Painting Calipers + Rear Brake Release

[cwcwcw]

I have my R1S with the wrap guy to do a bunch of stuff and after the second day with the car at the shop I get a call that says “so, in order to paint the calipers we unhooked the rear brake control briefly and even after hooking it back up the car won’t go back into park. It’s stuck in neutral.“ (see pic attached)

Bummer.

Rivian Mobile tech gets called out to the shop and after some time, explains that the electronic rear brake controls throw an error whenever they’re unplugged for a period of time, and the only way to avoid this is a tool that overrides the sensors and tells them that everything is a-okay. However, according to the mobile tech, they don’t sell that part to the public. Luckily, he was able to do something to fix the car and get it back to normal (SSOC told me later it was a 12V reset?).

At this point my options are:

1. Just go ahead and unplug the brake sensors, paint the calipers, hook it back up, and call the mobile tech out again. We’ve called SSOC and our local service center four times and no one will tell us if A) this voids the warranty B) this would even be possible to fix C) what the cost of the fix/reset might be
2. Buy this Electronic Brake Release Kit part, which no one at Rivian will confirm if it is the right tool. Hope it works and then sell it on eBay. I called the RivianServiceTools.com line and they’re glad to sell it to me but have no idea if it will serve my purpose or not.

Feeling a bit lost - does anyone have experience with this? Has no one else painted their calipers or taken their brakes off? This seems like a pretty normal modification.

Thanks!

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[Zoidz]

I have my R1S with the wrap guy to do a bunch of stuff and after the second day with the car at the shop I get a call that says “so, in order to paint the calipers we unhooked the rear brake control briefly and even after hooking it back up the car won’t go back into park. It’s stuck in neutral.“ (see pic attached)

Bummer.

Rivian Mobile tech gets called out to the shop and after some time, explains that the electronic rear brake controls throw an error whenever they’re unplugged for a period of time, and the only way to avoid this is a tool that overrides the sensors and tells them that everything is a-okay. However, according to the mobile tech, they don’t sell that part to the public. Luckily, he was able to do something to fix the car and get it back to normal (SSOC told me later it was a 12V reset?).

At this point my options are:

1. Just go ahead and unplug the brake sensors, paint the calipers, hook it back up, and call the mobile tech out again. We’ve called SSOC and our local service center four times and no one will tell us if A) this voids the warranty B) this would even be possible to fix C) what the cost of the fix/reset might be
2. Buy this Electronic Brake Release Kit part, which no one at Rivian will confirm if it is the right tool. Hope it works and then sell it on eBay. I called the RivianServiceTools.com line and they’re glad to sell it to me but have no idea if it will serve my purpose or not.

Feeling a bit lost - does anyone have experience with this? Has no one else painted their calipers or taken their brakes off? This seems like a pretty normal modification.

Thanks!

I think the vast majority of the community sees no need to paint their calipers, so experience is likely limited.

This is a bit of a concern. I know this is all based on anecdotal evidence and what a tech claimed. It's fine if it throws an error, but hey Rivian - what's the valid reason that a safety system (parking brake) does not attempt to continue to operate despite throwing the error? Ever hear of "fail safe" ? If my company programmed our manufacturing control systems this way, we would have been out of business long ago.

 

[cwcwcw]

This is a bit of a concern. I know this is all based on anecdotal evidence and what a tech claimed. It's fine if it throws an error, but hey Rivian - what's the valid reason that a safety system (parking brake) does not attempt to continue to operate despite throwing the error? Ever hear of "fail safe" ? If my company programmed our manufacturing control systems this way, we would have been out of business long ago.

Good point, it might be helpful for me to upload the video from the shop with the tech explaining things for more context. Also, this Reddit post explains that it can be temporarily disabled, but for only 15 minutes.

 

[Killer95Stang]

I kinda feel Rivian is doing the right thing... sort of. A lot of liability when a vehicle that weighs 7000 lbs loses it's only way to mechanically stop it. My only concern is not have a clear and cut method for a professional to reset or put it back into service. My neighbor who is an engineer at Rivian mentioned the tool required, but I thought that the tool was being used to disengage the parking brakes, while the vehicle is being towed or moved manually. If the brakes are applied in a parking situation and then the vehicle loses power completely, the tool is needed to disengage the brakes in order to pull it up a flatbed... from my understanding.

Although he is not associated with any design of the vehicle, his big concern is when DIY'ers start trying removing the hydraulic suspension system. The amount of pressure in the system is scary, in his words.

 

[cwcwcw]

I kinda feel Rivian is doing the right thing... sort of. A lot of liability when a vehicle that weighs 7000 lbs loses it's only way to mechanically stop it. My only concern is not have a clear and cut method for a professional to reset or put it back into service. My neighbor who is an engineer at Rivian mentioned the tool required, but I thought that the tool was being used to disengage the parking brakes, while the vehicle is being towed or moved manually.

That use case makes sense to me. Perhaps I misunderstood the video above, or maybe I linked to the wrong product (no one told me that’s the right product, I just stumbled across it while googling).

@ImperoMotorsport - you advertise painting calipers on your posts, have you done it with an R1 (I didn’t see any on the sample page you posted)? If so, any tips/help?

 

[LL75]

A member on Facebook forum did the samething as you did. Read the reply

 

[Oldsmobile_Mike]

1. Buy this Electronic Brake Release Kit part, which no one at Rivian will confirm if it is the right tool. Hope it works and then sell it on eBay. I called the RivianServiceTools.com line and they’re glad to sell it to me but have no idea if it will serve my purpose or not.

Thanks for that link. As a long-time DIY'er, I may be in need of some of that stuff. Although with a vehicle this sophisticated, I'm more inclined to let the professionals handle it. ?

Also (from your link), jfc:

 

[crashmtb]

I think the vast majority of the community sees no need to paint their calipers, so experience is likely limited.

This is a bit of a concern. I know this is all based on anecdotal evidence and what a tech claimed. It's fine if it throws an error, but hey Rivian - what's the valid reason that a safety system (parking brake) does not attempt to continue to operate despite throwing the error? Ever hear of "fail safe" ? If my company programmed our manufacturing control systems this way, we would have been out of business long ago.

I had the joyous experience recentoy Of dealing with a 2019 911 with a sulphated battery. (Get gas, car won’t start…) Electric parking brake will fail to ON. Great for safety I guess. Bad for moving the car.

 

[Zoidz]

I had the joyous experience recentoy Of dealing with a 2019 911 with a sulphated battery. (Get gas, car won’t start…) Electric parking brake will fail to ON. Great for safety I guess. Bad for moving the car.

At least with the 911 and ICE cars you generally have a transmission with a PARK position, or you can put it in first gear so it doesn't roll. With the Rivian failing in neutral as OP described, you have no postive "park" mechanism...... potentially dangerous.

 

[cwcwcw]

UPDATE: We finally got ahold of the local service center (who dialed in a regional service guy). They reported that if we go ahead and disconnect the sensors, paint the calipers, and then plug them back in then they would require:

1. We pay to tow the car to the local service center
2. He verbally quoted $800 to do a 12V reset, review the work, bleed the brakes, and make sure everything is working okay. For $800 of labor, I'd imagine that there's more than what he outlined, but I could be wrong - I'm certainly no mechanic, so it's hard for me to dispute.
3. The calipers would no longer be covered by the warranty

So, I guess it's a "go ahead and do it, but we aren't going to make it easy on you." It's times like this that I really am reminded of the over engineering that comes with an impressive car like this (especially in the hands of ex-McLaren engineers), and I think @usulio was spot-on when they said:

The ugly: Rivian is the Macbook Pro of cars, in all the worst ways as well as the best. The company aggressively erodes your right to repair and own your vehicle. You can only do things with your car that Rivian wants you to do.

 

[Dark-Fx]

vanity is a hell of a thing.

 

[sub]

Most of Rivian's response actually seems reasonable to me. Both the warranty part, and wanting to double-check the work that others performed before clearing the error code they caused. If they clear a brake error code without checking everything, and then you crash because the brakes failed you could quite reasonably sue them. The only thing that doesn't seem reasonable is there being no way for an independent shop to clear the error codes.

What if you just remove the 12V battery prior to starting the project and leave it unplugged until everything has been reassembled? Without power, the computer would have no way of knowing that the sensors had ever been disconnected.

Alternatively you might want to reach out to a Rivian-authorized body shop and see if they can help. It seems like they would have to have the ability to replace brakes that had been broken in a crash.

 

[SoCal Rob]

I had the joyous experience recentoy Of dealing with a 2019 911 with a sulphated battery. (Get gas, car won’t start…) Electric parking brake will fail to ON. Great for safety I guess. Bad for moving the car.

Our Land Rover had an EPB but there was a manual emergency release under an access cover in the center console: pull on a loop of steel cable really hard and the parking brake got released. I’m a fan of manual overrides for things which, if not working right, effectively disable a vehicle: entry to vehicle, access to refuel, parking brake, shift interlock, etc.

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