We took our Tesla Model Y for a safety inspection at Bumble Auto (3243 Bethany Ln, Ellicott City 21042). It failed the inspection; Bumble told us we had damaged bushings in the front left and front right control arms. They told us the bushings couldn't be replaced separately and recommended replacing at least three control arms. Due to kit pricing and overall maintenance, John suggested we replace all four.
We agreed for Bumble to replace the four control arms and do a follow-up alignment. This was going to be expensive for us. The parts were ordered, and they did the work on Friday, August 22.
We paid and picked it up late in afternoon. When my partner started to drive the car home with our daughter, she immediately noticed the steering felt unsafe, so she stopped half a mile north at Bethany Church. She called me and said I should come pick her up because she didn't feel safe driving the rest of the way home (which is only about one mile away on residential streets).
I drove the car and immediately noticed the steering was very weird. I called John at Bumble. He seemed to think it was just a small alignment issue. They said they outsourced the alignment to another shop. (I was not aware another shop would be doing work on the car.) We agreed I would bring it in on Monday morning.
Then I slowly drove the car home. Even at about 20 mph, small dips on the road (sewer covers for example) made me feel like I was about to lose control of the car. When driving the car forwards, the steering returns to center way too fast. When driving in reverse, the steering is also weird but in a different way. With the windows down, I could hear the tires making unusually loud noises. By the time I got home, I could also smell the tires. Something was majorly off. I parked and felt the surface of the front tires. They were very hot even though the rear tires were cool. The front tire outside edges were hotter than the inside edges.
I started to see we had a big issue which seemed like more than a small alignment mistake. I did some research and came up with a hypothesis that mistakes were made during installation of the control arms and/or with the alignment. It seemed possible to me that the camber and/or toe-in was set incorrectly.
How was the car was returned to us in this condition? Who test drove the car? Did anyone? Presumably the car was driven between different repair facilities with the suspension in this condition, wearing the tires unevenly. Tesla Model Y's are very common cars, and I would expect that many repair shops know what the steering should feel like. It was hard to imagine that no one noticed.
I drove the car at about 15-20 mph about a 1.5 miles from our home to Bumble on Monday morning. As another example of how noticable the steering problem is, I could hear the tires chirp when driving over expansion gaps on the small bridge on Bethany Lane that goes over the Little Patuxent River, about 400 feet from Bumble's location. (So this is likely part of their test drive route.)
I'm currently in conversations with Bumble Auto to make this right.
Here is what we need from Bumble Auto:
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Bumble will refund our money in full.
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Bumble will not touch our car again.
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Bumble will pay Tesla directly for all work needed to bring the car back to a factory-spec suspension configuration, including factory control arms and alignment. We don't want to have to guess or wonder as to the quality of Bumble's work.
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Bumble will pay Tesla directly for the work done. We don't want to deal with reimbursement hassles.
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Bumble will pay in advance. We don't want to get stuck in a situation where we're waiting for our car while the payment stuff gets ironed out.
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We will schedule and coordinate with Tesla, since we want to be in control of who touches and drives the car.