Rivian Quality - Two Genuine Questions

[dgl78]

Well you guys gave me a heart attack reading all the dreadful QA reports. I took delivery of a limestone/OC R1S tonight in San Diego. The gap at the bottom of the driver's door was a teeny bit narrower than it should be relative to the higher end of it. And yes the driver's door does have kind of a weird sound when it shuts like maybe there is a piece of plastic loose in there. Aside from those two minor things, the vehicle drives beautifully, there are no suspension or AC or compressor noises. The stereo is fantastic. The windows roll up just fine at a fine speed. The 20" AT wheels in black look bad ass. The UI will take some time to learn and master which is expected. But no there are no loose or missing bolts underneath. I think German interiors are better executed. Telsa model X is actually very nice, but drives like a bloated whale and looks like one too. I want to support US manufacturing and innovation. And certainly Elon can go fly a kite after what he did to his customers by dropping prices 30% in 8 months.

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[kyunam]

So my genuine questions are as follows:
- Why this level of quality that Rivian is currently producing an expectation of the norm? It seems like the Rivian community is willing to accept this level of quality which to me is shocking

This made me thinking:

Then, what should the Rivian community have done? Don’t buy, wait until Rivian makes flawless vehicles?

What would you have done instead?

 

[sac602]

I received my S at the beginning of August, and upon delivery the only thing wrong was that one of the plastic covers for a jack point had fallen off during transport. They sent mobile tech out the within a week who popped it on. At this point I did not notice any other imperfections, but the rivian mobile service tech noticed that the back liftgate gap with the tailgate was too close and should be adjusted, so I put in a ticket, and was scheduled for service 30 days later. After about 2 weeks the steering wheel started to get a little loose (torque was not correct on the steering wheel nut). I tightened it myself so I can still drive the car but a week later it loosened up again and I dropped it off at the service center a week prior to my appointment without calling Rivian (I knew they would send a tow truck If I mentioned anything loose with steering). when I dropped it off I also listed a few very minor door alignment imperfections that developed or had become more pronunced. honestly I think they were probably within spec, but as OP said, this is a very expensive car that should have a similar high quality/finish and why not ask? The car was returned within 5 days on my original scheduled service day and all the issues were fixed perfectly. I think there is some Credence to the fact that they're new and they still have Growing Pains such as not twerking a steering wheel nut, which is a pretty important thing to remember to do, but it was no also easily fixed. Service was extremely fast they were very professional they gave me plenty of uber credits to get home and back to the service center when the car was finished. I don't feel those service issues wouldn't necessarily have occurred with a legacy automaker, but they also May have. Me personally My overall experience was much smoother and Im

much more satisfied with the quality of the product then I was fearing based on the forums. With that said maybe I am a fanboy and giving them more latitude not holding them to the same high standard, but for me I am satisfied with the vehicle and service and feel that it is a very quality product

 

[maddave12]

I'll "+1" comments other posters have shared.

If I absolutely had to have it reliable, I wouldn't buy one just yet. It seems as though there are still too many unreliable units being delivered, too many initial defects. I haven't seen a graph of the trends, though, so I may be wrong on the direction things are going. As others have rightly pointed out, anecdotes aren't useful for this. If it absolutely had to be reliable, I'd get a Toyota or Honda, most likely. Or Kia. We've been able to weather the service visits because we have enough cars we can adjust when needed, though it's inconvenient.

I believe Rivian will get past this stage, and be churning out pretty solid vehicles soon. I, too, own stock, because I believe they're headed to solid success.

 

[rob_d]

I'll "+1" comments other posters have shared.

If I absolutely had to have it reliable, I wouldn't buy one just yet. It seems as though there are still too many unreliable units being delivered, too many initial defects. I haven't seen a graph of the trends, though, so I may be wrong on the direction things are going. As others have rightly pointed out, anecdotes aren't useful for this. If it absolutely had to be reliable, I'd get a Toyota or Honda, most likely. Or Kia. We've been able to weather the service visits because we have enough cars we can adjust when needed, though it's inconvenient.

I believe Rivian will get past this stage, and be churning out pretty solid vehicles soon. I, too, own stock, because I believe they're headed to solid success.

Thank you for this unvarnished response. I appreciate it! We are a two car family (parking constraint is the main reason why) so the potential for having one car down is another consideration for us.

 

[lovetowait]

Love this thread. So many anecdotal responses that reinforce the original point.

I think deep down you already know the answer. Right now a Rivian is probabalistically a bad choice. Expensive, complex and relatively unproven. Very likely to have more problems than your Honda and Toyota combined, and not providing much additional capability you don't already have in your fleet. Certainly not as cost effective at doing it. But you have to decide whether you want to do it anyways for a bit of fun.

Sometimes it is exciting to be a part of something new. Only you can decide how much that is worth to you.

 

[ev_fanatic]

Also waiting for my R1S for almost 2 years, and had similar questions as OP!

I was one of the first reservation holders for the Tesla model 3 (2018 may delivery) and while a couple of things needed to be fixed under warranty, I love that car - we plan to keep it as long as possible. I've also owned a BMW 3 series (twin turbo, had to trade it in after 10 years when turbo bearings started to give) and (currently have) a Porsche Boxster (base, so I can accelerate longer ) so hopefully that says I care about how a car drives and how long it lasts!

With a family that reached a count of 4 recently, I've been looking for a replacement for our Bolt. Naturally for a large SUV that can occasionally carry more than 5 people, my only choices (electric) were the R1S and the Tesla Model X (I'm constantly surprised people think they cannot be compared. Was strongly tempted with the price drop but resisted). I reserved Oct 2021 and was kinda sold even before the test drive a few months ago after watching the Munro live disassembly as well as other reviews. The test drive was pretty much what I expected.

Our delivery estimate (R1S quad large, pre-price-increase), however, is Sep-Oct (i.e. any time now!) and our Chevy Bolt's lease ends next March, so I've been lurking these forums in the meantime. Looking at all the threads about issues was not too concerning since Rivian (like Tesla for our 3) took care of most of them but it was very concerning when someone posted about "service said it was within spec/non-issue". It has been reassuring that a lot of people replied with "I've had n issues but they were all solved" with just a couple saying "I'll sell the car and wait for a better one/different one", but still the chances of getting a bad one which isn't resolved by service are concerning a bit.

After all of this, I've decided to continue with my original plan of getting the R1S, but instead of waiting till my current Bolt's lease expires, I'll likely get the R1S a couple of months early (late Jan/ early Feb maybe) in anticipation of any issues that require servicing. Thanks for all your inputs, and thanks to OP for the thread!

 

[GabeS]

I had the exact same hesitancy as you and nearly canceled my order, but I didn't. I literally had a conversation with my wife right before I decided to go forward "Am I knowingly buying a lemon? Is it worth the risk? I live 4 hours from a service center am I stupid? etc.."

Here is my experience for what it's worth (I have owned my Rivian for 1 year now / approaching 10,000 miles / This is the first time I've glanced at this forum in 6 months just poking around and saw your post / previous to getting Rivian I was on these forums every day):

I'll address a couple of things you mentioned as well:

- You said above "Only people who have problems post in the forums. For every complaint, there's 10 trucks/SUVs that are great." [I don't buy this.]"

You should "buy that" as it's been very true. I would go further to say for every complaint there are 100 that a great. Not just 10. Youtubers post inflammatory videos because they get way more clicks than a post "everything is great". People complaining on forums are the exception not the rule. This is 100% true. There are thousands of Rivians on the road, there are maybe 5% of owners who spend time on these forums. When something goes wrong you want others to know, research if others have same issue etc ... so you go online and post. When things are fine (as is my case) I rarely visit these forums (this is my first visit since I got my Rivian, prior to buying I was obsessing about visiting every day as it seems you are as well).

You mentioned a RAV4 forum where everything is great. - That may be a superfan bias. Again, in my life, I literally have never visited a forum for vehicles I've owned. Why? I'm not a superfan of my Subaru Forester, it was fine, and when something went wrong I just took it to a shop to fix it. --- > The reason I found this forum is because I was worried, the same way you are, since its a startup >>> This may piss off some Rivian owners (especially on the forums) but I find it to be true - because Rivian is a new company and electric cars are a new technology - Rivian owners are exceptionally "picky" examine their vehicles with a mind expecting something wrong. Some of the ridiculous complaints I find absurd - for example, WTF is a panel gap? Have you ever bought a car before a Rivian and inspected your panel gaps? I sure haven't but sure enough after all the damn posts on here I looked at them when I got my Rivian worrying if they were crooked or off (they were fine - I didn't use a freaking ruler to measure though).

My experience - What I did before I bought:

- There is a RAN network charger in Salida, CO close to where I live. I talked to people there in real life. Just literally hung out to talk to owners. Any Rivian I saw I talked to owners as much as possible asking simply "How do you like, any issues so far?" I never got a negative answer. I probably talked to around 20 real-life owners just living life before buying.

- I finally said F it and got my Rivian. I was most worried that the 12v would dye and brick the vehicle. Since 1 popular Tesla YouTuber made a very dramatic video about this happening to him with his new Rivian and some on the forum said it also happened to them. I was also worried the parking brake wouldn't work because someone on this forum posted a video of their truck rolling away down a hill (turns out the genius parked on pure ice on a steep hill and it actually slid down the road, wasn't a truck issue as someone finally pointed out. But the headline was something like Beware! Rivain's Parking Break Doesn't Work! I wonder how many other complaints are user errors?)

After all that worry, buying a portable jumper for the 12v issue just in case, planning that I would have to visit the service center many times - 1 year later I have literally had 0 issues with the vehicle. Not .. a ... single ... issue. So I can't speak to service centers since I haven't had to visit one.

I know it's only my experience, and there are legitimate issues from people on here, but I can tell you every Rivian owner I've met (in real life not on these forums) has had the same experience. Every time I see some headline on a news site about something inflammatory about Rivian vehicles, I find it a bit ridiculous as in real life, in my experience, it couldn't be farther from the truth.

Am I just lucky? I doubt it. The quality of the build has been much better than my previous Subaru Forester for what it's worth. The Rivian is solid.

Good luck with your decision!

 

[rob_d]

I had the exact same hesitancy as you and nearly canceled my order, but I didn't. I literally had a conversation with my wife right before I decided to go forward "Am I knowingly buying a lemon? Is it worth the risk? I live 4 hours from a service center am I stupid? etc.."

Here is my experience for what it's worth (I have owned my Rivian for 1 year now / approaching 10,000 miles / This is the first time I've glanced at this forum in 6 months just poking around and saw your post / previous to getting Rivian I was on these forums every day):

I'll address a couple of things you mentioned as well:

- You said above "Only people who have problems post in the forums. For every complaint, there's 10 trucks/SUVs that are great." [I don't buy this.]"

You should "buy that" as it's been very true. I would go further to say for every complaint there are 100 that a great. Not just 10. Youtubers post inflammatory videos because they get way more clicks than a post "everything is great". People complaining on forums are the exception not the rule. This is 100% true. There are thousands of Rivians on the road, there are maybe 5% of owners who spend time on these forums. When something goes wrong you want others to know, research if others have same issue etc ... so you go online and post. When things are fine (as is my case) I rarely visit these forums (this is my first visit since I got my Rivian, prior to buying I was obsessing about visiting every day as it seems you are as well).

You mentioned a RAV4 forum where everything is great. - That may be a superfan bias. Again, in my life, I literally have never visited a forum for vehicles I've owned. Why? I'm not a superfan of my Subaru Forester, it was fine, and when something went wrong I just took it to a shop to fix it. --- > The reason I found this forum is because I was worried, the same way you are, since its a startup >>> This may piss off some Rivian owners (especially on the forums) but I find it to be true - because Rivian is a new company and electric cars are a new technology - Rivian owners are exceptionally "picky" examine their vehicles with a mind expecting something wrong. Some of the ridiculous complaints I find absurd - for example, WTF is a panel gap? Have you ever bought a car before a Rivian and inspected your panel gaps? I sure haven't but sure enough after all the damn posts on here I looked at them when I got my Rivian worrying if they were crooked or off (they were fine - I didn't use a freaking ruler to measure though).

My experience - What I did before I bought:

- There is a RAN network charger in Salida, CO close to where I live. I talked to people there in real life. Just literally hung out to talk to owners. Any Rivian I saw I talked to owners as much as possible asking simply "How do you like, any issues so far?" I never got a negative answer. I probably talked to around 20 real-life owners just living life before buying.

- I finally said F it and got my Rivian. I was most worried that the 12v would dye and brick the vehicle. Since 1 popular Tesla YouTuber made a very dramatic video about this happening to him with his new Rivian and some on the forum said it also happened to them. I was also worried the parking brake wouldn't work because someone on this forum posted a video of their truck rolling away down a hill (turns out the genius parked on pure ice on a steep hill and it actually slid down the road, wasn't a truck issue as someone finally pointed out. But the headline was something like Beware! Rivain's Parking Break Doesn't Work! I wonder how many other complaints are user errors?)

After all that worry, buying a portable jumper for the 12v issue just in case, planning that I would have to visit the service center many times - 1 year later I have literally had 0 issues with the vehicle. Not .. a ... single ... issue. So I can't speak to service centers since I haven't had to visit one.

I know it's only my experience, and there are legitimate issues from people on here, but I can tell you every Rivian owner I've met (in real life not on these forums) has had the same experience. Every time I see some headline on a news site about something inflammatory about Rivian vehicles, I find it a bit ridiculous as in real life, in my experience, it couldn't be farther from the truth.

Am I just lucky? I doubt it. The quality of the build has been much better than my previous Subaru Forester for what it's worth. The Rivian is solid.

Good luck with your decision!

Thanks for the feedback Gabe. This is very helpful.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

After reading some of this thread I'm going to echo some of the other posters here and say you should not buy a Rivian. It sounds like you're just looking for reasons to be dissatisfied and that's a mindset that no matter the quality of the truck you receive you're going to be unhappy about it. Why bother spending your money on something you've already decided was garbage?

As to why I bought one of these "horrible" vehicles, it's hands down the best vehicle I've ever owned and that's counting all the issues I've had with it. I've had the 12V battery problem AND a drive unit failure and if I was able to be transported back to the day I bought the truck the only thing I would have done differently was get the 20" rims not the 21's. Just for tire availability mainly as the Pirellis aren't great wearing.

For me the good more than outweighs the bad and there's no other vehicle on the market today that better fits all my needs and wants. It's a capable pickup, and off road vehicle and one of the quickest vehicles on the market. I have no interest in measuring panel gaps or whining about super minor stuff. Since you do I suggest buying a Rolls Royce. The people at Rolls will be happy for you to measure panel gaps and scrutinize paint and trim. They hand build those to be perfect in appearance.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

I think that a lot of this comes down to an individual’s relationship to cars, overall. There’s no right or wrong stance on this to this, either. Are you someone who sees cars rationally: only (or at least primarily) as a way to transport people, animals, and things from place to place with an emphasis on economy and reliability? Are you someone who sees cars as less rational and more emotional, even sensuous (relating to the senses rather than intellect; not sensual, there’s a difference): things of beauty and passion that excite the senses?

I’ve always been a passionate car person and so I fall firmly in the less rational/more emotional camp. I’d rather pay more for a car that I LOVE, and even put up with mechanical issues than pay less for a reliable car that makes me resentful or sad that I spent my money on it. I want to like the looks of my car, inside and out. I like good performance, handling, comfort, and capability. I want interesting features. Rivians are made for people like me: I get joy from it every time I walk up to it, drive it, and even wash it. I know some friends and family questioned my sanity for buying a new vehicle design from a new manufacturer, and I didn’t care.

To the rational people, we emotional car people make zero sense, and for good reason! I get the feeling that you’re more of a rational person when it comes to cars, and I think you’d be happier delaying the purchase of a Rivian until the company matures a bit with build quality and service network locations / appointment availability. Rivian got very ambitious with launching 3 products within a year and building out a network of service centers. I know that there was talk of partnering with Cox Automotive (IIRC) for mobile service, but that never materialized. Maybe it would‘ve helped or it could’ve made things worse? All I know is, if you’re looking for a guaranteed flawless vehicle with absolute reliability and a robust service network, this probably isn’t the path to happiness for you today.

To the people who passionately love cars irrationally, though: jump in, the water’s fine! I’ve never experienced a vehicle that crams so many positive attributes and so much capability into one package.

edit: missed a word

Wow you just described me to a T. I would much rather have a car I like to drive with problems than something boring and lame that's trouble free. Driving itself is not a task I enjoy. I like being out and going places but I don't like the journey to get there. Most people drive like absolute shit and it's an exercise in frustration to get anywhere these days. When I'm driving my R1T though driving becomes more than tolerable it's enjoyable.

Any vehicle that can take a task I dislike doing and turn it into a task I enjoy is worth the premium in cost and time. With that said I'm in a situation that I understand most people are not in. My finances are such that even if I lost most or all value in my Rivian it would suck but I could take the hit in stride. I also have a very flexible schedule and although I am busy and in fairly high demand professionally I'm at the point in my career where people need to accommodate MY schedule instead of me trying to work around theirs.

So a service appointment wouldn't scare me, even if I have to drive 2.5 hours to Nashville in order to do it or 3.5 to Atlanta. I'd use that as an opportunity to take a couple day city vacation with the wife and turn a negative into a positive. Make lemons out of that lemonade. I am aware though not everyone can just take a couple days off midweek with little to no notice. With that said my truck has been reliable and I trust it as our road trip vehicle at this point.

 

[SoCal Rob]

Naturally for a large SUV that can occasionally carry more than 5 people, my only choices (electric) were the R1S and the Tesla Model X (I'm constantly surprised people think they cannot be compared.

If you’re looking for an electric vehicle which can occasionally carry more than 5 people they can DEFINITELY be compared.

If you also want the capability of a 4x4 SUV to go more seriously off-road, then you’d think they cannot be compared. If you also want the capability of a boxy SUV to move large boxy cargo and seat a 6’ tall adult in the 3rd for longer durations, then you’d think they cannot be compared.

We wanted a replacement for our Land Rover LR3. The R1S meets or exceeds the LR3’s capability in nearly every way and the Model X doesn’t so we wouldn’t even consider it.

I am sure there are other lists of requirements where they cannot be compared which eliminate the R1S, so it just comes down to the needs and wants of the buyer.

 

[HJP1]

I have not read every post on this thread but here are some thoughts after 1 year of ownership with my R1T. First off I do love the vehicle and it is my first pick up truck in over 55 plus years of buying and driving everything from Corvettes, Mustangs, Cadillacs and everything in between, even the wife likes it and she thinks pick up trucks are only for, ok we'll just leave that one alone! Anyway I do think about the unknown long term reliability even though I never keep a car more than a few years. I do think Rivian overengineered and over built this first generation of R1s as they need to get a reputation for quality right out of the box. Mine happens to be flawless, no body parts miss aliened, powered tonneau cover still works and the only interaction I've had with the service center is to tighten the steering bolt (they came to my home) and the seat belt recall (5 minutes at the Phoenix service center). With a five year bumper to bumper warranty and 10 years on the battery (I don't drive enough to exceed the mileage limits) I have no immediate concerns but if one does decide to keep this for 10 years plus or sell in the used market after warranty how will Rivians be perceived, like Lexus/Toyota or a Yugo? If you plan to keep this for 10 years plus how long will the air suspension last (they are known to need replacement in the 60 - 100K mile range on other vehicles) and at what cost. Plus what will be the cost to replace a circuit board or electric motor if needed not to mention the batteries? Like most early buyers I will not keep mine that long but some will, any thoughts especially from folks that are techies or actual engineers?

 

[Engineer]

My '22 Tahoe ($73k) was delivered without working heated steering wheel and parking sensors (COVID chip shortage) has some minor panel gap issues (dealership says its normal), poor paint coverage in some of the door jam areas, a heat shield rattle at highway speeds that the dealership refuses to even acknowledge, a chronic alignment/weird tire wear issue and the "black" chrome tint is chipping/peeling after only 10k miles (started at 2k). Oh yeah and the auto headlights didn't work out of the box and the Z71 badges were falling off...

I am just crossing my fingers that i don't have lifter issues before i pick up the rivian at the end of this month.

I guess my point is with mass produced products there are always going to be issues, even with an established company/product.

 

[eddierunner]

Just chiming in to say I've had my R1T since June 2022 and haven't needed any service (apart from a rock cracking the windshield and the quick recall issues). I absolutely love it!

Without any hard numbers on defects and type of defects, we can't really compare to other cars. But it certainly seems the biggest problem is that service center wait times are long. So if you end up with an issue, it takes much longer to resolve than other brands which is something you need to consider.

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