2021 TESLA MODEL 3 Complaints

The car will randomly brake on the highway when its in auto drive with no need to brake immediately.

The contact owns a 2021 Tesla Model 3. The contact stated while driving 70 MPH with the cruise control activated, the vehicle applied the brakes independently. The contact stated no warning light was illuminated. The contact stated he experience the failure three times while using the cruise control feature that same day. The vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired. A dealer was not contacted. The manufacturer had not been informed of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 7,000.

When applying Cruise Control on the model 3, the Tesla will apply phantom braking in various situations. The car will brake on its own without any human interaction. This has occurred on the highway with no other cars nearby that should cause such braking.. This phantom braking has caused me to not use cruise control at all in my car.

When passing below an overpass the car will rapidly brake from 80-60 MPH or 65-45 MPH without warning. I have to take over and speed up to avoid someone hitting me from behind. I believe the issue happens because the car for a second thinks you are driving on the overpass which has a much slower speed (25-40 MPH). Therefore, it brakes hard to match the speed of the overpass. When it is enough of a distance away, it goes back to the normal highway speed. This issue has happened many times since I bought the car and has not been resolved after many updates.

While driving on highway, I have autopilot on, and out of nowhere the vehicle will engage emergency braking.

On at least 4 occasions, I have been driving at freeway speeds of 70mph with cruise control engaged - typically while driving on I-35 between Duluth and Minneapolis in Minnesota - and the vehicle has applied the brakes very hard for no known reason, without human input to the brake pedal. The most recent occurrence was on May 27th, 2022.

On multiple occasions, my vehicle has experienced the same “phantom braking” problem other Teslas have. This has happened when cruise control (autopilot) was enabled. No cars or obstacles were directly in front of my vehicle and the immediate breaking was unnecessary

Since purchasing my vehicle a year ago, it had has occasionally engaged the emergency braking system in situations where other cars have not been a threat or directly in front of me. This week, the system engaged when I was driving up an incline on the highway with no vehicles around me. Very disconcerting and DANGEROUS. As a result I deactivated the system. This is a flaw.

The autopilot used for automatic cruise control regularly brakes for unexplained reasons when there is no immediate threat. This is not only scary but it could cause an accident if other cars were right behind me. There is one part of highway 470 in Highlands Ranch, CO, where it happens every time, like autopilot is expecting the speed limit to drop so it slows way down for me, but the speed limit hasn’t changed. Other times it just happens randomly. It will happen at least once usually every hour I use autopilot.

I was in auto pilot (cruise control). The car was going at 78 mph. The brakes suddenly engaged for no reason. Slowing the car to 60 mph very quickly. It basically felt like I slammed on the brakes. This happened 3 times.