What 136 owners told NHTSA about the 2022 Tesla Model S Bev

PHANTOM BRAKING: I was driving northbound on the I-5 highway south of Sacramento, California using cruise control and traveling at the 70 MPH speed limit on September 14, 2022. At approximately 2:50 p.m., I moved from the right lane into the left lane by using the turn signal to execute the lane change. Once in the left lane, the car immediately began violently applying the brakes. There was a car behind me that appeared as if it was going to rear end me. I pressed on the accelerator pedal which allowed me to regain control over the vehicle and avoid being hit by the vehicle behind me. The weather was clear and visibility was excellent. There was no apparent reason for the emergency braking system to become operative.

NHTSA ODI 11485612

I have quite a few incidents with fantom breaks on my Tesla. Two night ago I almost caused accident as my Tesla breaked for no reason. Many incidents happened before in the month.

NHTSA ODI 11482104

While driving with Traffic Aware Cruise Control engaged and set at 55 MPH the car did a hard break to an almost complete stop in the middle of the lane for no apparent reason. This occurred at least two times and both times there was no traffic in front of me. The road was a two lane highway. There was oncoming traffic and cars behind me but no cars in front of me. The breaking was so hard on both occasions and it startled me and caused me to veer off the road in the first instance . The car behind me had to break suddenly as well. After the second occurrence I disengaged the TACC as it seemed to be sensing the oncoming traffic

NHTSA ODI 11481684

I was driving to the airport at 4:00 am in the morning. I was on C470 going past SantaFa exist and had the cruise control set to 70mph. As I was just passing the exit the cruise control setting dropped to 45mph and the car broke hard for no reason. The cruise control setting was NOT set to the actual speed. This has happened on 4 other occasions while driving on the highway. This is very scary and very dangerous to any car that might be following me. I told the Tesla service person and they said, that it is called phantom breaking and they are aware of it, and if it happens again to just control the speed with the pedal. Doesn't seem like a good solution.

NHTSA ODI 11480463

We experienced between 10 and 15 Phantom braking events on Highway 395 between Carson City and Apple Valley California. We also experienced Phantom breaking a few times during the trip back along Highway 101 in California. The events occurred only when the car was in adaptive cruise control and in basic self driving. Braking was alarmingly strong in two or three cases, and could have resulted in an accident if someone had been following behind us . Other Phantom breaking was moderate to barely noticeable. These events occurred when there were no other vehicles in the immediate vicinity of the car. Some occurred with no vehicles anywhere in sight. Conditions were 100%, in daylight, no fog or dust obstruction, a brand new clean car, and no other known impacts. The car was simply being driven on a Highway with two lanes going in each Direction. In most cases the opposing lanes were separated by large medians between 50 and hundreds of feet apart. When self- driving and adaptive speed control were off there were no incidents of this phantom braking. As I mentioned before this is a brand new Tesla S. This car was received on June 30th. It was on its first road trip when these events occurred.

NHTSA ODI 11475433

I just completed a round trip from Minneapolis to Oregon. During cruise control, the vehicle frequently suddenly braked at highway speeds for no apparent reason. This was extremely dangerous a few times. I have put in a service request with Tesla.

NHTSA ODI 11474114

During our first road trip with this auto, we traveled along I-76 and I-80 on clear days; after setting the "traffic-aware cruise control" (aka adaptive cruise control), the car would brake randomly and for no apparent reason (such as approaching a car ahead of us). This happened so frequently as to make the feature useless during much of the drive. At other times during our trip, the cruise control would seem to work for a while, then start with random braking. On two-lane highways, though it didn't seem to regard oncoming cars in the opposite lane as a hazard (that's good), it still engaged in random braking when no cars were anywhere in sight. Once again, we'd just turn off the feature, as it became more of a safety hazard than having any benefit. Certainly, any cars that might have been behind us would have been endangered by unexpected braking, and had road conditions been at all slippery, such as on ice, it could have been downright dangerous. I'd rather that Tesla reverted to a "traditional" cruise control, where we can set the speed and then be responsible for managing braking situations.

NHTSA ODI 11467564

Driving at 70 mph with Autopilot on, vehicle slams on brakes when approaching Semi Truck in oncoming lane. No vehicles in front or behind me. No known reason for this action. AutoSteer was not engaged.

NHTSA ODI 11459142