NHTSA launches Tesla Model Y investigation over falling off steering wheels

NHTSA announced it is opening an investigation into Tesla Model Y after two reports were filed about steering wheels falling off during driving. Tesla is becoming almost the NHTSA’s favorite customer with a number of investigations underway.

We saw reports of a driver of Model Y ending up in the steering wheel in his hand and completely detached from the steering column. This apparently happened to at least two vehicles and as you can imagine it is quite a dangerous fault.

@elonmusk @TeslaOwnersWW @BLKMDL3 Family was excited to receive Tesla Y delivery on 1/24/2023. Was driving on highway and all the sudden steering wheel fall off, was lucky enough there was no car behind and I was able to pull on devider #SafetyFirst #Fixit #TeslaModelY #help pic.twitter.com/4UMokFA2cv

— Prerak & Neha Patel (@preneh24) January 30, 2023

NHTSA contacted Tesla to inform it about the new investigation and the company did some digging to find out what’s behind the steering wheels coming off. Apparently bothe of the vehicles involved underwent so-called end-of-line repair where a steering wheel had to be removed.

End-of-line repair happens when the quality control notices a step has been missed during the assembly. It means the vehicle has to be taken aside and the fault has to be rectified. We don’t know what the issue was but Tesla confirmed the steering wheel in both the vehicles had to be removed.

Whoever completed the repair, must have put the steering wheel back on and forgot to bolt it down. Shocking and unacceptable situation. The question is - was it really only those two vehicles involved?

If NHTSA finds that there is a possibility of more vehicles having the steering wheel locking nut either loose or completely missing, it will issue a recall order to Tesla. If it involves a small number of cars, it can be dealt with rather swiftly but if the number turns out to be significant, Tesla will have to get its service centers working overtime.

Never a dull day when it comes to Tesla, in the morning Elon Musk talks again about the next generation Tesla vehicle being fully autonomous, in the afternoon the company is facing yet another possible recall. Although the previous recalls were only software issues and were fixed really quickly, the company is facing a lot of pressure from NHTSA these days. Is this the price to pay for pushing the technological envelope or for cutting the corners?

Via