21" to 20" wheels switch -- never-ending drama

[madgrey]

They really need to add the ability to input the outside circumference and weight of the tire and calculate everything from this. Am I missing anything? Shouldn't this be possible.

You would think so! They probably lack the UI (maybe it's a cryptic, non-user facing menu). But... how hard would it be to pretty it up so us owners could use it? Seems like they are overly worried about liability or damage to some system.

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[Inkedsphynx]

I think the only reason there is a fee here is because you're doing this as a choice. I had to get my cameras recalibrated when my tailgate got replaced and I wasn't charged for it. I'd expect not to be for something relating to a warranty or service, but would expect to pay a fee for their time for something non-essential that isn't warranty or service-based.

EDIT: I don't know what correlation the cameras have to a wheel change. Been trying to think what that could but but can't come up with anything that seems reasonable. Everything should be speedometer based so once the truck knows the tire size it should be able to trigger the cameras at the appropriate speeds/times.

 

[p3ck]

All I can think of with the cameras is the height of the vehcile?

 

[rhumbliner]

When I switched from 21’s to 20’s I was told recalibration was included in the price. I was also told I would have to bring my truck to the service center, not for the wheel change, but for the recalibration. When I pointed out that entailed a 3 hr drive for me they told me in that case the mobile tech could install the wheels and do the recalibration. Once he arrived the whole process took about an hour. And the recalibration was flawless.

 

[joelster]

The 'recalibration' is probably in the Ride menu.

 

[RYU]

The whole point of having a modern vehicle with it's software advancements is to have configurations like this be easily doable by the end user from the car's setup screen.

Hope this makes the next update because it doesn't make any sense not to. The car can even verify the tire diameter size since the navigation system has a GPS based speedo to confirm the car's speed. If it's off by say >3% (or whatever) then send an error (or whatever).

Porsche's has been doing this for nearly a decade or more.

 

[Yellow Buddy]

I took an R1T from Rivian Shop w/ 21" wheels in order to get it sooner. It's been great, but I knew that I needed a winter solution (I live in Tahoe), so when the 20" wheels with the AT's became available, I purchased a set. An appt was set up and the tech delivered them, but couldn't install them for some reason. The tech did what he thought would let the R1T know that it now had 20's.....it didn't work. I installed the wheels myself. I let them know it didn't work and a 2nd tech came out and attempted to update the wheel config. Again it failed. I got a call today from the service center. They want me to bring the truck into the Sacramento SC so that they can update the cameras and charge me $400 to do so. That should enable the vehicle to realize it had 20's vs 21's. Seriously? I told her, no way I'm paying $400...that's insane. She agreed with me, but I'm stuck at the moment with a truck that thinks it has 21" wheels. Aside from it being annoying and affecting the range estimates, what else might it affect? Traction control? The SC rep was very nice and sympathetic, but couldn't do anything. Anyone else have any issues w/ swapping wheel sizes?

Take this with a grain of salt since we've learned Rivian is inconsistent and reps seem to have the freedom to make things up sometimes.

It cost me .25 hours book time to do the configuration, which should be included if you purchased the wheels from Rivian. .25 hours is the fee to hook up to the truck and reconfigure it. It's a simple configuration change but at this time it does require a hookup. I have no idea why you're being charged at all much less 2 hours of book time.

The configuration change affects the odometer, it can also affect camera calibration as the truck sits at a different height. In addition, it also changes the traction and suspension settings to optimize the ride for the wheels and supposedly there are different calculations for the wheel/tire combo that factors in the weight in addition to the size. This was stressed to me as going from a 21 to a 20 is a 7lb (nearly 10%) difference and the dampening rates needed to match.

 

[NY_Rob]

Rivian has stated that the ability of owners to change wheel size via the UI will be added via OTA "sometime in the future". Tesla added that feature in 2021 IIRC, it seemed pretty trivial.

 

[State11]

Do you plan to return to the 21s? If so, just drive it with the 20s and complain to customer service about a $400 charge for nonsense.

No, I'm keeping the 21's. My wife is waiting for a R1S that is configured w/ 20's. I plan to put the 21's on the R1S (hoping they have sorted this wheel change nonsense out by that time). I'll take her 20's for my summer tires and swap them back/forth myself. Hopefully, someone will make some winter tires that'll fit the 21s by then too. Oh, and I do plan on complaining!

 

[windblowlc]

...it can also affect camera calibration as the truck sits at a different height. In addition, it also changes the traction and suspension settings to optimize the ride for the wheels and supposedly there are different calculations for the wheel/tire combo that factors in the weight in addition to the size. This was stressed to me as going from a 21 to a 20 is a 7lb (nearly 10%) difference and the dampening rates needed to match.

This makes no sense - for camera calibration, 1/2" height difference with wheel change is irrelevant vs 9-15" ride height range. In addition, the soft and stiff settings for the suspension working with the variable ride height means there are so many variations. Don't believe what the reps told you - there's absolutely no literature supporting the wheel change changes the dampening rates anywhere that I can find. It's all marketing BS. The ride is way more influenced by tire pressure when everything else is the same.

 

[jwardell]

Just to confirm, I too payed $6k for new 20s and had to pay service to swap them, but it was more about labor for mounting and swapping wheels, not reconfiguration.
Speaking with my always awesome service advisor, yes the Rivian engineers in california have to remotely reconfigure the truck, and this request can add a few hours of waiting especially if you're doing the swap in the morning on the east coast.
Not only are suspension heights and efficiency/range calculations adjusted, but the UI is updated, and be warned, acceleration is nerfed off the line with the 20s. It's not just grip it's in the software torque curves. I could feel it right away. When I have them swap back t the 21s in the summer I'm leaving it that way, maybe it will shred my 20s earlier but I miss that extra punch

 

[kizamybute']

I took an R1T from Rivian Shop w/ 21" wheels in order to get it sooner. It's been great, but I knew that I needed a winter solution (I live in Tahoe), so when the 20" wheels with the AT's became available, I purchased a set. An appt was set up and the tech delivered them, but couldn't install them for some reason. The tech did what he thought would let the R1T know that it now had 20's.....it didn't work. I installed the wheels myself. I let them know it didn't work and a 2nd tech came out and attempted to update the wheel config. Again it failed. I got a call today from the service center. They want me to bring the truck into the Sacramento SC so that they can update the cameras and charge me $400 to do so. That should enable the vehicle to realize it had 20's vs 21's. Seriously? I told her, no way I'm paying $400...that's insane. She agreed with me, but I'm stuck at the moment with a truck that thinks it has 21" wheels. Aside from it being annoying and affecting the range estimates, what else might it affect? Traction control? The SC rep was very nice and sympathetic, but couldn't do anything. Anyone else have any issues w/ swapping wheel sizes?

I made the opposite switch, took months and months to get the truck updated. But, they figured it out eventually. Not really an issue though. What does it do for you? Don't worry about. If anything, being that speedo's are off on these things, I'd leave it alone as your speedo is probably closer to accurate now than if you get the truck to recognize it has 20's. Other than showing up on the screen, it otherwise makes no difference.

For mine, I waited until I had to take the truck in for service for another issue. At that time, they were able to update the truck that I have 21's on it now. other than seeing the 21's on the screen, it otherwise made absolutely no functional difference to have it changed over.

Your range estimates adjust over time based on your driving. Switching it over will reset that. But in the end, it will figure out the estimated range based on your use of it.

 

[State11]

I made the opposite switch, took months and months to get the truck updated. But, they figured it out eventually. Not really an issue though. What does it do for you? Don't worry about. If anything, being that speedo's are off on these things, I'd leave it alone as your speedo is probably closer to accurate now than if you get the truck to recognize it has 20's. Other than showing up on the screen, it otherwise makes no difference.

For mine, I waited until I had to take the truck in for service for another issue. At that time, they were able to update the truck that I have 21's on it now. other than seeing the 21's on the screen, it otherwise made absolutely no functional difference to have it changed over.

Your range estimates adjust over time based on your driving. Switching it over will reset that. But in the end, it will figure out the estimated range based on your use of it.

Thanks. I am primarily concerned about performance in the snow. Some have suggested that wheel size is factored into traction control. I've had a few unexpected issues thus far in snow. I know snow mode is coming, but living in a place where we can get 3+ feet of snow in a day like we did last weekend....I don't like the idea that it's math could be off on traction control. What's nuts about all this is the 2 different Service techs thought they had it fixed....like how can it be this difficult?

 

[kizamybute']

Thanks. I am primarily concerned about performance in the snow. Some have suggested that wheel size is factored into traction control. I've had a few unexpected issues thus far in snow. I know snow mode is coming, but living in a place where we can get 3+ feet of snow in a day like we did last weekend....I don't like the idea that it's math could be off on traction control. What's nuts about all this is the 2 different Service techs thought they had it fixed....like how can it be this difficult?

NO, traction in control is like a living breathing thing. It reads real-time data and adjusts for the conditions at that millisecond of time based on the traction it has at that millisecond. No math. The truck/SUV recognizes a tire slipping and adjusts throttle, braking, etc, accordingly for how much traction loss it is detecting in that particular millisecond and attempts to gain as much traction as possible (little slippage as possible) for that instance. So no, telling the truck it has different wheels, won't make any difference.

Besides, wheel size isn't what determines your traction, it's tire tread. If you were to put 20" snow tires on it, the truck's computers wouldn't know the difference versus having the same size tire but in a high-speed performance version. The difference would be, the traction control would be kicking in a lot more often on the performance tires than on the snow tires, in snowy conditions of course.

Hope that helps.

PS: With my truck, to get it updated, they had to upload it to the "cloud" and download it. The issue was with getting it to the "could", not so much with my truck accepting the update. They tried many times and said my truck should now show the new configuration, but it didn't. I'm guessing, when they had it at the service center, they just programmed it directly, rather than over the air. The over the air part is where they seem to have issues. There have been others that also had issues. For me, when I went to the 21's, due to the smaller tire size, my speedo was off by about 3-4 MPH, which impacted my max speed in Driver+, so that was the reason I wanted mine switched over. You're going the opposite direction. With the Rivian historically being off by 2+ MPH anyway, with the latest update, your speedo is probably now more accurate than the rest of us. If you have an app (or use google maps), check your speed via GPS next time you're on the freeway at 70 MPH. You're probably within 1 MPH. Once you get it updated to reflect the larger tires, the speed will adjust by about 2-3 MPH in the opposite direction. So right now, you're probably going 1 MPH faster than the speed shows. With the correction, you'll likely reverse that and be going 1 MPH slower than what the speedo shows.

 

[State11]

NO, traction in control is like a living breathing thing. It reads real-time data and adjusts for the conditions at that millisecond of time based on the traction it has at that millisecond. No math. The truck/SUV recognizes a tire slipping and adjusts throttle, braking, etc, accordingly for how much traction loss it is detecting in that particular millisecond and attempts to gain as much traction as possible (little slippage as possible) for that instance. So no, telling the truck it has different wheels, won't make any difference.

Besides, wheel size isn't what determines your traction, it's tire tread. If you were put 20" snow tires on it, the truck's computers wouldn't know the difference versus having the same size tire but in a high-speed performance version. The difference would be, the traction control would be kicking in a lot more often on the performance tires than on the snow tires, in snowy conditions of course.

Hope that helps.

PS: With my truck, to get it updated, they had to upload it to the "cloud" and download it. The issue was with getting it to the "could", not so much with my truck accepting the update. They tried many times and said my truck should now show the new configuration, but it didn't. I'm guessing, when they had it at the service center, they just programmed it directly, rather than over the air. The over the air part is where they seem to have issues. There have been others that also had issues. For me, when I went to the 21's, due to the smaller tire size, my speedo was off by about 3-4 MPH, which impacted my max speed in Driver+, so that was the reason I wanted mine switched over. You're going the opposite direction. With the Rivian historically being off by 2+ MPH anyway, with the latest update, your speedo is probably now more accurate than the rest of us. If you have an app (or use google maps), check your speed via GPS next time you're on the freeway at 70 MPH. You're probably within 1 MPH. Once you get it updated to reflect the larger tires, the speed will adjust by about 2-3 MPH in the opposite direction. So right now, you're probably going 1 MPH faster than the speed shows. With the correction, you'll likely reverse that and be going 1 MPH slower than what the speedo shows.

Yeah, my speed seems to be dead on accurate now, which I prefer. Thanks for the info and advice.

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