Tesla was "forced" to recall again
On April 7, the State Administration for Market Regulation announced that Tesla Motors (Beijing) Co., Ltd. and Tesla (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. have recalled some imported and domestically produced Model 3 electric vehicles from January 11, 2019 to January 25, 2022, with a total of 127785 electric vehicles. Among them, the imported version is 34207 vehicles, and the domestic version is 93578 vehicles.
SiC too advanced?
The reason for the recall is that the Model 3s are at risk of not starting or stalling in motion. The announcement shows that there may be slight manufacturing differences in the power semiconductor components of the rear motor inverter of the vehicles within the scope of the recall, and the difference in component manufacturing after some vehicles have been used for a period of time may cause the rear inverter to fail, resulting in the inverter not being able to control the current normally. This failure occurs when the vehicle is in a parked state, which will cause the vehicle to fail to start; this failure occurs when the vehicle is in a driving state, which will cause the vehicle to lose driving power, and in extreme cases, it may increase the risk of collision of the vehicle, and there is a safety hazard.
For the above hidden dangers, Tesla Motors (Beijing) Co., Ltd. and Tesla (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. will upgrade the motor control software for the vehicles within the scope of the recall through the vehicle remote upgrade (OTA) technology; for vehicles that cannot be recalled through the car remote upgrade (OTA) technology, they will contact the relevant users through the service center to upgrade the motor control software for the vehicle to closely monitor the rear motor inverter of the vehicle, and timely replace the rear inverter with related failures free of charge to eliminate safety hazards.
Before this recall, some car owners on the network have said that they have encountered stall problems. Just a few days ago, on April 6, a Model 3 owner broke the news that he was driving at a normal speed of 100km/h on the highway, and there was no illegal operation, the vehicle screen suddenly showed "the vehicle can not continue to drive, please stop immediately", at the same time, the vehicle lost power and began to glide, the owner repeatedly stepped on the electric door, but the vehicle did not respond. The owner said the vehicle was a new car purchased during New Year's Day this year. At present, Tesla has not indicated the specific cause of the owner's failure.
A year ago, in May, a Model 3 owner in Changsha, Hunan Province, encountered the same stall problem. At about 10 o'clock that night, the owner was driving normally on Furong Road, the main road of Changsha, and the vehicle's central control screen showed without warning that "the vehicle is closing, safely pull over to the side." However, due to the instantaneous loss of power, the vehicle suddenly stopped during the driving and was forced to break down in the middle of the road, and the owner tried to restart the vehicle several times and still could not start.
After communicating with Tesla, the owner learned that the cause of the sudden failure was that a transistor of the motor behind the vehicle was damaged, and the solution required the replacement of the motor after the entire vehicle. A transistor of the failed rear motor here may be a defect in the power semiconductor component of the motor inverter described in Tesla's recall.
Why is there a problem with this semiconductor component? As we all know, Tesla is called the benchmark for electric vehicles because Tesla will always apply the latest manufacturing processes, such as one-piece cast body, 21700 battery cell, 4680 battery cell, SiC controller and so on. Among them, model 3 is the world's first electric vehicle to use SiC controller, and most of the current electric vehicles are still using IGBT chips, and the information in the recall announcement points to the quality defects of SiC controllers.
Students familiar with computer chips should know that there will be a difference in the quality of the wafer when lithographed into a chip, and Intel will grade the chip according to the quality difference, so there are i3, i5, i7 and other chips with different performance. This difference in quality is present in any chip manufacturing, and the power semiconductors used in automobiles are no exception. Such a large area of defects can only be said to be too low tesla's acceptance standards, or that the standard system of the new process is not mature enough.
Tesla remains arrogant
Even if the stall case has appeared, Tesla's recall is not initiated on its own initiative, and the recall announcement shows that the recall was carried out under the circumstance that the State Administration for Market Supervision and Administration launched a defect investigation. Affected by the investigation, Tesla Motors (Beijing) Co., Ltd. and Tesla (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. decided to take recall measures to eliminate potential safety hazards.
Looking at the recall information of China's auto market in the past few years, most of it was initiated by auto companies on their own initiative to file with the State Administration for Market Regulation. We used the word "forced recall" at the beginning of the article, because this is Tesla's second reluctant recall in China.
In October 2020, Tesla announced that due to safety hazards in the suspension of the vehicle, it decided to recall some imported Model S and Model X vehicles in China. But Tesla's managing director for regulatory and regulatory affairs, Elizabeth M. H. McKitiq submitted a letter to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration stating that the suspension of the vehicle was not defective at all and that the vehicle did not need to be recalled.
Tesla once again used statistical data to defend itself (Musk had previously used statistics to justify Tesla spontaneous combustion), Tesla said that the Model S and Model X recalled in China used the same suspension system as vehicles in the United States, but the incidence of suspension quality problems in the Chinese market reached 0.1%, compared with only 0.05% in the rest of the world. This can prove that Tesla's vehicles do not have defects at all, and even if there is a problem with the suspension, it is caused by the improper use of Chinese owners, non-quality defects.
In addition to shifting the blame to Chinese consumers, Tesla also did not comply with the requirements of the Chinese regulatory authorities, Tesla said in the letter: "The China State Administration for Market Supervision and the Defective Product Management Center of the State Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine believe that the above Model S and Model X have quality defects and need to be recalled." Although Tesla did not share the views of both agencies, it still carried out a voluntary recall. ”
Shakespeare once said: A proud man always ends up destroying himself in pride. In 2018, Tesla's production capacity and finances came under great pressure, and the lightning construction, delivery, and pursuit of Chinese consumers in the Shanghai factory saved Tesla from the crisis. Over the past two years, the fully operating Shanghai factory has even helped Tesla achieve continuous profitability. Tesla's attitude toward Chinese users has always been a high-minded attitude. It is true that Tesla now has obvious brand advantages and technical advantages, but there are more and more strong people in the electric vehicle track, and with the rise of Wei Xiaoli, Extreme Krypton, and BYD, Tesla will eventually be eaten by its own arrogance.
It is interesting to note that in the past two years, Tesla's Shanghai factory has also had a large amount of production capacity to supply the European, Australian and Japanese and Korean markets. So, do these exported Model 3s have the same flaws? After the China recall, will these markets follow up the recall?
AUTHOR RushB
"Don't leverage, the bar is your right"