ALL POSTS - Replacement Traction Battery

[teaguecl]

Looks like I'm next for traction battery replacement. Car was gently used, 50K miles, no real issues until recently. It died while in motion and accelerating. Toyota has had the vehicle for 6 weeks, and have just notified me that both the motor and traction battery are being replaced. Unfortunately, they don't have an ETA for getting the parts from Tesla - anecdotally they say the last battery they ordered took 3 months. So I'm without a vehicle for 2-5 months

[Jonathan_UK]

I might be next for a battery swap too.

I'm at 97K mileage, and the car lost all power on the freeway yesterday. After I pulled over, it would only go into neutral or park. Had both the Check EV warning and power steering warnings come up on the display. It's now at Carlsbad, awaiting diagnostics.

Update 2nd April 19: Not as lucky as I first thought. Confirmed motor failure.

[teaguecl]

Looks like I'm next for traction battery replacement. Car was gently used, 50K miles, no real issues until recently. It died while in motion and accelerating. Toyota has had the vehicle for 6 weeks, and have just notified me that both the motor and traction battery are being replaced. Unfortunately, they don't have an ETA for getting the parts from Tesla - anecdotally they say the last battery they ordered took 3 months. So I'm without a vehicle for 2-5 months

I just got my car back - total of 5 months waiting for the motor, and 7 weeks for the battery. Has anyone else had a motor replacement? My car seems much more tame (sluggish acceleration) with the new motor. It is, however, a heck of a lot quieter than it was before!

[miimura]

Looks like I'm next for traction battery replacement. Car was gently used, 50K miles, no real issues until recently. It died while in motion and accelerating. Toyota has had the vehicle for 6 weeks, and have just notified me that both the motor and traction battery are being replaced. Unfortunately, they don't have an ETA for getting the parts from Tesla - anecdotally they say the last battery they ordered took 3 months. So I'm without a vehicle for 2-5 months

I just got my car back - total of 5 months waiting for the motor, and 7 weeks for the battery. Has anyone else had a motor replacement? My car seems much more tame (sluggish acceleration) with the new motor. It is, however, a heck of a lot quieter than it was before!

My car felt exactly the same after I got it back from drive unit replacement for noise last year. It was just much quieter. I only waited 2 weeks for the motor to come in and it was installed within one day.

[TonyWilliams]

If the motor is not making as much power as the previous ones, there’s some kind of problem.

[asavage]

Battery replacement time for mine.

73k miles. Has previously had these replaced over its lifetime:

Onboard-charger
DC-DC inverter
Heater
Drive Unit

Had to have it towed for the first time in my ownership, two weeks ago. I checked in every other day, all they would tell me is "needs a battery, waiting for fts". Now, I'm being told by Toyota of Seattle to arrange to have it shipped to California for battery replacement. I called Toy. Cust. Svc. and they are looking into that advice for confirmation; I suspect it will not have to be shipped south.

Driving my Sienna to commute -- ugh. I hate gas stations.

[asavage]

Yup, I have to ship it to Auburn in Calif., as nobody in Seattle has the battery lift equipment. That's the Toyota line. I pay to have it shipped to Auburn, Toyota will consider reimbursement of that portion.

Getting it back to Seattle is all on me, though.

[davewill]

There's only one thing to do...drive it to San Diego, put in a JDemo, then road trip back home.

[asavage]

Well, I don't need a road trip right now. My RAV4 EV doesn't need a JDemo -- it's my commuter, and never goes anywhere I need to fast-charge; I have the Tesla for longer trips.

I thought about driving it back north from Auburn, but I burn more in lost wages than having it shipped, and like I said: I don't need a road trip right now.

The shipper, Global Auto Transportation, had to get an extra $50 to Auburn; Toyota said it was in Sacramento, but Auburn is NE of there. And there was a $100 surcharge to winch it onto the trailer. So, $795 one-way.

$1500 round-trip is a chunk of change, but it seems the best I can do right now. I do hope the parts failure ramps down a bit going forward.

[edit 13Sep2019 ALS]
Received VM from Toyota's Alex Green: replacement HV battery has arrived at Auburn Toyota. ETA for completion of replacement: early next week (16-18Sep).

[later]
Received a reimbursement check from Toyota today for $800, for what I paid up-front to have the car shipped from Seattle to Auburn Toyota. That was a lot faster than Alex Green led me to expect.

[19Sep]
Got four shipping estimates to bring the car back to Seattle, all were $800-$1000. Flew to Sacramento ($300), Lyft to Auburn ($55), picked up car.

[21Sep]
760 miles, (11) charge stops (most @ 4 hours each @ 6kw) and I'm back home. Slept in the car. Total about $100 plus above.

[asavage]

I've had the replacement HV battery assy. for a couple of weeks and about 1500 miles, and I have a new noise, one that was definitely not present the first 70k miles.

With battery charge above 1/3, and road speed above 30 MPH, if I floor the accel, after a one second pause I hear a continuous squeal. From the LR area of the car. It's fairly repeatable. I didn't really notice it for a long time, because my hearing is only fair (esp. high frequencies) and I run NPR fairly loud to compensate, but I heard it the third time yesterday afternoon and turned off the radio and did a few running tests; it was reproducible a dozen times.

ISTR this was related to battery contactors in early Model Ss?

[later]

Google was my friend: Tesla Tech Note TN-13-16-002 R1, 13 Sep2013

TN-13-16-002 R1 Tesla Motors Inc
September 12. 2013 Tech Notes

Tech Note: Battery Contactor Squeal

Tech Notes are internal announcements that help to communicate and track new information about Tesla Service concerns

This Tech Note supersedes TN-13-16, dated 22-July-22 [sic]. [ . . . ]

What the Customer Sees

A customer might notice a squealing sound from the rear of the vehicle while driving, usually during hard acceleration. The sound often begins around 40 MPH during heavy throttle, but can sometimes be heard at lower speeds and lower throttle positions. This noise has recently been mis-identified on public forums by some customers as delamination of the windings in the stator. It is actually unrelated to the motor.

What the Technician Sees

The squeal can differ slightly from vehicle to vehicle. It is a high-pitched tone that has been described as 'air escaping from a balloon' or as a steady, almost electronic tone. The tone might waver slightly with accelerator pedal position. It is not the same as the"spool-up" whine that is normal during hard acceleration, and does not have a rising pitch.

If the noise is identified as rear acceleration squeal after a test drive by the Service technician, do not attempt any kind of repair.

What to Tell the Customer

While electric vehicle powertrains are significantly quieter than vehicles with an [sic] internal combustion engine powertrains, they are not completely silent; they emit both mechanical and electrical sounds that might seem unusual at first to occupants of the vehicle.

The Model S Performance features a 310 kW motor, which is far more powerful than the electric motors in most other all electric vehicles. These very high levels of power occasionally result in behaviors that might seem unusual, but are actually normal.

In this case, under hard acceleration the main contactors inside the HV battery might vibrate as large amounts of current flow from the battery to the motor. These vibrations might result in a squealing sound. Depending on ambient temperature and the age of the battery, these vibrations might happen at different power levels over time.

Both the vibrations and the squealing sound have been validated by Tesla Motors to be normal characteristics of operation, and do not indicate any kind of fault, problem, or defect in the safe and reliable operation of the Model S powertrain. The system is operating as expected, and no repairs are necessary.

TN-13-16-002 Rl TESLA Page 1 of 1

It's a bit disappointing to have a "normal" noise where once it was silent.

[Added 21Aug2022 -- three years later]
The contactor noise gradually faded away; I cannot reproduce it now. It was about a year of daily driving before it was completely silenced. Odd but true.