In a span of just 72 hours the Model S was accused of having major suspension issues, the NHTSA supposedly got involved, Tesla explained that there is nothing wrong and the NHTSA isn’t actually investigating the issue, and Elon Musk tweeted that the whole thing was a giant conspiracy. Thank goodness I was not traveling at a high rate of speed.
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In a statement, Tesla said: “Data shows that the vehicle was traveling at 6mph when the accelerator pedal was abruptly increased to 100 percent …”
The vehicle, owned by Peter Cordaro, 61, of Connellsville, Pa., has more than 70,000 miles on it and needed two tow trucks to take it to the service center, one to get it from the dirt road he lives on to the highway, and another to take it from the highway to the service center.
Tesla says that the Daily Kanban “fabricated this issue, then caused negative and incorrect news to be written about Tesla by reputable institutions”. Addressing the one auto from the original blog post, it said that the suspension ball joint experienced very abnormal rust, something they have never see on another vehicle. The vehicle had 70,000 miles on it and was out of warranty, so Tesla apparently told the owner that the company would not pay for his repairs. It said, in part: “You agree to keep confidential our provision of the Goodwill, the terms of this agreement and the incidents or claims leading or related to our provision of the Goodwill”.
As for the Goodwill Agreement, Tesla calls it “preposterous” to claim that the agreement prevents the owner from reporting issues to the NHTSA.
“When this happens, we sometimes ask our customers to sign a ‘Goodwill Agreement, ‘ ” the automaker said.
Joan Claybrook, a former head of the NHTSA, said requiring customers to keep quiet about repairs aroused suspicion.
Next, it clarified the issue with the goodwill fix agreement, saying that it would “never ask a customer to sign a document to prevent them from talking to NHTSA or any other government agency”. The website linked to a Model S owner who wrote on a Tesla fan website that he had suspension problems and had received an email from an NHTSA investigator.
The company responded that it cooperated fully with the NHTSA and the agency required “no further information”.
On Friday, a Tesla spokeswoman said in an email that “to remove any doubt”, the automaker would modify the language of the documents to make clear that the goal “is to benefit customers, while not harming us for doing a good deed”.
“NHTSA confirmed today that they found no safety concern with the Model S suspension”, Musk tweeted.
Tesla says it meets regularly with safety regulators and in the past has performed voluntary recalls even when there is only a “slight” risk of a safety issue.
It said it had informed Tesla that any language implying that drivers should not contact the agency needs to be eliminated.
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