Harley Guy, Lormax, Fab.....1 of you most likely knows, I've read the issue about the early vin cars and the rdm's failing. My question is, is it an absolute certainty the RDM's will fail in early vin # cars or are you just saying the likelihood is higher if it was an early build car? I only have 2,800 miles on my car, #426, and it runs perfectly, no strange sounds coming from the rear.....yet! I was at least fortunate to have my battery replaced early on and had a Fisker Engineer to fly in to load the cars last update, have had ZERO issues since then, but don't think the RDM's were changed to my knowledge. Thanks a lot.
Vin #426...Am I S.O.L. with my RDM's?
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@txam99, the only thing I can add as a (non-tech) user is that my RDM problems manifested themselves very early, within the first 200 miles, and I have driven almost a full year and around 15K miles since the replacement with no (knocking on reclaimed wood) further symptoms. So if you have not had any issues with RDM for almost 3K miles, you can be cautiously optimistic about the RDM situation.
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Is this true for all Karma's ? Has anyone on this board experince otherwise? It would be a poll to take or set up?
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My understanding is that there are 2 potential issues with early RDMs: the parking pawl failure that @Fabulist had, and stripping of the splines on the collar that mates with the shaft from the traction motor. The latter is similar to the problem I had with the splines on one traction motor shaft that failed at 5000 miles.
Spoke to some engineers today regarding RDM, traction motors, noises, problems, etc. Per them, I've got a solution that can give anyone with any VIN # some peace of mind about their RDM/Traction Motor setup. Requires some extensive work, but it makes sense and should do the job. Shoot me a PM.
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Traction motor spline failure
Mine failed at around 13000 miles with little warning. My dealership here in Austin was amazing and was able to get them replaced by apparently having to purchase the parts themselves.
Mine failed at around 13000 miles with little warning. My dealership here in Austin was amazing and was able to get them replaced by apparently having to purchase the parts themselves.
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1,217 Posts
What is your VIN #?
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Heres the deal:
The parking pawl failure is actually caused by a C Clip that holds the differential input shaft in place popping off. This allows the input shaft to and causes the parking pawl gear to start wearing into the differential, diff housing, and parking pawl mechanism. This is what causes that whining noise on decel/clicking noise in reverse for anybody that has encountered the issue.
Eventually the parking pawl will no longer engage/disengage park.
Fortunately if caught early enough the RDM can be repaired with the correct C Clip and the RDM can be salvaged. I dont know what dealerships charge but RDMs cost fisker about $3k.
The spline issue (soft splines) is actually a traction motor problem, but can premature failure of the differential splines as well.
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Rumor has it using
Loctite red can prevent traction motor failure ? Personally I don't think it can if the splines are undersized and with the amount of torque the traction motors produce I would think they still will fail . Where would we optain the correct E Clip I was told at one point TSS was all ready working on this repair and that was months before the doors were closed . Any reason why that repair wasn't pushed forward knowing that the cost savings would be a smart move
When I moved from Fisker Corp to the dealer, the first RDM I did I asked if they'd like me to do the clip instead of just the whole RDM. I'd already done who knows how many of them while I was at FA. They said no, it wasn't a dealer-level repair. Another badly managed decision...
Any reason the fan recall wasn't done sooner than it was?
They knew about the fans burning their motors out. It happened constantly while I was at FA. None of the motors that we replaced on the engineering cars ever got to the point that a fire looked like a concern, at least not in the shop. Maybe they thought it wasn't as important as it turned out to be? Maybe energy was being focused elsewhere? At this point, who knows why it wasn't done sooner. I can say though that when I asked about these getting fixed at the dealers, I was told, in basic terms, "That's what a warranty is for".
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The loctite is used to prevent the low/mid speed spline rattle, which can wear down the splines of both the traction motors/rdm. It was more of a interim solution than anything really. Software/different splines were the correct fix for spline rattling.
It had something to do with Tremec saying that they wouldn't warranty anything that was opened up. Building remanned units was part of the deal but I don't remember the specifics.
The software update for the spline rattling never made it though. Was that supposed to come in the rumored March release that disappeared?
Makes sense on the opened up RDM's and the warranty issue. That's too bad though, once the RDM was out of the car, replacing that clip was quite simple for any experienced tech.
I can guess at a software fix for this issue, but could you elaborate?
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