I don't see how 'Tesla' is not top of the list here. For the 'Trouble Areas' I suspected they're normalizing over the 'length of ownership' which would bias the scores towards older car companies.
Tesla's reliability scores have always been pure and utter trash. This is the best result they have ever had. While other companies have a higher failure rate of major drivetrain components, Tesla is stuck somewhere between reinventing everything (thus lacking legacy knowledge) and not fixing things because they don't have the time/manpower for it. A great example of this is Model 3 Suspension failures. The Model 3 upper control arms are known to fail prematurely and seemingly, there is no fix. By all means, this is an extremely dangerous failure that can cause loss of vehicle control.
Germany has a far more serious inspection process than the US and the result for Tesla is truly a disaster:
https://www.autoevolution.com/news/tesla-model-3-is-the-car-...
> Tesla's reliability scores have always been pure and utter trash.
Linked article is literally reliability score that puts them dead center in the middle of the pack.
I'm amazed at the investment people have on arguments about Tesla, and this particular canard especially. I mean, they're cars? Sometimes they break? But not often? Some other brands are better. But some are worse!
It's a boring story about boring facts. Why is it so important to you (and so many other people) that this be a hyperbolic affront to all humanity and not just... a car company?
Or... that they're improving rapidly and we should celebrate that? Does that spin not work for you?
Look, again: they make cars. Cars are complicated devices and sometimes break. There's some, but not a lot, of variation between individual manufacturers in the frequency with which they break. And that's not very interesting, and doesn't justify the kind of outrage I'm seeing in threads like this.
Whatever has you guys all puffed up about this, it's not genuine concern for poor Tesla owners who spend 15% more time in the shop, or whatever.
I don't own a Tesla, but just from observing them on the road and in the neighbourhood I can tell there are many reliability issues just with the easily observable features:
* Model S third brake light has single LEDs failing one by one
* Model X doors don't open in sub-zero weather, friends of us had an ICE rental car for weeks last winter
* All models, automatic activation of rear driving lights at night does not work
* All models, cruise control or something will sometimes suddenly slam the brakes on wide open road, so you need to keep good distance
* Model 3 and Y automatic high beams / matrix LED don't function correctly at night if the car is dirty, they blind everyone on the road - I will be very surprised if this doesn't trigger a recall soon
* Model X front driving light clusters failing, I've seen several, all on the passenger side
* Model 3 and Y, rear lights plastic cracking like it's a 1980s Hyundai
> Model 3 and Y automatic high beams / matrix LED don't function correctly at night if the car is dirty, they blind everyone on the road - I will be very surprised if this doesn't trigger a recall soon
Is that what that is? I thought it was my eyes getting older when thinking car headlights are brighter at night than they used to be. We live in an area with a high % of Teslas on the road and this could explain a lot.
Well, yes and no. The first development which is more than ten years old at this point, was to have projector xenon lights that are veery bright below a sharp line. That line is supposed to be kept below eye level of oncoming traffic, and there is a sensor that adjusts the line height. In Europe there is also a requirement to have washers on the headlights if you have this. The system kind of works fine, except when it doesn't, for instance when driving over a curved hill where it cannot work due to geometry, or when a sensor fails.
Then in the past 3-4 years, matrix LED lights became popular, where you have an array of LEDs with narrow beam optics that are aimed in a slight spread, so that each LED covers a specific area of the road ahead. Then there is a sensor that detects oncoming traffic, and dims the one or two LEDs that point towards those cars.
On the Model 3 and Y there seems to be a particularly frequent failure mode with the matrix LED where the lights, or sometimes just one of them, doesn't detect oncoming traffic at all. It also occurs when they are driving behind someone.
Couple of weeks ago I was behind such a Tesla at night, and I had to just let him get far in front of me, because he kept getting blinked at with the ultra-powered high beams of every oncoming semi trailer. Of course the poor driver couldn't do a thing about it.
Well, - frozen doors, LEDs failing, misaligned headlights, radar/camera cruise control suddenly braking for no reason - there are all pretty common and happen to all cars, not just Teslas.
> don't see how 'Tesla' is not top of the list here
Tesla owners love their cars. This means they tend to overlook issues others might find unacceptable. If my car just refused to drive until I restarted it a few times, that would be a catastrophic fuckup. But I’ve seen Tesla owners shrug that away.
Which is fine! There have always been legendary cars with notorious maintenance issues. But base reliability matters to most, and it matters to track that neutrally.
Is it fine though? For people to use machines that are known to put others in danger? I'm referring to "FSD" doing absolutely bullshit things like not detecting objects in the way.
On the contrary, I'm impressed by how much Tesla has improved. They used to be second last, and the effort they've put into improving quality - especially on the Model 3 - is clearly paying off.
Often times "Reliability" is calculated as "fraction of cars that have a recall or other unscheduled maintenance during the initial N months of ownership" and I believe Tesla is actually quite high in this regard?
My Tesla has been much less costly to own over the last three years than my Honda Odyssey: I have had several mobile repair visits for cosmetic issues and some OTA “recalls” but I find it hard to believe that any ICE car is more “reliable” than a Model 3 that didn’t gave obvious QC issues at delivery.
I mean, much less maintenance in absolute terms: no oil changes, transmission trouble, etc. Mostly just replacing windshield wipers and tires. The mobile service issues were all basically cosmetic issues that wouldn’t really impact reliability.
