Happy with the Truck, But….

[Kuro-Rivian]

I wonder if the retainer is even on the half shaft, it shouldn’t just pop out, I mean the rear doesn’t turn left or right, if it was on the front, then I get it.

I'm sure it's on there. If it's a typical half shaft it's just a little clip. See pic, just a stock photo.

Conserve mode only disengages the motor, the shaft is gonna spin when tires a rolling since it's attached to the hub.

You might be able to drive in low suspension setting but don't. Just wait and get it fixed.

Ignore the hyperbole from some of the previous and/or future posts. Seems like outrage is a national sickness/sport these days. It sucks but in the big scheme of things it's a pretty easy fix and not that uncommon of an occurrence.

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[milliemc]

I had the exact same issue, and of course it decided to fail at the worst possible time after I had fully loaded the truck and was leaving my house for a weekend in the mountains. I made it about 20 yd out of my driveway and heard a clunk and shortly thereafter saw the turtle and the service suspension soon icon. I pulled back into my driveway and got under the truck to inspect where I heard the sound and found my half shaft to be completely disconnected from the hub. I took a quick video and sent it to the service advisor that I was already on the phone with. They were very helpful and immediately dispatched a flatbed to pick the truck up and bring it to the service center. Once it was there it took them about 20 minutes to fix it, they told me that the shaft has a retaining clip that has to be pushed in fully before it seats in the hub and apparently in production mine hadn't been pressed in all the way. Guessing that will be the same issue with your truck. I have about 1,500 mi on the truck since and have no issues whatsoever, so hopefully short of the inconvenience and obviously disappointing experience with your new vehicle, it should be an easy and permanent fix. Good luck.

SO for us that aren't so mechanically inclined and continued to drive the truck, what would happen ? Total loss of control?

Shouldn't this trigger a recall?

 

[electruck]

SO for us that aren't so mechanically inclined and continued to drive the truck, what would happen ? Total loss of control?

Shouldn't this trigger a recall?

No, this really isn't much of a safety issue. If the half-shaft fully disengages from the motor or hub, you will obviously lose power to that wheel (and it sounds like the truck detects this and drops into turtle mode) and there may be some collateral damage to the vehicle. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the suspension and would not cause any loss of control of the vehicle. Depending on whether we are talking front/rear axle or hub/motor end, the shaft is partially "caged in" by what appears to be the motor carrier/subframe or various suspension bits so it would flop around and make a lot of noise as it would continue to spin being connected to the wheel on the other end (when disconnected at the motor). This would be a significant attention grabber causing all but the most clueless to immediately stop driving the vehicle (assuming turtle mode hasn't already forced that). But again, nothing here that constitutes a safety issue.

 

[dp351]

No, this really isn't much of a safety issue. If the half-shaft fully disengages from the motor or hub, you will obviously lose power to that wheel (and it sounds like the truck detects this and drops into turtle mode) and there may be some collateral damage to the vehicle. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the suspension and would not cause any loss of control of the vehicle. Depending on whether we are talking front/rear axle or hub/motor end, the shaft is partially "caged in" by what appears to be the motor carrier/subframe or various suspension bits so it would flop around and make a lot of noise as it would continue to spin being connected to the wheel on the other end (when disconnected at the motor). This would be a significant attention grabber causing all but the most clueless to immediately stop driving the vehicle (assuming turtle mode hasn't already forced that). But again, nothing here that constitutes a safety issue.

Thank you for inserting some much needed rationality to this thread. I hope all of the hyperbolic “safety” alarmists read this and calm down a bit. Although it’s not acceptable to deliver a vehicle with this sort of problem, that doesn’t mean that there’s a deadly conspiracy going on and we need to call the government.

Not being critical of the OP because I’m glad they shared this, but the fact that this was their first & only post here illustrates the fact that the internet is really good at highlighting negative information & makes low percentage problems seem commonplace.

 

[Count Orlok]

Unreal poor quality control.

exactly. I mean, over time these are things that wear-out but for a new 80k truck this is just unacceptable and I'm surprised so many people are willing to give Rivian a pass.

 

[Jac]

The benefit, I suppose, of having to wait another year for delivery of my October 2021 R1S preorder is the opportunity to see how Rivian addresses these early product quality concerns. This particular case may be an isolated issue, but the numerous forum posts regarding CV half shaft “tocking” related service requests on R1 vehicles definitely have my attention.

 

[NY_Rob]

exactly. I mean, over time these are things that wear-out but for a new 80k truck this is just unacceptable and I'm surprised so many people are willing to give Rivian a pass.

Well, because it's no big deal to be suddenly locked in to turtle mode when you're doing 80mph in the middle lane of a divided 4 lane expressway. Or you're towing a boat, camper, whatever and it happens.. you know.. it's super easy to manuver with a load like that behind you and get over to the shoulder when you're doing 40mph and everyone around you is doing 60-80mph. Not a problem....

 

[cjones1130]

I just got off the phone with the support advisor, the soonest available is Dec 6, the

Dec 6th? That is ridiculous. Are they providing a loaner or have they already green lit a rental car? If the latter what $$ are they allowing?

 

[MooneyPilot]

Very interested in the above. I would 100% need a loaner or rental.

 

[the long way downunder]

I had the exact same issue, and of course it decided to fail at the worst possible time after I had fully loaded the truck and was leaving my house for a weekend in the mountains. I made it about 20 yd out of my driveway and heard a clunk and shortly thereafter saw the turtle and the service suspension soon icon. I pulled back into my driveway and got under the truck to inspect where I heard the sound and found my half shaft to be completely disconnected from the hub. I took a quick video and sent it to the service advisor that I was already on the phone with. They were very helpful and immediately dispatched a flatbed to pick the truck up and bring it to the service center. Once it was there it took them about 20 minutes to fix it, they told me that the shaft has a retaining clip that has to be pushed in fully before it seats in the hub and apparently in production mine hadn't been pressed in all the way. Guessing that will be the same issue with your truck. I have about 1,500 mi on the truck since and have no issues whatsoever, so hopefully short of the inconvenience and obviously disappointing experience with your new vehicle, it should be an easy and permanent fix. Good luck.

"the shaft has a retaining clip that has to be pushed in fully before it seats in the hub"

It appears both examples are low mileage vehicles with a factory production failure not picked up by QA or pre-delivery inspection. This is a "show stopper" level failure (could directly cause the vehicle to crash.)

I don't think it requires anything more than a no-holds-barred audit of QA – it doesn't seem to be a design flaw, component defect or engineering issue.

 

[the long way downunder]

@Milo great sleuthing my friend. Very glad you were able to catch this before you headed on a long road trip.

This is completely unacceptable. There is quality control for the kinds of things that aren't safety issues that I'm willing to let slide as long as they eventually get worked out, but your half shaft being that loose could have put you or your family in danger.

Imagine if you weren't a skilled mechanic and were a mere mortal like many of us. We may not have had the wherewithal to turn around and do that kind of inspection.

Please give Rivian hell for this one. If they aren't pushing in retaining clips all the way in the factory, then somebody needs to be trained to push retaining clips in before someone gets into an accident and Rivian ends up on the business end of a class action lawsuit.

I'm scheduled to take delivery at the factory in Normal then spend the next week taking scenic routes back to the east coast and I'm starting to second guess that plan...

If I was taking delivery at the factory (which I asked to do and was declined …) I think I'd bring tools, torque wrenches, jack, stand, and a crawler … pull the inspection panels and start a "nut and bolt" …

 

[kyunam]

I just don't understand why this is still happening in the production line AND still passes their QA/QC ..

 

[Milo]

Update : truck is getting towed to service center tomorrow. The Rivian support was going to send a mobile service, but decided to flatbed it. I think this incident is one off, I don’t think is a design flaw.

 

[MooneyPilot]

Update : truck is getting towed to service center tomorrow. The Rivian support was going to send a mobile service, but decided to flatbed it. I think this incident is one off, I don’t think is a design flaw.

Did you need, request, and/or get a loaner/rental?

Hope they get it all straightened out!

 

[SoCal Rob]

"the shaft has a retaining clip that has to be pushed in fully before it seats in the hub"

It appears both examples are low mileage vehicles with a factory production failure not picked up by QA or pre-delivery inspection. This is a "show stopper" level failure (could directly cause the vehicle to crash.)

I don't think it requires anything more than a no-holds-barred audit of QA – it doesn't seem to be a design flaw, component defect or engineering issue.

I’m not going to excuse a basic QC issue with the drive train, but I guess I don’t understand how this can cause the vehicle to crash. My understanding is that this failure essentially disconnects one wheel from its motor so the vehicle should be controllable if this happens at speed. The half shaft may be flopping around making a lot of noise but it shouldn’t be like a drive shaft front U-joint failure on a front engine RWD car which can result in a pole vault effect. It isn’t even like the issue where the suspension falls apart because the fasteners weren’t properly torqued.

I think a better understanding of the logic behind what triggers turtle mode and what happens after the vehicle enters turtle mode at high speed would help.

I’m guessing that when the vehicle senses a speed mismatch between a motor and the wheel it is powering it triggers the turtle warning and mode. I’m sure other conditions can trigger this, too.

Has anyone gotten the turtle mode at highway speed and, if so, does the vehicle gracefully slow down or does it slow/stop rapidly?

If it does the rapid slow/stop then I agree with @the long way downunder and this is a serious safety issue. If it displays something like “Drive unit failure: Power limited, pull over when safe!” and safely reduces the vehicle speed then this seems no riskier than running out of gas in an ICE car.

Does any of this match up with what people are seeing?

edit: missed a couple words

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