Day 8 Battery Issues

[RayzorBEV]

I forgot to mention this to the service advisors, but the vehicle got really hot while charging too. Like noticeably hot (interior cabin +8F from the garage) and feeling heat in the hood area.

I own a Model Y and Leaf and never noticed heat coming from them while charging.

Just remember that Rivian's battery is literally twice the size of the Model Y. I own 2 Rivians, they all get toasty during charging, hence I installed a dedicated 1 ton AC in my garage to keep all my EVs happy (2 Rivians, 1 Tesla, 1 Zero motorcycle) : )

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[Donald Stanfield]

Wow. That's wonderful. I want your Guide to be my Guide : )

I've had two different guides with Rivian and both have been really great.

 

[honey_badger]

The service center just started looking into the issue, they think it's something with the BMS module.

 

[scottk]

The service center just started looking into the issue, they think it's something with the BMS module.

Thanks for the update - my advisor suspects the entire battery unit will need to be replaced, but they are waiting for the engineering team to review the issue. They need that before they can order a new pack, which is only delivered via freight.

I have a feeling I'm looking at a 3+ week wait to get the vehicle back.

 

[honey_badger]

Thanks for the update - my advisor suspects the entire battery unit will need to be replaced, but they are waiting for the engineering team to review the issue. They need that before they can order a new pack, which is only delivered via freight.

I have a feeling I'm looking at a 3+ week wait to get the vehicle back.

Wow. Alright, the only difference I can see between our scenario is the critical message in yours. According to the service hub, my R1S is ready for pickup, although I haven't heard from the service center yet. I'd rather get the fix correct as opposed to a band aid now and eventually having to replace the entire pack later.

 

[honey_badger]

Got the car back today. They ran diags on the battery and other components, seemed to come back ok. Final cause was " Secondary contactor stuck open once"

 

[scottk]

Got the R1S back today. Battery pack was replaced. They found an internal fault in module 5 of the pack. Service was unsure what caused it. It took the "engineering team" a few days to approve a replacement pack. They ordered a new pack by freight, which took about a week to arrive. Then another week for them to get it installed - most of the install time was "waiting" for the computers to get back up and running and going through a quality test of the systems.

All in all, the vehicle was not drivable for me for a little over 3 weeks, and the vehicle was at the service center for 17 business days. I felt like service was extremely slow giving me updates - I had to call and request an update after the tow truck dropped off and about once a week after that. However, after calling the service hotline around 10 times total, I'll say I never spent more than 1 minute waiting to speak to a human, and the service advisor always returned the call within a few hours after that! Every person I interacted with was an absolute delight.

I finally got a hold of my guide, which was trickier than expected. I got a Calendly link from the service hotline which let me schedule a call with someone on the team, and they routed me to then chat with my personal guide. They said text is the best way for a quick response, seems like they don't have an internal ticketing system ironed out for email right now (many of my emails went unanswered or took weeks to respond to).

My guide was able to gift me some recovery boards, after I asked nicely (and reiterated that I didn't have a loaner or rental, since we still hadn't sold our previous vehicle yet). Loaner would have been nice so we could have still gone camping, apparently they are almost impossible to come by.

In the end, my only gripe was missing two camping weekends with my daughter, and that there wan't a courtesy car wash when I picked the vehicle back up (nobody said this is a thing, but I remember Subaru doing it after oil changes years ago so thought it would be nice lol). Also, they didn't fix the air compressor issue I originally had service scheduled for - the replacement part they ordered didn't some with a sensor or something - but they are scheduling mobile service for that so no big deal.

Hopefully that's the last of my service adventures! Now I just got the "We’d love to hear about your first 30 days with your R1S" email from Rivian lol, maybe I'll copy/paste this over...

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