2021 TESLA MODEL Y Unknown Or Other Problems

123 NHTSA complaints on file

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All Unknown Or Other Complaints — Page 2

#11535764 | Crash 1 Death
My mother was involved in a fatal crash on August 30, 2022. We believe there was something unusual that occurred with the Tesla Model Y as it was on a quiet residential street and the car seems to have accelerated suddenly and she hit a pole. We are still waiting on the California Highway Patrol report.
#11531125 |
1.What component or system failed or malfunctioned, and is it available for inspection upon request? After closing the passenger side door, The 12v battery that controls the Tesla cabin died without any prior warning or car notification that it needed to be replaced, as a result the car instantly powered down , disabling the a/c, windows and door locks and we were unable to open the doors to access the car. 2. How was your safety or the safety of others put at risk? At the time of the event no, just our personal belongings were trapped inside the car but as a parent of a small child I usually put my child in her car seat first and close the door then get in my seat, if this had occurred with my child being in the car , my only option would be to smash in the window to...
#11524804 | Crash
Tesla full self driving drove off highway curb and dropped 10 feet down, vehicle was total loss, airbags popped. There was a car trying to change to Tesla lane, Tesla overacted and took over control, and driver was unable to take back the control while in full self driving mode, no warning sign whatsoever during the accident, Tesla just drove off high way curb by itself. No collision between Tesla and other car. As experienced driver for over 30 years, I have never had accidents at fault, never made such silly mistake to drive off high way.
#11516785 |
The plugs and door latches on both rear doors have repeatedly failed, endangering the safety of my family and other occupants of the vehicle. I am concerned about the safety of drivers and passengers and believe that this issue requires your immediate attention. The plugs and door latches on both rear doors of my Tesla Model Y have failed repeatedly. The failure of the door latches and plugs has repeatedly endangered the safety of the occupants, particularly children who may be unable to exit the car in an emergency situation. The door trim falls out of place, locking the occupants in the back of the car. This problem has been reproduced and confirmed by the dealer, as evidenced by my car's multiple visits to the service center for the same issue. Attached are the documents, they are all for the same issue - though tesla classified them inconsistently. The vehicle...
#11515867 |
Right side passenger door doesn’t open. Since I purchased the car Tesla has fixed the problem but it keeps reappearing. My concern is that if I get in to an accident passengers in the rear seat can get stuck as the door doesn’t open either from inside or outside.
#11509846 |
It seems like this is a common problem if you search "tesla phantom braking," which very obviously needs a solution. I commonly experience the phantom braking when there is a shadow like passing under a bridge. The car will slam on the brakes thinking the shadow is another car, which is obviously extremely dangerous especially on the highway. A simple solution would be to add a legacy cruise control option, while fixing the phantom braking. This would cause a lot less wrecks and deaths.
#11509105 |
The vehicle heating/defrost system is not functioning in cold weather. It only functions in my heated garage. In cold weather it cannot defrost causing visibility issues, driver distraction (trying to get the heat/defrost to work while driving) and a reduction in blood flow to the extremities. The heating system blows freezing cold air into the cabin when on. I have written a lemon law letter to Tesla, demanding the vehicle be replaced under Alaska law, and they have not done so after 80+ days. The vehicle’s supermanifold was damaged the day we took delivery. Tesla has not honored Alaska law and I’ll be filing paperwork with the state’s attorney general’s office. Tesla should not be allowed to operate in the State of Alaska due to committing an unfair trade act in the State of Alaska and endangering the lives of their customers.
#11509137 |
On February 20, 2023, my infotainment system console and screen completely failed as I was backing up to a Supercharger. This started with the typical lag I have filed service complaints for before, the camera occlusions, and then nearly caused an accident with the barrier pole in front of the Supercharger. This is the eighth near miss in over a year of ownership and the 27th occurrence of issues related to the infotainment system console and screen. Often, it is burning hot, other times it is woefully underpowered to accomplish anything in a timely manner (if at all) when these incidents occur. I have been to the Tesla service center twice about this very issue. Each time, I was told software update would be issued that would fix the problem(s). That has never been the case. With everything so reliant upon that center-mount display and its associated computer in this...
#11508476 |
While driving the all functionality was lost and the screen went black
#11507938 | Crash
I was in 2 accidents with this car within a span of less than a year all with the same problem. I had not been in any accident over 40 plus years until this car. First incident was at a drive through when creeping up to the next window the car took off hyperaccelerating. I was able to avoid the truck in front of me from back ending her however scraped her tailpipe causing extensive damage to my car. She then hit the car in front of her. Second incident was approaching my home in my 20-30 mph neighborhood and went to go from 20-30 when car accelerated at a fast speed and was unable to control it being it happened so fast. Hit a tree. All the airbags went off. I could have been seriously injured as anyone who had been on bikes or walking .
#11502777 |
Heatpump failed which caused a lack of cabin heat and in warmer weather would have caused charging issues due to lack of cooling possibly leaving me stranded. This had a warning on screen about loss of cabin conditioning. This happened over a mountain pass and caused the cabin temp to drop to 25F with two kids in car seats. This could be a really bad situation, luckily we had blankets and such to keep warm for the last few hours of the drive. I believe this was caused by an earlier TSB with sensor replacements and a software change done earlier in the life of my car for heatpump issues. This most likely caused wear on the pump and caused it to fail prematurely just out of warranty. The system was replaced by Tesla at significant cost and confirmed metal shavings in the system from the heatpump. I requested to...
#11502117 |
The driver side window doesn’t roll all the way up when trying to close it automatically with one button push. It goes partially up the side and then will automatically roll down.
#11502070 |
Autobraking works sometimes and it doesn't many a times consistently. Also, there is a bad smell that keeps coming regularly. Not sure where that is coming from.
#11501660 |
I was using the new version of the full self driving on surface streets. It was my second time using the system (yesterday was the first on the freeway and it seemed odd). Today it sped up and veered towards a car parked in the middle lane. I grabbed the wheel and thought it might have been an innocent error. Then a few minutes later the car took control again and tried to turn (quickly) into the side of a FedEx truck. At that point I knew the first miss wasn’t made up in my mind. I’m so glad I was paying attention, both would have been serious car damage - though not likely to be deadly because they were at low enough speeds.
#11500365 | Crash
In a rainy day I drove Tesla Model Y (AWD) on highway 1 in the Raleigh NC area. The highway 1 is under construction. There are only two lanes open with cement barriers on both sides. While I was driving on the left lane, the car suddenly lost control and slide to the right. I tried to hit break and turn left to avoid the SUV on the right lane, but my car end up turning 180 degree and driver side rear-end hit the cement barrier. Fortunately no injury and no other vehicles involved in the collation. It was raining but not hard. I don't understand why the AWD Tesla would suddenly lost control and slide to right. I can't remember if autopilot was on or off. I tried to request data from Tesla but was denied. Their email indicates only California registrant can request data. I believe the Teals...
#11499223 |
Regarding a Tesla Y, 2021with 10,000 miles; Durging a recent cold spell, winter driving conditions, the A/C Compressor/Heat Pump failed causing the windshield defrost to cease functioning, causing the visiblity to become poor to none at all, requiring that the vehicle not be driven on the roads until the weather cleared and even then, the driver or pasenger (if avalailbe) has to wipe down the wet windshield from inside to acceptable visibility standards. We did not get in an accident as we quickly abandoned the Tesla Model Y and obtained a ride from another vehicle that had a working windshield defroster. We understand that this has been a problem in Canada and is the subject of a Canadian recall. We contacted Tesla, sent them the computer code "VC front-a447 Cabin Climate Control Issues-requires service" and were advised that they were familiar with this problem and scheduled a repair which included...
#11497881 |
No clearing of recall once OTA / Software update was completed
#11496213 |
The contact owns a 2021 Tesla Model Y. The contact stated while at a complete stop with the brake pedal depressed, the vehicle rolled backwards. There was no warning light illuminated. The contact stated that the failure had been reoccurring intermittently while at a complete stop. The vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The failure mileage was unknown.
#11495922 | Crash
I was in a stop and go traffic (car wash line), a sudden unintentional acceleration happened and resulted in a high impact accident
#11494885 |
On November 5'2022 (12.30pm PST), we went to visit local bank. We parked the car and locked it. After locking the car ,we have started go towards bank and suddenly we noticed all four windows automatically started to open (eventually all windows were open and rain water started to go inside). We were lucky that this has happened with stationery car. I am worried if this will happen when car is moving at fast speed , this might cause serious issue .
#11494509 |
Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No 118. Power operated window, partition, and roof panel system
#11490091 |
Windows on certain model year 2021-2022 Model S and Model X vehicles, model year 2017-2022 Model 3 vehicles and model year 2019-2022 Model Y vehicles to correct performance of automatic window reversal systems to comply with regulatory standards
#11490239 | Crash
I was going on I-95 North (Palm Beach County) on Autopilot (and I had Full Self Driving enabled in my car). It was raining, and I was at moderate speed, I would say 45-50 mph. The car started spinning uncontrollably. By miracle nodoby hit me, the card corrected after what I believe were 2 spins and continue on the same direction as traffic. I believe, with the nerves of the moment, that about 45 to 60 seconds later, I put auto pilot again, not knowing what hapened. And the car, out of nothing, started spininng again. 3 times, and I hit the opposite wall of the highway. By another miracle, nobody hit me (rush hour, I-95 north, 820am)
#11481615 |
I have an ongoing problem with the dashcam recording, which for me is a safety issue. The dashcam constantly records from several cameras what is happening around the vehicle. The dashcam icon will show a red “x,” indicating that the dashcam is not working. Probably 80% of the time I get in the car, the red x is there. The solution involves opening the glove box and pulling the drive, waiting for up to 20 seconds, then replacing it. If that doesn’t work, the usb drive needs to be formatted and all previous clips are lost, but probably 95% of the time the reformat fails. It was recommended by Tesla service that I purchase another usb drive ($45?), but that did not solve the problem. I’ve had my car into Tesla service for this issue or reported it through the app multiple times. For months, I’ve been told it will...
#11471962 |
The car suddenly stops responding with the entire system seems to be shut down. I cannot access any controls including lights, brakes and any other safety features. I reached out to tesla regarding this and even sent them a video showing the same. They are not responsive at all and seem to not care about this. The car had sidetracked due to no visibility (Wouldn't consider a crash but almost one)This happened multiple times and is really a big safety concern. We were in the middle of woods when this happened and my wife was alone the other time. I would really appreciate if you expedite this issue and get us a solution. The image below is taken when the lights were on but eventually they were gone.
#11469656 | Crash
I had the Tesla on autopilot on interstate I-80, it was raining. The car was in the middle lane. It suddenly started to slide to the right and hit a truck in the right lane. I tried to regain control of the vehicle and hit the brake hard, but it did not seem to work. Tesla clipped the truck and continued to slide off into the guard rail.
#11467618 | Crash
2021 Tesla's rear-view camera and collision warning systems did not activate when backing out of a parking spot. Tesla screen showed the navigation map instead of the rear-view camera while I was backing out at low speed ~2 mph. A 2003 Honda Pilot directly behind me was also backing up at the same time resulting in a collision. After the crash, I confirmed that all safety features were enabled and I have always installed all regularly scheduled updates. After searching online forums, I found many customers reporting problems with their on-screen camera not activating. I have noticed that the camera did not consistently activate in the past. Sometimes it would, other times I would have to manually press the Camera button on-screen in order to view behind me. There were no on-screen notifications of problems before the event. However, there was one notable change I made to re-enable Sentry Mode...
#11467560 |
Driving on highway at 65 mph suddenly drive speed to 30 miles as if emergency brakes were applied.
#11467255 |
Due to the NHTSA demanding the removal of the boombox feature while driving I have had SEVERAL issues which were previously avoidable. The vehicle does not make a sound when driving and often times pedestrians cannot hear the vehicle. The horn without custom sounds is aggressive and could incite road rage from pedestrians or other vehicles when previously being able to play music via the outside speakers via boombox alerted pedestrians and in extreme cases a funny sound accompanied with the horn would cause the pedestrian or other vehicles to notice but not incite road rage. I am imploring NHTSA to allow Tesla to bring back the boombox while driving and the custom horn sounds before more people get hurt! This is an NHTSA demand issue and not a Tesla issue. This is a daily issue when driving in parking lots or through neighborhoods!! NHTSA's original demand being that the...
#11466593 |
The roof glass cracked with no impact and no accident. No chip or missing pieces of glass. Everything is in tack but has cracked
#11466119 |
On multiple occasions the rear hatch has opened while the vehicle was in drive stopped at traffic lights. During each event the only two users were present and neither were interacting with the phone app or the vehicle touch screen. The rear hatch should not open when the vehicle is in drive or reverse under any circumstance and it does. To close it in this situation you must place the car in park and wait for the screen that allows you to close it while sitting at a red light.
#11462621 | Crash
I was about to park the car in my garage and stopped midway down my driveway to take a phone call. After the phone call, I changed it from park to to drive by stepping on the brake and lightly stepped on the accelerator to ease it into the garage. It quickly accelerated. I stepped on the brake to stop it but it failed to stop. It crashed into my refrigerator in the garage. A video is available for you to view
#11462675 |
Recently while pulling into my children's school, my car has started deciding that the entrance to the parking garage is a large truck stopped diagonally in front of me and slams on the brakes scaring me and causing everything in the car to go flying. Luckily no one has been behind me while this has happened. I am always entering very slowly, maybe 5 mph at the very fastest.
#11458915 |
While driving along on an interstate highway at night, the frame rate for the display system including speedometer and other vehicle information drastically dropped. This resulted in limited situational awareness of what the car was doing. Updates for lane changing, blind spot detection, and lane departure warnings were delayed/lagged as a result of the reduced frame rate. This did not impact how the vehicle drove, or activation of turn signals, and the lower frame rate did not result in any flickering of the display. A display reset was required while driving at highway speeds to regain full situational awareness.
#11458329 | Crash
I was stopping at the parking lot of my church St. Thomas Syro-Malabar Catholic Forane Church (508 Elizabeth Ave, Somerset, NJ 08873) to drop my daughter. I applied the break but the vehicle kept moving and hit the gas line of the church. The gasline broke and car front got damaged. There was no auto break and warning of the obstacle.
#11457869 |
I started having issues with my heat pump and described to the service center that on multiple occasions it has malfunctioned or improperly heated the cabin on both negative temperature and 40° days. I mentioned it also makes a weird noise. Because I mentioned a noise they refused to look at it under warranty and will not look at it unless I pay 87.50. They have a known ongoing issue with what pumps for our model and this should be a priority for them to take care of. It seems like incredibly irresponsible business. This has happened on multiple occasions with tesla they refuse to look at many safety concerns unless I pay. There are also numerous other safety issues with my car they refuse to fix.
#11456759 |
Cabin climate control failure, no heat
#11453431 |
Sometimes randomly but often in the spot, when in autopilot, the car will randomly brake hard when there is no car or obsticle in front of me. This has occured when I'm on the highway and I've noticed a pattern that it happens when I go under and overpass. Its usually very sunny and there is a strong shadow in front of the car. I think with the camera vision autopilot it thinks the shadow is an obstacle in the road but I'm not sure. This happens very suddenly and luckily has not happened when a car is following close behind me. But if it did this could definitely cause a rear collision at high speeds.
#11452948 |
These issues occur w/ no warning, occur randomly, in all conditions. Issue 1. Vehicle randomly slams on the brakes with no obstructions or vehicles in front. This occurs at highway speeds as well as neighborhood speeds. I'm worried about being rear-ended. This occurs daily. Issue 2. Vehicle thinks oncoming traffic is in same lane and attempts to emergency stop. Issue 3. Upon changing lanes, using auto lane change, vehicle serves back I to lane for no reason.
#11452949 |
Phantom braking has occurred multiple times randomly when autopilot and cruise control are activated.
#11452798 |
I am aware that NHTSA is investigating Tesla over the emergency braking issue when using its advanced features. When I have read articles about this they always reference auto pilot or full self driving. I wanted to make sure you knew that this issue also impacted adaptive cruise control. When I brought my Model Y home in August of last year I quickly learned I could not safely use the adaptive cruise control. I live in rural NE Iowa, and mainly drive on two lane roads. If I was on a downhill slope and meeting a vehicle with any kind of height to it the car would activate emergency braking, even though the other vehicle was completely in its own lane. It appears to me this issue has gotten better as updates have been issued the last six months and I have started to gingerly use cruise control again. It...
#11452834 |
I DO NOT DRIVE THIS CAR OFTEN, BUT WHEN I WENT ON A ROAD TRIP FOR TWO WEEKS OVER CHRISTMAS I NOTICED THAT THE CAR WHEN IT WAS IN CRUISE CONTROL WOULD PICK UP VEHICLES COMING TOWARD ME ON A TWO LANE ROAD AND SUDDENLY SLOW DOWN. IT GOT MUCH WORSE COMING HOME WHEN I WAS IN NEW MEXICO ON I25 GOING NORTH. IT WOULD SUDDENLY SLOW DOWN COMING UP TO A CREST OF A HILL WITH NO OTHER VEHICLE AROUND ME. IT ALSO PICKED UP SEMIS GOING SOUTH THAT WERE HUNDREDS OF YARDS AWAY FROM ME. IT HAPPENED NUMEROUS TIMES AND SCARED MY WIFE. WHEN I WAS HOME I SET UP AN APPOINTMENT WITH TESLA SERVICE. THEY LATER CANCELLED IT AS THEY DID NOT SEE IT AS A PROBLEM.
#11452886 |
Phantom braking when using Tesla autopilot
#11451979 | Crash
First, the car was not in auto pilot mode or cruise control. The car was driven into the garage, 22 inches from the landing and put in park. The “P” was lit so it was in park when it suddenly lurched forward and hit the landing and the four way flasher came on. Damage has been repaired but was $2500. Per Tesla, the car was not at fault and the car functioned as intended but it was driver error. With all the safety features that this car has, why did it not sound a warning or apply brakes to prevent this from happening. I have read about hundreds of thousand’s of incidents of sudden unintentional acceleration but yet nothing has been done about it. There is another problem with phantom braking when the car suddenly stops if you use the cruise control. I do not use cruise control because of...
#11450335 |
Since the v11 upgrade, my backup camera has dropped frames and lags while backing up to the point that I have almost hit bollards while backing up. If a child walked behind the car, I would not know it.
#11450318 |
While driving on the freeway at 70 mph with cruise control activated, the Tesla suddenly braked hard. There was no emergency or vehicle entering my lane. This occurs on a regular basis, more so when passing a semi or large vehicle. Vehicles behind me have to brake or swerve to avoid hitting me. I have notified Tesla Service about the issue and their response was they know about the issue. I was told to keep my hands on the steering wheel and pay attention....UNACCEPTABLE!
#11449896 |
The manufacturer updated the vehicle software in January 2022. This caused the rear camera to malfunction. The malfunction is that the view of the camera inside the vehicle pauses for periods. The driver is becomes unaware of the true distance between the vehicle and objects behind it. This is worsened as the driver is unaware of the issue. This is a safety issue for any object behind the vehicle when it moves in reverse - including People. It could also easily result in damage to the rear of the vehicle being driven.
#11449961 |
Saw this article today in the Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/02/02/tesla-phantom-braking/ We have a 2021 Tesla Y. It does not have the Lidar technology. We have experienced this phantom braking when driving west and east across I-94 through MN and North Dakota and Montana. Sometimes it seems like it happens when we cross over a small bridge on the interstate and sometimes it happens randomly. We can't figure out what set it off. Anyway, I told my husband we should never use the auto pilot as that is when it occurs. So, we have quit using it. It is super scary when it happens!
#11450042 |
I was traveling in -5 degree (Fahrenheit) weather and the cabin heater stopped working (a notice appeared on the screen explaining that it was malfunctioning). Windshield began to fog up, so turned on fan and outside air in order to remove the fog. Ended up driving 8 hours in -5 degree weather with outside air coming in the car. Seat heaters and steering wheel heater continued to work. My passengers and I had to wear coats, boots, gloves, and a hat and still got numb hands and feet. I felt this was a dangerous situation, unable to keep warm while driving or when pulled over. Manufacturer looked at the issue and said the refrigerant was slightly low and replenished it. I don't feel confident that this was an actual fix.
#11449436 |
The heat pump that supplies all heated air to the cabin stopped working completely. Safety was impacted because my windshield fogged up, making it impossible to see clearly out of my windshield or other windows. It was 11°F outside with no heating. I am not sure if a service center has been able to reproduce the issue, but I have images of the fogging and the error message. Nobody has inspected the issue yet. I received an error message "VCFRONT_a447" and "Cabin Climate Control System Requires Service" I have received this error message in two separate occasions now, both when it was lower than 15°F outside.

Other 2021 TESLA MODEL Y Problem Areas

Forward Collision Avoidance Adaptive Cruise Control 397 complaints Forward Collision Avoidance Automatic Emergency Braking 318 complaints Service Brakes 175 complaints Vehicle Speed Control 152 complaints Electrical System 105 complaints Forward Collision Avoidance Warnings 100 complaints Steering 76 complaints Suspension 50 complaints Lane Departure Assist 43 complaints Visibilitywiper 40 complaints Power Train 27 complaints Seat Belts 24 complaints Lane Departure Warning 23 complaints Air Bags 19 complaints Structurebody 18 complaints Seats 17 complaints Back Over Prevention Warnings 15 complaints Engine 14 complaints Wheels 13 complaints Lane Departure Blind Spot Detection 12 complaints Latcheslockslinkagesdoorslatch 12 complaints Electrical System12v24v48v Battery 11 complaints Exterior Lighting 9 complaints Fuelpropulsion System 9 complaints Structurebodydoorhandleexterior 8 complaints Back Over Prevention Sensing System Camera 7 complaints Electrical Systemadasautonomousself Driving 6 complaints Visibility 5 complaints Service Brakes Hydraulic 3 complaints Tires 3 complaints Air Bagssensoroccupant Classification 2 complaints Forward Collision Avoidance Adaptive Cruise Controlsoftware 2 complaints Latcheslockslinkages 2 complaints Service Brakes Electricsoftwareprogramming 2 complaints Suspensionfrontcontrol Arm 2 complaints Visibilitydefrosterdefoggerhvac System 2 complaints Air Bagsfrontaldriver Sideinflator Module 1 complaint Back Over Prevention 1 complaint Back Over Prevention Rearview System Braking 1 complaint Chest Clip Buckle Harness 1 complaint Child Seat 1 complaint Electrical System Instrument Clusterpanel 1 complaint Electrical Systemadas 1 complaint Electrical Systemadasautonomousself Drivingsoftware 1 complaint Electrical Systemadasdriver Monitoringcamerasensor 1 complaint Electrical Systemalternatorgeneratorregulator 1 complaint Electrical Systemhorn 1 complaint Equipment Adaptivemobilityvehicle Controlsbraking 1 complaint Forward Collision Avoidance 1 complaint Forward Collision Avoidance Automatic Emergency Steering 1 complaint Lane Departure Lane Keep Steering Assist 1 complaint Power Trainautomatic Transmission 1 complaint Structure 1 complaint Suspensionsubframemounting Bracket 1 complaint Tether Lower Anchor On Car Seat Or Vehicle 1 complaint Tirespressure Monitoring And Regulating Systems 1 complaint Tirestreadbelt 1 complaint Vehicle Speed Controlaccelerator Pedal 1 complaint Vehicle Speed Controlcruise Control 1 complaint Visibilityglass Siderear 1 complaint
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