions-of-...
| soganess wrote:
| The silly thing about all this is eMMC is a wear part.
|
| Tesla made a really serious mistake and didn't take that into
| account and now the user is "holding it wrong". That needs to be
| in a place where the user or a technician can service it easily.
|
| They were just trying to save a penny or a second of engineering
| time and now pretending they knew all along.
| FireBeyond wrote:
| It is. But its wear is almost exclusively for Tesla's benefit,
| not the customers. That's what's galling to me. Capturing
| extensive logging data so Tesla can do product improvement is
| NOT something I should be hammered hundreds of dollars for
| service on because it impacts the ability of me to use my
| vehicle.
| MPSimmons wrote:
| They should eat the cost on these cars, and re-engineer the
| part to be easily replaced on future vehicles so that it
| actually is a user-serviceable replaceable part.
| soganess wrote:
| I always think this type of bad first step is a "test the
| waters" move.
|
| If no one complains, sweet. If someone complains backpedal
| with one of those "We hear you! And while we haven't done
| anything wrong, we will do right by the customer just like
| we have always done" PR stunts.
|
| Most everyone forgets, and the people that do remember,
| well they remember you "making things right." Exploding
| batteries on your s21? Anyone?
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| The semi-annual Toyota frame recall is a great example.
| They start small and then begrudgingly widen it to some
| larger range of years and maybe add in the 4Runners if it
| looks like people are switching brands.
| amznthrwaway wrote:
| TSLA never does the right thing by their customers.
|
| They've learned, over time, that you can sell a few
| horrible cars and be worth a fortune, so long as you create
| a cult-like following for your stock. So that's the focus.
|
| Who gives a shit about building a good, useful, reliable
| car, if you can just throw 1.5 billion of BTC on your
| balance sheet, and add 15 billion to your equity value,
| because your investors are _that_ absurd?
| mrfusion wrote:
| The vehicle Should still be able To operate without this at some
| level.
|
| I once hit a curb and the whole computer unit fell out of the
| socket in my 96 ford. There were flames and smoke coming out of
| the exhaust but it still started up and I was able to drive it to
| the shop.
| ouid wrote:
| kinda sounds like you shouln't have driven it to the shop
| though.
| powerbroker wrote:
| For well over 12 months, the Model S Owners Manual (p. 40) and
| the Model X owners Manual recite, "When you finish speaking the
| command, tap the voice button again or simply wait."
|
| Neither of my Teslas operate in the manner described in the
| manual since late 2019. If Tesla's manual writers can't
| communicate with the software developers -- is there anything in
| the manual you can trust? Can we always count on Tesla to
| arbitrarily loose functionality without anyone telling their
| manual authors?
|
| Anyway, I gave up telling Tesla about this problem (in multiple
| iterations of the manuals), and reported it to the NHTSA
| https://www-odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/VehicleComplaint/
| qazxcvbnmlp wrote:
| Tesla: "People keep buying our cars, must not be an issue" Fan
| People: "Tesla is the future" Silent Majority: "Yeah, I'm just
| gonna keep waiting for a normal car maker to release an electric
| car"
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| I present the following as a counter point
|
| Toyota every year since 1980: "Don't worry guys the new truck
| frames won't rust out, also sorry last year's truck frames
| rusted out it was out supplier's fault"
|
| People on the internet: "Warlords in Africa like the Hilux, the
| only truck they have a supply chain for, therefore every Toyota
| truck and SUV must be great"
| knolax wrote:
| 80% of Toyotas ever made are still on the road[0]. I know
| plenty of people who drive Toyotas older than they are. I
| have high doubts most Teslas won't be bricked by poor
| software within the decade.
|
| [0] https://www.toyotaofnaperville.com/80-of-toyotas-
| vehicles-st...
| mikestew wrote:
| _80% of Toyotas ever made are still on the road[0]._
|
| ...the rest made it home. But in seriousness, that 's
| exactly what I've been thinking in general, and especially
| reading this article: Teslas aren't going to age well. I
| hope I'm wrong, because I don't wish mechanical failure on
| anyone's car, but even Toyotas get a little loose with one
| or two hundred thousand miles. What's going to happen to
| those one-off production line mods to get the car out the
| door ten years from now? Now we're seeing eMMC failures for
| which Tesla is trying to charge the customer (seems those
| that can afford a Model S could easily afford a lawyer,
| too; but I digress). I don't have a smoking gun to point
| to, but much like code smell these just don't smell like
| devices that you'll pass on to your kid when she gets her
| license ten years down the road.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| It takes something beyond hubris to trust a dealer's claim
| on an issue like that.
|
| The OEMs are always creating crafted studies to underlying
| claims like that for their advertising campaigns. Dodge was
| running a similiar claim in their ads awhile back.
| mikestew wrote:
| I've often wondered if 80% of _everything_ isn 't still
| on the road. Depending on one's source, 70% of Harley-
| Davidson motorcycles are still on the road. Not only does
| Harley go back over 100 years, they made some real shit
| over the years (hello, 70s AMC Harleys). But if 70% of
| those are still running, I have no problem believing 80%
| of just about any make of vehicle are still going.
| ariwilson wrote:
| Cite?
| judge2020 wrote:
| https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-
| africa/2020/04/30/...
|
| Closest I can find, but I have no idea what point the OP is
| trying to make.
| hinkley wrote:
| By the time people stop buying your stuff, things have gotten
| very bad.
|
| Also the people who are most capable of fixing the problem?
| Probably gave up and work for a competitor.
| walrus01 wrote:
| Nissan, a normal car maker, released a huge number of Leafs
| with improperly implemented battery cooling and battery
| charge/storage voltage management systems, which resulted in
| terrible cycle life and drops in range capacity in the 1st and
| 2nd generation Leafs.
| mikestew wrote:
| They warranted those, though, right? Meanwhile, I'm still
| driving our first-gen Leaf here in the mild weather of the
| Pacific Northwest (granted, ten years later that battery
| isn't at its best anymore). EMMC doesn't care about what the
| weather is like in your neighborhood.
| reportingsjr wrote:
| > EMMC doesn't care about what the weather is like in your
| neighborhood.
|
| Yes it does. Higher temps will wear out all semiconductors
| at higher rates.
| mikestew wrote:
| Yeah, you're right. Which only makes it worse. My
| original point was that those in Anchorage suffer just
| like those in Phoenix. But perhaps those in Phoenix have
| comfy, air-conditioned batteries but persistent storage
| that fries in the heat.
| formerly_proven wrote:
| You got it backwards. Flash like this is going to wear
| out several times faster at -20 degC versus, say, 50 degC
| or 70 degC.
| reportingsjr wrote:
| Do you have a source for that? That is counter to
| everything I've learned.
|
| Here is a pretty thorough page from national instruments
| that agrees with what I stated: https://www.ni.com/en-
| us/support/documentation/supplemental/... (look at the
| "calculating drive endurance" section in particular).
| ddingus wrote:
| Well it is a wear item. The real trouble comes from a poor wear
| spec not aligned with the overall car service life expectations.
| walrus01 wrote:
| But in automotive terms a 'wear item' is something that a
| reasonable person could expect to replace or maintain, and is
| accessible through normal tools in a repair shop that works on
| multiple makes of vehicles. Such as tires, brake pads, brake
| rotors, belts, hoses.
| ddingus wrote:
| Absolutely.
|
| Where it currently is assembled into the vehicle requires
| either:
|
| 1) much longer expected service life, make it a non issue
|
| , or
|
| 2) greater ease of replacement, and or more graceful,
| utilitarian failure mode performance.
|
| 1) Is tolerable, and still shitty,
|
| 2) is, or could be, reasonable, and an annoyance tops.
|
| As things are now, the whole affair is a big dodge. I would
| be very unhappy.
|
| Fail fast, and all that rapid innovation culture has
| implications the mature auto manufacturers know well. I have
| friends with these cars and they are having a lot of fun.
| When the fun started, I talked about real costs and risks yet
| to play out.
|
| Well, now they are.
|
| Some of those people can afford the adventure. Ok fine, they
| got what they paid for. And they have options.
|
| Many secondary adopters may feel the pinch of these things
| far more. Sad day for them. Hope Tesla recognizes who they
| are selling to now and ups their game.
|
| I am a fan. The cars are fun, but there is no way I would own
| one personally. Maybe someday.
|
| Transportation to me needs to be cheap ass dollars per mile
| and either highly reliable, or easy for me to fix and
| maintain.
|
| I do not care too much about which it is.
| etcet wrote:
| I've been burned by bad uses of eMMC twice this year.
|
| First, Polycom Studio destroys itself: https://knowledgebase-
| iframe.polycom.com/kb/viewContent.do;j...
|
| Secondly, all the Edgecore top o' rack switches we have are
| backed by eMMC and will all eventually go read-only. This is an
| especially fun surprise while working remotely.
|
| Shit's junk and should never store anything that gets written to
| regularly (i.e. a log file).
| superkuh wrote:
| I've had a couple eMMC go bad on single board computers. I
| initially only noticed the off-by-1 read errors when the radio
| data that was being recorded by the computers (8kB/s for 2+
| years) as comma separated values started sometimes getting
| commas turned into the next character up in ascii which broke
| my visualization python script.
|
| It's definitely something you learn the first time you use eMMC
| (or any low end storage tech).
| walrus01 wrote:
| what volume of writes per day, in MB, should you be expecting
| on a top of rack switch, though?
|
| does it have some logging features you can't turn off? using as
| an example a cisco nexus 3064 I have sitting around here, all
| of the logging is done to an off-system destination over the
| network.
|
| I can think of very few legitimate or sound network engineering
| practices that would require 1U, mostly layer-2 feature set
| switches to be writing anything more than a few dozen KB per
| day to their internal storage.
|
| I can't say that I'm surprised to hear of something failing in
| a new and unique way in an edgecore switch, since the company
| (Accton) has also released a real dumpster fire of a series of
| outdoor radios in their Ignitenet brand, which have a
| spectacular failure rate.
| sschueller wrote:
| I don't know how this ever went into production. At least someone
| should have known that writing logs files to eMMC is a disaster.
| Anyone who has worked with any flash for a bit knows about this
| issue.
|
| How many other items like that made it into the car and how many
| of those are a safety risk?
| localhost wrote:
| I wound up paying ~$1600 to replace the entire MCU1 in my 2015 S
| last year. I'm waiting for the refund of that amount in March and
| will likely just apply the proceeds to upgrade to MCU2. No way I
| want an ancient Tegra3 computer that isn't made anymore in my
| car.
| delecti wrote:
| Tesla strikes me solidly as a "software company" that happens to
| make cars. And having worked in software for software companies,
| and in software for car companies, I would definitely never get a
| car made by a software company.
| lmilcin wrote:
| This is certainly not a "wear item" but incompetence.
|
| I had on two separate occasions designed an embedded POS
| application that worked on a dumb flash (dumb == no wear
| leveling).
|
| There is nothing special about it. You just need to control where
| your writes go. You don't resize files (because this updates
| inodes and directories). You don't create files for stupid things
| like locks. If you have a database, you create a file and treat
| is as circular buffer or append only log. If you need OTA, you
| can split the memory in two and have boot loader boot
| alternately. And so on.
|
| With wear leveling this is much, much simpler. You run the OS for
| some time and you capture all your writes at low level to see how
| much many blocks are being updated. Then you can predict how long
| the memory is going to last and you just size it accordingly.
| bdowling wrote:
| Tesla's actual letter [0] concludes with a paragraph including
| the following:
|
| > In addition, while Tesla recently launched a warranty
| adjustment program to repair or replace the 8GB eMMC device,
| Tesla has decided to make that hardware repair partof the free
| recall remedy.
|
| So, Tesla makes the argument that the eMMC is a wear item to
| preserve that position for the future (e.g., when they make it
| easily replacable). In this case, however, they are going to do
| what the NHTSA wants and replace the eMMC for affected customers
| for free. That's a reasonable approach, in my opinion.
|
| [0] https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/inv/2020/INRL-
| EA20003-82493P.pd...
| [deleted]
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| I'm a big believer in "everything is a wear item on a long enough
| timeline". You won't catch me hurring and durring and getting my
| panties in a bunch because somsone's gonna wear out the ball
| joints on their lifted truck in 80k instead of 100k. But spending
| 50k to have the display on your Tesla or the frame on your Toyota
| crap out in under a decade is unreasonable.
| walrus01 wrote:
| I thought Toyota replaced those frames at no cost, some people
| even got entirely new trucks.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| They replace just enough of them on a rolling basis to keep
| their brand reputation where they want it. 4Runner owners
| tend to get more shafted (shorter if any recall) than Tacoma
| owners.
|
| If they wanted to fix the problem they've had 30-something
| years to just copy what a different OEM is doing. But why
| would they fix it if they're still selling trucks and SUVs
| hand over fist?
| averynicepen wrote:
| Stories like this regarding almost all of automotive
| manufacturing history makes me wonder if the only reason
| Tesla is being highlighted on all these issues is just
| because they have significantly more publicity.
| walrus01 wrote:
| I see four failures here on the part of tesla:
|
| 1) choosing that particular eMMC, likely not something specced
| for very high write endurance, or not speccing a larger amount of
| flash to spread the write endurance out over a period of up to
| 20, 25 years.
|
| 2) linux/operating system/software engineering implementation,
| for a certain volume of MB of writes per day, that would be known
| to wear out the flash write endurance over a short number of
| years. possibly a result of the software team not communicating
| properly with the hardware team. the software team very well may
| have been operating in a vacuum of assuming that they could do
| whatever they wanted within the CPU, I/O, RAM, and disk space
| limits of the architecture, and weren't even thinking at all of
| the consequences of their logging setup.
|
| 3) not making that a socketed/removable part.
|
| 4) asking the owners to pay for the replacement due to tesla's
| own screwup.
| toddmorey wrote:
| Always thought of this as a fascinating race to watch. What
| will happen first: (1) Tesla figuring out how to really build &
| manufacture cars or (2) the legacy automotive companies really
| figuring out build & deploy software?
|
| (It's not that black and white, all automotive companies have
| varying degrees of expertise in both software engineering and
| mechanical engineering. But it's certainly interesting to watch
| the industries learn from each other.)
| ajross wrote:
| Software/design issues requiring hardware recalls are routine
| in the industry, though. There's really nothing notable about
| this particular issue at all, except that it involves
| "consumer-like" devices that posters here understand and feel
| expert on. We all think that "we'd never have done something
| this dumb", so therefore it's an easy shot to take where
| esoterica about engine control PCBs isn't something we have
| the confidence to second guess.
|
| (Needless to say, we totally would have made the same kind of
| mistake, and probably do so every day.)
|
| The only meaningful ding on Tesla here is #4 above: clearly
| this was a design flaw and should have been a recall from the
| start, not a customer-financed repair.
| CharlesW wrote:
| > _Always thought of this as a fascinating race to watch.
| What will happen first: (1) Tesla figuring out how to really
| build & manufacture cars or (2) the legacy automotive
| companies really figuring out build & deploy software?_
|
| Yes! And (3) is potentially: A company who's even better at
| building and deploying software _and_ hardware enters the
| market.
| CarelessExpert wrote:
| You forgot the much more cynical (4) Tesla lowers the bar
| for success and quality diminishes across the industry in a
| race-to-the-bottom on price. ;)
| semi-extrinsic wrote:
| A Dacia Sandero Stepway (5 seater small SUV/crossover)
| costs EUR 13 000 brand new. How much is the cheapest
| Tesla again?
| kcb wrote:
| Nothing that Tesla has built is anywhere near the bottom
| of the industry though.
| NathanielK wrote:
| > choosing that particular eMMC, likely not something specced
| for very high write endurance, or not speccing a larger amount
| of flash to spread the write endurance out over a period of up
| to 20, 25 years.
|
| The problem is that there isn't any wear leveling happening at
| all, so if you have an event that happens at every boot up and
| is logged, it wears the same block every time.
|
| > not making that a socketed/removable part. It's a very
| integrated module, I don't think socketed ICs have been a thing
| in automtive for a long time.
|
| edit: I'm wrong, daughter post has a nice run down
|
| If you're curious the very long forum thread is a lovely
| read.[1] You can see the chip levels itself, because just
| soldering in a bigger chip with the same code on it makes a big
| difference to many customers.
|
| https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/threads/consolidated-emmc-th...
| gorkish wrote:
| > The problem is that there isn't any wear leveling happening
| at all, so if you have an event that happens at every boot up
| and is logged, it wears the same block every time.
|
| This isn't true. Very nearly all eMMC devices have hardware
| wear leveling. They aren't like MTD (raw flash) devices or
| very cheap USB/SD where you have to rely on a block remapping
| layer or special filesystem because there is no hardware wear
| leveling. But like any flash device, when they are completely
| full there are fewer free blocks for the wear leveling to
| operate. Tesla also may have had them grossly misconfigured,
| but I haven't seen any evidence that it was anything other
| than good-old-fashioned log churn on a very full filesystem.
| I also understand Google kind of had them over a barrel with
| policies related to the caching of map data and aerial
| imagery too: since they could not retain this for very long,
| caches were constantly invalidated and the same data was
| being redownloaded over and over. At this point, I don't even
| think they cache map imagery to storage anymore.
|
| Regardless of the technical details, it's clear that Tesla
| gave little consideration to this problem during design and
| did even further damage by wasting their small remaining
| space by filling it up with Elon's glorious vision of fart
| sounds, fireplace videos, and games -- Which are great fun,
| not gonna lie, but in hindsight a terrible decision that
| greatly exacerbated this problem.
|
| I'm not a professional embedded systems person by any
| stretch, but I was watching out for this problem even in my
| hobby projects back in the 90's which used early flash memory
| products like DiskOnChip modules. To this day, I still buy
| SSD's that are a minimum of twice as large as I think I will
| need for every application? For things like all-flash SAN I
| double it yet again. Anyone who would like to understand why
| can look at my fat stacks of dead Intel SSDs that all died
| basically because they filled up. My point is that this sort
| of thing is really well known and there must have been
| hundreds of times people within Tesla had questioned this
| internally.
| wmf wrote:
| The socketed version of eMMC is called SD; it's pretty
| popular.
| walrus01 wrote:
| I didn't mean literally socketed, but in 2012 things like
| msata interface cards (a predecessor of m.2) absolutely were
| a thing. Or implemented soldered on a custom small pcb to
| edge pin interface not very different in size and slot from a
| laptop sodimm.
| NathanielK wrote:
| That's pretty neat. Do you have any pictures? I have never
| seen that before from automotive OEMs.
| pound wrote:
| re 4) - this is what Tesla does a lot :(
|
| In Model3 you can move front passenger seat forward and up (to
| clean up in the back) all the way to the point when it pushes
| on sun visor and cracks the mirror in it. Just by using handles
| intended to move the seat, no manual pressure or anything,
| there are no limitation on how far it goes and it's strong
| enough.. Tesla service centers blame owners for that and charge
| full replacement cost for the visor :\
| walrus01 wrote:
| Just out of morbid curiosity, what does this visor cost to
| replace? I'm guessing $299
| pound wrote:
| Actually it wasn't too expensive - something like half of
| that (I don't remember exact number, but mid-100s).
|
| It was more of a feeling that I shouldn't be paying for it
| at all that displeased me :( (and reddit is full of stories
| when it happened with others (with the same service
| centers' experience))
| pound wrote:
| One more thing that has no solution now but I'm sure
| Tesla will not fix it at all or will charge a lot for it:
|
| White interior and black seatbelts. Despite Musks's
| promises how durable white interior is, seatbelts they
| use are dyed with I don't know what and they mar the
| seats. It's permanently baked in and cannot be removed..
| Tesla responded long time ago that they are looking for
| solution, but whatever they will change will definitely
| not apply to any existing (screwed-up) white interior
| owners.
| buran77 wrote:
| One thing people don't understand about cost saving is that
| it almost always looks good in the short term. You save a lot
| of money by using commercial grade parts (like eMMC, the
| dashboard screen, etc.), or by hiring SW and HW engineers who
| have never worked in the automotive or embedded environment.
| It's sacrificing quality for quantity and price. But it's
| usually the customers who pay for it all, one way or another.
|
| From Tesla's perspective the bet might have payed off, by the
| time this becomes an actual problem for them, they're already
| over the hump and weathered the worst of times, and can
| afford to spec them better (one would hope they learned
| something from this although I have my doubts). In reality
| probably the real reason this worked for Tesla is Musk's
| ability to build a fanatical fanbase that can drown out any
| other voice.
| pound wrote:
| Funny thing is while I was okay with buying Tesla, it was
| Musk's personality attached to it that really bugged me..
| So while there is a (quite loud) fanbase, there is also a
| group of potential Tesla owners who may go other route just
| due to desire to not be associated with "meme king"
| onethought wrote:
| The (actual) founders of Tesla are much more interesting
| and compelling than Elon in this regard
| buran77 wrote:
| The idea was that there is a critical mass of people
| which are vocal enough to help Musk push Tesla's public
| image past any blunder. No other car manufacturer has
| this kind of clout.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| >No other car manufacturer has this kind of clout.
|
| Toyota does.
|
| Though they did put out ~20yr of great cars (emphasis on
| _cars_ ) to get that.
| buran77 wrote:
| Could be but the clout I'm talking about is how easily
| they're let off the hook after repeated blunders. I
| personally doubt Toyota could get away with Tesla's QA
| for a few years. Hard to judge in practice though.
| mattbee wrote:
| Tesla learned from Toyota's playbook! At least they were
| settling their "unintended acceleration" issue as Tesla
| were getting started: Deny and minimise systemic faults,
| recall quietly if ever, and blame it on the user wherever
| possible. I think they paid billion dollar fine in the
| US?
|
| I had a 2002 Celica that tried to kill me (gas pedal that
| got stuck under the floor mat at 90... 95... 100... on
| the M62) but I loved it too much to hold a grudge.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| Toyota has fixed the frame on the Tacoma and pinky
| promised the new ones won't rust out every year since
| 1990ish and recalled something every year since 2000ish.
| People find all sorts of ways to hand-wave it away.
|
| And then there was that decade where they made trucks and
| SUVs with ball joints that would pop out with levels of
| wear that would be inconsequential had they designed them
| conventionally.
|
| I guess the above are engineering examples. Their QA is
| definitely spot on.
| carlmr wrote:
| How are the numbers cars sold vs cars recalled though?
| Toyota is one of the largest car producers in the world
| while Tesla is tiny by comparison.
| buran77 wrote:
| Don't leave out the scale. Toyota sells almost 10 million
| vehicles per year across some dozens of models. Tacoma
| makes about 2% of that. Any manufacturer might have a few
| problematic models in their lineup (especially specific
| model years). But when it's across the board you have a
| problem. It's not just one factory, one model, one year,
| one batch. You can twist and turn it until the situation
| looks the same between the 2 brands but if we're being
| honest, it's not. In one case it looks like exceptions,
| in the other like a rule.
| yumraj wrote:
| And that is why there is only one real threat, if it is
| even real, from Apple.
|
| If Apple actually makes a half decent EV, it will put a
| massive dent in Tesla..
| jbob2000 wrote:
| Haha, if you think that's bad, try driving a jeep. You don't
| even have to drive it for it to break!
| camjohnson26 wrote:
| My jeep has 60k miles and never any issues
| fl0wenol wrote:
| Even as an anecdote, that's not impressive.
| camjohnson26 wrote:
| Ok? Counter example to "breaks even if you don't drive
| it"
| Foomf wrote:
| This is exactly my experience with the jeep my family had.
| However, there's a big caveat: the jeep engine itself was
| perfect. Over the 15 or so years we had it, that engine was
| solid. Everything else in the jeep failed at some point or
| another, and had nothing to do with driving. I have a few
| examples off the top of my head: The heated seats died
| after a few months. The insides of the car doors became
| detached because the glue wasn't strong enough. One by one
| the dashboard knobs all split apart at one point or
| another. We were a normal family, there were no crazy kids
| or pets in it that went nuts on the inside. Our jeep just
| kind of disintegrated around us, and none of the problems
| had to do with actually driving the jeep. So yes, we didn't
| even need to drive it for it to fall apart.
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| "There's only one Jeep" because all the others fell apart.
| SigmundA wrote:
| My Jeep Wrangler does not have any physical interference
| issues regarding seats breaking mirrors and the only issue
| I have had is the rear main seal started leaking and they
| happily replaced under warranty at 4 years and 6 months no
| questions asked.
| toddmorey wrote:
| That's really disappointing to hear.
|
| I've owned a Model S since before the Model 3 arrived and
| have always fretted that the level of service I received
| wasn't sustainable at scale.
|
| They AGGRESSIVELY attacked any problems and replaced parts,
| even when that's not what I asked for.
|
| It's kinda nuts. Just the things I can remember:
|
| - All 4 door handles were replaced with newer versions - I
| complained about a corner of stitching on the driver's seat
| and got an entirely new driver's seat - Glovebox cover
| replaced (to address latch) - Steering wheel controls
| replaced - Driver display unit replaced entirely - Sunroof
| replaced
|
| Granted, that's A LOT of parts to address, but their attitude
| was we'll do anything to make it right. Never once pushed
| back or questioned. Usually told me that they wanted to
| replace the part (rather than fix) because Tesla had
| engineered an improved version. And, to their credit, the new
| parts they put in seemed to have meaningful improvements and
| have worked really well.
| andykellr wrote:
| As a 2013 Model S owner and now a 2018 and 2021 Model 3
| owner (Tesla only family), I agree 100%. I assumed there
| were a few reasons for the Model S service I received:
|
| 1. Small scale
|
| 2. Desire to keep early adopters happy
|
| 3. 2x the cost of the Model 3
|
| However, my Model 3 service has been really poor.
|
| In my new 2021 the charge port bolt was loose and wouldn't
| charge. Known issue that took several days and many phone
| calls to get fixed while traveling. Eventually a service
| manager got involved and the fix took 5 minutes.
|
| Then they installed Homelink and forgot to plug the front
| sensors back in. Full self-driving was unavailable for 3
| weeks until they returned to plug in the sensors.
|
| Also ordered snow tires from Tesla and the TPMS sensors
| don't work in my car (2021 uses BLE sensors). They're
| ordering new sensors and I will need to take my wheels to a
| tire store to have them installed.
|
| It's been less than 2 months since I took delivery.
|
| Love the car, love the company, an enthusiastic
| shareholder, but service needs to be fixed.
| camjohnson26 wrote:
| "Love the car, but" has become a Tesla quality issue meme
| at this point.
| andykellr wrote:
| Of course if they made a Tesla with fewer issues and
| better service, I'd buy it. My 2018 Model 3 has had
| almost no issues. No other car company is making anything
| close so I'll put up with the service for now.
| szczys wrote:
| I mean, on your first point, it's an automotive grade part. I
| think any eMMC put under these conditions (75% full and the
| other 25% written heavily to with log files) is going to have a
| relatively short life expectancy.
|
| What baffles me is that who is reading these logs? Can't they
| just turn then off (pipe to /dev/null) and then have cars that
| need troubleshooting put into a debug mode at some point?
| kace91 wrote:
| I'm assuming they're some sort of airplane black box?
| amluto wrote:
| The OS was stock Ubuntu, I believe. It was not intended for
| this purpose.
| netsharc wrote:
| I think even stock Ubuntu it's not that hard (famous last
| words) to disable/redirect logs to /dev/null. It would take
| a competent engineer probably 1 day to configure it, even
| if they need to read Stack Overflow. They either didn't
| have the time, or they didn't even know it would be a
| problem.
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| I'd argue you've put those points in the reverse priority.
|
| 1. Admit you screwed up and apologise
|
| 2. Moving forward: make repairability a priority and use
| durable components
|
| 3. Open source some of the software, or allow third parties to
| scrutinise it
| tibbydudeza wrote:
| The software team probably never worked in an embedded
| automotive environment.
| walrus01 wrote:
| Ever scarier they might have never worked in an embedded-
| anything environment.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| The sad truth is you might be right. At a former company we
| had wear leveling in the firmware of IoT devices that would
| cost under 20$/piece so the fact that a car lacks such a
| basic feature, is shocking and tells me all I need to know
| about the development practices at Tesla.
|
| As a firmware engineer with automotive background, having
| now seen how the "sausage" is made there makes me stay away
| from them for the safety of my own life.
|
| I know the rest of he car manufacturers aren't as
| innovative or as desirable but at least some I worked for
| have their firmware development quality processes down to a
| religion, and, as boring as that may be, it's the kind of
| mentality you want from something you put your family into
| every day.
| colejohnson66 wrote:
| It did have wear leveling. They were just writing such an
| ungodly amount to it (more than the 8GB capacity) _per
| day_ it defeated the purpose of wear leveling.
| eldaisfish wrote:
| which is beside the point. the point being that competent
| and experienced people would have seen this coming and
| devised a solution.
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| > 4) asking the owners to pay for the replacement due to
| tesla's own screwup.
|
| I had an email from Tesla yesterday about this recall and as
| far as I can see I will not be expected to pay anything. It
| even says that if someone had the part replaced at their own
| cost that they might be able to get a refund. I live in Norway
| and have a 2015 S 70D.
|
| The email says:
|
| "Tesla har besluttet a frivillig og proaktivt tilbakekalle
| enkelte Model S og Model X som er bygget for mars 2018 og som
| er utstyrt med et 8 GB innebygd MultiMediaCard (eMMC) i MCU som
| kan oppleve en funksjonsfeil pa grunn av akkumulert slitasje.
| ... Hvis du allerede har betalt for reparasjoner som er
| tilknyttet til denne tilbakekallingen, kan du vaere kvalifisert
| for en refusjon."
|
| Google Translate does a good job on it:
|
| "Tesla has decided to voluntarily and proactively recall some
| Model S and Model X that were built before March 2018 and that
| are equipped with an 8 GB built-in MultiMediaCard (eMMC) in the
| MCU that may experience a malfunction due to accumulated wear.
| ... If you have already paid for repairs associated with this
| recall, you may be eligible for a refund."
|
| Hackaday's 'article' seems to be conflating what Tesla wanted
| to happen (and what they actually did before) with what is
| happening now.
|
| Or is Tesla in the US expecting owners to pay now as well as
| before?
| therealbilly wrote:
| Oh man, Tesla is not covering themselves in glory on this issue.
| C'mon Elon, step up and do the right thing. Don't burn your
| goodwill.
| vkou wrote:
| Why would he worry about concrete things, like customer
| service, when he can add three billion dollars to his on-paper
| wealth by sending two tweets about bitcoin?
|
| Responding to this sort of thing would mean acknowledging that
| TSLA's future is defined by something rooted in reality, as
| opposed to purely sentiment. As long as it doesn't actually
| have to stop and deal with these kinds of problems, its
| valuation is like that of dot-com startup - unbounded.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| I don't think it is fair to consider this unit to have been
| designed by a "major car company" as, at the time the design
| decision was made, Tesla was still a startup.
|
| That said, the response is fairly puzzling.
|
| It seems to me to be quite reasonable to consider the EMMC a wear
| item if they have determined that they don't want to make it
| survive the expected lifetime of the car. _However_ , if they are
| going to make that call, then they absolutely should be replacing
| these boards with ones where the EMMC component is on a field
| replaceable module that a dealer can swap out and a "hours of
| operation" metric for swapping it out.
|
| I used to joke that GM would put specific wear items in their
| vehicles, not because they couldn't design something that lasted,
| but instead so they could sell you the $500 GM specific tool you
| had to use to replace it periodically. A way of keeping
| "amateurs" from fixing the cars and pushing service calls to the
| dealers. That is what a "major car company" does in situations
| like this :-)
|
| On the plus side, many people didn't think Tesla would make it
| this far to have vehicles that had been on the road long enough
| _to_ wear out. So there is that.
| walrus01 wrote:
| > at the time the design decision was made, Tesla was still a
| startup.
|
| If you're going to sell a product, the Model S, at the same
| price range as a BMW M5, 7-series, or the equivalent Mercedes S
| class, it had better be a premium quality product. Start-up or
| no.
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| Wow, I guess I touched a nerve :-) Have you ridden in an
| early model S? Tried to repair a Roadster? I am a big fan of
| Tesla and impressed at what they pulled off, but I don't
| forget that when they started they cut all the corners.
|
| It is common, perhaps even expected, in startups when an
| engineer says, "Well this won't last more than 5 or 6 years"
| to be told by upper management, "Well if we're still around
| in 5 or 6 years, we'll do something about it."
|
| Given that Tesla is _not_ a startup these days, and _is_ on
| the other side of that chasm, I was surprised that their
| response here was "oh we'll replace the board with another
| board _with the same issue_. "
|
| Perhaps there is not a good understanding about the
| differences in the legal ramifications of a vehicle failing
| and resulting in property damage or loss of life from the
| failure of something considered a 'wear' item versus
| something that is not classified as a wear item.
|
| I am not a lawyer, one of my friends who does consumer
| product safety litigation and is a Tesla owner, immediately
| responded to this news that this was just Tesla trying to
| avoid criminal liability when a failing EMMC chip kills
| someone. Sure, they see everything in terms of liability :-)
| jsight wrote:
| > Perhaps there is not a good understanding about the
| differences in the legal ramifications of a vehicle failing
| and resulting in property damage or loss of life from the
| failure of something considered a 'wear' item versus
| something that is not classified as a wear item.
|
| This was my first thought as well. It feels like they were
| trying to avoid some implication beyond mere replacement of
| storage modules. Perhaps they are aware of some other
| component that will also fail at a high rate before the
| useful life of the vehicle?
| Retric wrote:
| That seems logical, but expensive niche cars tend to be worse
| in many ways than the mass market equivalents. BMW's more
| expensive cars for example are simply less reliable. At the
| extreme Bugatti Chiron skips a lot of modern car tech.
|
| It's always a trade off. New tech may mean better
| acceleration or whatnot, but you don't have 30+ years of
| reliability data to work from to refine things. The early
| years of automatic transmissions for example are words apart
| from what's available today.
| TheSpiceIsLife wrote:
| > you don't have 30+ years of reliability data
|
| Flash memory was invented in the 1980s, so yeah: we do.
| Retric wrote:
| Steel has been in mass production for well over 100 years
| and people still make the same mistakes today with new
| mechanical systems. Flaws often seem obvious after the
| fact, but that's when your looking at actual failures. If
| it never occurs to you that something could fail, well
| good luck.
| rcxdude wrote:
| An embedded engineer which is unaware of flash wear is
| incompetent. It's the number one failure mode of flash
| and more often than not drives the design decisions
| around it.
| Retric wrote:
| Aware of and accounted for are different thing. I mean
| metal fatigue is hardly some deep secret, yet it's
| constantly causing issues.
| ryanlol wrote:
| > BMW's more expensive cars for example are simply less
| reliable.
|
| Less reliable for the second or third owner.
| rsynnott wrote:
| > but you don't have 30+ years of reliability data to work
| from to refine things
|
| ... Hold on, are you suggesting that when this car came
| out, under a decade ago, no-one knew about Flash wear? If
| anything, people would have been more conscious of it then
| than now.
| Retric wrote:
| No, I am saying when designing a new system their isn't
| an automatic processes to discover faults.
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