New R1T owner. Paint issues. Panel misalignments. Still excited.

[trannosaurus]

1st time being on and posting to any sort of automotive forum in about 20 years =). Picked up my Red Canyon R1T in Richmond, BC on Monday!

So I was super stoked and excited and a little bit antsy (they booked me in for delivery over a month ago, then cancelled the day before delivery and said "Oops, sorry it's still on the train ride into Canada"). Because of my over-exuberance paired with the pretty short pick-up window once document signing and insurance was complete, I missed quite a few issues with paint and overall quality control. Problems are detailed below:

1. Paint next to the rear windshield looks like it was sanded down but subsequently left unfinished ?

2. Scratch on the charge port door

3. Painted rubber seal on rear roofline between rear doors and the glass roof. Looks like lots of people have reported issues with this on recent deliveries for the end of quarter push. Mine's luckily not as bad as some others.

4. Trim pieces of the driver's seat not clipped together. Seems easy enough to fix but haven't managed to get it to click together.

5. Various minor panel gaps and misalignments, minor paint swirls etc. but I'm not a nitpicker so these don't bother me as much as it would some. I usually do my own paint correction and detailing at home and was planning to do some of this anyways.

All in all I won't be letting this take the pep outta my step but not gonna lie, it is somewhat disappointing considering what these trucks cost. You'd kinda expect a bit better quality control but also understand us early adopters are guinea pigs. Still a happy owner (for now ??).

What's everyone else's experience with build quality and quality control on their recent deliveries? How's Rivian been with sorting these things out? I've got a service request open and waiting on a response for now. Hoping they'll take care of these things without a fight ?

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[trannosaurus]

Oops, forgot to post all the images...

 

[Southern R1S]

Oops, forgot to post all the images...

The paint in those two pictures that I quoted above looks bad and they should be willing to fix that without a fight. Out of everything you posted, that's the one I would definitely take a stand on if they try to push back, but I suspect they will be pretty accommodating on it at the end of the day.

Not sure about panel gaps -- seems like an easy enough fix by no experience dealing with that (yet).

From what I can see in the third picture of the seat -- that's actually not a defect and is how it is supposed to function (I learned this from experience because I had the same thought on my R1S). From my testing, that's to allow the seat to change positions, and it looks like that when you have it elevated upward and/or angled at an incline. To test on mine, I took the seat all the way down and level and that gap was gone, which is how I realized it was an intentional design rather than a flaw.

^^^^feel free to correct that if anyone has a different experience (and again, I had the same thought / concern on mine).

Fortunately, my R1S was nearly perfect / almost flawless out of the gate. It's a March 2023 build (61XX VIN) and the only issues that I've identified so far is that the hood / frunk is slightly misaligned (about 0.15" further to the right side when facing the windshield) and a minor paint indention. I'm putting in tickets on both, but will probably end up fixing the frunk myself assuming that can be done via the adjustment bolts.

 

[timmmmeh]

Oops, forgot to post all the images...

Gap in the car seat is normal. That gap changes as you tilt the lower seat up and down.

 

[trannosaurus]

Gap in the car seat is normal. That gap changes as you tilt the lower seat up and down.

Interesting, never would have thought. I'll go have a look at it later. Cheers

 

[trannosaurus]

The paint in those two pictures that I quoted above looks bad and they should be willing to fix that without a fight. Out of everything you posted, that's the one I would definitely take a stand on if they try to push back, but I suspect they will be pretty accommodating on it at the end of the day.

Not sure about panel gaps -- seems like an easy enough fix by no experience dealing with that (yet).

From what I can see in the third picture of the seat -- that's actually not a defect and is how it is supposed to function (I learned this from experience because I had the same thought on my R1S). From my testing, that's to allow the seat to change positions, and it looks like that when you have it elevated upward and/or angled at an incline. To test on mine, I took the seat all the way down and level and that gap was gone, which is how I realized it was an intentional design rather than a flaw.

^^^^feel free to correct that if anyone has a different experience (and again, I had the same thought / concern on mine).

Fortunately, my R1S was nearly perfect / almost flawless out of the gate. It's a March 2023 build (61XX VIN) and the only issues that I've identified so far is that the hood / frunk is slightly misaligned (about 0.15" further to the right side when facing the windshield) and a minor paint indention. I'm putting in tickets on both, but will probably end up fixing the frunk myself assuming that can be done via the adjustment bolts.

Thanks for the reply. Yep, I definitely think they'll take care of the paint where its been sanded down. I'll wait to hear what they say about the rest. My hood is also a bit misaligned/sunken on the driver side. Not a huge deal but it's there.

You guys were right about the seat. It's just my grandma sitting position.

 

[Prime]

Thanks for the reply. Yep, I definitely think they'll take care of the paint where its been sanded down. I'll wait to hear what they say about the rest. My hood is also a bit misaligned/sunken on the driver side. Not a huge deal but it's there.

You guys were right about the seat. It's just my grandma sitting position.

The little paint globs over the sealant between the panels towards the rear roof of the car is pretty common, ive seen it on many R1Ts, I'll have my first service in a few weeks so i'll see what they say. I havent ticket it yet because not sure if it's worth the trouble of it going to a body shop and more damage potentially being done. For now its a out of sight out of mind situation..

Your other paint issue on the body panel is definitely a problem and should be taken care of. Love the color by the way. Congrats!

 

[MountainBikeDude]

@trannosaurus Welcome to the fold!

It'll be nice to see a fellow R1T around town. My wife and I took delivery at the end of March and live in the west end.

The hood alignment issue is an easy fix of the stopper on the front right or front left corners. Paint issues I agree aren't up to snuff on yours, as mine was defect free. Seat trim, as others mentioned is just a byproduct of the way the seats articulate, and that trim while odd, is meant to move like that.

My T had two issues.

Drivers wiper was seated incorrectly and would make light contact with the A pillar when in use. I just backed off the nut holding it down and rotated it a couple degrees counterclockwise and re-torqued it. works as intended now.

Second was some of the underbody panels had some missing screws (7 total) I was taking the panel off to reveal the trailer hitch and looked below and noticed one missing. Decided to raise the suspension, and crawled under with some torque bits and checked all of them. The vast majority were snug (all of the reinforced shielding bolts were perfect) but the odd one on the carbon panels weren't loose enough to turn with your fingers, but enough that they weren't fully seated. The missed screws of various sizes will be installed tomorrow at the service centre.

All in all, pretty minor and not unexpected.

 

[trannosaurus]

The little paint globs over the sealant between the panels towards the rear roof of the car is pretty common, ive seen it on many R1Ts, I'll have my first service in a few weeks so i'll see what they say. I havent ticket it yet because not sure if it's worth the trouble of it going to a body shop and more damage potentially being done. For now its a out of sight out of mind situation..

Your other paint issue on the body panel is definitely a problem and should be taken care of. Love the color by the way. Congrats!

The little paint globs over the sealant between the panels towards the rear roof of the car is pretty common, ive seen it on many R1Ts, I'll have my first service in a few weeks so i'll see what they say. I havent ticket it yet because not sure if it's worth the trouble of it going to a body shop and more damage potentially being done. For now its a out of sight out of mind situation..

Your other paint issue on the body panel is definitely a problem and should be taken care of. Love the color by the way. Congrats!

Yea, most of it will be easily taken care of once I do my first detail so I'm not all that concerned.
Cheers, thanks! I was back and forth about canyon red or limestone but hadn't seen any reds so figured I'd go with it. Guide said it's the only one he knows of in this spec that's been delivered in the country so far. That doesn't seem right but I'll take it!

 

[trannosaurus]

@trannosaurus Welcome to the fold!

It'll be nice to see a fellow R1T around town. My wife and I took delivery at the end of March and live in the west end.

The hood alignment issue is an easy fix of the stopper on the front right or front left corners. Paint issues I agree aren't up to snuff on yours, as mine was defect free. Seat trim, as others mentioned is just a byproduct of the way the seats articulate, and that trim while odd, is meant to move like that.

My T had two issues.

Drivers wiper was seated incorrectly and would make light contact with the A pillar when in use. I just backed off the nut holding it down and rotated it a couple degrees counterclockwise and re-torqued it. works as intended now.

Second was some of the underbody panels had some missing screws (7 total) I was taking the panel off to reveal the trailer hitch and looked below and noticed one missing. Decided to raise the suspension, and crawled under with some torque bits and checked all of them. The vast majority were snug (all of the reinforced shielding bolts were perfect) but the odd one on the carbon panels weren't loose enough to turn with your fingers, but enough that they weren't fully seated. The missed screws of various sizes will be installed tomorrow at the service centre.

All in all, pretty minor and not unexpected.

Thank you! Yea I've only seen a couple along the sea to sky highway and in Whistler but everyone keeps telling me about sightings daily now. I'm out closer to the Fraser Valley so it's def more about ICE vehicles.

Good to hear yours was built well overall with only minor issues! I'd be a tad nervous about loose/missing screws but sounds like none of them were holding anything structural ?

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Yeah they need to make that sanded down spot right for sure.

 

[R1EV]

The red canyon looks sharp! Congrats.

 

[trannosaurus]

The red canyon looks sharp! Congrats.

It sure does! Except for my one dull spot ?. Thanks!

 

[mini2nut]

My drivers side body panels were all misaligned when I took delivery. I almost walked away during delivery but I knew I had a 7-day return right.

My local SC addressed everything to my satisfaction and the truck looks great now with near perfect panel alignment. Luckily I had zero paint or weatherstripping issues like many others have encountered.

 

[R1Tom]

My drivers side body panels were all misaligned when I took delivery. I almost walked away during delivery but I knew I had a 7-day return right.

My local SC addressed everything to my satisfaction and the truck looks great now with near perfect panel alignment. Luckily I had zero paint or weatherstripping issues like many others have encountered.

And this still amazes me. Seems a team at the end of the line could be looking at these types of issues and correcting, far more efficiently than waiting for then to be dealt with at service centers while irritating customers and paying for loaners, etc....

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