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Comment by maxdo | Hacker News Reader

because it's a single incident, there is nothing to recall.

So why can't they install the brake pad without keeping the car for close to a month? They are building model 3s on the assembly line right now right? They have brake pads in the factory? Pull one out of there and put it in this messed up car. If that means delaying assembly of an in-manufacturing model 3 til there are more brake pads, then so be it. You need to have enough brake pads to equip all your cars, especially the cars that you have already shipped.

It is quite likely that the caliper will need to be replaced. The hydraulic pressure that would normally activate the brakes has likely pushed the piston out, possibly making contact with the rotor under pressure (or making the seals suspect, having allowed them to travel beyond their design range). That’s the “worrying scraping sound” the owner reported.

Your point about “they must have the parts in the country” is a valid one, but it’s probably not going to be just a forgotten pad that they’ll need to slap in there. As a shade tree mechanic, if I’d somehow put my car back on the road without a brake pad, I’d do more than that. I doubt Tesla’s going to think differently with liability on the line.

Yeah, the caliper and rotor seems like more stuff they should have on hand though. And at first it sounded like just a missing pad.

I don't do my own brakes and don't know about the caliper, but rotor replacement is pretty routine, I thought. They usually resurface them whenever they replace pads, and replace them once they get too thin. So having no spares seems a little bit too JIT for a car company.

Pads and rotor are indeed regular wear parts, and even calipers are readily available for most every car (more from rust or crash damage than wear, but still fairly common and on the shelf in a warehouse serving every town of 50K+ people). It’s puzzling that they can’t manage to fix this car; only thing I can think of is no one has the authority to say “pull a kit from the line and fly it out there if you have to!”

You think Musk hasn’t seen this article yet?

I would think it needs a new caliper seal and piston, and possibly a rotor if the old one was gouged beyond the minimum thickness --- otherwise it can be machined smooth again in a brake lathe.

If the repair is that intense, they should swap her Tesla for a non defective lemon straight off the line (same color) and fix it if/when they get a chance. Or give her her damn money back and let her buy a different car.

That intense? It’s like having a flat tire and replacing the tire and wheel. Once that’s done, the car is as good as new. There’s no lingering concern.

It's intense enough that Tesla has postponed repairs three times, and still hasn't fixed it. I have no doubt it will be fine once fixed. My point is that Yeala should just replace the brand new car with another one off the line and repair the defective one at their leisure. Or give her her money back like she asked for. At this point, she's owned the car for four weeks, and Tesla has had it for most of that time. And before that, she had a horrible experience.

We don't know that. We have a single report so far, just like GM apparently got.

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