Professional Distributor - 32

DIAGNOSTIC TECH
solutions for Tesla customers who are
no longer interested in visiting their
closed network.
If you want to see what the future
of vehicle transportation looks and
feels like, drive a Tesla. If you own a
Tesla, be forewarned that one of the
experiences you'll have difficulty witnessing is how the vehicle's features
and operation improves through software updates.
As a Tesla owner myself, I've
noticed all the updates my vehicle
has received thus far never required
a visit to a service department. This
is because Tesla takes advantage of
their connected vehicle network
and can deliver updates and receive
vehicle feedback over-the-air (OTA).
Many manufacturers are beginning to
take advantage of OTA updates, and
I believe this shift will continue to
grow as manufacturers race towards
the autonomous drive vehicle.
As far as Tesla product knowledge
goes, one can gain a ton of intelligence
by simply spending time online reading about the manufacturer. Rich's
Rebuilds is one good source of information. This guy purchases wrecked
Teslas and either rebuilds them or
transplants propulsion systems into
other vehicles. Quite a bit of service
knowledge can be obtained by watching his video library.
Jack Rickard with EVTV Motor
Werks is another resource. Rickard
is an engineer and an electric vehicle junkie. He can help technicians
wanting to learn more about electric
vehicles get up to speed. See sidebar
for links.

FINDING A COMMUNITY
As a technician, seek out regionally
based online forums where electrified
vehicle owners communicate. Tuning
in can help reveal common complaints
and symptoms exhibited by various
carlines. I've participated in many,
and it's amazing to learn some of the

stuff taking place in the market, even
at the OEM level. I've heard horror
stories describing repeated trips to the
manufacturer dealership to get problems resolved.
I am in no way trying to disrespect the OEMs and their service
dealer network, as there are a lot of
cases out there where these folks are
on the front lines and they are seeing failure modes for the first time.
Oftentimes, the OEMs have poor test
plans or documentation within their
service information. In fact, there
is great benefit to virtually living
through these experiences.
Moreover, the demand placed on
today's technician is very high, and
these technicians will disappear into
other industries if they're not provided
with the proper tools and knowledge
to thrive in this environment.

CASE STUDY
In 2012 I purchased a 2013 Chevrolet
Volt and still own the vehicle today.
It's been fairly trouble-free through its
first 105,000 miles of operation, but I
did have an interesting issue early on.
Within the first 7,000 miles I began
to experience a dead zone with the
electric power steering (EPS) system.
When the vehicle was in its warm
up period (0-10 minutes) and I was on
the freeway at 50-70 mph, I found
that the EPS was unresponsive to
minor corrections with steering input

32 Professional Distributor I September 2020 I VehicleServicePros.com

The EV1 full battery electric vehicle (BEV) by
General Motors made its debut in 1996 and
ran through 2002 with just over 1,100 units
produced. At the time, General Motors viewed
electric vehicles as an unprofitable niche of the
automobile market.

and I had to apply a lot more torque to
the wheel in order to get the steering
to react. As any technician would, I
began to monitor this behavior and
quickly established a pattern where I
could duplicate the condition.
I was hesitant to head straight to
the dealer since frankly, I didn't have
much faith that they would be able
to address the issue properly. Instead,
I searched the GM Volt forums for
similar complaints and found discussion on the subject. I came across a
GM employee who was tasked with
sourcing vehicle operators with this
complaint. I contacted this individual
and provided my VIN. He connected
me with a "Volt Liaison" who would
provide communication support for
the service dealer.
I wrote a detailed letter explaining how and when this problem
occurred and how service personnel
can increase their odds of duplicating the complaint. Armed with all that
intel and my Volt liaison, I contacted
my selling dealer and scheduled an
appointment.
Five days after dropping off my
vehicle I hadn't heard from the dealer,
so I called and placed an inquiry. Prior
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