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Rental firm walks away from Tesla order after quality dispute
- semantic_x 7y agoModel 3 is assembled outside in a tent, what did they expect?
- dplgk 7y agoPerhaps Tesla wanted them to cancel the order because they couldn't fulfill it and that's why they delivered sub-par vehicles that they know would be throughly scrutinized.
- epistasis 7y agoThat seems like a needlessly complicated way to cancel an order that also makes Tesla look bad.
- dplgk 7y agoMight look less bad than "we can't fill that order"
- smacktoward 7y agoAh yes, the famous "I meant to do that!" defense.
- chc 7y agoThe idea that Tesla couldn't produce 85 cars and thus intentionally produced 15 bad cars when they could have produced 15 good cars seems a bit far-fetched.
- dplgk 7y agoWell the reality seems to be they couldn't 15 good cars.
- thatgerhard 7y agoTesla in the news again for something that wouldn't be considered news for any other car manufacturer.
- danhak 7y agoSeriously...85 units. A cancellation of a $5.5 million contract would not warrant articles on Reuters and Bloomberg were it any other company.
- dragontamer 7y agoIts a cancellation of a $5.5 Million contract on top of news from falling sales in Germany. The overall "plot" being discussed is whether or not Q3 2019 will have more, or less, revenue than Q2 2019. Stories like this point towards "less revenue", which is worrisome for sure.
- danhak 7y agoCan you provide a source for falling Germany sales?
- dragontamer 7y agohttps://insideevs.com/news/363047/tesla-model-3-orders-germany-july/ https://insideevs.com/news/363047/tesla-model-3-orders-germa... > Jan: 911 > Feb: 835 > Mar: 811 > Apr: 735 > May: 664 > June: 795 > July: 733 Model S and X sales are also down.
- danhak 7y agoso...pretty stable since Q1 which is when Model 3 deliveries began there.
- dragontamer 7y agoQ1 averaged 852 / month. July was 733 / month, or a drop of 14%. That's a double-digit drop from a company claiming to have a growth story.
- tastygreenapple 7y agoIt's a shame that Tesla has build quality issues, but it's rich that a car company in a country known for making expensive cars with defective designs is panning a foreign automaker for quality issues.
- pkulak 7y agoI see you've never driven a Germany luxury car.
- rootusrootus 7y agoI have. Loved the service, but I did get a chuckle out of the little things that broke precisely because they were overengineered unnecessarily.
- Shebanator 7y agoI've owned many, many BMWs over the past twenty years. I spent way more time and energy fixing quality issues on those BMWs in their first year than I have on my Tesla. The Porsche Boxster I bought in 2015 was much better than the BMWs in its first year. But it did have a broken convertible top motor upon delivery. And that car just got totalled by my insurance company, because a defective firewall caused water to leak into the interior and destroyed the electronics and interior. The dealer estimated $48K to fix. Yes, $48K.
- driverdan 7y agoKeep it and turn it into a track car.
- Shebanator 7y agoThanks for the idea. But given my experience I've kinda soured on Porsche, plus parts are so damn expensive. My plan is to take part of the settlement and get/make a track-prepped miata. Edit: But of course if someone feels so sorry for my tale of woe that they gift me a GT3, I wouldn't turn it down :-)
- kryogen1c 7y ago>Nextmove said its Model 3 vehicles had paint defects, faulty wiring, scratches on the dashboard, faulty wheels and condensation in the headlights. This seems like a pretty significant list of defects for only 85 cars. Assuming one incedence per defect, 5 / 85 ~= 6%. Thats a high rate of failure from tesla. Hopefully damage is being incurred during transit. Tesla is still responsible, of course, but its better than having bad core processes.
- rconti 7y agoOne issue our Model 3 had was 2 defroster wires were burned out. I didn't notice it until ~5mo after delivery. The glass is made by Saint-Gobain, so arguably it's not Tesla's 'fault'. Would it have happened with another auto manufacturer? I'm not sure how to assess that. I suppose it could have been caused in installation or handling of the vehicle, rather than in manufacturing. Or perhaps the materials and design the automaker specs were the source of the problem more than the manufacturer of the glass itself?
- dragontamer 7y ago> Would it have happened with another auto manufacturer? Of course. But other auto manufacturers have better service / warranty service. When you're looking at a fleet-wide deployment of many vehicles, those warranty / service agreements become more important. No reasonable business expects perfection from any auto manufacturer, they just expect warranty / service at a decent rate for any given problem.
- rconti 7y agoYou didn't ask me how my warranty service was. I still think it's an open question whether it would have happened with another manufacturer. My gut feeling is 95% "yes", but design/handling/installation/testing (or lack thereof) could absolutely mean that Tesla is more likely to suffer these problems than another manufacturer.
- dragontamer 7y ago
- luckydata 7y agofrom the article "“We believe the customer’s decision not to take delivery of its remaining Model 3 orders wasn’t entirely due to quality issues, but was largely influenced by their frustration with an unrelated dispute from earlier in the year,” Tesla said in a statement, without elaborating further." Translated: Nextmove wanted fleet discounts Tesla wasn't willing to provide and they grasped at straws to get out of the contract. Model 3 famously had fit and finish issues in the first runs but most issues are resolved and the quality of vehicles coming off the line now is pretty good. The famous panel gaps issues, I dare anyone to go measure them on your current car and on a Tesla built in the second half of 2019 and tell me if it's any different. I've seen BMW with pretty questionable craftmanship and tons of electrical issues that are super expensive to resolve. This is a non news.
- close04 7y ago> Translated: Is this a personal opinion type translation or are you (hypothetically wink) referencing some inside information from either one of the parties?
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- luckydata 7y agoI live in Fremont. That's all you need to know.
- clouddrover 7y ago> This is a non news. These fleet operators have had similar issues: https://www.thedrive.com/tech/27725/tesla-fleet-company-struggles-raise-questions-about-robotaxi-plans https://www.thedrive.com/tech/27725/tesla-fleet-company-stru... How do you translate their experience with Teslas?
- AndrewBissell 7y agoHere's a tweet from another EU rental agency saying they encountered the same issues as Nextmove. Maybe they're crooked too! https://twitter.com/chrisheiligers/status/1162382518211010561 https://twitter.com/chrisheiligers/status/116238251821101056...
- CPLX 7y agoThe fit and finish of Teslas is absolutely embarrassing by any standard, but by the standards of German car makers it’s a total joke. My theory has always been that Tesla is pretty much done the day BMW and MB and Audi get the hang of the electric thing. The experience of sitting in a $70k+ Tesla is below that of a Honda Civic. There’s a limit to how long that’s going to last in a competitive market.
- danhak 7y ago> The experience of sitting in a $70k+ Tesla is below that of a Honda Civic. As someone who has owned two Honda Civics and now owns a Model 3 you are laughably off the mark here. > Tesla is pretty much done the day BMW and MB and Audi get the hang of the electric thing. "Netflix is pretty much done the day Blockbuster gets the hang of the online thing." "Apple is pretty much done the day Nokia gets the hang of the smartphone thing." It's astounding to me how a community of technologists and entrepreneurs still can't grasp the innovator's dilemma at play here. Tesla's lead is accelerating every year as a new Tesla killer has been perpetually "around the corner." Cadillac ELR, BMW i3, Chevy Bolt, Chevy Volt, Audi E-Tron, Jaguar I-Pace were all supposed to eat Tesla's lunch. Just look at the sales numbers. Not even close.
- SimbaOnSteroids 7y agoPlus their infrastructure lead is literally gargantuan. Charging stations are everywhere, without them you might as well not have roads they can drive on.
- Sohcahtoa82 7y agoI must be missing something because I'm not sure why this matters when Tesla has made their patents open. Can't someone else make a car that can use a Tesla supercharger? Why wouldn't another manufacturer make their cars compatible with Tesla's charging network, then sell that as a massive feature?
- gergles 7y ago
- zaroth 7y agoOne possible issue I have heard about regarding paint problems in particular is that California State and Bay Area local authorities have particularly tight limits on VOCs in terms of lbs per gallon of paint, and in terms of total annual lbs of VOC emissions which the Tesla paint shops are allowed to emit. I believe the Federal standard is 5.0lbs/gallon but CA limits that further to 3.5lbs/gallon. Apparently it’s pretty hard to make decent hard coat paint with that little VOC emissions. The BAAQMD (Bay Area Air Quality Management District) also permits Tesla paint shops for a maximum total annual VOC emission level. This level could be low enough that either the paint shop becomes a production bottleneck, or they have to find ways to use less paint per vehicle. It can’t be easy to manufacture cars in the regulatory environment that is the Bay Area, and many of these regs have tightened significantly since GM & Toyota closed NUMMI in 2010. CARB VOC limits, and local air quality district regulations in particular. I’m sure this is an issue that all manufacturers are facing to some degree, but it’s interesting how the location of the final assembly plants can have a big impact on the regulations and therefore the finishing processes that can be used. EDIT: That’s not to say the limits should not exist, or Tesla should be granted a waiver, etc.
- JohnJamesRambo 7y agoThe Bay Area seems like a really poor choice of location to manufacture anything where cost is a factor.
- _nhynes 7y agoNot least of which software...
- joshAg 7y agoIs there not a way to capture the VOCs using a hermetically sealed painting area and filtering?
- dmitrygr 7y agoYes, but it is hard to install a fume hood in a tent...
- jmpman 7y agoThe Tesla panel gap spec on the front hood is 4.5mm +/- 1.5mm. One side could be 3mm, and the other 6mm, and that would be considered within spec. I just took my Model 3 in for panel gap issues yesterday (new as of 5 weeks ago), and their fix, although an improvement, wasn’t nearly the quality I’d expect on a car in the same class as a BMW, but it was “in spec”. I forced the tech to show me the spec document. After confirming with a panel gap gauge that the gap on the front was 6mm and within spec, I told the tech that it still didn’t look right. His advice was to leave it as it is, because other cars with similar gaps haven’t really been adjusted properly... when one panel is properly gap’d, the others are then wrong. Whatever method they’re using in the field to fix the gap problem isn’t able to reliably get consistent gaps.
- semantic_x 7y agoThe unibody is probably twisted, they would have to put it on a frame pulling machine. I've seen totalled and rebuilt cars have higher tolerance gaps.