2023 TESLA MODEL S Complaints

THIS VEHICLE HAS THE YOKE STEERING WHEEL.Issue is two fold. The right and left turn signal activation in on the face of the wheel and difficult to find since the arrows are not raised so you can feel them. You have to take your eyes off the road to find the left or right turn signal, then if they do not automatically turn off you have to repeat this again to press. Very unsafe and frustrating. Second issue: the Horn. Again, the switch is on the surface of the wheel and you can not feel it you have to search for it because of other switches nearby. The horn activation needs to be in center of wheel with an easy push sequence to activate. Searching for the horn switch is unsafe due to the speed needed to warn somebody and again, you have to take your eyes off the road to locate the small lit switch to blow the horn. If you are turning a Yoke Wheel and need to blow the horn, it is impossible. A Recall is needed to replace the entire Yoke Wheel with a Horn activation in the center, and a lever installed on the steering column for blinkers.

I was driving in dense fog about 9 am on December 2, 2024. It was about an hour after sunrise. I passed an approaching car without lights on and thought to myself how dangerous it was to be driving in dense fog without lights. I then realized that my automatic headlights were off! That means my fog lights were also off. They were on when I first left the house. The fog was dense enough that cars without lights appeared out of the fog with 10-15 feet warning. Very dangerous when turning left onto roads or at stop signs. The fog was dense enough that the driver assist cameras were complaining about being blocked or blinded, but the car had decided to turn off the headlights and fog lights without notification (except removing the lights on indicators on the dash). I have tried to contact Tesla support on their web support and haven't been able to figure out a way to provide comments. I only find a "help" section that provides answers to a few questions and seems to go in circles for anything else. I was able to move the headlights from Auto to On and solve the problem, but that required messing with the touchscreen while driving.

Driving on freeway when the rear tire tread peeled off the inside tire tread wheel/blow out almost causing an accident. The vehicle pulled hard while driving and almost lost control. The problem has been inspected and confirmed by the Tesla dealer. The tire warning did alert after the tire blew out. This is a very frequently reported incident with the Model S plaid. A defect in the factory camber causing the blowout. Extensive wear is seen on the very inside wall of the tire. You couldn’t see or measure the tire wear from the outside of the vehicle. This is a scary and dangerous problem that needs to be fixed. I bought this vehicle brand new from Tesla Factory and the vehicle had less than 13,000 miles. The alignment was also measured when getting repaired and had bad results.

Experienced severe phantom breaking on [XXX] in route to Las Vegas at 70mph September 2024. In heavy rain, while windshield wipers set to auto...........wipers have stopped momentarily blinding the driver, a problem Tesla hasn't fixed on my neighbors 2019 Model 3. The stalkless design prevents safe use of turn signals, horn and gear shifts. Wife who only drives an ICE car can not safely operate turn signals, horn and gear shifts in my 2023 Tesla Model S. Camera system constantly renders 'Blinded' error messages halting Autopilot features. Tesla's resolution is to clean camera's before initiating Autopilot. INFORMATION REDACTED PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6)

The horn location is a button to the right of the center airbag on the steering wheel. It is small, difficult to find when under stress and needed. Impossible to find when in a turn. In the past 10 months I have had multiple occasions needed to alert another vehicle of an unsafe situation, and have never been able to activate the horn when needed. This is simply not safe. My car is a 2023 Model S. I noticed that Tesla did change this s few months after I purchased my vehicle. They should fix the cars, like mine that have the poorly positioned horn activation button to the middle.

Tesla has not provided software updates for the 3 recalls listed for my VIN. Each time I ask them about the issue, they indicate my vehicle has the latest software update, but it does not.

The horn on this car is a button on the right side of the steering wheel. I nearly got into yet another accident when someone started backing up and nearly hit me. I panicked as they backed up and pressed the center airbag as a natural reaction, where a car horn had been for 100 years. Tesla has since changed this on new models, but they need to recall my model and repair this defect before someone gets killed.

This vehicle has a small button on the steering wheel to actuate the horn, instead of part of the center airbag (as most modern vehicles.) In the ten months I’ve owned this car, I have experienced numerous situations where I tried to use the horn in an urgently evolving situation, but could not as I could not instinctively find the horn button. I have complained to Tesla that I view this issue as a safety concern. I know they recognize this, as all new cars manufactured since January 1st of this year now have the horn as part of the airbag. Their response to me has been to purchase the new horn and airbag, at a cost of over $2,200. I firmly believe this should be a recall situation, as the present system does not allow easy, instinctive use of a primary safety device.

There is a design flaw in the functionality of the windshield wipers. Instead of the functionality being on a stalk like every other car, Tesla decided to make it a 2 step process. To operate the windshield wipers, you first have to press a capacitive button on the steering wheel and then you have to scroll a wheel on the steering wheel. The first problem is that the button to turn on the windshield wipers is a capacitive button that is not raised on the steering wheel - so the button moves as you turn the steering wheel and thus it is not in the same place all the time. This makes it very difficult and practically impossible to find the button without taking your eyes off the road to find the button on the steering wheel. The second problem is that once you find that button, you then have to find the scroll wheel on the other side of the steering wheel to then adjust the speed. So picture you are driving into a downpour. You instantly can't see because of the rain. Because you are turning slightly on the highway, you have to take your eyes off the road to find the button on the steering wheel. That will activate the wipers but only in intermittent mode. You then have to use the scroll wheel on the other side of the steering wheel to adjust the speed so it is continuous. And while the car does have an "auto" mode, I've owned 3 different Teslas over 9 years and it has never worked properly - often turning on the wipers on a day that is 100% sunny. The auto mode also doesn't work well when it is raining because it often doesn't sense the correct speed (so staying in auto mode is not a great solution). The correct solution would be to return the wiper functionality to a stalk on the steering column and most definitely not require 2 separate buttons/functions to use it. It is very dangerous having to take your eyes off the road when you enter a downpour or when you are in a drizzle situation and then it starts pouring because you need to do 2 things.

Tesla removed the blinker stalk and replaced it with capacitive buttons on the steering wheel. This is very dangerous because the buttons move as you turn the wheel. To make it worse, they used capacitive buttons that are not raised so sometimes the ONLY way to turn your blinker on is to look away from the road and at the steering wheel to find the button. The buttons would be more useful had they simply been a rocker button like a lot of vehicles have on their steering wheel for volume control of the radio. But the real problem is that on multiple occasions, the turn signal button simply does not work. They do work 99% of the time but there have been several occasions where I have pressed the capacitive button and the blinker does not go on. I then have to look away from the road to confirm I am pressing the button but it still does not work. On a couple of occasions, if I press the other blinker button and then press the original blinker button, it will work. Other times if I press it enough times (i.e. over 5 times), it will then work. After the 1st complaint, Tesla replaced the component but it continues to happen. I believe it is a software bug and despite seeing other people report this problem to the NHTSA, Tesla told me no one else is reporting it. They suggested when I pick up the car that they show me how to press the button. What is more likely, that I don't know how to press a button or that there is a problem in their design? I know there is probably no rule against not having a blinker stalk because why would anyone ever design a car that would have moving buttons on a steering wheel but I think it is time for a rule and to require Tesla to fix this. If you can't require a blinker stalk, which would be the correct fix, then require the buttons to not be capacitive and to be raised. And who would design left and right buttons to be one on top of the other instead of being side by side. Terrible design and very unsafe.