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Woman Gets Her Brand-New Tesla Delivered. Then She Realizes It’s Damaged

“It’s a Tesla not a Lamborghini."

Photo by: AdobeStock

Mustafa Gatollari

By: Mustafa Gatollari

Oct 11, at 10:00am ET

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A woman’s delivery of her brand-new Tesla was spoiled after she clocked interior frame damage after popping its trunk.

Brandy Ruiz (@brandyru1z) recently published a social media post showing off paint scuffs and cracks on what appears to be welding points inside of the blue EV.

What’s more, she says Tesla’s customer service department wasn’t exactly helpful in rectifying the situation. She narrates over the video, highlighting the imperfections in her new ride.

“This is just a reminder for everyone who’s excited about their brand new Tesla to make sure you check everything on delivery day. Mine unfortunately came damaged and now it’s been three weeks and I’m still trying to get it fixed,” she says.

Ruiz adds in a caption: “Delivery day excitement can quickly turn into a headache.”

Tesla Love And Hate

Folks who reacted to Ruiz’s video had varying opinions on her gripes. Some believed she was being much too persnickety about the condition of the Tesla.

“That is not damaged,” one person wrote. “It’s a Tesla not a Lamborghini,” another agreed.

Ruiz disagreed. She replied to one commenter, “I paid money for a brand new car; it should not have any flaws like this. And what would you count as damage? I live in Oregon and prefer rain to not come inside and ruin my headline."

Others concurred with Ruiz’s assessment of the damage. One said they could clearly see why she was displeased with the condition her new ride arrived in. “Seems supposedly her trunk’s pinch weld from roof to rear passenger panel, 30 minute fix genuinely, diabolical they missed a whole weld in factory," they said.

Others took the opportunity to criticize Tesla’s overall fit and finish.

“I had 51 items for them to fix on my Y. There was 1 on my R2,” one said. Another penned, “My Mazda CX5 beautifully crafted in Japan had zero issues when I bought it in 2019 and zero issues today!”

Someone else wrote: “Please don’t have high hopes for Tesla quality no matter what you paid.”

This sentiment was echoed by another Tesla owner who said they faced similar issues. “Picked up ours on June 28th. Finally got an appointment for all the delivery day defects including a dent for October 12th. They’ll have it for 3 or 4 weeks and we get a free loaner with free supercharging the entire time. Can’t complain about that,” they wrote.

Criticisms Of Tesla's Durability

In addition to Tesla’s early panel gap controversy, Wards Auto published findings from one firm's assessment of an early Model 3 vehicle. According to Wards Auto, Munro & Associates appraised the metal joining techniques used on the Model 3 and were baffled by some of the choices.

“Munro points out self-piercing rivets in the trunk area/rear of the car that are inexplicably raised and lowered, as well as an unusual mix of conventional and concentric-circle aluminum spot welds and rib-nut and clinch-nut fasteners." Of the latter, Munro says, ‘I don’t understand the rationale there,’” the article states. A rep from the firm called the Model 3 “over-designed by normal standards.”

Tesla’s adoption of Gigacasting was heralded as a solution to welding gripes. MDPI detailed how this manufacturing process can solve welding woes, “especially for electric vehicles.” This is accomplished “by enabling large aluminum components to replace assemblies traditionally produced from stamped and joined sheet-metal parts. In short, a car’s body is largely made of single aluminum pieces, which reduces the number of joining operations required to put it together.

For instance, on the Model Y and Cybertruck, a large number of stamped and/or spot-welded components in their rear frames were purportedly swapped with single die-cast parts.

Gallery: S-Klub LA Mercedes 300SL Tesla Model 3

Mercedes 300SL electric by S-Klub LA

Source: InsideEVs

Are Teslas Shipped With Fit-And-Finish Defects?

One of the most persistent complaints in the early days of Tesla involved their assembly. Panel gaps appear to have been a massive point of contention for 2018-2022 models.

Notably, there appear to have been improvements in later Model 3 and Model Y vehicles. Though the same can’t be said for the oft-maligned Cybertruck.

Others have reported that a frequent sticking point for buyers is overall paint quality. One blog post says that paint coating on Tesla cars is often thinner than on other brands and hovers around the “below average” mark. “Measured total paint thickness … [is] only about 80-100µm … by contrast, many premium brands average 120-150µm: e.g. Audi A4 is ~ 100-140µm, BMW 3 Series ~ 95-140µm,” the site says.

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Consequently, the same write-up says many Tesla owners who, upon purchasing their vehicles, almost immediately opt to “apply protective film or coatings immediately—one paint show even recommends PPF/ceramic coating as the ‘best fix’ for Tesla paint issues.”

Motor1 has reached out to her via TikTok direct message for further comment.

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